The defence secretary will call for a 50-day drive<\/a> to arm Ukraine<\/a> when he chairs a meeting of Kyiv<\/a>\u2019s allies on Monday.<\/p>\n John Healey<\/a> is set to argue that the West should again boost its military support for Ukraine<\/a> in an effort to bring Vladimir Putin<\/a> to the negotiating table.<\/p>\n Donald Trump<\/a> has already threatened to impose \u201cvery severe\u201d tariffs<\/a> on Russia<\/a> if it does not agree to a ceasefire by 2 September, 50 days on from the US<\/a> president\u2019s announcement that he would sell \u201ctop-of-the-line\u201d weapons to Nato<\/a> that could then be given to Ukraine.<\/p>\n On Monday, Mr Healey will use a meeting of the Ukraine Defence Contact Group (UDCG) to back Mr Trump\u2019s proposal and pledge that the UK will \u201cplay our full part in its success to bolster Ukraine\u2019s immediate fight\u201d.<\/p>\n Calling for more support from Western allies, he is expected to say: \u201cAlongside this, the US has started the clock on a 50-day deadline for Putin to agree to peace or face crippling economic sanctions.<\/p>\n \u201cAs members of the Ukraine Defence Contact Group, we need to step up in turn with a \u201850-day drive\u2019 to arm Ukraine on the battlefield and force Putin to the negotiating table.\u201d<\/p>\n open image in gallery<\/p>\n US president Donald Trump and Russia’s president Vladimir Putin are seen during the G20 leaders summit in 2018 (Reuters)<\/p>\n Monday will be the fourth time Mr Healey has chaired the UDCG, and the third occasion he has done so alongside German defence minister Boris Pistorius.<\/p>\n The group, which brings together defence ministers and officials from Ukraine\u2019s allies, was chaired by the US until Mr Trump came to power and began rowing back on American support for Kyiv and European security.<\/p>\n Mr Healey\u2019s comments come as the Ministry of Defence confirmed the UK had sent \u00a3150 million worth of air defence missiles and artillery rounds to Ukraine in the past two months.<\/p>\n The deliveries are part of a commitment to spend \u00a3700m on air defence and artillery ammunition for Ukraine this year, alongside other funding to provide more of the drones that have become key weapons in the war with Russia.<\/p>\n The UK has delivered 50,000 drones to Ukraine in the last six months, with another 20,000 coming from a coalition of nations led by Britain and Latvia.<\/p>\n Monday\u2019s UDCG is expected to see further commitments, with Germany and the UK agreeing to procure more air defence missiles using 170 million euros of funding from Berlin.<\/p>\n Shadow defence secretary James Cartlidge said it was \u201cright\u201d that the government \u201ccontinues to provide all possible support to Ukraine\u201d.<\/p>\n He added: \u201cIt is also important that we stand firm alongside the United States in reinforcing their 50-day deadline to ensure Putin is under maximum pressure to pursue peace.<\/p>\n \u201cThat means all of our allies playing their part, and following the PM\u2019s recent summit with Chancellor Merz, we hope that this 50-day drive will include German confirmation that it intends to provide Taurus missiles to Ukraine.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":278426,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7654],"tags":[2000,299,657],"class_list":{"0":"post-278425","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ukraine","8":"tag-eu","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-ukraine"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114887916651396023","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=278425"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278425\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/278426"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=278425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=278425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=278425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"US](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/1753050370_268_SEI257784354.jpg\")
<\/p>\n