The European Union’s (EU) military production capacity will go up this year and the bloc will supply one million artillery shells to Ukraine by the end of the year, as reported by the Ministry of Defence.
Latvian Minister of Defence Andris Sprūds stressed at the EU Foreign Affairs Council defence ministers meeting in Belgium that the EU needs to rapidly increase supplies of artillery shells to Ukraine.
“Currently the EU military industry is able to manufacture one million artillery shells a year, and this is only the beginning of the breakthrough for Europe’s military industry. EU’s production capacity will reach 1.4 million shells by the end the year,” stressed Sprūds.
According to the Latvian minister, in order to continue supporting Ukraine, the EU needs bigger and more predictable EU financing and a demonstration of solidarity.
“Our agenda also included the topic of the future support of European Peace Facility (EPF). Latvia stressed it is possible to quickly agree on an increase of funding for this and for Ukraine,” added Sprūds.
EU ministers also agreed to continue working on the EU Defence Industry Strategy and various defence sector’s development initiatives.
The Latvian ministry also mentioned that providing training to Ukrainian troops is just as important. In 2023 the EU trained approximately 40 000 Ukrainian troops. As many are planned to be trained this year.
Last year Latvia trained 4 000 Ukrainian troops. The country plans to continue supporting Ukrainian troops.
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