(Adds EU pledging support for port infrastructure in paragraph
6)
By Max Hunder
KYIV, Nov 25 (Reuters) – Ukraine needs more air defences
to protect its grain export routes as well as regions bordering
Russia, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Saturday, as he
addressed an international summit on food security in Kyiv.
“There is a deficit of air defence – that is no secret,”
Zelenskiy told the Grain from Ukraine summit, which was attended
by senior officials from European countries, including Swiss
President Alain Berset and Lithuanian Prime Minister Ingrida
Simonyte.
Zelenskiy was speaking after Russia attacked Ukraine with 75
drones overnight, the biggest drone assault of the war. The
joint press conference of the three leaders was cut short by
another air raid siren.
Zelenskiy said Ukraine would be supplied by its foreign
partners with vessels to accompany convoys of cargo ships from
Ukraine’s ports to guarantee their security.
“I have agreements with several countries about powerful
accompaniment of convoys by Ukrainians, but using (foreign)
equipment,” he said.
Separately, European Commission President Ursula von der
Leyen pledged support in a letter to Zelenskiy that she shared
on social media platform X, saying the Commission would make
available 50 million euros for “quick repairs and upgrades of
infrastructure in Ukraine’s ports.”
The Ukrainian president said Kyiv hoped to solve its air
defence shortage through new supplies from partners and
increasing its own production capacity, something on which he
said there had been progress.
“As of today, I can’t say details what we are making and
where, but there is progress,” he said.
Ukraine, a major exporter of grain, has been exporting grain
via unilateral corridors through the Black sea, after Russia
withdrew in July from a UN-brokered deal to allow grain ships
through its blockade.
Ukraine’s current Black sea grain export corridors all start
from ports in Ukraine’s southern region of Odesa.
“There are certain air defence systems… we are asking for
them,” Zelenskiy said. “We’ve already got an answer when those
systems will start to guard that region. Because there, both the
corridor and the people are important.”
Asked about the protests by Polish and Slovak truckers which
have blocked much of Ukraine’s road-based cargo supply in recent
days, Zelenskiy blamed the problem on the internal politics of
those countries.
“I believe that there are difficulties on the border first
and foremost because of certain political steps by our
neighbours,” he told a press conference after the summit.
Zelenskiy said he was confident the issue would be solved if
Ukraine’s neighbours were given “a bit of time” to deal with the
dispute.
(Reporting by Max Hunder; additional reporting by Elaine
Monaghan in Washington; Editing by Hugh Lawson)