President Donald Trump on Thursday night revealed a new NATO deal reached during last month’s summit that would allow U.S. arms to flow to Ukraine through allied nations — an agreement reached at last month’s summit.
“We’re sending weapons to NATO, and NATO is paying for those weapons, 100%,” Trump said in a phone interview with NBC News. “So what we’re doing is the weapons that are going out are going to NATO, and then NATO is going to be giving those weapons [to Ukraine], and NATO is paying for those weapons.
“We send weapons to NATO, and NATO is going to reimburse the full cost of those weapons,” he added.
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Trump did not detail which weapons were included in the sales or which countries were involved in the deal — though his comments come as European leaders signal they were prepared to purchase U.S. arms for Ukraine.
Earlier this month, after the Pentagon issued a pause on some previously pledged defensive aid slated for Kyiv, reports surfaced suggesting that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had begun looking for new ways to acquire the arms his nation desperately needed.
On Thursday, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz also told the Ukraine Recovery Conference in Rome that Berlin is “prepared to purchase additional Patriot systems from the U.S. to make them available to Ukraine.”
Trump told reporters this week that he did not approve the Pentagon’s aid halt, which apparently had been done over stockpile concerns, and defensive arms have reportedly resumed transfer to Ukraine.
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Trump has increasingly voiced his frustration with Russian President Vladimir Putin and his refusal to end his war in Ukraine as Russia’s assault continues to escalate in intensity and frequency, including in a series of overnight strikes that killed nine and injured 42 others across Ukraine and hit a maternity hospital.
“Women in labor with children, women after surgery. Fortunately, there were no children among the victims. Russia targets life. Even where it is just beginning,” Zelenskyy said.
No one is believed to have been killed in the maternity hospital strike.
Trump, who told NBC News that he plans to make a “major statement” on Russia come Monday, was asked on Friday about the strike that targeted the maternity hospital, to which he said simply, “You’ll be seeing things happening.”
Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters on Thursday from the sidelines of an international conference in Malaysia that, following a meeting with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov, he would be presenting Trump with a “new and different” approach to ending the war.
Rubio did not expand on what this new approach entailed.
The secretary was seen approaching Lavrov again on Friday, but when asked about it by reporters, he offered no details and said it was regarding an “unrelated” matter.
