Obama can veto a bill to help APU.
The upper house of the U.S. Congress on Tuesday passed a bill S. 2943, which determines the Pentagon’s budget for the 2017 fiscal year.
In the text of the document provides financial support for defense of Ukraine in the amount of up to $500 million.
“To assist and support described in paragraph (a) for the government of Ukraine can be used $250 million”, – stated in the document.
This indicates the possibility of additional use of $250 million under a separate decision of the Minister of defence in coordination with the head of the US State Department. To this end, representatives of the administration must convince Congress that Ukraine has made significant steps in structural reforms in the defense sphere, including on the fight against corruption and enhance accountability in government.
It is worth noting that the lower house of Congress passed a similar bill (H. R. 4909) budget for the Pentagon in mid-may. It military support for Ukraine is determined in the amount of only $150 million.
According to the procedure of both bills must pass the approval procedure where all of the items, including financing of operations abroad will be reduced to a single value. After that, the document submitted for signature to the President of the United States.
Meanwhile, the White house said that Barack Obama intends to veto the bill in its current form, since the budget is unable to provide the Armed forces of the United States sufficient funds necessary to achieve security. Earlier the administration said that the President insists on an additional appropriation to fight against the “Islamic state” and the continuation of other military operations abroad.
Overall, the draft budget of the Pentagon (the U.S. Senate) planned to allocate $500 billion for operations abroad. That’s $200 billion more than this year.
