EU lawmakers 'get creative' in arming Ukraine
(Baonghean.vn) - A group of parliamentarians wants the EU to provide Ukraine with military vehicles that were intercepted en route to Libya. “The US can do it, so why can’t we?” asked Bart Groothuis, a leading supporter of the idea.
The proposal was put forward by the Dutch parliamentarian with the support of French MP Nathalie Loiseau, chair of the European Parliament's defence subcommittee, and Belgian Guy Verhofstadt.
The weapons in question included two shipments seized by the EU military mission IRINI, which allegedly violated the UN arms embargo on Libya, Dutch broadcaster RTL News reported recently. One shipment, consisting of 41 BATT UMG armored vehicles manufactured in the UAE, was intercepted in mid-October last year. The US-made product is based on the Ford F550 chassis and has been used by Ukraine. The other batch, consisting of more than 100 Toyota all-terrain vehicles, modified to mount guns and some armor, was seized last summer.
Modified civilian vehicles are common among militant groups fighting in Libya’s 2011 civil war, in which NATO supported anti-government forces with an air campaign. The North African country has been divided between various factions and has been engulfed in violence for more than a decade. Redirecting the vehicles, currently held in Marseille, France, to Ukraine would send “a very clear signal to Russia that Europe wants to do everything it can,” said Groothuis.
In an interview with Politico, he cited as a precedent the US decision to provide some 1.1 million rounds of ammunition it seized in December, which were allegedly sent by Iran to Yemen. Mr Groothuis called on the EU to do the same, saying he had presented the idea to the ambassadors of two member states, who were “very enthusiastic and thought it was a very creative idea”.
The US and its allies have pledged to support Ukraine against Russia “for as long as necessary” to defeat it, but that commitment is now being undermined by a number of issues, including the limited amount of physical weapons that can be pumped into the war in Ukraine. Western donors are said to have exhausted their old Soviet arsenals, as well as the NATO-standard weapons and ammunition they have stockpiled. They are struggling to ramp up military production to meet Kiev’s needs. The EU, in particular, is lagging behind on a commitment to send a million artillery shells to Kiev next spring, Bloomberg reported this week. So far, only about 30% of the promised number has been delivered./.
