US President Donald Trump has not provided any clarification as to who last week ordered the cessation of deliveries of some critical arms shipments to Ukraine. Questions about this change arose during the public part of Trump's dinner with leaders of five West African countries, UNN reports with reference to AP.
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On Monday, Trump announced that the US would continue to supply weapons to Ukraine in an attempt to repel increasingly intense aerial attacks from Russia, effectively reversing a pause that the White House and Pentagon had announced less than a week earlier.
"I will know if a decision is made. I will know," Trump told reporters on Wednesday, when asked who ordered the pause. "I will be the first to know. In fact, most likely, I would have given the order, but I haven't done it yet."
Trump also avoided questions about who ordered the pause during an exchange with reporters on Tuesday. "I don't know. Why don't you tell me?" the president said.
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But Trump privately expressed frustration that Pentagon officials announced the pause because, in his opinion, they did not properly coordinate their actions with the White House, three people familiar with the matter said, who were not authorized to comment publicly.
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Earlier, the White House confirmed that the US was stopping the supply of some types of weapons to Ukraine due to low levels of its own military stocks. This decision, as explained by the White House, is related to the US Department of Defense's review of military assistance to other countries.
US President Donald Trump promised Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy to investigate whether military aid to Kyiv had indeed been stopped.
Later, Trump stated that the United States of America would provide Ukraine with more weapons. According to him, Washington would send new weapons to Kyiv mostly for defense.