US House of Representatives plans $61 billion to help Ukraine

The texts which plan to release funds for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan will be put to a vote on Saturday, after repeated pressure from American President Joe Biden.

The Republicans of the American House of Representatives unveiled, Wednesday April 17, a package of 61 billion dollars to help Ukraine. Two separate bills also provide more than $26 billion for Israel and several billion dollars for Taiwan. Entangled in partisan disputes, Congress has been struggling for months over the adoption of funds for kyiv, at war with Russia since February 2022.

A highly anticipated vote beyond the borders of the United States. Finally, the elected representatives of the American House of Representatives will vote on Saturday on four texts which release funds, the Republican leader of the institution, Mike Johnson, said on Wednesday. “We expect the final vote on these bills to take place on Saturday evening”he wrote in a letter to elected officials, consulted by AFP. “This is a very important message that we are going to send to the world this week”, declared a little later, Mike Johnson, who has long blocked the sending of funds to Ukraine. If it is adopted by the Republican-majority House, the batch of texts will then be studied by the Democratic-majority Senate, before possibly arriving on Joe Biden’s desk for promulgation.

“A pivotal moment”

Bedroom “must adopt urgently” the proposed laws on new aid to Ukraine and Israel and on humanitarian aid for Gaza, for his part urged Joe Biden, in an article published Wednesday morning by the Wall Street Journal. “If both countries are fully capable of defending their own sovereignty, they depend on American aid to do so, including in arms. And we are at a pivotal moment”, writes the Democratic president. Wednesday evening, Joe Biden, in reaction to the aid amounts revealed, said he “very supportive” to the envelopes revealed by the Republicans in Congress.

Ukraine is desperately short of ammunition in its war against Russia and American funds are exhausted. “Ukraine needs immediate measures to strengthen its air defense”, pleaded Volodymyr Zelensky on X with the head of NATO, after the strike which left several dead in Chernihiv on Wednesday. In February, a package of $60 billion in military and economic assistance for Ukraine was adopted in the Senate. But Republicans in the House of Representatives refused to consider the text, due, among other things, to a dispute over the issue of immigration.