2022-03-03T20:07:00+02:00 Politics 2024-05-15T06:10:51+03:00

Ukrainian news

Kuleba To Discuss Closure Of Skies Over Ukraine And Supply Of Heavy Air Defense Weapons With NATO On March 4

Kuleba To Discuss Closure Of Skies Over Ukraine And Supply Of Heavy Air Defense Weapons With NATO On March 4

Foreign Affairs Minister Dmytro Kuleba will discuss the issue of closure of the skies over Ukraine and the supply of heavy weapons to strengthen the country's air defenses with the foreign affairs ministers of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) on March 4.

Kuleba announced this on the 1+1 television channel, the Ukrainian News Agency reports.

“There will be a meeting of NATO foreign ministers tomorrow. I will participate in it online, and this (the issue of closing the skies above Ukraine) will be the key topic of my communication with my fellow ministers. We have a broader issue: they are, in principle, air defense and missile defense of Ukraine. This is currently the most vulnerable area. Therefore, we need to talk not just about closing the skies, but also about systematic and very serious support from Ukraine’s air defense partners, i.e. about providing us with specific heavy air defense weapons,” Kuleba said.

According to the foreign minister, diplomats have already arranged the delivery of the American-made Stinger man-portable anti-aircraft missile systems to Ukraine. However, according to him, Ukraine needs a much powerful anti-aircraft weapon, and the Foreign Affairs Ministry is working on it.

Kuleba was unable to predict the outcome of the talks on Friday, but he stressed that Ukrainian diplomats have already done the impossible since the beginning of the war by ensuring the delivery of weapons to Ukraine within a short time.

Commenting on Ukraine's call for the West to impose a no-fly zone over Ukraine, the Office of the President of Ukraine’s head Andrii Yermak wrote in an op-ed for The New York Times newspaper, “We recognize that this would be a serious escalation in the war and that it could bring NATO into direct conflict with Russia. But we firmly believe that Russia won’t stop at just Ukraine, which would potentially drag NATO into this conflict anyway. A no-fly zone would at least give Mr. Putin some pause.”

As Ukrainian News Agency earlier reported, Ukraine has called on NATO member countries to close the skies over Ukraine because Russian missile attacks on Ukrainian cities are causing the most damage.

However, NATO countries are refraining from making such a decision because they believe it would mean drawing the alliance into a war with Russia.

On Thursday, the parliament requested that the United Nations and the international community impose a no-fly zone over Ukraine and establish humanitarian ("green") corridors for the evacuation of people in need.