Foreign Minister João Gomes Cravinho states that everything is being done to accelerate European defense production capabilities. Cravinho believes this will be the way to counter the Kremlin’s strategy.
“Putin, we already know, as an ally, bets on time, that is, he believes that time is working in his favor. [e] believes that over time the country will be able to reduce Ukraine’s capabilities and secure its goal,” he stated, defending the strengthening of the defense industry, responding to Kiev’s criticism over the current difficulty of the European defense industry in responding to the demands of a war such as that in Ukraine.
João Gomes Cravinho spoke in Brussels, at the end of the first meeting of the NATO-Ukraine Council, in which the Ukrainian Minister of Foreign Affairs took part. This morning, Dimitri Kuleba criticized the limited capabilities of the European defense industry.
At the entrance to the meeting, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dimytro Kuleba had criticized the limitations of the defense industry in the European Union, pointing out the need for “people with specific knowledge about how things work, how [stocks] of spare parts, how supply chains work.” Kuleba says these experts “need to sit down and figure it out, otherwise Europe will be left defenseless.”
However, the Portuguese minister made it clear that the scenario will soon change as “a process is now underway to accelerate the work at European level and promote support for Ukraine. That is why we expect this to happen in the coming months.” will register as a consecutive increase”.
João Gomes Cravinho also said that Portugal is preparing to send a new aid package to Ukraine, while the Ministry of Defense is already “working on a new aid package for Ukraine, in the order of 200 tons. In other words, it is a package that corresponds to an increase of about 20% on what we have already given.”
João Gomes Cravinho also downplayed the controversy with Hungary, which is threatening to block European aid to Ukraine, saying that at the next summit in December he “expects” that there will be no failure on Hungary’s part to deal with the geostrategic reality recognize that these are the interests of the European Union.
“All countries of the European Union will have to recognize the geostrategic challenge we face. Naturally, under these circumstances, as we have repeatedly seen, Hungary is trying to improve its own conditions through a difficult negotiation process,” Cravinho said.
Source: DN
