On June 17, during talks with a high-ranking African diplomatic delegation in St. Petersburg, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a draft preliminary treaty with Ukraine, a document drafted in March 2022 in Istanbul, Türkiye.
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| Denmark wants to transfer F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine. (Source: Arenalogic) |
“As you know, a series of talks between Russia and Ukraine have been held in Türkiye to develop confidence-building measures and draft the text of the treaty,” President Putin said.
We did agree with the Ukrainian side that this agreement would be kept confidential, but we never published it or commented on it. This draft treaty was initialed by the head of the negotiating team from Kiev. He put his signature to it. Here it is!”
According to President Putin, the above document is called “Treaty on Permanent Neutrality and Security Guarantees for Ukraine”, which includes 18 articles. Point 1 of Clause 1 of the draft treaty states: “Ukraine is committed to maintaining permanent neutrality, which is declared and enshrined in the Constitution of Ukraine”.
The next points of the document affirm that the guarantor states recognize, respect and guarantee the status of Ukraine as a permanently neutral state, and commit to ensuring compliance with this status at the international level.
In return, Kiev “undertook not to take any actions contrary to the international legal status of permanent neutrality.”
The list of guarantor countries listed in the preamble of the draft treaty includes Britain, China, Russia, the United States and France.
In a related development, on the same day, June 17, Acting Danish Defense Minister Troels Lund Poulsen announced that Copenhagen is ready to provide F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine and hopes that the US will support this decision.
Speaking at the Folkemødet forum in Allinge, Mr. Poulsen said that the final decision has not been made yet and that Denmark cannot decide on its own but needs to get the "green light" from Washington because the F-16 fighter jet was developed by the US.
Earlier, Denmark and the Netherlands pledged to start training Ukrainian pilots and aircraft technicians on F-16 multirole fighter jets.
The media reported that the administration of US President Joe Biden "signaled to European allies" that Washington would not hinder the determination to send F-16s to Ukraine.
White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said the US would not provide F-16s from its military stockpile. Instead, Washington may “focus more on third-party transfers, but President Biden has not made a final decision.”
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