The High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Policy, Josep Borrell, confirmed this Monday that the US decision to lift restrictions to long-range weapons to hit Russia will allow Ukraine to attack targets up to 300 kilometers inside Russian territory.
“The Biden administration has authorized the use of the weapons it delivers to Ukraine up to 300 kilometers inside Russian territory,” said the head of European diplomacy at a press conference after the meeting of EU foreign ministers, in reference to Biden’s turn to have Ukraine fire ATACMS systems against Russian territory.
“It’s less than nothing. It doesn’t seem like a spectacularly deep distance to me,” said the Spaniard, who has become the first European leader to speak specifically about Washington’s decisionwhich until now had avoided official confirmation.
Of course, Borrell did not want to go into Biden’s reasons for taking this step or why the decision comes after the elections and a few weeks before the election. Donald Trump’s return to the Oval Office.
The High Representative has stressed that Ukraine must be able to use military systems “not only to stop the arrows, but to hit the archer”, but has ruled out that there will be a unanimous EU decision, reiterating that It is up to each Member State to decide the conditions of the weapons it supplies to kyiv.
Washington’s decision shifts the focus to France and Germany, member states that supply this type of weapons to Ukraine. For the moment, the French Foreign Minister, Jean-Noël Barrot, has indicated that the French president, Emmanuel Macron, He has already said that it is an option “to consider”, pointing out that “there is nothing new under the sun” regarding the passage of the United States and that Paris could adopt this same decision.
On Germany’s side, the Olaf Scholz Executive has reiterated its refusal to deliver long-range Taurus-type missiles to Ukraine, although there are evident differences within the coalition, since the Greens defend that Ukraine can defend itself and the Foreign Minister, Annalena Baerbock, has considered the Biden’s decision at this time of the war.
On the other hand, Borrell has admitted that the European Union is concerned by reports indicating that Iran, North Korea and China andThey are boosting the Russian war machine in Ukraine by producing and supplying weapons to Moscow. “Without Iran, without China, Russia could not support its military effort“said Borrell.
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