President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy has arrived in the Washington to take part in the NATO summit.
The three-day summit will also be attended by the leaders of the 32-member military alliance.
The Ukraine war, now dragging into its 29th month, is set to be high on the agenda, with Zelenskyy set to use the occasion to further press for more military assistance.
In particular, the participants will talk about strengthening the military potential of the alliance, increasing the size of the armies of its member countries, acquiring new weapons, including air defense and missile defense systems, as well as new requirements to increase the defense spending of European states.
The Ukrainian President is expected to give a speech at the Ronald Reagan Institute later on Tuesday, July 9, 2024.
He has been urging allies to bolster Ukrainian air defence systems and is expected to renew those pleas during the summit.
Observers expect NATO members to pledge at least four additional Patriot missile batteries.
Zelenskyy had previously asked NATO for seven batteries, saying that Russian President, Vladimir Putin “must be brought down to earth, and our sky must become safe again … And it depends fully on your choice … [the] choice whether we are indeed allies.”
Kremlin To Closely Follow NATO Summit
Meanwhile, the Kremlin disclosed that it would closely follow the summit because the alliance had declared Moscow its enemy and sought to defeat Russia.
Kremlin Spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov said that NATO “is an alliance that considers Russia an enemy, an opponent.”
He added that NATO “has regularly declared its aim to inflict a strategic defeat on Russia on the battlefield” and “is taking part directly in the Ukrainian conflict on the side of Ukraine.”
According to Peskov, Ukraine obviously planned to use the incident when an anti-missile projectile hit a children’s hospital as a background for Zelenskyy’s participation in the NATO summit.
“Indeed, this is a tragedy but it is used to create a background for Zelensky’s participation in the NATO summit,” he said in an interview with journalist, Pavel Zarubin, while commenting on the strike on the Okhmatdyt children’s hospital.
“Such dirty, Jesuitical methods have been used more than once,” he noted.
He drew attention to the fact that the strike with an anti-missile projectile took place ahead of the NATO summit.
“I don’t think that there can be any coincidences when such things are concerned,” he said.
Moreover, Peskov told the journalist that the incident with a Ukrainian air defense missile hitting a children’s hospital in Kyiv is a PR stunt.
“It’s kind of a PR stunt, actually, a PR stunt built on blood,” Peskov said, commenting on the strike.
“Clearly, the air defense missile was used incorrectly, which is why it hit the children’s hospital,” the Kremlin spokesman added.
Russia’s top brass dismissed as untrue Ukrainian allegations that a Russian missile strike deliberately targeted civilian infrastructure as they said images and footage from the site of the attack showed a Ukrainian air defense missile crashing into the health facility.
The Russian Defense ministry emphasized that “the Kyiv regime has been throwing such tantrums for years, each time ahead of a get-together (summit) of its NATO sponsors.”
The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) will hold a meeting on Ukraine later on Tuesday.
Russia’s First Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN, Dmitry Polyansky stated that at the meeting, Russia will share evidence refuting the Ukrainian version of the attack on Kyiv.
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