EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has spoken out in favor of Ukraine joining the EU. Asked on Sunday by a Euronews reporter about the country’s inclusion in the community, she said: “Over time, they do indeed belong to us. They are one of us and we want them in.” She also emphasized that there are already several areas of cooperation.
According to his own statements, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyi called the President of the European Commission shortly after von der Leyen’s announcement. “We talked about concrete decisions to strengthen Ukraine’s defense capacities, about macro-financial aid and Ukraine’s membership in the EU,” Zelenskyy tweeted on Monday night.
Selenskyj had pushed for a decision on Saturday. “It is a crucial moment to end once and for all the long-standing discussion and decide on Ukraine’s membership of the EU,” he wrote on Twitter. Ukraine has been working towards joining the Alliance for some time. This goal has also been enshrined in the constitution since 2019.
Before von der Leyen’s statements on Ukraine’s possible EU membership, it had become known that the EU was providing half a billion euros for the supply of weapons and equipment to the Ukrainian armed forces. The permanent representatives of the 27 member states agreed on this in Brussels on Sunday evening, as several diplomats from the German Press Agency confirmed. In addition, according to the information, an agreement was reached on sanctions against Russian oligarchs.
Of the 500 million euros, 450 million are to be made available for arms supplies and 50 million for other equipment. According to the plans, the money will come from the so-called European Peace Facility. It is a new EU financing instrument that can also be used to strengthen the capabilities of armed forces in partner countries. For the period from 2021 to 2027, the peace facility is endowed with around five billion euros.
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According to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, it is the first time that the European Union has financed the purchase and delivery of weapons and other equipment to a country that is under attack.
The main purpose of the sanctions against the oligarchs is to freeze their assets in the EU. Names were not initially mentioned. A final agreement on new sanctions against the Russian central bank was expected late Sunday evening.
More on the Russian attack on Ukraine:
As a further sanction, the EU foreign ministers decided on Sunday evening that the airspace over the EU states would be completely closed to Russian planes. This was announced by EU chief diplomat Josep Borrell in Brussels. Von der Leyen had previously announced the move. She stressed that the airspace would be closed to all Russian planes, including oligarchs’ private jets.
In the past few days, individual countries – including Germany – had already closed their airspace to Russian aircraft or announced this. Federal Transport Minister Volker Wissing, for example, announced on Sunday night that he was in favor of a corresponding closure of German airspace and had ordered everything to be prepared for it. The measure went into effect a few hours later.
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Russian aircraft are now only allowed to use German airspace in a few exceptional cases, such as for humanitarian purposes, according to information from the aviation security organization Eurocontrol. In addition to Germany, Poland, Italy, Belgium, Ireland and the Baltic and Scandinavian EU countries had previously announced and implemented this step.
The EU also wants to ban the Russian state media RT and Sputnik. They would no longer be able to spread lies to justify Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war against Ukraine and sow division in the EU, EU Commission President von der Leyen said in Brussels on Sunday. (dpa)
