France is to provide Ukraine with additional armoured vehicles and anti-aircraft missiles, taken from old but still functional equipment in French stocks, Defence Minister Sébastien Lecornu has said in remarks published on Sunday.

The equipment includes wheeled armoured personnel carriers of the type VAB and missiles of type Aster for the SAMP/T systems.

The VABs were key to troop mobility along the long front and had been requested by Ukraine, which has previously taken delivery of vehicles of this type.

Speaking to newspaper La Tribune, Lecornu declined to stipulate the quantities being provided, beyond saying that “hundreds” of the armoured vehicles would be sent to Ukraine. They would arrive this year or at the beginning of next.

France is reported to have supplied Ukraine with materiel to the value of some €2.6 billion ($2.8 billion) since the Russian invasion in February 2022.

DPA