The President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky said today that missiles for Western air defense systems will be part of the first deliveries of American weapons paid for by NATO countries under the PURL mechanism or “Prioritized Ukraine Requirements List“ (Prioritized Ukraine Requirements List, PURL), Ukrinform reported, quoted by BTA.
“We have received more than two billion dollars from our partners, specifically for PURL. We will receive additional funds in October, I think we will receive another 3.5-3.6 billion dollars“, Zelensky said at a joint press conference with the President of the European Parliament Roberta Metzola.
“The first two packages worth $500 million … These packages… will definitely include Patriot and HIMARS missiles, he said.
PURL is an initiative through which countries that wish to will be able to purchase defense weapons from the United States in accordance with what the Ukrainian military needs most, and then provide them to it. 11 countries have already joined it.
According to information from September 6, six billion dollars have already been raised for the new initiative. Zelensky said that Ukraine is making efforts to increase the financing of the mechanism.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky met earlier in the day with European Parliament President Roberta Metsola, with the main topics of conversation being Ukraine's membership in the EU, tightening sanctions against Russia and the construction of bomb shelters, Ukrinform reported.
„We are really glad to welcome the President of the European Parliament to Ukraine. This is already Roberta Metsola's fourth visit to Ukraine during the war. Roberta was one of the first to visit Ukraine after the start of the full-scale invasion. "Overall, the European Parliament and the President have consistently supported our state, our independence, our sovereignty and our people," Zelensky said at a joint press conference with Metsola.
He stressed that the key topics of conversation were Ukraine's accession to the EU, tougher sanctions against Russia, as well as support for the construction of bomb shelters in Ukraine.
“Today, Roberta and I discussed the key areas of work between Ukraine and the European institutions. We are grateful for the support for Ukraine's EU accession negotiations. We are fulfilling our promises and we count on the EU and European leaders to fulfill their part of the work on the negotiation chapters. "We expect the first group of negotiation chapters to be opened as soon as possible with the unanimous support of all EU member states," Zelensky said, adding: "The European Parliament provides us with strong support in this." Another central topic was sanctions against the aggressor country, Ukrinform reports. "It is important that the European Parliament consistently supports sanctions against Russia over this war […] We expect the nineteenth package of EU sanctions to be adopted." We hope that one of his main targets will be Russia's energy resources, its trade infrastructure, the Russian banking sector and various sanctions-evasion schemes that Russia uses to finance the war," Zelensky stressed.
He also said that Ukraine is counting on similar steps from the United States.
„Putin must feel that his intention to continue the war, to carry out strikes, including destabilizing activities in countries such as Poland and Romania, will mean more pain for Russia. If Russia. If Russia does not feel pain, it will continue to fight. They must feel heavier economic, political and other losses, so that we finally get closer to peace,“ Zelensky said.
The Ukrainian president also highlighted the issue of building bomb shelters.
„Today I discussed in detail with Roberta the bomb shelters for our schools, kindergartens, universities, hospitals – bomb shelters for people. We also count on Europe's support for our program of free meals for all children in all schools in Ukraine," Zelensky said.