1y ago

Rishi Sunak visits Kyiv after announcing rise in UK military aid to Ukraine to £2.5bn

www.theguardian.com Rishi Sunak visits Kyiv after announcing rise in UK military aid to Ukraine to £2.5bn

Friday’s trip comes as PM stresses Britain’s continued backing for Kyiv before meeting with Volodymyr Zelenskiy

The UK prime minister, Rishi Sunak, is visiting Ukraine on Friday to meet his counterpart, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, as the UK announced it would provide further military aid to the country over the coming year.

The UK has been one of Kyiv’s staunchest supporters since Russia’s invasion and Sunak said Britain would boost its support in the next financial year to £2.5bn, an increase of £200m on the previous two years.

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Meanwhile Republicans holding aid hostage for petty domestic points.
- Election year over here. Sunak wants to look like a dynamic world leader, rather than a lily-livered frightened little rich boy.
  
  It’s election year here too. It’s just that one of our parties has decided any coppers with the other or compromise on literally anything or even just governing at all means the president gets re-elected and that they’d rather burn the world down than allow that to happen. Also they’re pro Putin
- And Democrats are damned if they do and damned if they don't because they know Europe will step up to the plate if America stops funding Ukraine out of sheer desperation. And Republicans want to harm our relations with the EU, so they're all for that.

This is the best summary I could come up with:
Sunak’s visit comes at a tense moment after UK and US launched air and missile strikes in Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen, aimed at halting attacks on ships in the Red Sea.
The crisis in the Middle East as Israel continues to bombard Gaza has also turned global attention away from the Russian president Vladimir Putin’s invasion of the country.
The UK and US, with support from allies Australia, Bahrain, Canada, and the Netherlands, hit at least 60 targets in 16 locations around Yemen overnight on Thursday.
Announcing his visit to Kyiv, Sunak said: “For two years, Ukraine has fought with great courage to repel a brutal Russian invasion.
They play a critical role.” British drone manufacturers would be able to test “innovative and competitive” designs in real conditions on the battlefield, he suggested.
“Today we are going further – increasing our military aid, delivering thousands of cutting-edge drones, and signing a historic new security agreement to provide Ukraine with the assurances it needs for the long term.”
The original article contains 637 words, the summary contains 167 words. Saved 74%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

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