Donald Trump’s abrupt shutdown of USAid has cut off staff working near the front lines in Ukraine from their official communications systems, posing a “major security concern”.

The president ordered a 90-day freeze on all foreign aid shortly after his inauguration, and Elon Musk has since led an operation apparently aimed at shutting down the world’s largest and most powerful aid agency.

Musk, the head of the department of government efficiency (Doge), branded USAid a “viper’s nest of radical-Left Marxists who hate America”, while his team forced their way into the Washington DC office and accessed classified databases.

With staff told to stay out of the office, hundreds locked out of their email systems, and blockages in the payment system for foreign partners, the 64-year-old agency was in its death throes, serving USAid officials told The Telegraph.

Among the most sensitive programmes impacted are several inside Ukraine.

USAid field teams have been involved in the rescue of 60 vulnerable people per day from the embattled city of Pokrovsk in the Donetsk region, according to an internal USAid document whose contents were reviewed by The Telegraph.

There are concerns that pausing the agency’s bureau for conflict prevention and stabilisation will also halt the delivery of 500,000 litres of fuel and 1,000 generators, as well as “timely repairs to key infrastructure”.