NATO to decide on more aid to Ukraine as membership talks stalled - FT
NATO foreign ministers will discuss in Brussels on Tuesday the doubling of commitments to the Ukraine comprehensive assistance package to €500 million per year, according to a Financial Times report, citing four diplomats.
The diplomats, who spoke to FT on condition of anonymity, said that renewed financial pledges were aimed at easing Ukraine's irritation at NATO reluctance to discuss specific timelines for Ukraine's membership.
The NATO ministers are also set to discuss how to expand work on increasing interoperability between Ukraine’s army and NATO forces, improving the standards of the country’s military, accelerating the transition from Soviet to modern NATO equipment, and deepening political ties between Kyiv and NATO, according to the report.
While Ukraine officially applied for NATO membership in September 2022, the Alliance has not taken any reciprocal steps.
"There’s this application letter on the table and we’re just ignoring it. Fine, membership might not be an option right now. But we can take concrete actions short of that or in support of that to show we believe in it long term," one of the diplomats told the Financial Times.
NATO's Comprehensive Assistance Package for Ukraine (CAP) was established in 2016 to enhance Ukraine's resilience and security. After Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine last February, it was used to deliver food, fuel, medicine and equipment to Ukraine. But now the planned spending exceeds the CAP budget, NATO officials say.
"We won’t be able to offer them membership anytime soon. But we can talk about closer relations between Nato and Ukraine. But we have a big funding gap for that … and we need to heavily invest in it," another NATO diplomat said to the Financial Times.
An expanded support package for Ukraine could be unveiled at the NATO summit in Vilnius in July, FT sources said. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine has told NATO leaders that he will only attend the summit if he is offered tangible benefits.
NATO’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, invited Mr Zelenskyy to the Alliance's summit in Vilnius back in March.