PRESS RELEASE: Andriy Yermak discusses security assistance to Ukraine with chair of Bundestag defense committee [October 2022]

The press release issued by the President of Ukraine on 7 October 2022.

Head of the Office of the President Andriy Yermak held a meeting with the chair of the German Bundestag’s defense committee, Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann, who is in Ukraine on her second visit since the beginning of the full-scale Russian invasion. The main topics of the negotiations were: the need for the strongest possible international reaction to Russia’s illegal attempts to annex Ukrainian territories, as well as ways to strengthen defense assistance to our state from Germany.

At the beginning of the meeting, Yermak briefed Strack-Zimmermann in detail on the situation at the front and thanked her for her decisive support of Ukraine in the conditions of Russian aggression. The Bundestag defense committee chair’s sharp condemnation of the cynical Russian farce with pseudo-referendums and attempts to join the territories of Ukraine, which are null and void from the international legal point of view and which will not have any impact on the complete restoration of the territorial integrity of our state, became important.

The parties noted the European Union’s approval of the eighth package of sanctions and agreed on the need to further increase sanction pressure on the aggressor state, as well as its complete international isolation.

The parties focused on the defense cooperation between Ukraine and Germany. Yermak expressed his gratitude to Strack-Zimmermann for a clear position in providing our country with heavy weapons by Germany, including Marder armored fighting vehicles and Leopard tanks, to strengthen the potential of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in resisting the full-scale Russian invasion, as well as air defense systems to defend Ukrainian skies from missile terror of Russia.

It was stated that to implement its revanchist plans in Europe and the world, Russia uses all possible tools, resorting to energy, nuclear, radiation and other forms of blackmail. The armed occupation and attempted seizure of the Zaporizhzhia NPP by Russia, which threatens a disaster of a planetary scale, was given as an example.

The parties noted the importance of proper implementation of the grain export initiative and the need to continue it despite obstacles from the Russian Federation.

There was an exchange of views regarding the planned important international legal measures, as well as Ukraine’s initiatives at the UN.

The head of the President’s Office and the chair of the Bundestag committee discussed the practical mechanisms of inter-parliamentary cooperation between Ukraine and Germany, in particular at the level of the defense committees.

Strack-Zimmermann said that more than 80% of the population in Germany supports Ukraine, and expressed her belief in maintaining such a high level of solidarity between German society and our state.