Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy expressed gratitude to the Netherlands on March 1 for a new package of aid signed during a visit to Kharkiv by Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte.
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Zelenskiy put the value of the arms pact at 2 billion euros ($2.17 billion) for the current year. The package was part of a security agreement signed by Rutte and Zelenskiy. It is the sixth agreement of this kind between Ukraine and a Western state.
Zelenskiy also said in a video address that the Netherlands would help secure the skies over Ukraine with its participation in the coalition of states supplying Kyiv with F-16 fighter jets as he and Rutte agreed to speed up the process of supplying Ukraine with the planes.
“Regarding the F-16: we are on schedule. This means that they will be in the Ukrainian sky later this year, but there is still a lot to be done,” Rutte said at a joint press conference with Zelenskiy.
Rutte said he and Zelenskiy discussed the possibility of accelerating the transfer of the F-16s.
"So we will ask our defense ministries to work on this together with our partners like Norway, Belgium, and other countries that are part of the F-16 coalition because Ukraine needs this advantage in the air as quickly as possible," he said.
The Danish Defense Ministry reported earlier that Denmark will transfer F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine in the summer of 2024.
The ministry noted that it is difficult to establish a clear schedule for the transfer of the fighter jets because there are several conditions that must be met in order for Ukraine to be able to use them.
Denmark and the Netherlands became the first countries to promise to transfer F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine, but it will only happen after Ukrainian pilots are trained to fly them.
Rutte's trip included joining Zelenskiy in visiting wounded Ukrainian soldiers at a hospital in Kharkiv. The two leaders also visited an underground classroom where schoolchildren attend classes safe from missile strikes.
The visit to Kharkiv was a rare one by a senior Western politician as the city is regularly attacked by Russian air strikes and is much closer to the Russian border than Kyiv.
"The task facing Ukrainian allies is clear -- do whatever you can to provide what is needed, as long as it takes," Rutte said.