SpaceWar.com - Your World At War
EU ministers divided on Ukraine military training plan
Prague, Aug 30 (AFP) Aug 30, 2022
The European Union's defence ministers appeared divided on a plan to hold a major training mission for Ukrainian forces as they arrived for an informal meeting in Prague on Tuesday.

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell, co-hosting the meeting together with the Czech presidency of the bloc, proposed the training operation last week.

Few details were disclosed but Borrell said the Ukrainian soldiers battling a Russian invasion since February 24 should be trained in nearby EU member states.

The informal meeting cannot take a binding decision but Borrell said in Prague he expected the talks to yield "a general, overall political agreement".

"Today I hope that we will have a political green light," the former Spanish foreign minister told reporters.

But some ministers were less upbeat.

"It remains to be seen whether this is the right way to help," said Luxembourg Defence Minister Francois Bausch. "I am not so convinced."

"Perhaps it can be done more quickly and flexibly on a bilateral level under the coordination of the EU," he added.

Austrian Defence Minister Klaudia Tanner echoed his concerns.

"The first question to be clarified is whether such a mission can exist at all," she said, adding that similar missions had previously taken place outside the EU.

"From our point of view, many questions remain unanswered," Tanner said.

Backing the plan, Slovak Defence Minister Jaroslav Nad said his country was ready to host the training.

"I believe we will find a solution," he said.

Dutch Defence Minister Kajsa Ollongren said her country would "respond very favourably" to Borrell's plan.

"We are already training Ukrainian soldiers in the United Kingdom," she said.

"We are (also) working with Germany on new training on demining so we feel this is the right step to take," Ollongren said.


ADVERTISEMENT




Space News from SpaceDaily.com
Mars glaciers are purer and more uniform than previously thought
Curiosity Rovers Boxwork Campaign Reaches New Heights on Mount Sharp
Skyfall Mars helicopter fleet to scout future astronaut landing sites

24/7 Energy News Coverage
MicroCarb satellite launches to map global carbon dioxide emissions from space
Chemistry breakthroughs open new frontiers in industrial carbon capture
Rollable solar array by GalaxySpace redefines satellite compactness and power efficiency

Military Space News, Nuclear Weapons, Missile Defense
BlackSky to supply satellite imagery and analytics for Latin American security operations
GovSat selects Thales Alenia Space to build secure satellite for military communications
SES and Luxembourg to expand military satcom with next generation GovSat2

24/7 News Coverage
One billion years of protein evolution reveals surprising design flexibility
MetOp Second Generation satellite fully fuelled ahead of August launch
We tracked illegal fishing in marine protected areas - satellites and AI show most bans are respected, and could help enforce future ones



All rights reserved. Copyright Agence France-Presse. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse.