The European Commission has identified 15 companies in 11 countries where production capacity in the defence industry could be increased, and Romania is one of these countries, said European Commissioner for Internal Market Thierry Breton who visited on Wednesday, at the invitation of the minister of Economy, Florin Spataru, two of the defence industry factories, subsidiaries of Romarm, namely Plopeni Mechanical Plant and Dragomiresti Special Products Plant.
"All European countries have unanimously decided to support Ukraine's requests, to help Ukraine defend itself against this aggression. And we will continue to do so. Of course, we know that in order to do this we have to provide Ukraine with equipment and also ammunition. It is important that we provide the quantities requested by the Ukrainian authorities and we are determined to do so. We have decided, together with the Ministries of Defence and the European Commission, to launch a major tender, worth over one billion euros, to buy the ammunition that is needed and we want to do this with the European defence industry. We have identified 15 companies from 11 countries in Europe that can respond to this request for increased capacity to produce what is needed and Romania is one of these countries," Breton told a conference at the end of his visit.
He stressed that after visiting the two factories he was impressed by the dedication of the people, their skills and the equipment they saw, something that gives him confidence that Romania will be part of this tender, "which is important both for Ukraine and for our own security".
The Commissioner for Internal Market explained that there are three pillars through which Member States and entities can be supported in relation to the current requests to supply ammunition to Ukraine.
"The first is a billion euros that we are using from the European Peace Facility to reimburse member states that donate part of their own ammunition stocks and we are encouraging member states to do so. The second pillar is another billion euros whereby we would like to launch a tender for companies in the European defence industry to deliver what is needed, on the one hand to replenish the ammunition stocks of the member states that have donated part of their stocks to Ukraine, and also to maintain a certain level of ammunition stocks. And the third pillar, to make sure that we can strengthen and increase the capacity of the defence industry to meet these demands and here I am about to finalise an instrument, if we come to the conclusion that we need more financial support, including to invest in new production lines," explained Thierry Breton.AGERPRES
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