On 4 April 2024 the US government took a significant holding of war materiel seized from Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and transferred it to the Ukrainian armed forces to help them defend against the Russian invasion, US Central Command (CENTCOM) reported on 9 April.
The material included more than 5,000 AK-47 assault rifles, machine guns, sniper rifles, RPG-7 rocket-propelled grenade launchers and over 500,000 rounds of 7.62 mm ammunition: enough materiel to equip one Ukrainian brigade with small arms, CENTCOM noted.
The US government obtained ownership of the materiel on 1 December 2023 through the US Department of Justice’s civil forfeiture claims against the IRGC. The weapons and ammunition were originally seized by CENTCOM and partner naval forces from four separate transiting stateless vessels between 22 May 2021 and 15 February 2023. They were being transferred from the IRGC to the Houthi militia in Yemen in violation of UN Security Council Resolution 2216.
“US CENTCOM is committed to working with our allies and partners to counter the flow of Iranian lethal aid in the region by all lawful means, including US and UN sanctions and through interdictions,” the command stated. “Iran’s support for armed groups threatens international and regional security, our forces, diplomatic personnel, and citizens in the region, as well as those of our partners. We will continue to do whatever we can to shed light on and stop Iran’s destabilising activities.”
While Ukraine will welcome the US gifting of the confiscated materiel (although this is not the first time this has happened), a USD 95.3 billion (EUR 88.75 billion) US foreign aid bill that includes USD 60 billion for Ukraine is still hung up in the US Congress. The bill was passed by the US Senate in February 2024, but Make America Great Again Republicans have blocked it in the House of Representatives.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a CNN interview in February that his country’s forces would have to fall back, and would lose personnel, unless the US aid package could be secured.
