President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy met with President of Estonia Alar Karis, who is visiting our country these days for the last time while serving as President.
The Head of State thanked Estonia for its unwavering support for Ukraine and Ukrainians, the level of cooperation achieved, its principled stance in assessing Russia’s aggression, and joint European efforts to protect against it.
“Estonia provides us with military assistance. We support each other’s security capabilities, and we have the Drone Deal format between us – we signed it – which allows us to share our defense experience with your country, with Estonia. Of course, it is important to accelerate this work with Estonia and the Baltic states as a whole within the Drone Deal framework,” Volodymyr Zelenskyy said.
Alar Karis noted that Estonia is considering ways to strengthen cooperation between the defense industries, in particular, and is interested in Ukraine’s experience and joint production of defense equipment.
“Estonia is doing everything possible to ensure that Ukraine receives additional missile interceptors. Of course, we are not able to produce and supply these missiles to Ukraine, but we are using all diplomatic mechanisms to ensure that Russian ballistic missiles do not hit civilian and infrastructure facilities,” the President of Estonia stressed.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy emphasized that Estonia was among the first to engage in Ukraine’s reconstruction – restoring and building educational institutions, homes for Ukrainian families, and infrastructure in the Zhytomyr region.
The President of Ukraine also noted that Estonia has always been a principled supporter of Ukraine’s European and Euro-Atlantic integration. The Head of State thanked Estonia for supporting the opening of all clusters this year.
“It is always particularly difficult to discuss Ukraine’s Euro-Atlantic choice with our partners. But it is very important that there are principled partners who consistently raise this issue, even in diplomatic circles where Ukraine is not present. We know that Estonia’s advocacy is always on our side, and we are very grateful for that,” he said.
The leaders discussed security threats, particularly those expected in winter. Volodymyr Zelenskyy emphasized that Ukraine and Estonia share a common understanding that Russia’s aggression against one country in the region always means potential aggression against any neighboring country, so we must be able to defend ourselves together and develop alliances.
“All voices in Europe must speak out in support of providing Ukraine with air defense. It is important that our special NB8, Nordic-Baltic, cooperation format is also effective – Ukraine together with the Nordic and Baltic states. We count on Estonia continuing to play an active role in all the coalitions established since the beginning of the full-scale war, including the IT Coalition, which Estonia leads,” the Head of State said.
The President also noted the importance of continued support from Estonia for all necessary sanctions against Russia.