By Steven Erlanger and Michael R. Gordon, New York Times
KIEV, Ukraine — The European Union added a significant financial underpinning to the struggling Ukraine government on Wednesday in the midst of the East-West crisis with Russia over Ukraine’s future, offering aid worth as much as $15 billion over the next two years.
Ukrainian troops watied during talks on Tuseday with Russian forces at the military airport in Belbek, a village in the Crimea region. The Ukrainian forces wanted to return to their posts. Photo by Sergey Ponomarev for The New York Times.
The offer comes on top of the $1 billion in American loan guarantees to ease Ukraine’s economic transition, announced here on Tuesday by Secretary of State John Kerry during a visit aimed at reassuring the interim Ukraine authorities and challenging Russia, which escalated the crisis last weekend by seizing control of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula.
Mr. Kerry met on Wednesday in Paris with his Russian counterpart, Sergey V. Lavrov, as part of an attempt to arrange the first face-to-face talks between representatives of the Russian and interim Ukraine governments since the crisis boiled over. The Russians have refused to recognize the interim Ukraine government’s legitimacy.
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