The Ambassador briefed the Congressman on recent developments in the occupied territories of Ukraine’s Donbas and Crimea. Having stressed the importance of further U.S. assistance to Ukraine, in the security and defense areas in particular, in countering the Russian aggression, Valeriy Chaly asked Representative Womack, a member of the House Appropriations Committee, to support enhancing the assistance for Ukraine in the FY 2018 U.S. budget.

Ambassador Chaly and Congressman Womack, a new member of the House Democracy Partnership, also touched upon prospects for furthering the cooperation between the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine and the U.S. Congress. Among other things, they discussed the available possibilities for engaging the HDP mechanisms of inter-parliamentary dialog in the context of implementation of the memorandum on cooperation between the parliaments of our two states signed in July 2017.