2023-07-11 18:26:02
F-16 fighters of the Netherlands Air Force (Archyde.com)
The coalition of 11 allied countries that will participate in the training of Ukrainian pilots to handle the F-16 combat planes will begin this military training next August, Danish Defense Minister Troels Lund Poulsen reported from Vilnius.
The training center will be installed in Romania, added his Dutch colleague, Kajsa Ollogren, following a ministerial-level session held in the Lithuanian capital, where the NATO summit is taking place.
The Netherlands and Denmark are spearheading an initial plan to train the pilots, following the United States – which has to give the go-ahead for US-made planes to be used – authorized the move.
The Ukrainian Defense Minister, Oleksí Réznikov, who arrived in Vilnius on Tuesday to attend the meetings, confirmed through his Twitter account the signing of the Memorandum making official the coalition of countries willing to offer their F-16s.
“Ukrainian pilots, technicians and support personnel will participate in a training program,” wrote Reznikov, through his Twitter account, where he also points to the possibility of including other types of combat aircraft in the program. He welcomed the initiative and said he hoped to see pilots ready to fly in six months.
The pilot Laurens-Jan Vijge will be one of those who will give the training to the Ukrainians (Archyde.com)
Danish Defense Minister Troels Lund Poulsen stated that the training would begin in his country in August. “We hope to see results early next year,” he stated.
Her Dutch counterpart, Kajsa Ollongren, stated that the allies would establish a pilot training center in Romania in the longer term.
The announcement was made on the sidelines of the NATO summit, which began on Tuesday in Lithuania, while Ukraine increased its pressure on the military alliance. Zelensky bitterly criticized the “uncertainty” and “weakness” of NATO in relation to the accession of his country and noted that this attitude stimulates Russian “terror”.
Ukraine’s demands to obtain a clear and defined road map on its accession to NATO, once the war with Russia is over, constitute the central issue of the summit of leaders of the military alliance.
Moscow affirmed that it follows the Vilnius summit “very closely”, in which it sees “a strong anti-Russian character”.
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