UK to Supply 650 Missiles Worth £162 Million to Ukraine
The United Kingdom will supply 650 Light Multipurpose Missiles (LMM) worth £162 million to Ukraine as part of a contract to strengthen Ukraine's air defence. The missiles, manufactured by Thales at a plant in Belfast, are versatile and can be launched from various platforms on land, sea and in the air.
This is stated in a statement by the British Ministry of Defence.
Defence Secretary John Healey will announce this package of assistance to Ukraine in the field of air defence at today's meeting of the Ukraine Defence Contact Group at Ramstein Air Force Base. This will be his first meeting as Secretary of Defence.
The announcement follows a bilateral meeting between John Healey and his Ukrainian counterpart Rustem Umerov in London earlier this week, where they discussed how the UK will continue to increase support over the coming months. At the meeting, the UK Secretary of State for Defence confirmed that £300 million worth of artillery ammunition will be delivered by the end of this year to support Ukraine's war effort.
In line with the new government's commitment to speed up the delivery of aid, the first shipment of LMM missiles is also expected by the end of this year.
‘This new commitment will provide an important boost to Ukraine's air defence and demonstrates our new government's commitment to increasing support for Ukraine.
In recent days, we have seen the tragic cost of Russia's indiscriminate attacks on Poltava and Lviv. These new British-made missiles will help Ukraine defend its people, infrastructure and territory from Putin's brutal attacks,’ says Healey.
The package is funded largely by the UK's £3 billion a year of financial assistance to Ukraine, as well as contributions from Norway through the International Fund for Ukraine (IFU), and is in line with the Prime Minister and Defence Secretary's commitment to support Ukraine for as long as it takes.
Today, the 24th meeting of the Contact Group on Ukraine's Defence, known as the Ramstein format, will take place at the eponymous US Air Force base in Germany. President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy will personally attend the meeting.