Ukraine commended the decision of the NATO Summit that our country will become a member of the Alliance, and the Membership Action Plan (MAP) is an integral part of this process.
"We are grateful to NATO members for such a logical decision, which fully confirmed the decision of the 2008 Bucharest NATO Summit," said President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
"At the same time, the decision of this year's Summit lacks specific time frames for the next steps in our rapprochement with NATO, which we expected," the President said.
In the communiqué of the Brussels Summit, NATO member countries welcomed the significant Euro-Atlantic reforms that Ukraine has already implemented and reaffirmed their willingness to continue to provide practical support to our country in implementing security and defense reforms.
"We will continue the course of security and defense reforms in order to meet the standards of interoperability with NATO member states even more," Volodymyr Zelenskyy said.
NATO leaders praised Ukraine's significant contribution to the Alliance’s operations, participation in the NATO Response Force and NATO exercises. They also stressed the importance of military cooperation and capacity-building initiatives between Allies and Ukraine, in particular the activities of the Lithuanian-Polish-Ukrainian Brigade.
"Ukraine, not being a member of NATO, is already making a significant contribution to Euro-Atlantic security. Confronting Russian aggression in the east, during which, unfortunately, Ukrainian soldiers continue to perish, is our invaluable contribution to the security of the entire Euro-Atlantic area," the President said.
In his future bilateral talks with the leaders of NATO member states, the President will continue a detailed discussion of Ukraine's Euro-Atlantic aspirations. This will be discussed in particular at his meeting with US President Joe Biden during the planned visit to the United States.
"Ukraine's role in ensuring global security must be properly assessed," Volodymyr Zelenskyy stressed.