Ukraine invited to NATO summit in The Hague this month

Ukraine, which is defending itself a full-scale Russian invasion, has received an invitation to the upcoming NATO summit in The Hague.

“We have been invited to the NATO summit. I think that is important,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told journalists on Monday.

The invitation was extended during his meeting with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte in Vilnius. Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha has been tasked with preparing the meeting.

Zelensky did not say whether he would travel to the Netherlands himself. The summit of the member states of the NATO military alliance is scheduled to take place in The Hague in just under three weeks.

Ukraine has been fighting a Russian invasion with Western support for more than three years. Preventing Kiev from joining NATO, which is enshrined in the country’s constitution, is one of the Kremlin’s main reasons for having launched the assault on its neighbour Ukraine.