Ukraine received Abrams tanks “soon” and Zelensky attacked Russia at United Nations summit

 US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said that Ukraine will soon obtain Abrams tanks from the United States, while Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky took advantage of his speech at the United Nations General Assembly to level several accusations against Russia.

“I am pleased to announce that the M-1 Abrams tanks that the United States has pledged to send will arrive in Ukraine soon,” Austin said - during a meeting in Germany on Tuesday - of the so-called Contact Group for the Defense of Ukraine.

The US Secretary of Defense stated that the Ukrainian counterattack “continues to make steady progress,” and that Ukrainian forces are penetrating “heavily fortified lines of the Russian aggression army.”

At the same time, a senior US military official said that the first batch of Abrams tanks will be sent in the coming days, and the process will be completed within weeks.

Washington promised early this year to provide Kyiv with 31 tanks as part of the $43 billion in aid that the United States has pledged to provide since the start of the Russian war in Ukraine in February 2022.

The tanks will be sent with 120 mm depleted uranium ammunition, which is used to penetrate armored vehicles and armor. These munitions raise controversy because of their association with cancer and birth defects.

On the other hand, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky made several accusations against Russia during his speech at the United Nations General Assembly in New York on Tuesday.

Zelensky said that Russia was committing "genocide" by forcibly deporting Ukrainian children to areas under its control.

He also accused Russia of using energy and food as a weapon to pressure the world, and said, "The aggressor uses many other things as weapons, and these things are not used exclusively against our country, but also your countries."

Zelensky believed that Russia could not be trusted with nuclear weapons, and said that "terrorists do not have the right to possess a nuclear weapon."

The Ukrainian president - who is attending General Assembly meetings for the first time since the war - renewed his call for holding a "global peace summit" that his country is preparing.

On the ground, the Ukrainian authorities announced that 9 people were killed in attacks carried out by Russia on Tuesday.

6 of these deaths occurred in the city of Kubyansk (eastern Ukraine), as a result of an attack using a “guided aerial bomb,” according to what the governor of Kharkiv Province announced.

Two people were killed, including a policeman, in a bombing in Kherson (southern Ukraine), and one person was killed in Lviv (west of the country).

The attacks on Lviv - which is located far from the combat lines - led to the ignition of industrial warehouses in the city and the burning of about 300 tons of relief supplies that were stored in one of these warehouses.

Ukraine previously announced the downing of 27 drones launched on Monday night in the latest large-scale Russian air attack.

Meanwhile, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that Ukraine urgently needs to acquire air defenses, including ammunition, spare parts, and maintenance.

Stoltenberg added that the ongoing conflict in Ukraine is a "war of attrition," but it is not in a state of stagnation given the gains achieved by Kyiv in its counterattack, he said.

Since last June, Ukraine has been launching a counterattack to regain areas controlled by Russian forces, but it is facing difficulties.

Source: Agencies