U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland implied in revised testimony to House Democrats that a potential meeting between President Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky, as well as the release of military aid to the country, was contingent on the announcement of an anti-corruption probe into Burisma Holdings.
The testimony, updated over the past month and released on Tuesday, is part of an impeachment investigation against President Trump by House Democrats, who suspect Trump of pressuring Ukraine to investigate his political rivals by withholding aid to the country.
“I said that resumption of the U.S. aid would likely not occur until Ukraine provided the public anticorruption statement that we had been discussing for many weeks,” Sondland said in his revised testimony. he said that he relayed the message to Andriy Yermak, a top adviser to Zelensky, on September 1 while Zelensky was meeting with Vice President Mike Pence in Warsaw.
Sondland also testified that the military aid was contingent on the opening of an investigation into allegations of interference in the 2016 election by Ukrainian hackers.
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