NATO Secretary General: All member states are in favor of admitting Ukraine, but no timeline has been set.
In a conversation with The Washington Post, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that all NATO allies support the idea of Ukraine's accession, but that no specific timeline has been set.
He also emphasized that NATO members believe that Ukraine has the right to choose its own path, and this decision should be made in Kyiv, not Moscow.
Stoltenberg noted that NATO is currently contributing to the development of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, supporting their interoperability with Alliance forces, as well as reforming and modernizing defense and security structures.
The NATO Secretary General believes that the most important task now is to ensure Ukraine's victory as a sovereign, independent state, as without this, the issue of joining NATO will not be relevant.
Ukraine's Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba says that at the July NATO summit in Vilnius, the Alliance should make a political decision to set a timetable for Ukraine's accession or commit to doing so by the end of the year as a signal to Russia. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy also plans to attend the summit.
According to The Financial Times, the United States, Germany, and Hungary are resisting attempts by Poland and the Baltic states to put Ukraine's NATO membership on the agenda of the July summit in Vilnius.
Hungary claimed that Ukraine's accession to NATO requires Russia's "approval." Kyiv immediately responded to these statements by emphasizing that Ukraine does not need Russia's consent to join the Alliance.
On September 30, 2022, after Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the annexation of the occupied territories of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced that Ukraine would apply for NATO membership under an accelerated procedure. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg noted that Ukraine's victory should be a prerequisite for the start of negotiations on NATO membership, and that the Alliance members support Ukraine in this process.
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