Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni vowed to continue Italy’s staunch support for Ukraine on a visit to Kyiv, pledging to provide more air defense systems but falling short of committing to tanks or jets.
(Bloomberg) — Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni vowed to continue Italy’s staunch support for Ukraine on a visit to Kyiv, pledging to provide more air defense systems but falling short of committing to tanks or jets.
“Those who support Ukraine militarily are those who support peace,” Meloni told reporters after meeting with President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in Kyiv. “A victory for Russia wouldn’t be peace but would be an invasion, and a defeat for Ukraine would be nothing else but the prelude to the potential invasion of other European states.”
Meloni said that Italy is focusing on sending air defense systems, which include the so-called SAMP/T-MAMBA, with France. While the premier confirmed the government is working on a new military package for Ukraine, she said that there are no plans to send jets for now. “This is a decision to take with foreign partners,” she said.
While details of Italy’s military support to Ukraine are not public, the new right-wing government which has succeeded Mario Draghi’s broad coalition has already approved a decree which continues military support throughout the year.
Meloni has been a strong backer of Ukraine since she took office at the end of last year, but her coalition partners Silvio Berlusconi and Matteo Salvini have in the past praised Russian President Vladimir Putin and cultivated ties with Russia.
Politicians “have the right to have their own position,” Zelenskiy said as he stood alongside Meloni. He added that Berlusconi’s “house has never been bombed everyday,” nor did he see his relatives killed. “Berlusconi did not get up at three in the morning to do all the household work, as there will a blackout for two or three days, caused by Russians.”
Details of the meeting had been kept confidential ahead of the visit, but Meloni said repeatedly she wanted to make the trip before the Feb. 24 one-year mark of the Russian invasion. The visit was the second by an Italian premier to Kyiv since the start of the invasion.
Former premier Draghi traveled to Kyiv last June on a train with French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz to show European unity in support for Ukraine. But Meloni has so far struggled to be treated on a par with Macron and Scholz, and was not invited to a dinner with Zelenskiy at the Elysee palace earlier this month.
Earlier this month, ex-premier Berlusconi blamed Zelenskiy for the continuation of the war, saying that giving up Donbas would be enough to end the war. Berlusconi, a friend of Putin’s, has said in the past that he sent the Russian president some bottles of wine over Christmas.
Those remarks prompted Zelenskiy to joke in an interview with Italian media this week: “Maybe we should send him something as well. Does he like vodka? We have really good vodka in Ukraine.”
–With assistance from Alessandro Speciale.
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