Rubio calls claims that US intelligence restrictions are costing Ukrainian lives ‘outrageous’

Speaking to reporters in India on October 20, Rubio responded to reports that Washington had curtailed intelligence sharing with Kyiv and blocked some weapons deliveries through the NATO-led Prioritized Ukraine Requirements List (PURL) initiative.

“I saw somebody associated with the Ukrainian government say that people in Ukraine are dying because the US is denying them information. That's scandalous. That's outrageous. That's just simply not true. That's not accurate,” Rubio said, according to Sky News.

He insisted that US Defense Department policy toward Ukraine had not changed.

“Everything they [Department of Defence] has been doing with Ukraine remains the same. That has not changed. Nothing has changed,” Rubio said.

The secretary of state denied that Washington had issued any “deliberate political directive to go out and harm Ukraine.”

“There's nothing being deliberately denied to Ukraine. It's simply about a balance between our obligations to other partners and, frankly, our own standards and requirements for our own facilities as well,” he added.

Rubio's remarks follow reports that the United States failed to provide Ukraine with advance warning of a Russian ballistic missile strike.

Asked previously about that incident, Rubio said he did not know precisely what had happened that night but later acknowledged a software problem in the US early-warning system.

His latest comments did not provide details about the current volume or timing of intelligence shared with Ukraine.