There is an emerging consensus in the EU about a special fund for military assistance to Ukraine

Member states are getting closer to mutual understanding regarding how a special fund for military support for Ukraine should work.

It was stated by Vsevolod Chentsov, Representative of the Mission of Ukraine to the EU, at a briefing at the Media Center Ukraine – Ukrinform. 

“This issue was also a topic of discussion in yesterday’s agenda. There are no fixed amounts yet that the member states have agreed to contribute to this fund. But in fact, a consensus is already being reached that this fund should be created,” he said.

Vsevolod Chentsov explained that the European Union provided sustainable military support to Ukraine through the UN Peacebuilding Fund.

“It was not created specifically on-demand for Ukraine, and its volume in 2021 was 5.7 billion in 2021 at its launch. This is an off-budget fund that was financed by member states separately from the budget. With the large-scale Russian aggression outbreak, essentially all the allocated financial support was channeled to Ukraine, the funds have not yet been delivered to the donor states, but basically, the funds are reserved, and the member states have pledged even more resources than this fund had envisaged. Therefore, it was revised, and an additional two billion was agreed upon. But this is not enough. That is why the European Commission, in particular represented by Josep Borrell, came up with a proposal to set up this separate fund. Based on today’s needs, we have calculated that it will need to be replenished with about 5 billion annually. And state members came to an agreement at that point,” he explained.

Read more: https://mediacenter.org.ua/news