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European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and United Kingdom Prime Minister Keir Starmer discussed London's plan to join the European Union's €90 billion loan for Ukraine, as revealed in a joint statement posted on Monday, AzerNEWS reports.

The two sides agreed that the UK's participation would be "a major step forward in the EU-UK defence industrial relationship."

Von der Leyen and Starmer also reiterated that they will continue to support Ukraine.

"We also agreed to commence negotiations on UK participation in the European Innovation Council Fund, including the Scaleup Europe Fund, which will provide support for promising high-growth tech businesses to scale up and support EU and UK ambitions to keep the most promising innovators in Europe," it was further shared in the statement.

EU leaders last month approved the deal to lend Ukraine €90bn over the next two years after Hungary lifted its veto, with the funding described as "a matter of life and death" by Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Taras Kachka.

Two-thirds of it will be spent on bolstering Ukraine's defence needs while the rest will go on broader financial assistance.

Sir Keir is one of 48 heads of state and government invited to attend the EPC summit in Yerevan, Armenia.

"In relation to the EU loan that we are discussing participating in, that is very good for Ukraine, because it will give Ukraine capability that it desperately needs in year five of this conflict," Sir Keir said as he arrived on Monday.

"It's very good for the UK, because of the capability that leads to jobs in the United Kingdom.

"And it's very good for UK-EU relations, which is very important as we go on to the various discussions."

Speaking at the summit, Sir Keir said that "some of the alliances that we have come to rely on" were "not in the place we would want them to be".

"There is more tension in the alliances than there should be and it's very important that we therefore face up to this as a group of countries together," he said.

On issues of defence, trade and energy, "we need a much stronger Europe", he added.