The head of the Romanian Defence Ministry, Angel Tylvar, has said that Bucharest is not obliged to send its own Patriot surface-to-air missile systems (SAMs) to Ukraine, as the US installations are needed to protect “national territory”.
“No one said that we should give up the Patriot SAMs. The equipment has been requested from them (Ukraine. – ed.) taking into account the situation there,” the Romanian defence minister said on TVR.
According to the head of the Romanian Defence Ministry, the country has one working Patriot SAM system. According to him, three other US installations “are in the process of being put into working condition”.
“For now, our needs are met by these equipment. We took them precisely because of Romania’s need to defend its national territory,” Angel Tulvar noted.
The Romanian Defence Minister stressed that the situation with the possible transfer of Patriot SAMs to Ukraine will be discussed in detail at the level of the Supreme National Defence Council. According to Tulvar, it is not about damaging “national security, it is about defence of the national territory in coordination with our allies, because Romania is part of the alliance”.
Earlier, Polish President Andrzej Duda said that Warsaw had no possibility to send US Patriot systems to Ukraine because the republic simply did not have them.
