KYIV: President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has called on Ukraine’s Western partners to allocate 0.25% of their GDP to helping Kyiv ramp up weapons production and said the country plans to sign agreements this summer to start exporting weapon production technologies.
In remarks released for publication by his office on Saturday, Zelenskiy said Ukraine was in talks with Denmark, Norway, Germany, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Lithuania to launch joint weapon production.
“Ukraine is part of Europe’s security and we want 0.25% of the GDP of a particular partner country to be allocated for our defence industry and domestic production,“ Zelenskiy said.
As the war with a bigger and better-equipped Russia has intensified in recent weeks, Ukraine’s need for new weapons and ammunition is constantly growing.
This year Kyiv had secured $43 billion to finance its domestic weapon production, Zelenskiy said.
Member nations of the NATO military alliance are expected to meet next week in The Hague, to discuss higher defence spending.
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte has proposed that countries should each agree to spend 5% of their GDP on defence and security measures.
Zelenskiy said he was likely to visit the NATO summit, adding that several meetings with Western leaders had been set up on the sidelines. He also said that he hoped to meet U.S. President Donald Trump.
Last week, Zelenskiy attended the Group of Seven summit in Canada as he sought to discuss stronger sanctions against Russia and more military support for Ukraine with Trump there.
But he failed to meet with the U.S. President as Trump left a day early for Washington to address the Israel-Iran conflict.
Ukraine currently covers about 40% of its defence needs with domestic production, and the government is constantly looking for ways to increase production further.
Kyiv plans to launch joint weapon production outside of the country and will start exporting some of its military production technologies, Zelenskiy said.
“We have launched a program ‘Build with Ukraine’ and in summer we will sign relevant agreements to start exporting our technologies abroad in the format of opening production lines in European countries,“ Zelenskiy said.
The discussions focused on producing different types of drones, missiles, and potentially artillery, he said.
