No invitation for Ukraine at upcoming NATO summit, allies seek alternatives – NYT

Onischenko Elena

Ukraine will not receive the anticipated official invitation to join the Alliance during the 75th-anniversary summit of NATO leaders this July in Washington. Nevertheless, member states aim to show their long-term support for Ukraine through other means.

The New York Times reports this, referring to unnamed NATO officials.

According to the publication, the officials of the Alliance agree that the invitation of Ukraine will not take place at the celebrations planned in Washington in July. NATO has no desire to accept a new member who, through the collective security agreement, "will involve the Alliance in the largest land war in Europe since 1945", writes the NYT.

Therefore, the publication's interlocutors noted that NATO will seek "some middle ground, something short of membership but meaty enough to show that it is backing Ukraine "for the long haul."

According to senior diplomats from Western countries, what exactly this will be is still unknown.

According to the NYT, the US and Germany oppose offering Ukraine the start of negotiations on NATO membership and want this issue "off the table" in July.

But they want to provide Ukraine with concrete obligations that they will be able to fulfill.

For reference:

Last year, at the NATO summit in Vilnius, Ukraine was assured that it would one day receive full membership in the Alliance after it made specific changes to improve democracy and security.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg promised that NATO would invite Ukraine to join the Alliance "when the Allies agree, and the conditions are met." The membership process "will move from a two-stage to a one-stage path." This may mean that Ukraine will be invited to join NATO without a membership action plan (MAP).

President Volodymyr Zelensky called NATO's unwillingness to extend an invitation to Ukraine or announce the terms of membership acquisition "absurd". International partners criticized Zelensky's reaction and called him to "cool down."

Ukraine's Minister of Foreign Affairs, Dmytro Kuleba, believed that after the NATO summit in Vilnius, Ukraine's path to joining the Alliance became "shorter, but not faster."

It is worth adding that NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg proposes creating a fund of allies' contributions worth $100 billion over five years for Ukraine within the framework of the package that the Alliance's leaders should sign in July in Washington.