'Plan B' for funding Ukraine: Eurocommission head shares details
Photo: Ursula von der Leyen, the President of the European Commission (Getty Images)
The European Union is preparing a contingency plan to provide Ukraine with €50 billion in aid at the beginning of next year. The project could not be approved at the EU summit due to the veto by Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orban, according to Ursula von der Leyen, the President of the European Commission.
She emphasized the importance of reviewing the EU's multiannual budget, as the current one was developed before "numerous crises we have encountered since its adoption."
"It was designed before the pandemic, before Russia's war in Ukraine, before the severe energy crisis and the inflation that this energy crisis sparked. It was, of course, designed before the Middle East crisis, not to speak of the ever-increasing number of natural disasters that we are witnessing," von der Leyen explained.
Currently, the EU has "come to the limits of our budget to answer these unexpected crises," so in June, the Commission proposed to strengthen the bloc's budget.
She also noted that at the summit in Brussels on December 14-15, 26 EU member states had confirmed the key priorities of the budget project and agreed to provide additional funding to achieve them.
"This is a good result. The agreement also addresses the concerns of the Member States related to their national budgetary constraints. And thus, the agreement includes redeployments and reprioritisation alongside new funding," the statement said.
According to von der Leyen, the combination of resource redistribution and new funding "required a difficult choice."
"We have taken those choices. However, unfortunately, we did not manage to reach unanimity yesterday. Hungary was unable to support. There is now a new rendezvous early next year," she said.
Background
The European Commission proposed allocating €50 billion to Ukraine over the next five years, and this decision must be approved by all EU member countries. However, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban vetoed it at the summit in Brussels.
Prior to this, Hungary threatened not to approve the allocation of 50 billion euros to Ukraine.
Earlier, reports indicated that EU leaders had reached "broad agreement" on the budget for the multiannual financial program. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine had already congratulated the EU decision to create a Ukrainian fund of €50 billion for 2024-2027.
In response, the Prime Minister of Ireland, Leo Varadkar, stated that EU funding would continue to reach Ukraine, despite the decision of Hungary.
Additionally, according to the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, EU leaders will hold a summit in early 2024 to discuss providing Ukraine with €50 billion.
