The Government of Slovakia followed in the footsteps of Poland and gave the green light to send MiG-29 fighter jets to Ukraine, making it the second NATO member country to take this measure, the Prime Minister announced on Friday. Slovak, Eduard Heger.
Slovakia has a fleet of 13 MiG fighters in various states of readiness. They were grounded last summer after running out of a maintenance agreement with Russia and most of them are not in operational condition. In principle, it will send all the MiGs it owns to Kyiv.
No other ally has yet come forward with a pledge to contribute to the Ukrainian air force. The other NATO members that have MiG-29 jets, a type of Soviet-era fighter, in their inventories are Bulgaria, Croatia and Romania.
The Polish government said yesterday that it plans to donate the planes to Ukraine as part of an international coalition. However, both from Europe and from the US expectations were lowered before sending air support to the war, a decision that since the invasion has generated controversy in the Atlantic Alliance. In particular, the US maintains that delivering fighter jets to Ukraine would represent an escalation in the armed conflict.
