France to join Czechia's initiative to purchase ammunition for Ukraine
French President Emmanuel Macron has said his country is joining the Czech Republic's initiative to purchase ammunition for the Ukrainian Armed Forces and seek funding for the project.
He said this at a joint press conference with Czech President Petr Pavel in Prague on Tuesday, March 5, according to an Ukrinform correspondent.
"We will reach out to third, non-European countries with the request to provide resources to meet Ukraine's short-term ammunition needs," Macron said.
He recalled that the initiative consists "in finding ammunition where it exists and is compatible with the equipment that we have delivered."
"And we started the work that was earlier carried out separately. This is a more effective form of cooperation. That's why we support it and are ready to join," Macron said.
According to him, given Ukraine's needs, European countries should go beyond what is available.
Commenting on financing the purchase of ammunition, he said that "it can be bilateral mobilization, it can be cooperation with third parties, bilateral funding, as well as European funding, from the European Peace Facility, which can be mobilized to support this initiative."
Macron also stressed that France's position on frozen Russian assets is unequivocal.
"We fully support the proposal to tax profits from assets, which amount to EUR 3-5 billion per year," he said.
At the same time, commenting on the use of the frozen funds themselves, Macron said France was against doing "what is prohibited by international law."
He added that France supports the proposal of "more innovative European funding," proposed by Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas.
Pavel announced at the Munich Security Conference that he had agreed with Denmark, the Netherlands and Canada to join forces to find the necessary equipment and ammunition for Ukraine around the world. According to him, the Czech Republic has already managed to identify 800,000 pieces of artillery ammunition, but to transfer them to Ukraine, Prague needs financial support from its partners.
At the same time, the Czech Republic hopes that as many EU countries as possible will join its initiative, Speaker of the House of Representatives of the Czech Republic Marketa Pekarova Adamova said.
Photo: Petr Pavel / Instagram