US President Joe Biden will meet personally with Ukrainian President Volodimir Zelensky through the NATO Summit in Vilnius (Lithuania). Each Politico and CNN have reported on this assembly.
This assembly is a part of the US bilateral agenda on the NATO Summit and can ship a robust message of unity in direction of Russia at a time when the Atlantic Alliance will resolve what relationship it desires to have with Ukraine and, above all, if it is able to to supply it a brief framework for its accession.
Zelenski will attend a NATO Summit in individual for the primary time – on the Madrid Summit he did so by video name – and can thus inaugurate the newly created NATO-Ukraine Council (tomorrow from 12 to 2 p.m. on the Spanish peninsula), which should elevate pending points for a future Ukrainian accession to the Alliance or to work on that “long-term dedication” that NATO has already promised to Kiev. Zelensky is predicted to present a speech at Lukiskes Sq. within the heart of Vilnius later at the moment, the place he’ll carry a Bakhmut flag.
A joint press convention between the Ukrainian president and NATO Secretary Normal Jens Stoltenberg can be scheduled. In addition to a speech by Joe Biden himself in an solely Ukrainian key.
It have to be remembered that the allied international locations arrive on the Vilnius Summit with divisions concerning the phrases that must be provided to Ukraine in order that this nation, at struggle as a result of Russian invasion, turns into the thirty third nation of the Atlantic Alliance. Poland and the Baltic international locations, on the one hand, are in favor of providing Ukraine a scheduled roadmap for Ukrainian accession and that, for instance, it may be current on the North Atlantic Council; For his or her half, the US and Germany lead the group of nations most favorable to ready for the tip of the struggle.
Earlier than his arrival in Vilnius, the US president needed to distance himself from the chance that the Vilnius Summit would approve Ukraine’s candidacy for NATOa call that have to be made unanimously by all allies: “I don’t assume there may be unanimity in NATO on whether or not or to not embody Ukraine within the NATO household now, at the moment, in the course of a struggle,” Biden mentioned. in an interview on CNN.
Zelensky will ship his speech at Lukiškių Sq., the biggest sq. in Vilnius
For his half, Zelensky requires higher pace: «It might be an essential message to say that NATO just isn’t afraid of Russia. Ukraine ought to get clear safety ensures whereas it’s not in NATO. Solely below these situations would our assembly make sense, in any other case it’s simply one other coverage,” he mentioned in an interview with ABC tv.
Biden and Zelensky have had a number of high-profile conferences in current months. The Ukrainian president’s first journey outdoors Ukraine for the reason that February 24, 2022, begin of the Russian invasion, was to Washington simply earlier than Christmas, the place Biden feted him within the Oval Workplace earlier than addressing Congress.
Biden made a shock go to two months later to kyiv to return the favor and announce a $500 million help bundle. His final in-person assembly befell on the G-7 Summit in Hiroshima, Japan, in Could.
