Berlin: At the upcoming summit in Lithuania, Germany opposes giving Kiev a specific timetable or tangible assurances of joining the Western military alliance, according to NATO officials quoted in The Telegraph on Saturday.
"Berlin is apprehensive about the possibility of offering immediate membership... The military bloc, according to an unnamed source, wants a procedure and some time to create guarantees to essentially prevent membership.
German officials are reportedly concerned that Kiev will immediately cite Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty, which states that an attack on one NATO member "shall be considered an attack against them all."
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Olaf Scholz, the German chancellor, stated in a statement from last month that "we have to take a sober look at the current situation." He argued that the Western bloc should concentrate on other ways to support Kiev because even Ukrainian officials acknowledge "that joining NATO is out of the question" as long as the conflict with Russia is ongoing.
In a recent interview, US President Joe Biden expressed similar worries, claiming that Ukraine's membership in NATO would result in "war with Russia," and instead making reference to some sort of arrangement "a la the security we provide for Israel."
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The "Israel model" was also brought up by French President Emmanuel Macron, who stated in June that "we have to build something between the security provided to Israel and full membership."
According to The Telegraph, the US, Germany, and France are "understood to be working on a series of bilateral security offers" to Kiev. These offers would be incorporated into a larger "Memorandum of Understanding" that would have the support of NATO and the EU.
At the upcoming summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, Ukraine has demanded an invitation from NATO or at the very least a statement about when it might be prepared to welcome it on board. According to reports, President Vladimir Zelensky even threatened to cancel the summit unless the bloc provided "concrete" assurances.
NATO's official stance on Ukrainian membership has remained largely unchanged since 2008, when it said that the bloc's "door is open" and Ukraine "will become a member" at an unspecified later date. Despite some rhetorical changes since then, however.
Moscow has stated repeatedly that it sees the eastward expansion of NATO as a threat to national security and that a lasting peace between the two nations is contingent upon Ukraine remaining neutral.