Cameron to try to rally US support for Ukraine aid
British Foreign Secretary David Cameron is set to meet Tuesday with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Washington as part of a trip to push U.S. officials to support a new aid for Ukraine. Cameron’s visit will also have him hold talks with congressional leaders, including House Speaker Mike Johnson, who has opposed moving forward with a security bill that features $60 billion in aid for Ukraine’s military. President Joe Biden has repeatedly urged Johnson and other Republican opponents to back the security bill, but Johnson has said the focus should instead be on domestic priorities such as security at the U.S.-Mexico border. ’Success for Ukraine and failure for Putin are vital for American and European security,’ Cameron said in a statement. ’The alternative would only encourage Putin in further attempts to re-draw European borders by force, and would be heard clearly in Beijing, Tehran and North Korea," Cameron said. Ukrainian officials have asked allies to provide more military help, particularly with systems to defend Ukrainian skies from Russia’s daily drone and missile attacks. Ukraine’s air force reported Tuesday that overnight attacks from Russia featured four guided missiles and 20 drones. Ukrainian air defenses shot down all 20 drones, with intercepts taking place over the Mykolaiv, Odesa, Kherson, Dnipropetrovsk, Poltava, Vinnytsia and Lviv regions, the air force said. Russia has also been defending against Ukrainian drone attacks. The Russian defense ministry reported Tuesday destroying two Ukrainian drones over the Belgorod region and two others over the Voronezh region. Russian forces shot down a Ukrainian missile off the Crimean coast, the ministry said. Some information for this report was provided by Reuters, The Associated Press and Agence France-Presse. The Voice of America provides news and information in more than 40 languages to an estimated weekly audience of over 326 million people. Stories with the VOA News byline are the work of multiple VOA journalists and may contain information from wire service reports. Subscribe
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