According to three EU diplomats, a small group of countries led by France is blocking attempts to use EU money for buying shells for Ukraine from outside of the bloc, Report informs referring to Politico.
European arms manufacturers say that they need orders to justify ramping up their production.
Earlier this week at a meeting of the Political and Security Committee, a majority of EU countries was in favor of allowing EU money to be used to buy non-EU produced shells as an emergency measure to help Ukraine, the diplomats told Playbook. But France, Greece and Cyprus opposed the effort, the diplomats said.
That’s despite a senior French official telling my Paris colleagues late last month that France would allow non-EU purchases if the bloc missed its target of delivering 1 million shells to Ukraine by March - which it will.