The shortage of ammunition on the front and the US blockade of aid to Ukraine drive kyiv to look for new partners. The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky, has taken advantage of the Ukraine-Southeast Europe summit, which is being held until this Thursday in Tirana (Albania), to propose to the Balkan countries that they help him fight the Kremlin through the joint production of weapons. .
The risk that the political situation of each ally – as is the case in the United States, where Congress blocks the aid package of 60.06 billion dollars (about 55.5 billion euros) promoted by the president, Joe Biden – could affect supplies Kiev has encouraged the Ukrainian Government to seek cooperation systems with third countries that allow it to strengthen its arms industry and promote self-production, reducing its dependence on foreign countries. Strengthening its own industry with the help of allies would at the same time allow it to better address global problems, such as the current depletion of ammunition reserves, while the war lasts.
In the new formula, designed together with the United States and the United Kingdom, Ukraine stops being a simple beneficiary of donations and aid and becomes a partner. The military industries of each country would reach agreements with Ukrainian companies to jointly produce weapons and ammunition in their country while Ukraine would share with those companies and the governments of their countries the technology and experience that it has accumulated over the two years that A war has already lasted, which is also expected to be long. Having a conflict underway would allow foreign industries that join the plan to immediately test their innovations on the ground.
That same method of co-production and collaboration was what Zelensky offered this Wednesday to the executives of Albania, Bulgaria, Serbia, North Macedonia, Kosovo, Bosnia, Montenegro, Croatia, Moldova and Romania. “We are interested in co-production [de armas] with you and your partners, the Ukrainian president said in his speech at the forum. “In Ukraine we have about 500 defense companies and each of them gives us strength, but this is not enough to win [Vladímir] Putin.” “We are having problems with the supply of ammunition, which affects the situation on the battlefield,” Zelensky said.
Restrictions on access to projectiles, especially artillery, have led the Ukrainian army in recent weeks to lose ground to Russia on the Donetsk front (east). Since the Ukrainian withdrawal from Adviivka, just six kilometers from the capital of that region on February 17, the Kremlin has made several subsequent small advances in that same area. It also hits hard in the south, where it attacks the little ground recovered by Kiev during last summer’s failed counteroffensive in the Robotine area, and lays siege to the right bank of the Dnieper River in the region with rockets, drones, artillery and some boat assaults. of Kherson.
However, not all the countries to which Zelensky now proposes this formula of military-industrial cooperation have the same position regarding the conflict that ravages their country. While Albania, Bulgaria, North Macedonia, Montenegro, Croatia and Romania are members of NATO and have supported economic sanctions against Russia for the invasion and sent weapons to Ukraine, among the countries invited to the summit is Serbia, a traditional ally of Moscow. There has also been Kosovo, which neither Belgrade nor kyiv recognizes as a State. Pristina, however, defends Ukraine against Russia and, like kyiv, aspires to be a member of the Alliance. The military industry has a large presence in the Balkans, especially in Serbia and Croatia, former members of the former Yugoslavia.
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