RT.com
22 Jan 2023, 04:13 GMT+10
Berlin will eventually be pressured into signing over the vehicles, officials believe
Ukrainian Defense Minister Aleksey Reznikov stated on Friday that his nation's forces will begin training on German Leopard tanks in Poland, despite the fact that Berlin and its NATO allies have not yet reached an agreement on supplying the tanks.
Speaking to US state media, Reznikov said that in addition to Poland, "countries that already have Leopard tanks can begin training missions for our tank crews."
"We will start with that, and we will go from there," he continued. "I hope Germany will follow their process, conduct their internal consultations, and will arrive at the decision to transfer tanks. I am optimistic regarding this because the first step has been made."
Reznikov spoke following a meeting in Germany of the US-led 'Defense Contact Group' - a panel of nearly 50 countries that meet regularly to pledge new arms packages for Ukraine. While US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin used the occasion to pledge a fresh military aid package worth $2.5 billion to Kiev, Germany did not commit to supplying Leopard 2 battle tanks, or to allowing other European countries to export their own stocks of Leopard 2s to Ukraine.
Poland, however, has threatened to send fourteen Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine even without Germany's permission. Although Berlin's consent is a legal requirement, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki declared on Wednesday that "consent is a secondary issue," and that his government would "do the right thing on our own" if necessary.
Reznikov is not the only Ukrainian official expecting Germany to eventually approve delivery of the tanks. "Germany will do it anyway at a later date," Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba told German TV earlier this month. "We have already seen this with the self-propelled howitzers, with the IRIS-T anti-aircraft system and most recently with the Marder and Patriot systems."
Whether the tanks make it to Ukraine or not, Moscow has said it is unconcerned. "Those tanks can burn and they will burn like the rest [of the Western weapons]," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said earlier this week.
(RT.com)
Get a daily dose of Scandinavia Times news through our daily email, its complimentary and keeps you fully up to date with world and business news as well.
Publish news of your business, community or sports group, personnel appointments, major event and more by submitting a news release to Scandinavia Times.
More InformationPhoto credit: Ercin Erturk / Anadolu AgencyThe death toll from Monday's massive 7.8 magnitude earthquake in Turkey and Syria has ...
DUBLIN, Ireland: The Irish Navy has reported that it canceled 12 of 26 patrols scheduled for January, primarily due to ...
PARIS, France: Following an 18 month controversy that exposed the workings of the global jet market, Airbus and Qatar Airways ...
PRAGUE, Czech Republic: Ahead of her visit to Taipei, Marketa Pekarova Adamova, Speaker of the Czech Lower House, reiterated to ...
OSLO, Norway: Ending a three-year run of profits as stock and bond prices were hit by rising inflation and Russia's ...
Nearly a year in, the war in Ukraine has cost tens of thousands of lives and brought the world to ...
WASHINGTON, DC - The global community has extended aid to Turkey and Syria following the devastating earthquakes that hit the ...
WASHINGTON D.C.: US lawmakers have called on the Department of Energy to release documents detailing attempts by Russian hackers to ...
Photo credit: Ercin Erturk / Anadolu AgencyThe death toll from Monday's massive 7.8 magnitude earthquake in Turkey and Syria has ...
WASHINGTON D.C.: In a sign of future political battles over record numbers of illegal crossings under Democratic President Joe Biden, ...
MOSCOW, Russia: Russian state-run TASS news agency has reported that a US woman was detained and fined by a Russian ...
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - Former President General (retd) Pervez Musharraf died in a Dubai hospital on Sunday at the age of ...