US prevents Ukrainian pilots from training on F-16s

The New York Times reported the information, citing a senior Ukrainian official.

The US is preventing Ukrainian pilots from training on F-16s owned by European countries. Washington's unwillingness to allow pilot training severely limits the proposed new European coalition to help Ukraine obtain F-16s.

"What’s really important here is to signal to Russia that we as nations have no philosophical or principled objection to supplying Ukraine capabilities that it needs, depending on what is going on in the battlefield," said British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace.

A senior US official told the NYT that the Joe Biden administration is still reluctant to send Ukraine its own F-16s, in part because the multimillion-dollar price tag would eat up too much of the war's already dwindling funding pool.

Instead, the US official said, the administration is more concerned with speeding up the delivery of other US weapons to Ukraine in time for a planned counteroffensive.

• Ukraine wants 40 to 50 F-16s in total, forming 3 or 4 squadrons to protect its skies from Russian bombing. 

• Dutch Foreign Minister Wopke Hoekstra says there has been no progress in international talks on a possible transfer of F-16s to Ukraine.