In a letter to US President Barack Obama, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Robert Menendez urged him to strongly support Ukraine and Eastern European NATO allies.
Menendez who is in Kiev, encouraged Obama to significantly expand sanctions on the banking, energy and defense sectors of the Russian economy, and expressed his backing for providing weapons to Ukraine to defend themselves, as well as additional support and training for the Ukrainian military.
“Russia is now directing and waging a war in eastern Ukraine with Russian troops to further its illegitimate land grab of broad swaths of Ukrainian territory,” Menendez said. “The United States must work closely with our European allies in sending an unequivocal message to Moscow that we are unified in our commitment to assisting Ukraine and other allies in Eastern Europe to defend themselves.”
In a letter addressed to Obama, Menendez commended US decisions to increase its troop levels in Poland and said, “those actions have been extremely well received by our allies, as tangible measures of NATO resolve but will largely be undercut should the NATO-Russia Founding Act be reaffirmed at next week’s Summit.”
He expressed great concern about Russian President Vladimir Putin's action in Ukraine and urged the US to “pursue multilateral policies to appropriately respond to Russia's continued aggression, to increase Russia's economic isolation, and demonstrate NATO’s continued and equal commitment to the security of every member state.”
Tensions between Russia and the United States and EU member states escalated after Moscow opposed US and EU-backed protests in Ukraine which toppled president. Following that, Russia supported a referendum in eastern part of Ukraine leading to annexation of Crimea; this hightened tensions and US and EU imposed sanctions against Russian individuals and entities to pressure Moscow.
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