THE Defense minister of Denmark names a key condition after his country announced the donation of F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine.
Ukraine’s President Vladimir Zelensky secured a significant pledge during his European tour as the Netherlands and Denmark committed to providing long-awaited F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine.
Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte announced an airbase in Eindhoven during a joint press conference with President Zelensky recently.
Rutte stated, “The Netherlands and Denmark commit to transferring F-16 aircraft to Ukraine and the Ukrainian Air Force, in cooperation with the United States and other partners once conditions are met.”
Although the exact number of F-16s to be donated is yet to be confirmed, Zelensky called it a “historic” breakthrough and hinted at receiving 42 planes in total from the Netherlands alone.
Denmark’s Defense Ministry confirmed its support for Ukraine, promising F-16s subject to specific “conditions.” These include selecting, testing, and training Ukrainian F-16 personnel, alongside necessary authorizations, infrastructure, and logistics.
The donation arrives as both the Netherlands and Denmark replace older F-16s with modern F-35s.
However, the F-16 fighter jets set to be donated to Ukraine by the two countries must only be used on Ukrainian territory, as said by Danish Defense Minister Jakob Ellemann-Jensen.
According to a Reuters report, the Danish Defense minister underscored that Denmark and the Netherlands will donate the weapons under the condition that they are used to drive enemies out of Ukrainian territory, and no further than that.
These are the conditions, whether it’s tanks, fighter jets, or something else, as said by Ellemann-Jensen.
Meanwhile, Pentagon spokesperson Sabrina Singh explained that Ukraine must meet certain criteria before they approved the requests of the Netherlands and Denmark to transfer the F-16s and that the process is going to take some time.
Singh also said that the US was open to the idea of training Ukrainian pilots to fly the F-16 jets if Denmark and the Netherlands could not teach all of the pilots sent by Ukraine at once and that it’s up to Kyiv to decide how many of their pilots are going to receive such training.
