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Biden signs defense budget with $300 million for Ukraine and no sanctions against Nord Stream 2

US President Joe Biden signed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for 2022 in the amount of $770 billion. The document was preliminary approved by the House of Representatives and the Senate.

According to Reuters, the NDAA includes a 2.7% increase in salaries for military personnel, more funds for purchasing aircraft and ships, and additional funds for a strategy to combat geopolitical threats (especially with the Russian Federation and China).

The document provides $300 million for the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative, $ 4billion for the European Defense Program and $150 million for security cooperation with the Baltic states.

The defense budget does not contain sanctions against Nord Stream 2 and restrictive measures concerning Russian officials and the Russian national debt. More attention in the NDAA-2022 is paid to countering the PRC than Russia.

Context. Recall: in September, the US House of Representatives approved the defense budget for 2022 with amendments concerning new sanctions against the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, the sovereign debt of Russia, and a number of Russian representatives. The main accusations of the Russians were interpreted as "violation of human rights." The list includes: the head of the Russian Federation government Mikhail Mishustin, the head of the electoral commission Ella Pamfilova, the Presidential Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov, the mayor of Moscow Sergey Sobyanin, and the editor-in-chief of the TV channel Russia Today Margarita Simonyan.

The fact that the referred restrictive measures had been not included in the final version of the bill became known on the same day, when an online summit was held between Putin and Biden, the Presidents of Russia and the United States.

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