{"id":4443,"date":"2025-12-19T06:37:57","date_gmt":"2025-12-19T06:37:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/2025\/12\/19\/eu-agrees-hefty-105bn-ukraine-loan-without-using-russian-assets\/"},"modified":"2025-12-19T06:37:57","modified_gmt":"2025-12-19T06:37:57","slug":"eu-agrees-hefty-105bn-ukraine-loan-without-using-russian-assets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/2025\/12\/19\/eu-agrees-hefty-105bn-ukraine-loan-without-using-russian-assets\/","title":{"rendered":"EU agrees hefty $105bn Ukraine loan without using Russian assets"},"content":{"rendered":"<div aria-live=\"polite\" aria-atomic=\"true\">\n<p>European Union leaders have agreed to provide an interest-free loan to Ukraine to meet its military and economic needs for the next two years, EU Council President Antonio Costa has said.<\/p>\n<p>The leaders decided early on Friday \u200dto borrow cash on capital markets to fund Ukraine\u2019s defence against Russia rather than use frozen Russian assets, diplomats said.<\/p>\n<section>\n<h2>Recommended Stories <\/h2>\n<p><span>list of 3 items<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span>list 1 of 3<\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2025\/12\/19\/russia-ukraine-war-list-of-key-events-day-1394\">Russia-Ukraine war: List of key events, day 1,394<\/a><\/li>\n<li><span>list 2 of 3<\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2025\/12\/17\/putin-slams-wests-war-hysteria-as-eu-mulls-russian-assets-for-ukraine\">Putin slams West\u2019s \u2018war hysteria\u2019 as EU mulls Russian assets for Ukraine<\/a><\/li>\n<li><span>list 3 of 3<\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/video\/newsfeed\/2025\/12\/18\/eu-debates-use-of-frozen-russian-assets-to-support-ukraine\">EU debates use of frozen Russian assets to support Ukraine<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span>end of list<\/span><\/section>\n<p>Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy thanked the EU for its loan to bolster the country\u2019s looming budget shortfalls, saying it \u201ctruly strengthens\u201d Kyiv\u2019s defence.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is significant support that truly strengthens our resilience,\u201d Zelenskyy said on X. \u201cIt is important that Russian assets remain immobilized and that Ukraine has received a financial security guarantee for the coming years,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe have a deal. Decision to provide 90 billion euros [$105.5bn] of support to Ukraine for 2026-27 approved. We committed, we delivered,\u201d Costa said in a post on social media early on Friday.<\/p>\n<p>Costa did not specify the source of the funding, which came after EU leaders worked deep into Thursday night to reach an agreement.<\/p>\n<p>But a draft text of the summit\u2019s conclusions, seen by the Reuters news agency, said it would come from capital markets, secured against the \u2060EU budget, rather than the bloc proceeding with its <a href=\"http:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/economy\/2025\/12\/4\/why-is-belgium-opposed-to-using-russian-assets-to-support-ukraine\">contentious plan<\/a> to use frozen Russian assets for a loan supporting Ukraine\u2019s war effort.<\/p>\n<p>At the same \u200btime, EU governments and the European Parliament will continue discussing setting up a loan for Ukraine that would be based on Russian central \u200dbank assets.<\/p>\n<p>Friday\u2019s deal will not affect the financial obligations of Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic, which did not want to contribute to the financing of Ukraine, the text said.<\/p>\n<p>Kirill \u200dDmitriev, \u200dRussian President Vladimir Putin\u2019s special envoy for investment \u2060and economic cooperation, said \u200bon Friday that \u201claw \u200dand sanity\u201d won, after EU leaders decided \u200dto \u2060borrow cash to fund Ukraine rather than use Russia\u2019s frozen assets.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMajor BLOW to EU \u200bwarmongers led \u200cby failed Ursula \u2014 voices of reason in the EU \u200cBLOCKED the ILLEGAL use \u200cof Russian \u2060reserves to fund Ukraine,\u201d Dmitriev said on X, \u200cmentioning European Union Commission President Ursula von der \u200dLeyen.<\/p>\n<p>Kyiv will only repay the EU loan based on joint borrowing once it receives war reparations from Moscow. Until then, the Russian assets will remain frozen, while the EU has also reserved the right to use them to repay the loan, according to the text.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s good in the sense that Ukraine will secure funding for two years,\u201d one unnamed EU diplomat told Reuters.<\/p>\n<p>The move followed hours of discussions among leaders on the technical \u200dand legal details of a loan based \u2060on frozen Russian assets \u2013 which turned out to be too complex or politically demanding to sort out at this stage, diplomats said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe have gone from saving Ukraine to saving face, at least that of those who have been pushing for the use of the frozen assets,\u201d a second EU diplomat said.<\/p>\n<p>The main difficulty in using Russian money was providing Belgium \u2013 where approximately 185 billion euros ($217bn) of the total 210 billion euros ($246bn) of frozen assets are held \u2013 with sufficient guarantees against financial and legal retaliation from Moscow.<\/p>\n<p>The Kremlin had said it would launch legal action and seize foreign assets in Russia should the plan to use its assets go ahead.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"divided-europeans\">Divided Europeans<\/h2>\n<p>Prior to Friday\u2019s decision, analysts had said the use of frozen Russian assets was effectively the only viable option for EU funding Ukraine\u2019s war effort. The proposal, however, would be unprecedented, with German state assets not even seized during World War II.<\/p>\n<p>In advance of Thursday\u2019s meeting, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz had warned that the chances of agreement remained \u201c50-50\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Belgium\u2019s Prime Minister Bart De Wever had told the European Parliament he remained deeply concerned about the legal and financial risks, having previously opposed the measures over fears Belgium could be forced to compensate Russia if courts later ruled that the use of the frozen assets was unlawful.<\/p>\n<p>Belgium had demanded binding commitments from other EU states to cover all potential liabilities, and wants assurances that Russian assets held outside Belgium would also be used.<\/p>\n<p>Some countries, including Germany and the Netherlands, said they were prepared to back up the loan, while others, such as Italy and Bulgaria, were hesitant.<\/p>\n<p>Early on Friday, De Wever heralded the pivot towards borrowing on capital markets, saying EU leaders had avoided \u201cchaos and division\u201d with their decision.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>European Union leaders have agreed to provide an interest-free loan to Ukraine to meet its military and economic needs for the next two years, EU Council President Antonio Costa has said. The leaders decided early on Friday \u200dto borrow cash on capital markets to fund Ukraine\u2019s defence against Russia rather than use frozen Russian assets, &#8230; <a title=\"EU agrees hefty $105bn Ukraine loan without using Russian assets\" class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/2025\/12\/19\/eu-agrees-hefty-105bn-ukraine-loan-without-using-russian-assets\/\" aria-label=\"Read more about EU agrees hefty $105bn Ukraine loan without using Russian assets\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4444,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4443","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4443"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4443\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4444"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}