US finalizing plan to send tanks to Kyiv, officials say
Some of Zelenskyy’s top officials ousted amid graft scandal
WASHINGTON — In what would be a reversal, the Biden administration is poised to approve sending M1 Abrams tanks to Ukraine, U.S. officials said Tuesday, as international reluctance to send tanks to the battlefront against the Russians begins to erode.
The decision could be announced as soon as Wednesday, though it could take months or years for the tanks to be delivered. U.S. officials said details are still being worked out.
One official said the tanks would be bought under an upcoming Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative package, which provides longer-range funding for weapons and equipment to be purchased from commercial vendors.
The U.S. announcement is expected in coordination with an announcement by Germany that it will approve
Poland’s request to transfer German-made Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine, according to one official. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity.
Until now, the U.S. has resisted providing its own M1 Abrams tanks to Ukraine, citing extensive and complex maintenance and logistical challenges with the high-tech vehicles. Washington believes it would be more productive to send German Leopards since many allies have them and Ukrainian troops would need less training than on the more difficult Abrams.
As Kyiv appeared close to having one of its most persistent aid requests approved, Ukraine’s biggest government shake-up since the war came as several senior officials lost their jobs Tuesday in a corruption scandal plaguing President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s administration.
Zelenskyy was elected in 2019 on an anti-establishment and anti-corruption platform in a country long gripped by graft, and the new allegations come as Western allies are channeling billions of dollars to help
Kyiv fight against Moscow.
While Zelenskyy and his aides portray the resignations and firings as proof of their efforts to crack down, the scandal could play into Moscow’s political attacks on the leadership in Kyiv.
The shake-up even touched Zelenskyy’s office.
Its deputy head, Kyrylo Tymoshenko, prominent for his frequent battlefield updates, quit as Zelenskyy pledged to address allegations of graft — including some related to military spending — that could slow Ukraine’s efforts to join the European Union and NATO.
Tymoshenko asked to be relieved of his duties, according to an online decree signed by Zelenskyy and Tymoshenko’s own social media posts. Neither cited a reason for the resignation.
Deputy Defense Minister Viacheslav Shapovalov also resigned, local media reported, alleging his departure was linked to a scandal involving the purchase of food for Ukraine’s armed forces. Deputy Prosecutor General Oleksiy Symonenko also quit.
In all, four deputy ministers
and five governors of front-line provinces were set to leave their posts, the country’s Cabinet secretary said on the Telegram messaging app.
Authorities did not announce any criminal charges.
The departures thinned government ranks already diminished by the deaths of the interior minister, who oversaw Ukraine’s police and emergency services, and others in the ministry’s leadership in a helicopter crash last week.
On Sunday, a deputy minister at the infrastructure ministry, Vasyl Lozynsky, was fired for alleged
participation in a network embezzling budget funds. Ukraine’s anti-corruption agency detained him while he was receiving a $400,000 bribe for helping to fix contracts for restoring facilities battered by Russian attacks, said Infrastructure Minister Oleksandr Kubrakov.
In an address Sunday, Zelenskyy said Ukraine’s focus on the invasion would not stop his government from tackling corruption, pledging: “There will be no return to what used to be in the past.”
Entrenched corruption long has made foreign investors and governments
wary of doing business with Ukraine. Allegations by Ukraine’s journalists and nonprofits about corruption at high levels of government, in courts and in business have lingered under Zelenskyy, despite a proliferation of anti-corruption panels and measures, according to a U.S. State Department 2020 country report.
A corruption scandal could endanger billions of dollars the U.S. and its allies are pouring into Ukraine to keep fighters armed, civil servants paid and the lights on. It could also risk sinking what has been popular support for Ukraine from the United States.