France will use EUR300 million in 2024 to purchase weapons for Ukraine, part of the EUR1.4 billion in proceeds from frozen Russian assets allocated by the European Union, the French Defense Ministry said.
“The European Commission has agreed with the Directorate General for Armaments that it will use these funds to quickly acquire priority equipment for Ukraine from the French industry, ammunition, artillery and air defense equipment from the French industry for a total of 300 million for 2024,” the ministry said in a communique published on Friday.
Earlier, EU Diplomacy Chief Josep Borrell said that the EU has already begun to transfer the proceeds of Russia’s frozen assets to the Ukrainian side and the bloc countries that will supply Kyiv with weapons.
The enterprises of Ukroboronprom concern exported $908 million worth of arms and services abroad in 2019, which is 19% more than a year earlier, said Aivaras Abromavicius, the head of the Ukroboronprom state concern. “Last year, our companies exported arms and services worth $908 million. This is a 19% increase over the previous year,” the head of the concern said on the Real Politics program on Ukraine 24 TV channel on Sunday.
Abromavicius added that Ukraine is not one of the ten largest arms exporters, while U.S. and Russian exports are ten times greater than domestic, but assured that Ukroboronprom’s foreign supply will also increase in 2020.
“We see that in 2020 export growth is planned to reach 30%. And this is a very important figure, especially in anticipation of a slowdown in industrial production growth, which is taking place not only in our country, but throughout the world,” said the head of Ukroboronprom.
Ukraine exported conventional weapons to six countries under contracts in 2017, the Ukrainian State Service of Export Control said in a report detailing international transfers of individual types of Ukrainian armaments last year. The figures published by the Ukrainian State Service of Export Control since 2004 are a key to the annual United Nations Register of Conventional Arms.
According to the latest report, in 2017 Ukraine exported 16 units of armored military hardware, namely 16 Oplot main battle tanks to Thailand, and also more than 17,000 small arms and over 800 light weapons to the United States, Uzbekistan, Jordan, Mongolia, and Turkey.
According to the figures, the main importer of Ukrainian small arms and light weapons in 2017 was the United States, which bought 15,040 automatic weapons and submachine guns, and also 790 portable anti-tank rifles and grenade launchers. Uzbekistan purchased 2,000 automatic weapons and submachine guns from Ukraine last year. A total of 22 portable anti-tank rifles and grenade launchers, two hand-held under-barrel and mounted grenade launchers, and one revolver were exported to Jordan, ten rifles were delivered to Mongolia, and three trigger mechanisms for anti-aircraft guns were exported to Turkey.
