By Gram Slattery
SAMARKAND, Oct 19 (Reuters) – Secretary of State Marco Rubio denied on Monday that the United States had paused some intelligence sharing with Ukraine, contradicting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy who said Washington had briefly done just that.
Speaking to NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday, Zelenskiy had said intelligence sharing had been interrupted, but later “de-blocked.”
“We are very thankful for this,” he said. “Now it works.”
But Rubio, speaking to reporters during a visit to Uzbekistan on Monday morning, said intelligence was in fact never interrupted in the first place.
“I don’t know where he’s getting these things or why he’s saying these things to the press. You should go back and ask him. There’s been no pause,” Rubio told reporters after touring Registan Square, a historic complex of madrassas in Samarkand.
“What he should be focused on, and what we want to be focused on, is bringing an end to this war. That’s what he should be focused on,” Rubio said of Zelenskiy.
It was the latest twist in a confusing several days during which Washington and Kyiv have contradicted each other on more than one occasion and relations between the countries have deteriorated sharply.
Zelenskiy has also said he believes the US government was behind recent limits on Ukraine’s ability to use the Starshield system, designed by SpaceX, which is crucial to defending against Russian drones and missiles. US officials have denied those assertions as well.
Ukraine has relied on US intelligence to spot the fast-moving ballistic missiles that Russia has fired in waves at its cities.
President Donald Trump had said earlier this week that Washington was still sharing intelligence, although Ukrainian officials said some Russian strikes had occurred without warning, raising questions about whether the intelligence was in fact flowing as normal.
(Reporting by Gram Slattery; Editing by Christian Schmollinger)
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