Poland handed over ten additional Leopard 2A4 tanks to Ukraine as promised, Polish Defense Minister Mariusz Blaszczak said on Thursday, AFP reports. This is in addition to the four sent last month.

“We are talking about a battalion of heavy tanks, which in the case of Poland have already been delivered, and in the case of our allies, they will be delivered to Ukraine very soon,” a Polish official told the media.

In late January, Poland promised to send a total of 14 Lepoard 2 tanks to Kyiv, and the first four were already delivered on February 24, the anniversary of the Russian invasion.

“In addition to 14 Polish Leopard tanks, this battalion also has eight Canadian tanks, eight Norwegian tanks and also six Spanish tanks,” the Polish minister said.

A standard Ukrainian battalion consists of 31 tanks.

After speaking with his Spanish counterpart, Margarita Robles, Blaszczak said that Spain would supply “maybe four more tanks.”

According to the Polish minister, “tank training has already been completed.”

Tank repair center

Blaschak also noted that he “began to create a center responsible for the maintenance and repair of tanks supplied to Ukraine.”

“I discussed it with my German counterpart” Boris Pistorius, he said.

According to him, spare parts for German-designed tanks were a “challenge” because their production “was stopped 20 years ago”.

“We are ready to restore it, of course, in cooperation with the Germans,” he insisted.

Poland has strongly supported Ukraine since the Russian invasion a year ago.

Warsaw has increased its own arms purchases, increasing its military budget to more than 4 percent of gross domestic product by 2023.

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