KYIV NATO has decided to drop a requirement for Ukraine to follow a Membership Action Plan (MAP) setting out targets to be met before joining the military alliance, Ukraine's foreign minister said on Monday.

In comments on the eve of a NATO summit, he said such a move would shorten Ukraine's path to joining the alliance.

"Following intensive talks, NATO allies have reached consensus on removing MAP from Ukraine's path to membership. I welcome this long-awaited decision that shortens our path to NATO," Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said on Twitter.

NATO did not immediately comment on Kuleba's remarks.

NATO leaders meeting on Tuesday and Wednesday in the Lithuanian capital Vilnius are aiming to overcome divisions over Ukraine's drive for membership.

Kyiv wants to receive a clear invitation to join the alliance after Russia's war on Ukraine ends, and hopes to receive security guarantees until that time.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has cited NATO's expansion towards Russia's borders over the past two decades as a reason for his decision to send tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022.

In the run-up to the summit, a growing number of NATO member states have backed a British proposal to allow Kyiv to skip the MAP programme that sets out political, economic and military targets candidates have to meet and that other eastern European nations had to pass before joining the alliance.

With such a move, the alliance could address demands to go beyond a declaration made at a NATO summit in 2008 which said Ukraine would become a member eventually, without offering Kyiv an actual invitation or timetable.

"It is also the best moment to offer clarity on the invitation to Ukraine to become member," Kuleba said on Twitter.

(Reporting by Anna Pruchnicka and Kyiv Newsroom, Editing by Timothy Heritage)