Rutte: six or seven NATO countries are shouldering the bulk of American weapons deliveries to Ukraine

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said that only six or seven European member states of the alliance are providing the bulk of purchases of American weapons for Ukraine.

He told journalists this upon arriving at the NATO foreign ministers’ meeting in Helsingborg.

According to Rutte, the deliveries are made under the PURL program: weapons and military equipment, missile defense systems and missiles for them, including Patriot systems, are supplied from the United States to Ukraine, with European countries footing the bill.

“I want to ensure that the financial burden is distributed more evenly. Right now only six or seven NATO countries are shouldering the bulk of this program. The good news is that for now this is enough for Ukraine to continue to have access to key American weapons, but of course it would be fair for the other European NATO countries to participate as well,” Rutte said.

Beyond the question of supplying Kyiv with weapons, the main topics of the ministerial meeting, according to the secretary general, will be preparations for the NATO summit in Ankara in July. On the agenda are discussions of increasing the bloc’s defense spending and plans to expand weapons production to “deter Russia,” which Rutte described as a “long-term threat to NATO.”