Kyiv hopes to obtain a formal invitation to NATO membership at the Alliance's 75th anniversary summit in Washington in July, according to President Zelensky’s office chief.
“Only Ukraine’s invitation to NATO will give Europe and the world real chances to return to true security,” Andriy Yermak, Head of the Ukrainian Presidential Office said at the Yalta European Strategy (YES) conference this weekend.
The prospect of opening Ukraine’s accession negotiations on NATO membership at the Washington summit was one of the main topics of discussion, involving Boris Johnson, the former Prime Minister of the UK, and moderated by Aleksander Kwasniewski, President of Poland from 1995 to 2005.
“Our struggle and this support have shown that the majority of people in the world are on the side of good. We see that this support remains at a very high level, and it is important to maintain it,” Yermak said.
According to him, “arguments suggesting that Ukraine’s accession to NATO could lead to further escalation look strange to Ukrainians, as our country has been living in the conditions of the dreadful full-scale war for two years already.”
“The failure to invite Ukraine to the Washington summit, we believe, could indeed trigger a new escalation – in the Middle East, in other regions of our planet. Only the invitation and real concrete steps towards Ukraine’s full membership will give the world and Europe real chances to return to security,” he said.
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Yermak said that to advance this issue, the International Task Force on Security and Euro-Atlantic Integration of Ukraine was created, with former NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen and Yermak himself as co-chairs.
Boris Johnson, as a member of the International Task Force, also expressed the belief that at the upcoming NATO summit, Ukraine should receive an invitation to begin negotiations on Alliance membership.
“And we need to stop using the argument about escalation,” said Johnson. “The way to prevent escalation is to do much more to protect Ukraine.”
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Comments (4)
NATO is a joke. They intervened in the Kosovo war at the request of the UN. Where's the feckless UN now? Russia is committing acts of war crimes and terrorism against a peaceful neighbor. Millions of Ukrainian women with their children fled to Poland and other European nations causing extreme demands on housing and education.
NATO could just as easily intervene in Ukraine just as they did in the Kosovo war.
If you idiots at the Kyiv Post had any brains you would be pushing for the UN to vote to send NATO in. And Russia should be blocked from being able to invoke their veto power. They should be removed from the Security Council.
@.....GUY NAMED JACK GRIFFIN .....,
The joke part with both NATO and UN is that they still include putin aligned members with VETO rights.
As far as I'm concerned Article 5 was triggered when NATO members passage in the Black Sea became threatened by putins regime. Or when russia took down a US Reaper drone, or shot a missile at a British fighter, or threatened to shoot a French aircraft again over international waters.
Article 5 was triggered when at the start of the current invasion, putins orcs drove huge economically / socially destabilizing refugee streams to NATO members borders. While NATO members humanely give refuge to those war displaced, NATO itself stupidly continues to consider all similar acts of putin's hybrid war against them benign. It is not benign. It is gutting our economies and social cohesion from within.
It was triggered again when russian missiles, aircraft, naval vessels, mine's entered NATO member territory. His political meddling threatens our democracies by supporting putin friendly dictator wannabes like putinrump.
NATO MUST needs to respond in terms an aggressor understands. In putin's case he does not take their words seriously. He only understands a military defeat.
This is the moment NATO was funded for! Get to work already. I often write my nation's leadership and NATO reps to say as much.
Some in the US don't see the point of NATO, why pay up when America is unlikely to be attacked directly?
I would ask them if they know WHY they are unlikely to be attacked. It is simply due to the amazing work done by the US since WW2 to spread its influence globally.
For example in Northern England we have had US radar systems since 1963 providing a glimpse beyond the curvature of the earth at incoming missile launches, we also host US nukes in Britain but nobody likes to talk about that.
If the US didn't support NATO or Britain it would lose its early warning and undo years of planning and diplomacy to ensure the safety of its own citizens.
Put simply, NATO stops enemies knocking directly on your front door. If you don't want to be members you better barricade yourselves in and pull up the drawbridge because you won't see the enemy coming.
As an Englishman in a land of medieval castles I can tell you the siege mentality is a poor strategy and only for last resort.
@David Steel, Good points!
I monitor BBC's war coverage daily. It often includes inspiring stories of generosity by UK's citizens for Ukrainian in their time of need. The UK is no doubt gaining a lifelong friend in Ukraine. The moral path is rarely the easy path...but it remains the right path regardless.
On many topics I do not always agree with Boris Johnson.
However a BIG THANK YOU to the British people, that under his lead, came through for Ukraine militarily while some of the largest founding EU members were initially slothing along on the sidelines (France and Germany come to mind albeit at least the latter has now done significantly better).
I also agree with this statement Boris is quoted as saying in this article:
“And we need to stop using the argument about escalation,” said Johnson. “The way to prevent escalation is to do much more to protect Ukraine.”
@John, Thanks as always John for your valuable insights here.
Boris Johnson, wtf?! Useless fucking clown, piece of shit. The West is so fucked.