Kalinak: Several Factors behind Withdrawal of German Military Repair Shop

Bratislava, December 18 (TASR) - Several factors were behind the German military repair shop's withdrawal from the Slovak town of Michalovce (Kosice region), said Defence Minister Robert Kalinak (Smer-SD) following the government session on Wednesday, adding that customs tariffs were a big problem. "It doesn't send any signal. The situation is changing even now, so from my viewpoint the pressure on their tasks may have changed as well. I think that they've opened something directly in Ukraine as well," said Kalinak, who stressed that the repair shop was meant to be in Slovakia only temporarily from the very beginning. The defence minister doesn't expect that the repair shop's departure from eastern Slovakia will have a negative impact on Slovakia's arms industry. He specified that some ten people were employed at the facility and that it had no impact on Slovakia's GDP with regards to its size. The German Defence Ministry earlier on Wednesday announced that Germany will shut down its workshop repairing western-type military equipment for Ukraine in Michalovce, as it wants to move the repair unit to Germany by December 31. The German ministry cited a change in the framework conditions as the reason for this step, along with "extremely complex" repair procedures that must be carried out on damaged Ukrainian military equipment. The repair shop in Slovakia has been operating since the end of 2022, providing repairs for self-propelled howitzers 2000, Dingo wheeled armoured vehicles, the MARS II artillery missile system and Gepard anti-aircraft tanks. ko/df