Germany pledges 500 mn euros in more military aid to Ukraine

BERLIN: Germany will supply Ukraine with a further 500 million euros ($500 million) in military aid, most of it earmarked for delivery next year, a government spokesman said on Tuesday.

The equipment will include three IRIS-T anti-aircraft systems, “around a dozen armed recovery vehicles, 20 rocket-launchers mounted on pick-ups… precision munition and anti-drone equipment,” the spokesman told AFP.

Most of it will be delivered in 2023, he added.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz and his government, which has decided to invest 100 billion euros in modernising the German army, have come under heavy criticism in recent months, not least by Ukrainian authorities themselves, over its apparent reticence to supply weapons to Kyiv.

Scholz had already said at the beginning of June that Berlin would provide the IRIS-T anti-aircraft system developed by German manufacturer Diehl.