French President Emmanuel Macron on Monday (26 February) indicated he would be open to non-EU ammunition purchases for Ukraine as allies agreed to urgently ramp up efforts to deliver more shells to Kyiv in light of a serious shortage.

Some 20 European leaders gathered in Paris on Monday for a Ukraine support summit in Paris, put together under Macron’s hospices late last week as Russia’s war on Ukraine enters its third year, aimed to find ways for Western countries to further their military support for Kyiv.

The Paris summit came amid growing concerns Russia is posing an increasing threat towards Ukraine and the West.

“I have noted that more or less all the countries represented around this table have said…that the common consensus was that we should be ready in a few years for Russia to attack [these] countries,” Macron told reporters in Paris.

His comments came after European countries’ military brass over weeks has increasingly warned they believe Russia could try to undermine NATO in the coming decade.

Ammunition progress

There was progress on a Czech-led initiative to buy hundreds of thousands of ammunition rounds from third countries, which France has been cautious about as it prioritises developing Europe’s own industry.

“Many European countries are trying to increase their production capacity, but this process will take time. By next year, 2025, production in Europe and Ukraine could already be sufficient, but we have to bridge that period,” Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala told reporters on Monday.

Fiala said about 15 countries had agreed to sign up to his initiative. “We are talking about hundreds of thousands of pieces of ammunition we should and could get in a relatively short time,” he told reporters.

Ammunition supplies have become a critical issue for Kyiv as its troops are increasingly in a disadvantage on the battlefield.

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has been warning for months that immediate action is badly needed to palliate the lack of ammo rounds, with Kyiv outgunned 10-to-1 by Russia on the frontlines.

Ahead of the summit, Zelenskyy warned in Kyiv that the EU had massively undershot promises on ammunition deliveries.

“It is the priority of priorities,” Macron said, adding that a clearer plan of action should be fledged out in the next ten days.

Western leaders’ commitment comes as the EU’s pledge to produce 1 million ammunition by spring 2024 failed to materialise, with only half of it due to be ready and dispatched to Ukraine by March.

The EU’s ammunition pledge was “undoubtedly an imprudent pledge,” Macron said.

Macron’s comments mark a sudden shift in France’s original reticence to spend EU cash on industries other than European.

For months, it had called for a “European buy” clause for all things military equipment – but this appears to have been at least temporarily shelved to respond to Ukraine’s most urgent needs.

‘No consensus’ on European troops

“There is no consensus at this stage (…) to send troops on the ground,” Macron told reporters. “Nothing should be excluded. We will do everything that we must so that Russia does not win.”

He fell short of specifying which countries would consider taking such a step, embracing “strategic ambiguity”.

So far, no European member state has suggested it has such plans to send troops to fight in Ukraine and there are also no plans to send NATO troops as this would likely drag the alliance into war as a party to the conflict.

Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico, who has opposed military aid to Ukraine, said before the talks several NATO and EU members were considering sending soldiers to Ukraine on a bilateral basis.

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, who is the frontrunner to become NATO’s next Secretary-General, told reporters the issue of sending troops was not the focus of Monday’s talks.

More concrete pledges

Leaders approved five “action categories” to further work on urgently: cyber defence; weapons and ammo coproduction on Ukraine soil; the defence of countries facing a direct threat by Russia, first and foremost Moldova; support for Ukraine at its Belarusian border through non-military forces; and mine-clearing operations.

A new inter-country coalition will also see the light of day to focus on medium to long-range missiles and bombs.

Macron reiterated his support for Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas’ bid for a new round of EU joint debt to support Kyiv, dubbing Russia’s aggression a “geopolitical shock that justifies exceptional measures”.

EU countries approved a four-year €50 billion Ukraine aid package on 1 February, and bilateral security deals have been signed with key member states, including France, the UK, Germany, Canada, Denmark and Italy in the past week.

Meanwhile, a $95 billion aid package to Ukraine, Taiwan and Israel is still stuck in the US Congress, and Republican candidate Donald Trump’s shadow hovers over the EU, as he threatened to pull out of the NATO military alliance were he to be elected again in November.

Read more with Euractiv

Ukraine says only 30% of promised EU artillery shells received

Ukraine has received less than a third of the one million artillery shells the EU has promised to deliver by March, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Monday (26 February).