During 2024, the European Union handed over 980,000 artillery shells out of the promised million to the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
This was announced by the head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell.
The official admitted that the bloc failed to deliver the target number of shells by the spring of 2024. This happened because the partners could not predict the real production capacities.
"There is a lot of ammunition that has been delivered to Ukraine under bilateral agreements with [EU] member states, plus a Czech initiative that is working, although not as quickly as we expected. In general, by the end of the year, we will deliver more than 1.5 million ammunition to Ukraine," Borrell added.
If the factories of the allies reach cruising speed, then Kyiv will receive the same amount of ammunition in 2025.
Ammunition from the European Union
In March 2023, EU member states promised to increase supplies of artillery shells to Ukraine. The countries agreed to a plan that included the supply of ammunition from their stockpiles and joint orders for the production of projectiles. The goal was to transfer one million ammunitions to Kyiv within a year, i.e. by March 2024.
At the end of November 2023, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, Dmytro Kuleba, announced that the European Union had transferred almost 300,000 artillery ammunition to Ukraine.
European Commissioner for the Internal Market, Thierry Breton, said that the bloc will be able to produce 1.3 million shells by the end of 2024, some of which will be transferred to the Armed Forces. However, Bloomberg reported that one million rounds of ammunition will not be delivered by March due to production delays and concerns about stockpiles.
Czech initiative with artillery shells
In February 2024, the Czech Republic announced that it had found a way to get 800,000 shells for Ukraine, but they had to be bought. The country called on its allies to invest money in this initiative — it was supported by Canada, Finland, Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, Portugal, France, Great Britain, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Lithuania and other countries.
Already in March, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic reported that there may be more projectiles within the scope of the initiative — from 1.5 million. The Czech Republic contracted the first 180,000 ammunition in mid-April. At the end of June, it became known that Prague had already supplied Ukraine with 50,000 shells as part of its program.
In the autumn of the same year, "Ukrainian Armored Technology" and the Czech arms manufacturer Czechoslovak Group (CSG) signed an agreement on cooperation in the production of 155-mm and other large-caliber ammunition in Ukraine from 2025.
At the beginning of October, six trucks with ammunition arrived in Ukraine, for which the Slovaks collected money, despite the position of their authorities. In three weeks, people donated more than €4 million. The collection was started after the Slovak government announced that it would not join the initiative of the Czech Republic.
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