Pressure grows on Hungary to lift Ukraine funding objections

The original proposal of the European Commission for the EU’s financial aid package aimed to give Ukraine a predictable cash flow over four years, including €17 billion in grants and €33 billion in loans.

Hungary signalled it could approve the funding as long as the €50 billion package would be split into four annual envelopes worth €12.5 billion each, according to several EU diplomats with knowledge of the negotiations.

Several EU member states are against deciding the issue on a year-to-year basis as they believe it would deny Ukraine long-term planning ability and would effectively give Budapest the option of an ‘annual veto’.

The EU diplomats said that Budapest has also made an unrelated demand about the bloc’s COVID-19 recovery funds.