In addition to the 14 German Leopard-2 tanks, Poland will supply Ukraine with its own modernized tanks. We are talking about 60 vehicles, 30 of which are the Polish main battle tank PT-91.
About that in an interview Polish Prime Minister Tadeusz Morawiecki told Canadian channel CTV News. Earlier, the head of the office of the President of Ukraine Andrii Yermak provided information. At the same time, his message on the Telegram channel spoke of 60 PT-91 tanks.
PT-91 – an upgraded version of the Soviet T-72 tank, note “New Newspaper. Europe” .
This week, Warsaw officially sent a request to Berlin with a request to allow the transfer of the Leopards to the Ukrainian army. Later, the German authorities announced a decision allowing the re-export of German equipment to Ukraine, as well as an intention to supply Kiev from its own arsenal with 14 Leopard-2 tanks of the A6 modification. On the same day, January 25, US President Joe Biden announced that the United States would send 31 American M1 Abrams tanks to Ukraine.
Training of Ukrainian crews to work with German main battle tanks should begin in the near future. For the moment, as Deutsche Welle writes , the first serviceman of the Ukrainian Armed Forces arrived in Germany to learn how to work with Marder infantry fighting vehicles. A group of Ukrainian soldiers landed in Cologne on January 26.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy thanked allied countries for their support, while calling the issue of the timing of deliveries and their volumes of equipment critical in the future. “We must form such a tank fist, such a fist of freedom, after whose blows tyranny will not rise again”, – quote Zelenskyyy “BBC” .
The delivery of Western Kiev tanks as part of the Russian military invasion has been sought for several months. As part of the final decision, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz told the Bundestag that while providing military support to Ukraine, Germany follows the principle of doing whatever is necessary, but not letting the war escalate. into a conflict between Moscow and NATO. “We will continue to respect this principle,” Scholz stressed.
Nevertheless, Russian Ambassador to Germany Sergey Nechayev called Berlin’s decision on the tanks “extremely dangerous”. “The decision takes the conflict to a new level of confrontation and contradicts statements by German politicians about the reluctance of the FRG to get involved,” Nechaev said.
The Kremlin, commenting on the supply of American tanks to Kiev, said that they would not help the Ukrainian army much. “I am convinced that many experts understand the absurdity of this idea. It’s just that in terms of technological aspects, it’s a rather failed plan,” said Dmitry Peskov, press secretary to the Russian president.
