One million rounds of artillery ammunition will be delivered to Ukraine over the course of the next twelve months, according to a decision made by the bloc’s security officials at the EU Council meeting on March 20th.
“This decision was taken very, very quickly,” said Josep Borrell, the EU’s High Representative of Foreign Affairs, at the press conference after the meeting. He pointed out that the joint procurement was first proposed by Estonia at the previous Council meeting just a month ago, and now “the agreement has been reached.”
Most ministers involved were convinced that the plan would encounter no resistance in the Council. “We have reached a political consensus to send to Ukraine one million rounds of 155-caliber ammunition,” Estonian Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur said ahead of the meeting. “Definitely there are many details still to solve, but for me it is most important that we will conclude these negotiations, and it shows me one thing: if there is a will, there is a way.”
The final agreement was built on the EU’s “three-track approach” devised by the Commission and presented by Borrell at a previous meeting earlier this month. The plan involves using the member states’ existing stockpiles to provide Ukraine with ammunition immediately (while promising reimbursements of up to €1 billion through the European Peace Facility), launching a joint procurement program to be able to supply Ukraine until the end of the war from another €1 billion, and investing in the bloc’s arms production sector to ramp up future defense and deterrence capabilities.
In the short term, “the objective is to deliver, and to deliver fast,” Borrell underlined at the press conference.
However, not every member state signed up for all three pillars of the plan. Specifically, it was the joint procurement program—with the tender entrusted to the European Defense Agency (EDA)—that more than a third of EU countries opted out of. “For now, seventeen member states (and Norway) have signed the project arrangement,” Borrell said, but added that “more will join soon,” expecting the final number to be above 20 member states.
According to the High Representative, the contracts should be passed with the weapons industry by the end of May. Apart from the 155mm artillery rounds, the plan also includes supplying Ukraine with missiles, if Kyiv requests them.
When addressing the third track—ramping up arms production bloc-wide to accommodate future strategic needs—Borrell emphasized the seriousness of the current situation. “Since the end of the Cold War, Europeans, we have been decreasing our military capacity. That’s a fact,” he said. “And now suddenly we need to increase it because the environment has changed dramatically.”
Nonetheless, with yesterday’s agreement in place, Borrell is confident that Europe will be able to face whatever the future might bring. “This is an extraordinary demonstration of European unity and readiness,” the High Representative said in the end.
