Germany announces €500 million military aid package for Ukraine — RT World News
German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said Berlin would raid its own stockpiles and buy ammunition from foreign suppliers to continue the fight in Kiev.
German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius announced on Tuesday that Germany will supply Ukraine with weapons and ammunition worth 500 million euros ($543 million). Despite shortages of manpower and ammunition at home, Berlin has pledged to spend 7 billion euros on military aid to Kiev this year.
“We have once again put together an aid package worth nearly half a billion euros,” he added. Pistorius told reporters at a meeting of the so-called Ukraine Defense Contact Group at Ramstein Air Base on Tuesday.
The package will include 10,000 artillery shells from the German Army's inventory, with deliveries to begin “Immediately,” Pistorius said. The minister added that 100 infantry vehicles and 100 non-armored vehicles will also be sent.
Pistorius announced that Germany will also buy 180,000 shells from non-EU suppliers as part of a larger initiative led by the Czech Republic, and another 100,000 directly from defense contractors.
Germany is the second largest Western supporter of Ukraine, after only the United States. So far, Berlin has given Kiev 22 billion euros ($23.7 billion) in aid, including 17.7 billion euros in military aid, according to figures compiled by the Kiel Institute for the World Economy. Chancellor Olaf Scholz said last February that when aid transferred through the European Union is included, Germany would have delivered a total of 28 billion euros to Ukraine.
Schulz and Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky signed the agreement “long-term” Last month's security agreement, under which the German Chancellor pledged to give Ukraine an additional 7 billion euros in military aid this year, and to continue arming Kiev over the next decade.
However, this spending harmed Germany's military preparedness. parliamentary a report The report published last week identified shortages of ammunition, spare parts, tanks, ships and aircraft, as well as an aging and shrinking workforce.
While these issues predated the conflict in Ukraine, the report found that they now do so “greatest” Since then, Schulz began withdrawing weapons and equipment from German stocks to send to Kiev. Although Schulz announced a rearmament program worth 100 billion euros in 2022, German soldiers Tell They still lacked sufficient ammunition for training exercises, lived in substandard barracks, and were unable to fire the German army's newest howitzers, all of which were sent to Ukraine, the New York Times reported last year.
You can share this story on social media:
Source link
