The First 180,000 Shells from Czech Initiative Set to Arrive in Ukraine in June
The first batch of 180,000 shells purchased for Ukraine under the Czech initiative is expected to reach Ukrainian forces in June. Czech President and chief initiator of this program, Petr Pavel, announced this in an interview with the German broadcaster ARD.
"We, along with our Prime Minister Petr Fiala, anticipate that the first 180,000 ammunition units will be delivered in June," Pavel noted.
According to the Czech President, in addition to the contracted 180,000 units, agreements have also been reached for the supply of "an additional five to six-figure quantity of shells."
Moreover, negotiations are underway for the procurement of another 300,000 units of ammunition for Ukraine. Petr Pavel also added that theoretically, under this scheme, Ukraine could purchase 1.5 million artillery shells within a year.
The Czech President believes that assistance to Ukraine needs to be provided immediately and in the maximum possible volume to prevent further loss of territories and lives.
"Each new stage of assistance has been accompanied by lengthy discussions before it was finally implemented. If we had skipped this period of discussion and risk assessment, Ukraine would have received this assistance months, perhaps even years earlier, and the situation could have been different," Petr Pavel observed.
He emphasized the importance of learning from history to avoid the horrors of World War II, as Russian aggression against Ukraine shares many similarities with it.
"There are many parallels between the origins of World War II and the war in Ukraine. If we look at the example of Czechoslovakia at that time, the German minority in the border regions of Czechoslovakia became the pretext for Hitler's invasion. In the case of Russia and Ukraine, it was the Russian-speaking minority in eastern Donbas. Western allies of Czechoslovakia then believed they could save peace by appeasing Hitler. And how wrong they all were!" Petr Pavel remarked.
It's worth noting that recently, The Gaze reported that according to the investigation by Czech police, the explosions at ammunition depots in the country in 2014 were orchestrated by Russian special services.