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Pentagon will send green-card holders to recruit training

Pentagon will send green-card holders to recruit training

US green-cardWashington : The Pentagon will begin sending a backlog of thousands of green-card holders to recruit training, suspending a policy adopted by President Donald Trump’s administration that required more-stringent background checks for some immigrants wanting to serve.

The policy called for green-card holders to submit to and complete a full background check and respond to any concerns before they could go to boot camp which was in addition to standard requirements for green-card applicants, such as biometrics screening, reports The Washington Post.

The change put thousands of people in limbo, as their screening languished and specific jobs within the military promised to them slipped away.

The new directive issued on Monday says that each armed service must comply immediately with a preliminary injunction issued last month in the District Court for the Northern District of California.

Air Force Lt. Col. Carla Gleason, a Pentagon spokeswoman, said the services will begin sending the recruits to training this week and will be placed in available slots.

About 18,000 US troops were green-card holders at the beginning of the Trump administration, and about 5,000 joined the military each year before the stricter policy, Pentagon officials have said.

The Marine Corps sent 1,044 green-card holders to recruit training in 2016 and 1,169 in 2017, but the number dropped to 808 in the most recent fiscal year ending in September, according to Pentagon data.

The Air Force sent 567 green-card holders to recruit training in 2016 and 590 in 2017. But that number dropped to 44 in the fiscal year ending in September. About 470 green-card holders are under contract and waiting to attend training.

The Army sent 4,600 green-card holders to recruit training in 2016, and 3,600 in 2017, according to data provided by the Pentagon. That number plummeted to 513 in 2018.

—IANS

Pentagon to give $200 mn military aid to Ukraine

Pentagon to give $200 mn military aid to Ukraine

Pentagon to give $200 mn military aid to UkraineWashington : In its latest gesture to counter Moscow’s influence in Ukraine, the Pentagon has announced $200 million in security assistance to the country.

The aid will fund additional training, equipment and advisory efforts to build the defensive capacity of Ukraine’s forces, Xinhua news agency quoted a statement by the Pentagon on Friday.

“This reaffirms the long-standing defence relationship between the US and Ukraine,” the statement noted, adding that US security assistance to Ukraine totalled more than $1 billion since 2014.

The statement came after the White House on Friday rejected a proposal from Russia to hold a referendum in eastern Ukraine on the fate of the region.

“To organise a so-called referendum in a part of Ukraine which is not under government control would have no legitimacy,” said White House National Security Council spokesman Garrett Marquis.

The US media on Thursday reported that Russian President Vladimir Putin had raised the possibility of a referendum in Ukraine during his meeting with US President Donald Trump on Monday in Finland.

Russian Ambassador to the US Anatoly Antonov on Friday confirmed that Putin had raised the topic with Trump and made “concrete proposals” on how to handle the conflict.

The conflict in eastern Ukraine started in 2014 between Ukrainian government forces and armed groups which declared independence from Kiev. Ukraine has long accused Russia of aiding the insurgents while Moscow has repeatedly dismissed the claims.

—IANS

Pentagon asks for major budget increase

Pentagon asks for major budget increase

Donald TrumpWashington : Citing increasing threats from China and Russia, the Pentagon has asked for a major boost in military spending for 2019, requesting Congress to approve a budget of $686 billion, one of the largest in the country’s history, the media reported.

Touting the proposal on Monday, President Donald Trump said the US military would be the strongest it has ever been, including “increasing arsenals of virtually every weapon”, reports CNN.

The $686 billion budget is an increase of $80 billion from 2017 the Pentagon has said that it was primarily aimed at countering Russia and China.

“Great power competition, not terrorism, has emerged as the central challenge to US security and prosperity,” Under Secretary Of Defence David L. Norquist told reporters Monday following the unveiling of the budget proposal.

“It is increasingly clear that China and Russia want to shape a world consistent with their authoritarian model-gaining veto authority over other nations’ economic, diplomatic, and security decisions,” the budget document said.

Beijing is “using predatory economics to intimidate its neighbours while militarizing features in the South China Sea”, according to the document.

China “seeks Indo-Pacific regional hegemony in the near-term”, but in the long term seeks to “achieve global pre-eminence” over the US, CNN quoted the document as saying.

“Russia has violated the borders of nearby nations and pursues veto power over the economic, diplomatic, and security decisions of its neighbours,” it added.

The proposal would add 25,900 service members to the military and further grow the force by 56,600 by 2023, allowing the Defence Department to fill in units, and recruit pilots, maintainers and cyber-security experts, according to Norquist.

Troops would also receive a 2.6 per cent pay raise during the 2019 calendar year, in what would be the largest salary increase since 2010.

—IANS