The promised start of accession talks is shaky – especially due to Hungary’s resistance. A €50 billion aid budget is effectively dead, as is a €25 billion fund for arms supplies.
Brussels. “Your fight is our fight. The EU stands by Ukraine”, said Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, on her first visit since the Russian attack in Kiev at the beginning of April, a year ago. The tragedy of the Ukrainian people, who were exposed to an escalating war of annihilation by the Kremlin for nine years, stimulated the Union’s geopolitical will to act following the invasion of Russian troops on February 24, 2022. Ukraine’s bid to become candidate country received the green light in no time. Despite record inflation and Member States’ national budgets, which are increasingly under pressure due to the turnaround in interest rates at the end of 2022, around €85 billion in financial aid has been released to date, according to the Commission. Monthly transfers from Brussels alone amount to 1.5 billion euros and cover around half of the Ukrainian government’s expenses.
New military aid is stagnant
At the same time, the EU made grandiose military promises. It wanted to deliver one million pieces of artillery from its national arsenals to the Ukrainian armed forces by March 2024. The European Peace Mechanism, the 27-member intergovernmental fund that reimburses arms supplies, is expected to have five billion euros available during the next four years, Josep Borrell, the EU’s high representative for foreign and security policy, suggested in July.