Germany approves Polish request to send five MiG jets to Ukraine
Photo: Slovak MiG-29А (Wikimedia / TSGT. BRAD FALLIN)
Germany has given its permission for formerly East German MiG fighter jets to be sent on to Ukraine.
The swift approval comes just hours after Berlin said that it had received the application, Spiegel reports.
I welcome the fact that we in the federal government have reached this decision together. This shows Germany can be relied on, Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said after the decision was made in Berlin.
According to German rules, the weapons that it sells require approval from Berlin if the receiving country wants to send them on to a third country.
Poland already announced its Soviet-made MiG-29 fighters supply to Ukraine to support the country in the war. However, at first, the planes from the stocks of former East Germany were not delivered.
The Soviet-made planes formerly belonged to East Germany. The state sent 23 to Poland in 2002.
At the end of March, the security adviser of Polish President Andrzej Duda, Jacek Siewara, stated that the Polish Air Force still has about a dozen such aircraft today.
Contracts for the sale of military equipment from Germany specify that the state's government must agree to a possible transfer at a later date.
Defense Minister Pistorius had said during a visit to Bundeswehr soldiers in Mali that the German government would reach a decision on approval on Thursday.
"It is there," Pistorius said after the application was received. "And the commitment is there that a response will go out to our Polish partners later today," without revealing what the response would be.
Poland has previously urged Germany to finalize the decision by making public announcements of its plan to send weaponry that require German approval.
