Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Tuesday denounced the hesitations of NATO member countries meeting in Vilnius who are struggling to find a wording on Kiev’s future membership in the Alliance, and refuse to mention a timetable.
“It seems that there is no will either to give Ukraine an invitation to NATO, or to make it a member of the Alliance”, launched, in a very virulent tweet, Mr. Zelensky, who is to attend this two-day summit.
Deeming it “absurd” that his country did not have a timetable for membership, he felt that this encouraged Moscow to “continue its terror” in Ukraine.
“Indecision is a weakness,” he said.
The meeting of the 31 leaders of the countries of the Alliance is held some 35 km from the border with Belarus, an ally of Moscow, and not far from the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad.
“We are going to send a clear message, a positive message on the way forward”, promised the Secretary General of the Alliance, Jens Stoltenberg, referring to Ukraine’s future membership.
But the debate between the Allies thickens when it is necessary to formulate this promise of adhesion. kyiv “has its place” in the Alliance? kyiv must have “a path” to membership when “the conditions are met”?
For weeks, diplomats have been searching for the subtle formula that will satisfy everyone, including kyiv. The final press release is expected today.
The Baltic countries are the most eager. “There will be no security and stability in Europe if Ukraine’s future is not clearly defined. We owe Ukraine a clear path to NATO membership,” Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda said.
NATO will chart a “reform path” for Ukraine, so that the country can join the Atlantic Alliance, but without a “calendar”, said White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan.
The Kremlin, for its part, has already warned NATO of the “very negative” consequences for European security of Ukraine’s membership. “It is clearly an Alliance summit which has a strongly pronounced anti-Russian character,” criticized the spokesman for the Russian presidency, Dmitry Peskov.
G7 Joint Statement
While he has been very forthcoming with substantial military assistance to kyiv, US President Joe Biden has always been much more reserved about Ukraine’s promises of membership in the Alliance.
The tenant of the White House has mentioned, for the time being, an agreement similar to that between the United States and Israel: the Jewish state receives several billion dollars from Washington every year in military aid, which provides long-term visibility.
The G7 (France, United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Japan, Italy, Canada) will make a joint statement on “security commitments” for Ukraine, announced German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
Berlin will deliver almost 700 million euros worth of additional weapons to Ukraine, we learned from German government sources.
French President Emmanuel Macron announced the delivery of long-range “SCALP” missiles to Ukraine. This cruise missile, which is jointly developed by the United Kingdom and France, is launched from the air. It has a range of more than 250 kilometers, more than any other weapons supplied to kyiv by Western countries.
These promises come on top of the tens of billions of dollars of equipment already delivered to Ukraine since Russia invaded Ukraine just over 500 days ago.
The Vilnius summit is the first for Finland, which in April became the 31e countries to join the military alliance.
On the eve of this meeting, the Allies succeeded in preserving their unity by unblocking Turkey’s opposition to Sweden’s integration into NATO: President Recep Tayyip Erdogan finally agreed to lift his veto on this candidacy , after more than a year of obstruction.