NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg began a series of talks in Washington on Monday January 29 focused on the continuation of American military aid to Ukraine in the face of Russia.
He was received in the morning by the head of the Pentagon, Lloyd Austin, before meeting in the afternoon with the head of diplomacy Antony Blinken, as well as national security adviser Jake Sullivan.
He is expected at Congress on Tuesday to meet Republican and Democratic officials who are negotiating an agreement on a new budget for Ukraine.
After delivering tens of billions of dollars in weapons to kyiv since the start of the war, Joe Biden's administration exhausted its funds at the end of 2023.
The president has asked Congress to approve some $61 billion more, but negotiations with Republicans have stalled.
Under pressure from the right, the new military aid package is being negotiated in parallel with measures relating to immigration, at a time when the number of migrants crossing the border with Mexico is reaching record levels.
“A good deal”
The agreement currently being negotiated in Congress
“is actually a good agreement, because by using a fraction of the American military budget, we managed to significantly damage, destroy, the Russian army
,” Jens said. Stoltenberg on Fox News Sunday, adding,
"so we have to keep going
. "
The other subject of discussion concerns Sweden's accession to NATO, while only one member of the Alliance, Hungary, remains to ratify this accession after the green light given by the Turkey last week.
In exchange for Turkish ratification, the American government approved Friday evening the sale of F-16 fighter jets to Turkey, for an amount of 23 billion dollars.
At the same time, Washington approved the sale to Greece of 40 F-35 planes for an amount of 8 billion dollars.
Both Athens and Ankara are members of NATO.