Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Saturday that Germany has agreed to send the Patriot air defence system to Ukraine, refusal to provide Kyiv with Taurus cruise missiles remains intact, POLITICO reported.
Germany agreed to send Patroit air defence systems to Ukraine after a phone call between Olaf Scholz and Volodymyr Zelensky on Saturday in which the Ukrainian leader described Russian airstrikes on civilian energy infrastructure. German Chancellor stressed that Germany stands “unwaveringly by Ukraine’s side.”
For his part, Zelensky thanked the German chancellor for agreeing to supply Ukraine with an additional Patriot air defence system, as well as surface-to-air missile systems for existing systems. He said:
This is a genuine show of support for Ukraine at a critical moment. I urge all other partner country leaders to follow suit.
Ukraine has pleaded with its Western allies for more military supplies, including additional batteries of Patriot missiles. Western support has waned in recent months, and a major US aid package has been delayed due to partisan differences in the US Congress.
Despite Germany’s agreement to transfer the Patriot systems, Berlin still refuses to provide Kyiv with Taurus cruise missiles. Earlier this week, Zelensky criticised this attitude towards the supplies as Ukraine needs the German-made Taurus missiles, which have a range of about 500 kilometres and carry a powerful warhead to hit targets behind the front line, such as the Kerch bridge linking Russia and Crimea.
Scholz has flatly refused to send German missiles to Ukraine, arguing it could even draw Germany into direct conflict with Russia.
Western military aid to Ukraine is slowing, leading Ukrainian army commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrskyi on Saturday to call on allies to provide faster support to counter Moscow’s superior weaponry, as the situation on the eastern front for Ukraine “deteriorated significantly in recent days.”
