Italy will supply Ukraine with an anti-aircraft system. According to European correspondent Geert-Jan Hahn, it is a SAMP/T system, a Franco-Italian-made anti-aircraft system that can be compared to Patriot systems. He added: “It is the best European anti-aircraft system, and it is still present in Kuwait, but it will return soon and then head to Ukraine.” This is, above all, an important symbolic step.
Italy provides Ukraine with the best European air defense system
So far, Germany has been the only country to heed the call by Mark Rutte and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg to send more air defenses to Ukraine. “But now a dangerous anti-aircraft system is coming to Ukraine. This is not enough, but it is very important,” says Hahn.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is in the Philippines. There he is trying to gain the support of South Asian countries for the peace conference that will eventually be held in Switzerland. “About a hundred countries have already agreed to send someone to this conference, and this conference is based on Zelensky’s hundred-point plan,” says foreign commentator Bernard Hammelburg.
The plan stipulates, among other things, that Russian President Vladimir Putin must appear before the court and that all occupied territories must be returned. “This is not really attractive for the Russian side, but it is not welcome either,” he added. “This is something that makes me wonder if it would be wise to at least send out an invitation.”
China is guilty
However, according to the foreign commentator, Zelensky has not yet managed to get Asian countries to side with him. The Ukrainian president himself blames China for this, but Hammelburg sees it differently. He added, “Most South Asian countries have no desire to take a position in this conflict, and this has been the case from the beginning.”
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The United States has already announced that it will send Vice President Kamala Harris to the peace conference. According to Hammelburg, this is not symbolically unimportant. “Harris is part of the executive branch, so sending her is no easy feat. But sending Biden to such a conference is not a good plan either, because you already know that the conference will not provide a solution anyway.”
Hahn agrees: “Zelensky always does his best and always acts a little angry when he doesn’t get what he wants right. Then he hopes that other countries will still give in, but I don’t think that will happen now.” More than a hundred people are attending the peace summit in Switzerland. A country, but one hundred ambassadors is different from one hundred prime ministers.