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President Joe Biden enters day two of the NATO Summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, facing questions about Ukraine’s path to becoming a member of the alliance, with concerns from his Ukrainian counterpart on full display and fissures among NATO leaders on the thorny issue.
Ukraine has been a dominant item on the summit’s agenda as the US president looks to keep the group united behind President Volodymyr Zelensky in the face of Russia’s invasion. While the final communique from the summit does remove one barrier to entry, the Ukrainian president will likely be left looking for more signs of assurances from the allied nations.
While US officials have emphatically said Ukraine will not be joining NATO as a member coming out of this meeting, there are few concrete steps or timelines the group has offered as a significant show of support for the war-torn nation.
Zelensky arrived in Lithuania on Tuesday and will participate in the summit and meet one-on-one with Biden, his attendance a sign of unity that threatens to be overshadowed by a blistering statement he issued while he was on his way to the gathering.
The Ukrainian president said he has “received signals that certain wording is being discussed without Ukraine,” emphasizing that the “wording is about the invitation to become NATO member, not about Ukraine’s membership.”
“It’s unprecedented and absurd when time frame is not set neither for the invitation nor for Ukraine’s membership. While at the same time vague wording about ‘conditions’ is added even for inviting Ukraine. It seems there is no readiness neither to invite Ukraine to NATO nor to make it a member of the Alliance,” Zelensky said in the statement, issued via tweet, adding, “Uncertainty is weakness. And I will openly discuss this at the summit.”
The final communiqué, released Tuesday, is unlikely to provide Zelensky the answers he demands.
