The EU will financially support Ukraine even without the US, as the war enters a critical phase

2024-09-28 11:00:00, Kosova & Bota CNA

The EU will financially support Ukraine even without the US, as the war enters a

The war in Ukraine has entered a critical period, and the European Union has decided that it must take responsibility for what it sees as an existential threat to its own bloc security, preparing to bear some of the financial burden, perhaps even without the United States. United.

EU envoys have been working in Brussels this week on a proposal to give Ukraine a huge loan package worth up to $39 billion. The news was announced by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen during a trip to Kiev last Friday.

"This loan will go directly to your budget," she told President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. "It will provide you with significant and much-needed fiscal space. You will be the one to decide how best to use these funds, giving them maximum flexibility to meet your needs," she added.

Mr Zelenskyy is looking to buy weapons, provide bomb shelters and rebuild the country's battered power grid as winter approaches.

But in international affairs, especially those involving major conflicts, the European Union rarely takes action without the United States. However, Brussels hopes that this decision will encourage others to act.

The US presidential election and the war in Ukraine

As it marks almost 1,000 days since Russia's full-scale offensive, Russian troops have made advances in eastern Ukraine. Kiev enjoys slight control of part of Russia's Kursk region, which gave Ukrainian forces a temporary morale boost. On the other hand, with the increase in the number of victims, Ukraine is lacking human resources and weapons.

On the political front, Mr Zelenskyy hopes to secure support for a "victory plan" that could force Russian President Vladimir Putin to the negotiating table. He is trying to convince US President Joe Biden and other allied countries to help strengthen Ukraine's positions in any future talks.

But as the US presidential election approaches, polls suggest that Donald Trump may return to the White House. Mr. Trump has been critical of American aid to Ukraine. On Wednesday, he said Mr Zelenskyy should have made concessions to Mr Putin before the Russian attack was launched in February 2022.

Most of the 27 EU countries fear that a victory for Mr Putin would lead to deep insecurity.

Russian military forces have weakened and are currently incapable of another war, however the risk of future territorial gains in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania or Poland remains.

Reworking a G7 credit plan

The EU loans are part of a plan by the Group of Seven, the world's most industrialized nations (G7), to benefit from interest earned on some $250 billion in frozen Russian assets, most of them confiscated in Europe. These profits are estimated to be around 5 to 6 billion dollars per year.

This supports the G7 plan.

The EU would provide $20 billion, the US $20 billion and Canada, Japan and the UK a combined $10 billion, for a total of $50 billion.

The scheme expires at the end of the year, before the next US president takes office.

But amid disagreements over how long the freezing of Russian assets should be guaranteed, the EU has decided to go ahead alone.

Its offer of $39 billion in loans covers almost all of what the United States would have to contribute.

The US wants to ensure that assets are frozen for at least three years to guarantee income. But EU member Hungary insists that this decision must be reviewed every several months. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán sees himself as a person who works for peace, and many of his European allies see him as close to President Putin.

The other twenty-six EU countries feel they must move forward with the issue now because time is running out.

EU and relations with the United States

The US election is just a few weeks away. Europeans are being wary of the unpredictability Mr. Trump presents and are testing scenarios to protect themselves from any kind of shock, such as the tariff hikes they faced when Mr. Trump was in the White House.

But they are seeing that even Democrats are more focused on domestic issues these days.

Mr. Biden's inflation-reducing act angered European leaders over rules favoring American products. China and the war in the Middle East are the foreign policy priorities of the Democratic and Republican candidates, and for now the US is gripped by election campaign fever.

The EU hopes that Vice President Kamala Harris, if elected president, will enter into the loan program as previously planned and reduce the EU's financial burden. But for now, questions on the matter remain. But EU members say Ukraine's position is too precarious to hesitate.

Political disputes in the US Congress last year that led to delays in approving a $60 billion aid package for Ukraine left the country's troops without weapons and ammunition for months, resulting in "real consequences on the battlefield ", as the Secretary General of NATO, Jens Stoltenberg, said.

Urgent needs

Helping Ukraine militarily is a challenge for the Europeans. They cannot do it alone and cannot match the superiority of the United States in terms of transportation, logistics and equipment, despite progress in growing their defense industries, arms and ammunition supply.

Yet the world's largest trading bloc has economic power. He has already given Ukraine about $132 billion since the start of the war. Brussels seems ready to provide tens of billions more in a few weeks, even though continuing this way alone is not in the EU's DNA.

"I don't know what the United States will do with the new president," EU Foreign Policy Chief Josep Borrell said on Tuesday. But he added that "as long as the Ukrainians want to resist, we must support them. Otherwise, we will make a historical mistake".

The Biden administration announced on Wednesday that the US will send Ukraine a large package of military aid, including cluster bombs and an array of missiles, artillery and armored vehicles. A US official also said billions of dollars more in aid would arrive in the coming months.

Meanwhile, discussions on the EU's share of the G7 loan package will top the agenda of a high-level meeting between the bloc's leaders, held in Brussels on October 17 and 18./ Voa