EU closes agreement for assistance fund for Ukraine with 5 billion euros | European Union

The Member States of the European Union have finally reached an agreement to review the budget and functioning of the European Peace Support Mechanism (MEAP), an instrument external to the community budget that supports the participation of the 27 in international militarized missions and operations — and which, since the beginning of Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, has been used to finance support for Kiev, namely the supply of weapons, ammunition and other war material.

“Ambassadors to the European Union reached an agreement in principle on strengthening the European Peace Support Mechanism in order to support Ukraine with a budget of €5 billion for 2024. The EU remains determined to provide support lasting support to Ukraine and ensuring that the country receives the military equipment it needs to defend itself”, informed the Belgian presidency of the Council of the EU, through a message published on the social network X (formerly Twitter), this Wednesday.

“The message could not be clearer: Ukraine can count on our support and everything necessary to prevail”, reacted immediately the EU High Representative for Foreign and Security Policy, Josep Borrell, who launched the proposal for reform of the MEAP in December 2023.

The idea, which will be formally approved by EU foreign ministers next week, involves creating a dedicated channel for financing the EU’s lethal and non-lethal aid to Ukraine, as well as the military training and training that the 27 are undertaking. provide the country’s Armed Forces with an independent financial envelope. The establishment of a new Fund for Assistance to Ukraine within the MEAP provides greater stability and predictability to military support for Kiev, and avoids a “diversion” of available resources from other security production missions in third countries in which the EU is involved. , as is the case in Mozambique.

Since the start of Russia’s war of aggression, MEAP has reimbursed more than 6 billion euros of military support sent by Member States to Ukraine. This amount includes payment for equipment that came directly from national reserves to the battlefield, but also covers orders that have since been aggregated into joint purchase contracts to accelerate ammunition production.

Member States rejected Josep Borrell’s proposal for an increase of 20 billion euros in the MEAP’s financial envelope until 2027. But their alternative solution does not differ much from the premises of their plan: the 27 agreed to contribute an additional 5,000 million euros, to be able to create the support program for Ukraine this year, which means that, if the transfers in the following years are of the same value, at the end of the budget cycle the EU will reach the total initially defended by the head of diplomacy European.

More than the amount, Member States took months to discuss — and agree — the modalities and conditions for future aid to Ukraine, with Germany and France demanding, respectively, that bilateral donations to Ukraine could be counted in the calculation of national contributions to the MEAP, and that only deliveries of material or equipment that were produced in the EU could be financed.

Both the wishes of Berlin, which is the largest military donor after the United States, and Paris’ insistence on having a “Buy European” clause, to promote investment in the European defense industry, were met. But in the final text the rule began to allow a certain flexibility, to ensure that Member States can be “exceptionally” reimbursed for purchases from third-country suppliers. Priority continues to be given to European manufacturers, but if they are unable to “provide a schedule compatible with needs”, the new fund will cover the costs of these orders, to speed up deliveries of material that Ukraine urgently needs, e.g. ammunition.

A commitment that gives new impetus to an initiative by the Czech Republic to increase Ukraine’s supply of artillery ammunition manufactured in third countries and available on the market for delivery: according to a Prague Government source cited by Reuters, the EU could easily acquire up to around 800,000 projectiles, with a first order for a batch of 300,000 expected to go ahead this month.

“Our Czech colleagues will present us with a detailed plan this week on how this will work. The supply will be staggered and the first deliveries will not take long”, confirmed the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, Dmytro Kuleba, to the British agency.