This was confirmed by Slovakian Prime Minister Eduard Heger (Olano/Ordinary People) on Friday in a Facebook video from his train journey to Kyiv.
A delivery of the missile system will be in the Slovakia hotly debated for weeks. The Heger government has always denied that it could send the S-300 to Ukraine without a permanent replacement. According to the Slovakian television station Markiza, the air defense system is said to be in Ukraine already, and the transfer is said to have taken two days. Last week, the defense department in Bratislava assured that the system would only be moved to the eastern border with Ukraine, where it will protect Slovakian airspace.
“I can confirm that the Slovak Republic donated the S-300 air defense system to Ukraine,” Heger said surprisingly in the video recording released on Friday. “I believe that this system will help save as many lives as possible from the aggression of the Putin regime,” he added.
At the same time, Heger assured that the step did not mean that the Slovakia became part of the armed conflict. “I want all citizens of Slovakia assure that the defense of our territory is adequately secured and will be reinforced by another system from our allies in the next few days,” he said.
The currently strongest opposition party Slovakia, the Hlas (voice) of ex-Prime Minister Peter Pellegrini, spoke of “the incumbent government cheating on its own citizens”. Defense Minister Jaroslav Nagy has always emphasized that the Slovakian army will only do without the S-300 if a suitable replacement is secured. Even the minister himself recently spoke of a time horizon of a few months to years, according to a statement from the party.
Source: Nachrichten
