Kremlin-New Aid For Ukraine Will Not Change Situation On The Front

Wires carrying comments from Kremlin spox Dmitri Peskov regarding the war in Ukraine and efforts in the US to pass a security funding supplemental. Peskov: "Due to its internal political disagreements, Washington is looking for different [routes] in order to continue to provide assistance to Ukraine. In any case, with any modes of providing this assistance, de facto, we are talking about provoking Ukraine into further hostilities until the last Ukrainian, ensuring guaranteed profits for the United States."

• Peskov: "This is not capable of in any way influencing the outcome of the development of the situation on the fronts. All specialists, and even semi-specialists, are now recording with the naked eye the situation at the front, which is far from favorable for the Ukrainian side, so nothing can change this,."
• Peskov's comments come as US House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) is set to hold a vote on the House floor on a USD95bn+ defence supplemental that includes USD60.8bn in funding for Ukraine. The vote, taking place on Saturday 20 April, has proved hugely divisive among Republican lawmakers, with the prospect of right-wing hardliners seeking to remove the speaker in response (for more detail see MNI's US Daily Brief).
• The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has warned that the situation around the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant is "dangerously close to an nuclear accident."Moscow and Kyiv blame one another for the three strikes on the NPP since 7 April (the first to hit the facility since Nov 2022).