Chaly believes that President should attend the Vilnius summit
The diplomat said this in an interview with Ukrinform, commenting on the President's statement that he sees no point in participating in the NATO summit in Vilnius if Ukraine does not receive specific signals on when it can join the Alliance.
"The leader of Ukraine should be at the Vilnius summit. I think we want to become a member of NATO, or am I missing something? I mean, every step in this direction is a positive step. We should not blackmail our partners with our attendance or non-attendance at the summit - it will not benefit us," the diplomat said.
According to him, another thing is President Zelensky's rather determined position to obtain NATO membership, not some so-called alternative mechanisms.
"I fully support it. That is, everything else, all these workarounds are nonsense, we have already been going down these paths for a very long time. We should be talking about inviting Ukraine to NATO, and this should be done either at this summit or at the next one in Washington," Chaly said.
In his opinion, the Vilnius summit should be a clear step toward such a political decision "if not now, then next year."
"After that, I think it will be much more difficult," the diplomat predicted.
The diplomat also noted that a political decision on Ukraine's membership in the Alliance should be made at the NATO summit in Vilnius or Washington. According to him, if this is not done now, it is unclear when else it will be possible.
"If NATO countries believe that a buffer zone between them and Russia is more effective for them than Ukraine's membership in the Alliance, and that we will always be fighting to cover their eastern flank, they are very wrong. And I'm afraid that they are then making a wrong calculation of the European security strategy," Chaly said.
In this context, he drew attention to another important point, in his opinion.
According to the diplomat, NATO member states may have the latest weapons, they may have more powerful production, but they definitely do not have a million men and women who are professional, trained, motivated, and ready to die for their country and for European security.
"This is what we have seen in this war. Some say it's a war of artillery, some say it's a war of HIMARS. But I will say that this is a war of people, of the ability of nations to organize and concentrate. In fact, our partner countries are definitely not ready for this now," the diplomat is convinced.
He also noted that Ukraine has been trying to rebuild its army since 2014.
"As a result, we have a significant part of the very professional Armed Forces of Ukraine and the Defense Forces. No other NATO country has this. If they underestimate this, they are making a huge mistake. For these reasons, Ukraine is now a very valuable member of NATO," the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Ukraine emphasized.
As reported, President Volodymyr Zelensky said in an interview with the WSJ on June 3 that he saw no point in participating in the NATO summit in Vilnius if Ukraine did not receive concrete signals on when it could join the Alliance.
Czech President Petr Pavel believes that the participation of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in the NATO Summit in Vilnius is very important for the Alliance.
