EU confirms intention to give Ukraine EUR 9B in macrofinancial aid

The European Council has decided to allocate EUR 1 billion to Ukraine and will continue to work toward finding a way to provide Ukraine with another EUR 8 billion from the total package of EUR 9 billion of macro-financial assistance that has already been politically agreed at the EU level, although it is too early to talk about specific terms of providing such assistance.

EU High Representative Josep Borrell announced this on Monday, during a press conference in Brussels following the EU Foreign Affairs Council, an Ukrinform correspondent reports.

“On the macroeconomic assistance, the Commission did announce EUR 9 billion. Now the Council has decided to disburse EUR 1 billion, and we continue to work to disburse another EUR 8 billion. I don’t have a date to give you now but it remains on our agenda and we will find a way to do it because we fully understand the macroeconomic difficulties that Ukraine faces, which are entirely normal – it’s a war,” Borrell told a press conference, answering a reporter’s question on the progress in providing macroeconomic assistance to Ukraine.

Speaking of Ukraine’s challenges, Borrell noted that the nation’s “revenue has collapsed, they had budget difficulties in times of peace – imagine the situation in times of war.”

The High Representative said the EU will provide macroeconomic assistance to “stabilize” Ukraine because “it is just as important as military aid.”