Ukraine Governor: US to Pay Employee Salaries, Train Police

Georgia’s former President Mikhail Saakashvili said on Facebook the United States would financially back his team and send police to train officers.

Ukraine’s governor of the Odessa region, Mikhail Saakashvili, wrote that the U.S. government would allocate money for the salaries of his new team on his Facebook page Monday.

The former Georgian president also added that the California police will train his region’s officers. “Within the framework of Odessa’s anti-corruption pressure, the U.S. government agreed to provide funds for the salaries of the new team of [Mikhail] Saakashvili,” Saakashvili posted on his Facebook page after the meeting with the U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt.

Saakashvili has been accused of war crimes and criminal charges in his native Georgia. His appointment as governor of the Odessa region was viewed by many as a provocation toward Russia.

U.S. Ambassador Pyatt has been largely supportive of Saakashvili. Russia Today reported that earlier in July Pyatt said that the U.S. administration “fully supports Mikheil Saakashvili and his team, and we will do everything so that they can succeed.”

Saakashvili’s announcement is the latest U.S. involvement in Ukraine. In April, U.S. brigades based in Vicenza, Italy, trained Ukrainian government troops. Pyatt recently posted on Twitter several pictures and videos of U.S. paratroopers training the Ukrainian forces.

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