Zelenskyy urges Western allies to allocate 0.25% of GDP for Ukraine’s defence

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has called on Western allies to dedicate 0.25% of their GDP to supporting Ukraine’s weapons production as the country looks to scale up its defence capabilities amid the ongoing war with Russia.

In comments released by his office on Saturday, Zelenskyy also said that Ukraine plans to begin exporting weapon production technologies this summer. Talks are underway with several countries including Denmark, Norway, Germany, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Lithuania on launching joint weapons manufacturing agreements.

Zelensky accused Western firms of supplying Russia with tools used to make weapons, in remarks made public Saturday.

“The Russian Federation receives machine tools from some countries –- machine tools that they use to manufacture weapons,” he said, adding that companies from the Czech Republic and Germany were among them.

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Zelenskyy said on Friday that Ukraine was working on the rapid development of interceptor drones to counter the swarms of Russian drones that have been descending on Ukrainian cities in increasing numbers in recent weeks.

Ukrainian officials have noted the sharply increased numbers of Iranian-designed Shahed drones deployed by Russian drones in the course of a single night and say it is vital to develop technology capable of tackling the threat they pose.

He also said that Kyiv received the bodies of 20 Russian soldiers instead of Ukrainian ones during exchanges of war dead with Moscow.

He accused Russia of “not checking” who they were sending, and suggested Moscow might be doing it on purpose to conflate the number of Ukrainian bodies they had.

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The repatriation of fallen soldiers and the exchange of prisoners of war has been one of the few areas of cooperation between the warring sides since Moscow invaded Ukraine in February 2022.

Moscow and Kyiv agreed earlier this month during talks in Istanbul to exchange the bodies of 6,000 soldiers each.

“It has already been confirmed during repatriations that the bodies of 20 people handed over to us as our deceased soldiers are Russian,” Zelensky said in remarks released on Saturday.

“Sometimes these bodies even have Russian passports,” he added.

An “Israeli mercenary” fighting for Moscow was also among those sent, he said.

Tens of thousands of soldiers have been killed on both sides since the war began. Neither country regularly releases information on military casualties.

Zelenskyy said there were currently “695,000 Russian troops” on Ukrainian territory.

With inputs from agencies