Rada Ratifies Cooperation Memo with NATO

On Wednesday, the Verkhovna Rada approved draft bill No. 0173 on the ratification of the memorandum on practical bilateral cooperation between Ukraine and NATO under the Partnership for Peace (PfP).

This follows from the bill's card on the parliament's website.

The full name of the document is the Memorandum of Understanding between the Government of Ukraine and the NATO Communications and Information (NCI) Agency on the issues of consultations, management, communications, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance within the framework of the NATO Partnership for Peace program.

Within the framework of the memorandum, signed in January 2022, NATO will deepen cooperation with Ukraine in modernisation of information technologies and communication services.

The first relevant agreement was approved in 2015, and since then NATO has continuously assisted Ukraine in technology, primarily through the NATO-Ukraine Trust Fund.

As part of the agreement, the Ukraine-NATO Regional Airspace Security Program (RASP) was developed to provide early warning and coordination of airspace threats. The system includes an integrated IP telephony system and offers tools for interaction, such as chat, geographic pointers, and aircraft track selection.

Earlier, Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration Olha Stefanishyna said that following the full-scale war with the Russian Federation, NATO membership will remain a higher priority for Ukraine than joining the EU.