The issue of Ukraine joining NATO should be dealt with after the war in the country is resolved, representatives of several political parties have concurred in statements for TASR.
Ukraine's membership of NATO is out of the question given the war, according to Sme rodina. "It can be considered only when this conflict is over," said the party. MP Peter Kmec, who is a member of the Hlas-SD party, takes a similar view. "Ukraine must meet the political and military conditions of the accession process," he stressed.
Head of the Za ludi party Veronika Remisova said that she can't imagine a country engaged in a military conflict joining NATO because that would mean dragging NATO members into the conflict. She called for an end to the conflict through a peaceful solution or the expulsion of Russian troops from Ukrainian territory.
MP Tomas Valasek from Progresivne Slovensko identified the key challenge after the end of the war as preventing any repeat. In his opinion, integrating Ukraine into NATO seems to be the best solution in light of security guarantees in the Alliance. He considers the fact that Russia will not accept Ukraine's accession in good faith to be a drawback. He added that even Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy isn't asking for a specific date for Ukraine to join NATO but for a signal that Ukraine will receive membership once the conditions are met.
"It is in the paramount interests of the Slovak Republic for Ukraine to win and defeat the aggressor - the Russian Federation. Our subsequent task must be to help Ukraine to cooperate more closely with NATO. This could ultimately lead our eastern neighbour meeting the conditions for membership in this key organisation," said SaS.
According to Andrej Ziarovsky of the Christian democratic KDH, Ukraine should have the opportunity to become a member of NATO after the war ends and after it meets the necessary criteria. He added that a sovereign and democratic Ukraine integrated into Euro-Atlantic structures is also in Slovakia's national interests.
The Democrats party also considers Ukraine's accession to be in Slovakia's strategic interests. "Having a NATO-member country as a neighbour is an advantage from the security point of view. However, this is a decision for the whole Alliance, and each country that wants to be part of it has to meet a number of conditions. For example, there cannot be any military conflict on its territory," said the party.
As for Smer-SD, the party considers Ukraine's potential NATO membership to be the worst possible solution, an escalation of tensions and disrespect for US-Russia agreements from the 1990s.
Source: TASR
