Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has met with NATO leaders after they declined to commit to a timeline for Ukraine's accession to the alliance. Speaking alongside Zelensky, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said that NATO would be issuing a formal invitation for Ukraine to join once the allies agree the conditions for membership are met. In the meantime, he said, NATO has agreed to set up "a multi-year program of assistance...reaffirming that Ukraine will become a member of NATO and removing the requirement for the membership action plan." The agreement, he said, will help Ukraine transfer from Soviet-era military assets to be fully interoperable with other allies, a major plank of the alliance's setup. Also set up is a new NATO-Ukraine Council, a permanent body where the 31 allies and Ukraine can hold consultations and call for meetings in emergency situations. The setting is part of NATO's effort to bring Ukraine as close as possible to the military alliance without actually joining it. On Tuesday, NATO leaders said in their communique summarising the summit's conclusions that Ukraine can join "when allies agree and conditions are met." Instead, the alliance's top members are planning to ratify a major package of long-term security guarantees for Ukraine. White House European Affairs Adviser Amanda Sloat told reporters that the multilateral plan, which will be signed by G7 leaders Wednesday, will send a "significant signal" to Russia that "time is not on its side". The framework is designed to provide for Ukraine's long-term security. The plan will "help Ukraine build an army that can defend itself and disarm any future attack", with the emphasis on "long-term investment", Sloat added. US President Joe Biden and the leaders of the other G7 nations – the UK, France, Canada, Germany, Italy and Japan – will join their Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky at the end of the Nato summit in Vilnius on Wednesday to announce this package of security guarantees. "We are going to fight for this, security guarantees for Ukraine on the road to (membership of) NATO", said the Ukrainian president on his arrival at the summit, which has been taking place since Tuesday. On the first day of their meeting, NATO leaders promised that "the future of Ukraine" was "in NATO", and shortened the process that Kyiv would have to follow to join the organization. According to the British Foreign Office, the G7 will "set out how allies will support Ukraine over the coming years to end the war and deter and respond to any future attack." The ministry added that the framework marks the first time that this many countries have agreed to a "comprehensive long-term security arrangement of this kind with another country". Zelensky has pushed hard for NATO membership in private and in public, calling the lack of a timeline "absurd". He told a crowd in Vilinus yesterday that membership would benefit both parties. "NATO will make Ukraine safer, Ukraine will make NATO stronger," he said. However, Zelensky has expressed thanks for new promises of military hardware from key NATO allies, including hundreds of millions of euros in supplies from Germany and new long-range "Scalp" missiles from France. — Euronews
