In a major ratcheting-up of the debate on the next EU budget, frugal countries are increasingly linking it to the other big political contest on the agenda: funding Ukraine.
The issue is likely to surface in next week’s informal European Council in Dublin, officially devoted to AI. But diplomats say the EU’s long-term budget and Ukraine will be the real battle lines.
EU leaders have set an end-of-year deadline to clinch a deal on the EU’s next seven-year budget, while also aiming to decide how to find €70 billion for Ukraine on the same timeline. The two tracks are now increasingly on a collision course.
The EU executive is preparing options expected to lean heavily towards another loan for Kyiv, and some capitals see an opening to put pressure on those resisting cuts to the EU budget.
Several countries fiercely protective of EU regional and farm spending are also reluctant to fund further support for Ukraine. Hungary, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Bulgaria have ruled out taking on the burden of another loan.
The number of countries opposed to supporting Ukraine is expected to grow in the next year as a series of national elections, from France to Poland, make it more difficult to muster political support for Ukraine loans.
Germany, Sweden and the Netherlands – all major contributors to Kyiv’s war effort – are now using that contradiction to press the 17-strong cohesion club, arguing that protecting regional spending while withholding support for Ukraine is increasingly harder to justify.
But not all frugals are in favour of linking the two topics. Support for Kyiv must continue even if budget talks drag into next spring, Joakim Strand, Finland’s European affairs minister, told Rapporteur.
“We need to be able to support Ukraine, no matter what happens with the MFF,” he told my colleague Magnus Lund Nielsen.
In another sign of how high the stakes are, Valdis Dombrovskis, the economy commissioner, warned there would be broader consequences if the EU failed to find extra funding for Ukraine.
Shaping Ukraine’s post-war future
A separate meeting on security guarantees is taking place at NATO headquarters today, following talks on Ukraine’s post-war reconstruction in Brussels on Wednesday.
The discussions on Wednesday brought together representatives from Ukraine, the US, France, Germany and the UK, NATO and the World Bank, with the agenda centred on the so-called Prosperity Plan for Ukraine’s economic recovery, development and long-term resilience.
BlackRock, the global asset management company, was also present, according to a statement by Ukraine. The Commission did not mention BlackRock’s presence in its own statement.
The EU was represented by Björn Seibert, von der Leyen’s chief of cabinet, while Ukraine’s delegation was led by Rustem Umerov, its chief negotiator. The two meetings pave the way for Ukraine-US-Russia talks scheduled for 10-11 November in Abu Dhabi. My colleague Pietro Guastamacchia has the details.
EU fears ‘associate membership’ precedent
France, alongside Italy, Cyprus, the Netherlands and Spain, warned that Canada’s new “associate membership” status could open the door to similar arrangements with other non-EU countries, two diplomats said.
Mark Carney, while initially reluctant to embrace the label floated by Ursula von der Leyen in her annual speech in September, finally endorsed it last week at the end of the EU-Canada summit in Montreal.
Simon Mordue, von der Leyen’s chief diplomatic adviser, played down the concerns, noting that very few countries are as closely aligned with the EU as Canada.
The two sides now have until June to define the label.
