FT: Intense pressure on Greece and Spain to send Patriot to Ukraine – EU Foreign Ministers meet

European Union foreign ministers are meeting today in Luxembourg to discuss strengthening Ukraine’s air defenses and extension of sanctions against Iran.

There is also expected to be a discussion about the war in Sudanhowever attention will be paid to conflicts on the EU’s eastern and southern doorstep, Ukraine and the Middle East.

As Russia has escalated airstrikes against Ukrainian energy infrastructure and other targets, European governments are being pressured to supply Kiev with air defense systemssuch as in particular the American-made Patriot.

Intense pressure in Greece and Spain

According to a report in the Financial Times, there is particularly intense pressure on Greece and Spain to provide such systems, with European leaders at the European Council last week in Brussels personally asking Kyriakos Mitsotakis and Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez to move to this direction.

The two leaders, whose armed forces have more than twelve Patriot systems as well as other systems, such as the S-300, have heard other leaders tell them that their needs are not as great as Ukraine’s and that they face no imminent threat.

Kiev secured support from the US over the weekend, as the House of Representatives approved a $60 billion-plus funding package.

However, the head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell, and the NATO Secretary General, Jens Stoltenberg, urge European countries to step up their own efforts to supply Ukraine with weapons, especially air defense systems.

Following a video conference of NATO defense ministers with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Friday, the NATO Secretary General said that expect announcements soon.

“NATO mapped existing capabilities across the alliance and there are systems that can be made available in UkraineStoltenberg said.

“In addition to the Patriot, there are other weapons that the allies can procure, including the (French system) SAMP/T,” he added.

Germany promised to send Patriot

By this stage, Germany is the only EU country that pledged to send additional Patriot system to Ukraine after Kiev’s calls.

The Foreign Ministers’ meeting will also be attended by European defense ministers, as well as their Ukrainian counterparts, before attention turns to the crisis in the Middle East, triggered by the Hamas attack on southern Israel on October 7.

Sanctions on Iran

Agreement will be sought on how far the EU should go in sanctions against Tehran following last weekend’s Iranian attack on Israel.

The EU has already implemented various sanctions against Iranciting the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, human rights violations and the supply of UAVs to Russia.

The European Council decided last week to impose new sanctions on the Islamic Republic. More specifically, many EU countries are calling for the existing drone-related sanctions regime to be expanded to include missiles and arms transfers to forces close to Tehran in the Middle East.

Member states are specifically debating whether and to what extent new sanctions related to missile production should be imposed, according to diplomatic sources.

In addition, some countries are pushing for the EU to find a way to designate the Revolutionary Guards, Iran’s elite military, as a terrorist organization.

But officials note that the legal basis for this step has not yet been found and they are not sure that it would be supported by all member states.

With information from FT and APE-MPE

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