Spain will transfer an additional Hawk air defense system to Ukraine

Spain will hand over an additional battery of the Hawk anti-aircraft missile complex to Ukraine.

This was reported by the Minister of Defense of Spain Margarita Robles during a video meeting with her Ukrainian colleague Rustem Umyerov.

She assured that Ukraine will have a battery by September. Robles emphasized that another complex of this air defense system "will strengthen the air defense potential of the Armed Forces of Ukraine."

The ministers also discussed the process of training Ukrainian military personnel on the territory of Spain — their number has already reached five thousand.

The MIM-23 Hawk is an American medium-range anti-aircraft missile system developed by Raytheon and adopted by the US Army in the 1960s. The complex has three versions — Phase I, Phase II and Phase III. Initially, it was developed to destroy aircraft, and later it was refined to intercept missiles. Ukraine already has such complexes — they were handed over as aid by the allies.

• On July 10, President Joe Biden declared plans to supply additional Hawk systems at the NATO summit. In general, he announced that in the coming months, the US and partners will transfer "dozens of tactical air defense systems" to Ukraine, including NASAMS, IRIS T-SLM, IRIS T-SLS and Gepard systems.