Ukraine has received less than a third of the one million artillery shells the European Union promised to deliver, President Volodymyr Zelensky said Monday.
After two years of war and political infighting among its allies, Kyiv has been struggling to secure the artillery rounds needed to defend the frontline two years after Russia’s invasion.
“Out of the million shells that the European Union promised us, not 50 percent came, but 30 percent, unfortunately,” Zelensky said at a press conference with Bulgarian Prime Minister Nikolay Denkov in Kyiv.
The EU made the pledge last year, but in January it acknowledged that it would be able to supply only half the initial one million shells earmarked to be supplied by March.
Ukraine urged the EU earlier this month to take “urgent steps” to increase deliveries by easing regulations and signing contracts with defence companies.
It has since been forced to withdraw its forces from the eastern town of Avdiivka, handing Moscow its first major territorial gain in over a year.
