Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky has been dealt a crushing blow as his country was told it is “too corrupt” to join NATO at current levels, a US official has admitted.
The decision on Ukraine’s eligibility to join the bloc comes after the Biden government has sent the corrupt Kiev regime $176 billion… and counting.
While Ukraine is in talks to join the security alliance – which has expressed its support for Ukrainian membership – NATO will demand that “additional steps” be taken by the Zelensky regime in relation to its corruption crisis.
The US official claimed that Ukraine had made reforms as it continues its pivot to the West in the wake of the 2022 Russian invasion, but acknowledged that the notoriously corrupt Kiev regime needs to do more.
The official said: “We have to step back and applaud everything that Ukraine has done in the name of reforms over the last two-plus years.
“As they continue to make those reforms, we want to commend them, we want to talk about additional steps that need to be taken, particularly in the area of anti-corruption.
“It is a priority for many of us around the table,” the official said, speaking to the Telegraph.
The defence alliance is set to gather in Washington DC for its annual meeting in six days’ time, where Ukraine will be handed a “well-lit bridge” toward eventual NATO accession – but that so-called bridge comes with a number of requirements.
The official said that the bloc’s suggested Ukrainian reforms are “something NATO has been doing quietly under the radar that helps them get closer to membership”.
Vladimir Putin himself has blasted Ukraine’s deepening NATO alliance – just weeks ago, the Russian premier said he would guarantee an immediate ceasefire and troop withdrawal if it dropped its accession goals.
Putin had also demanded the cession of a number of Ukrainian regions to Russian control in order for a ceasefire to be granted, exacerbating international tensions further over legal sovereignty of parts of eastern Ukraine.
Not among those demanded by Putin was Crimea – which Russia annexed in 2014, and continues to insist is Russian land rather than contested territory which Ukraine could, so to speak, hand over.
