Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky has urged NATO members to continue to arm his country and pressure Russia to agree to Kiev’s peace terms this fall. He made the statement during a meeting with US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin at the Ramstein Air Base in Germany. Regular gatherings there are designed to coordinate military aid to Kiev.
Zelensky urged Western countries to support the joint production of weapons, including drones and missiles, on Ukrainian soil.
“To achieve this, we need funding – we are ready to quickly produce everything that will help us bring this war to an end, namely by putting decisive pressure on Russia for real peace,” Zelensky said, according to his website.
“Let’s make this fall a time for Russian aggression to fall – in a way that will end the war and restore a reliable international security order.”
Austin stressed the importance of weapons manufacturing, saying that the US was “working with Ukraine to design and build a substitute for the S-300 surface-to-air missile system and the R-27 air-to-air missile.” Washington has set aside more than $200 million to purchase “critical components” to allow Ukraine to make drones and electronic warfare systems, he said.
Kiev has encountered several setbacks on the battlefield in recent months, with Russian troops steadily making gains in Donbass and advancing towards the city of Pokrovsk.
In the hope of forcing Moscow to recall most of its soldiers from Donbass, Ukraine launched an incursion into Russia’s Kursk Region on August 6, capturing several villages and the border city of Sudzha. The Russian advances have not stopped, however.
By sending its most well-equipped and experienced units into Kursk, the Ukrainian army has “weakened” its positions on other fronts, Russian President Vladimir Putin said this week. He added that the Russian forces have only increased their push in Donbass.
Peace negotiations between Moscow and Kiev broke down in the spring of 2022. Moscow has since stated that Zelensky’s demand to restore Ukraine to its 1991 borders was completely unacceptable.
Speaking on Monday, Putin said that Russia was ready to reopen peace negotiations, but only on its own terms. Moscow needs to neutralize Ukrainian attempts to “destabilize the situation” in Kursk and other border regions first, he stressed.