NATO and Ukraine Launch New Format of Cooperation

During the meeting of NATO Ministers of Defence the Ukrainian delegation agreed on a new format for cooperation with the North Atlantic Alliance, said the head of the country’s defense department Andriy Zagorodnyuk. Ukraine is updating the format of cooperation with NATO, announced the Minister of Defense Andriy Zagorodnyuk in Brussels on Friday, October 25, after the meeting of the NATO heads of defense. “We are restarting our cooperation format NATO, making it more practical”, said Zagorodnyuk. It is called “one-country-one-plan approach”. Deputy Foreign Minister of Ukraine Yegor Bozhok, also a member of the Kyiv delegation, said that within the cooperation between Ukraine and NATO there is a lot of programs and projects to be implemented. According to him, the new format will improve the implementation of programs and make cooperation between Ukraine and NATO more transparent. The Minister of Defense Zagorodnyuk also said that he agreed with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg to develop a schedule for the implementation of the new plan. It will be controlled by one team, which will include representatives of both sides. But the NATO experts will finally evaluate the fulfillment of the tasks indicated in the plan, the Ukrainian minister assured. Zagorodniuk called priority for Ukraine the transition to NATO standards. “A roadmap for each of them will be developed ... After its implementation, we can say that the armed forces of Ukraine are already working according to NATO standards,” he said. DW