'Ammunition for Ukraine' to Make First Artillery Ammo Purchase for Ukraine

Bratislava, May 8 (TASR) - The first four million euros collected in a civic Slovak fundraiser called Ammunition for Ukraine will be used to buy artillery ammunition, organisers of the Peace for Ukraine initiative announced on Wednesday. The first supply of the ammunition for the Ukrainian army will take place in cooperation with representatives of the Czech governmental initiative. The ammunition is going to be procured by a fund for Ukraine, the project of which, titled 'Gift for Putin', partners with the Slovak civic fundraiser. Its plan is to procure the ammunition via the Czech Defence Ministry from a Czech arms manufacturer called STV Group. "We thank STV Group for its fair approach during talks. We made the choice according to specific demand from the Ukrainian side, which has shown great interest in this 122mm ammunition," said Martin Ondracek of the 'Gift for Putin' initiative. "We wanted Slovakia to join symbolically the Czech initiative and we've managed to accomplish that. Therefore, we're grateful for support extended to us by Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala and Defence Minister Jana Cernochova," said one of the fundraisers organisers Fedor Blascak. Ukrainian Ambassador to Slovakia Myroslav Kastran thanked for the crowd-funded ammo. "Our armed forces face severe shortages of artillery ammunition. We'd like to address our thanks once more to all the people who contributed to the fundraiser and thank them for their support," said the ambassador. mf/mcs