LONDON, June 20. /TASS/. The United States will announce a move on Thursday to halt all open orders for its Patriot air defense systems to ensure that Ukraine has enough of those, the Financial Times reported, citing people with knowledge of the decision.
The European countries with open orders for the Patriot systems include Germany, Romania and Spain, the people told the British newspaper.
In January, NATO’s Support and Procurement Agency placed an order to procure 1,000 Patriot missiles to strengthen their air defenses amid the Ukraine conflict for a coalition of its allies, namely Germany, the Netherlands, Romania and Spain, the newspaper recounted.
According to the people interviewed by the FT, Washington made the decision after US President Joe Biden made a statement at the G7 summit in Italy last week. The US leader said on June 13 that the United States "let it be known to those countries that are expecting from us air defense systems in the future that they’re going to have to wait," as "everything we have is going to go to Ukraine until their needs are met." According to Biden, Washington has acquired commitment from five nations for Patriot batteries.