The head of Ukraine's mission to the North Atlantic Alliance, Natalia Halibarenko, explained that Kyiv's submission of an application for accelerated accession into NATO means that the discussion about it "has become formalized."

"As for the specific action plan, the ball is in NATO's court. Because after officially submitting the application, the member states must hold a preliminary discussion of our application and express their position," Halibarenko explained during a briefing at the "Ukraine" media center in Lviv on Tuesday, as "Interfax-Ukraine" reports.

The diplomat added, "now the discussion about our future membership has become formalized."

"Previously, we had only unofficial discussions somewhere on the sidelines because the issue was not officially raised. Now this discussion will take place within the North Atlantic Council at various levels," Halibarenko explained.

According to her, the first discussion will take place at the level of ambassadors to NATO, and the next, perhaps, within the framework of the meeting of defence ministers, which will take place on October 12-13. Ukraine's Ministry of Defence, Oleksii Reznikov, will attend it.

On Friday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said his nation submitted an "accelerated" application to join the NATO military alliance and called on Western partners to implement the proposals for security guarantees prepared by Ukraine, outlined in the Kyiv Security Compact.

Read also: Ukraine Demands "Accelerated Accession" to NATO. What Is behind This Decision?