EU to train additional 15,000 Ukrainian soldiers

The European Union is set to double the number of Ukrainian troops it is planning to train to 30,000, as the bloc continues to ramp up its efforts to help Kyiv achieve victory in its war with Russia.

"This will be reached probably before the end of the second quarter of this year and there will be a new additional target of a further 15,000 Ukrainian soldiers trained by various European countries," an unnamed EU official told AFP, The Brussels Times reports.

"So that will bring the number of Ukrainian soldiers trained in this scheme to 30,000."

The EU's current €16 million training scheme — the European Union Military Assistance Mission in support of Ukraine (EUMAM Ukraine) — was announced in October last year. Its stated goal is to "strengthen the capacity of the Ukrainian Armed Forces to defend Ukraine's territorial integrity within its internationally recognised borders and to deter and respond to possible future military offensives by Russia and other potential aggressors".

The training EUMAM offers typically takes place across multiple EU countries, although the Mission is nominally headquartered in Poland.

According to Belga News Agency, the official announcement of the additional 15,000 trained troops will be made during the EU-Ukraine Summit in Kyiv on 3 February. It comes barely a week after Germany agreed to send Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine, a decision which drew an angry response from Moscow.