Germany, together with Denmark, will hand over Leopard 1A5 tanks to Ukraine in the coming weeks.
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This will be the second largest military aid to Kyiv in the field of equipment supply, direct financial assistance or assistance within the European Union.
German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius stated in an interview with Rzeczpospolita:
Dozens of Leopard 1A5 battle tanks provided by Germany and Denmark will arrive in Ukraine in the coming weeks. In addition, we just launched a new €2.7 billion aid package in May that includes additional urgently needed weapons such as IRIS-T SLM air defense systems.
The authorities of Germany and Poland cannot agree on the maintenance of Leopard battle tanks, which were transferred to Ukraine, Spiegel reports, citing defense sources.
At the end of May, a repair center was supposed to open in Poland, but the parties have still not been able to reach an agreement. The publication recalls that German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius announced plans to open the plant back in April, estimating the approximate cost of the project at 150 million euros.
Two months after the meeting in Ramstein, optimism faded – and not only among the minister. According to defense industry insiders, the German-Polish tank project has not yet made any progress. But Berlin and Warsaw are in irreconcilable disputes over the details of the structure of the joint venture, writes Spiegel.
According to the plan, the two German arms concerns Rheinmetall and Krauss-Maffei Wegmann were to create a joint venture, and the Polish state arms company PGZ was to open a tank repair shop on its territory. The cost of repairing the Leopards was to be borne by the German government.
One of the reasons for the delay in the source of the publication is called different estimates of the cost of repair work. According to them, the Polish PGZ wanted to charge more than 100 thousand euros for the so-called primary diagnostics of tanks. In Germany, they usually take about 12 thousand euros for it. In addition, PGZ is allegedly unwilling to provide any warranty for repairs.
On Monday, Boris Pistorius met with his Polish counterpart Mariusz Blashak. This could be the last opportunity to save the joint project before the NATO summit in mid-July, concludes Spiegel.
Source: Racurs
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