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Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmitri Kuleba is firing at Europe for what he believes is a lack of understanding of how wars play out.
– Europe does not know how to fight wars. The production of weapons is not the most popular business, says Kuleba to the Ukrainian newspaper Kyiv Independent.
– Unfortunately, our friends are more concerned with discussing how and when to increase weapons production (than actually doing it, journ.anm.). I am more concerned about the speed of the development of the defense industry, than deliveries of new types of weapon systems, says the Ukrainian foreign minister.
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– Busy discussing
Kuleba’s criticism comes in the wake of European arms manufacturers having hesitated to adjust arms production in recent months. In addition, aid packages from the EU and the US have been delayed for various political reasons.
– Europe clearly has a head start when it comes to technology. The problem and challenge they face is to scale up the production of this technology. It’s sad to say, but it doesn’t work as the situation is now. Russia will be ahead of us, he says.
– Today it is Ukraine that is at stake, but what is the situation tomorrow? It is their security, the security of the European countries. Anyone who believes that Putin will not dare to attack a NATO country if he wins in Ukraine is a naive or a supporter of Russian values in this matter, Kuleba continues.
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Russia: We are faster
Russia, for its part, has allocated more money to defense than ever before. In addition, they are said to have received large quantities of artillery ammunition from North Korea, as well as drones from Iran.
– I don’t want to brag, but I can say that we have picked up speed in production faster than the Western countries, said Denis Manturov, Deputy Prime Minister responsible for arms production in Russia, on Monday.
Information on Russian weapons production is difficult to verify.
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Europe and Norway’s contribution
In March, the EU launched several schemes which should contribute to the member states purchasing 1 million rounds of ammunition, both grenades and rockets, within a year. One of the most important was to provide Ukraine with badly needed 155 mm artillery shells.
But at the beginning of December, sources told the news agency Reuters that only 60,000 of the artillery shells had been obtained.
The arrangements, which allow member states to purchase ammunition via contracts entered into by the European Defense Agency (EDA), have so far resulted in the purchase of approximately 480,000 units, according to the EU. There are still four months to go. But one lacks large quantities of artillery shells, we are to believe the sources.
At the start of 2023, the government announced the purchase of grenades for NOK 4.3 billion, but so far less than half have been contracted. Nammo has asked for 850 million in investments, while the government has so far provided 75 million.
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2023-12-29 04:00:48
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