Germany has ordered 120,000 shells from Bulgaria, which it will deliver to Ukraine.
The details of the agreement announced by Germany for the supply of hundreds of thousands of artillery ammunition to Ukraine have become known. Spiegel reported this, citing sources from the German Ministry of Defense.
The publication claims that 120,000 artillery shells, announced by the German government on February 16 as part of the new military aid package, were ordered to be produced in Bulgaria.
According to the press release, all agreed Bulgarian ammunition must be handed over to Ukraine in 2024.
General Christian Freuding, head of the Bundeswehr Situation Center in Ukraine, noted that there is no shortage of money. For 2024 alone, Germany has allocated around 7 billion euros. The main problem remains the availability of ammunition on the world market.
The 122 mm artillery shells are Soviet-era ammunition. They are used in D-30 howitzers and self-propelled howitzers 2C1 Gvozdika, which are widely used in the Ukrainian army, the publication Militarnyi recalls.
Bulgaria is a producer of projectiles of this caliber and one of the largest players on the world market in the niche of Soviet weapons.
The main producer of these projectiles in Bulgaria is the "Dunarit" plant in Ruse. It manufactures a wide range of Soviet-era artillery ammunition, including 122mm split-load shells.
However, due to the high demand for weapons caused by the Russo-Ukrainian war, Bulgaria is also rebuilding other capabilities that have been conserved in recent decades.
At the end of 2023, it was announced that after 35 years of inactivity, the Bulgarian plant in the city of Kostenets, owned by the state holding TEREM, will resume the production of 122 mm shells. This plant ceased production of 122 mm shells in 1988.
It is possible that the plant received a share of the German order for the supply of ammunition to Ukraine. /BGNES
