Financial aid for Ukraine is getting harder to find

The headquarters of Euroclear in Brussels, Belgium. Ansgar Haase/picture alliance via Getty Images

Helping a European neighbor remains politically popular, but rearming amid economic stress leaves less money to give.

Derek Bisaccio , Forecast International

Forecast International

European leaders meet next month to discuss ways to help Ukraine fill a projected €70 billion budget deficit. But their capacity for direct aid is constrained by efforts to rearm their own militaries amid a challenging economic environment, while Belgium continues to oppose the conversion of frozen Russian assets into a loan.

Western financial aid— €170 billion ($189.5 billion) since 2022—has been key to helping Kyiv stay financially afloat since Russia's wider invasion, according to the Kiel Institute. But the U.S. has drastically cut aid under the second Trump administration, leaving the European Union, Canada, Japan, Norway, and the United Kingdom to shoulder most of the burden.

Earlier this year, the EU approved a plan to lend Ukraine €90 billion to Ukraine through 2027, two-thirds of which will go to buy weapons and the rest to budgetary support. Around €14 billion has been disbursed to date, and by year's end that figure should grow to €45 billion.

But Russian attacks on critical infrastructure and other stresses mean that Kyiv is still looking at a budget deficit of around €70 billion for 2027.

European governments are spending more on their own defenses. In 2021, the defense budgets of NATO's European members averaged around 1.6 percent of GDP, below NATO’s then-target of 2 percent. The alliance has since boosted its goal to 2.5 percent of GDP , and at last year's summit, committed to raising ‘core’ defense expenditure to 3.5 percent over the next decade.

At the same time, they are facing rising debt and slowing economies. Eurozone countries have an average debt-to-GDP ratio of nearly 89 percent , and nearly 83 percent in EU nations generally. Buffeted by the trade wars and energy shocks of the Trump administration, eurozone economies will grow only 1.1 percent in 2026, according to a recent projection by the International Monetary Fund. Some northern EU members are in much better fiscal shape than their southern and western counterparts.

The budget picture is getting cloudier. Annual inflation in the eurozone rose to 3.8 percent in September, according to Eurostat, well above the European Central Bank (ECB) target of 2 percent. The ECB raised interest rates at its June and September meetings, and is expected to deliver another hike at one of the year's two remaining meetings. Rising prices may force the ECB to continue tightening policy, raising debt-service payments from government budgets.

Supporting Ukraine remains broadly popular in the EU, but the challenging economic environment makes it a tough sell for governments to increase aid to Ukraine along with their own defense spending. European governments are already facing domestic criticism over rearmament. Italy, for example, was approved for an allocation of up to €14.9 billion from the E.U.’s Security Action for Europe (SAFE) loan facility, meant to aid rearmament. Yet Rome requested only about €8 billion from SAFE, as Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s government sparred with critics within her own coalition and in the opposition on financing more defense spending with debt.

Frozen Russian assets

EU countries are thus once again looking at alternative methods of backstopping Ukraine’s budget. One of the most obvious options is the conversion of frozen Russian financial assets into a loan to Kyiv.

After Russia's February 2022 invasion, the G7 froze Russian government securities held abroad. As much as $300 billion was impounded as a result and remains in limbo to this day, including about €210 billion held in the European financial system.

While the principal has remained untouched, the EU has begun to use the interest income on those securities to help Ukraine, on the grounds that Russia, as aggressor, should pay for the damage caused to Ukraine. That has generated about €8 billion , of which €3.8 billion has been delivered to Ukraine, and €4.2 billion has been reserved to repay E.U. or G7 loans to Ukraine.

In September, Germany and other E.U. members revived the topic of converting the Russian assets into a loan for Kyiv, POLITICO reported . Berlin views the step as a ‘win-win’ for the E.U., enabling the bloc to help Kyiv address its financial needs, while replacing some of the funds that would be reserved for Ukraine in the E.U.’s upcoming multi-year budget.

But the politics around seizing the Russian assets have barely budged.

Belgium is the custodian of much of those Russian funds, which are housed in the Brussels-based Euroclear. The Belgian government blocked a 2025 proposal to seize the funds, fearing that it alone would bear the legal and financial risk of seizing the funds. Earlier this year, the Bank of Russia sued Euroclear in a Russian court for the funds, arguing that they were illegally seized. The court backed the Russian central bank’s challenge in a ruling two months later, though it lacks jurisdiction to enforce the judgment.

Concern over the legal risks means Brussels will likely stymie the proposal again.

“I am certain that the European Commission will not make proposals to meet Ukraine’s financing needs through a new operation linked to Russian assets,” Belgian Prime Minister Bart de Wever told reporters on Oct. 21. “I am certain of that, because that is what was said.”

As European leaders prepare for a November meeting to iron out next year's assistance to Ukraine, the EU is already pushing other partners to increase their contributions to Kyiv.

The situation is becoming more urgent. Ukraine has largely exhausted its stockpile of interceptors, leaving its cities and energy grid vulnerable to Russian attack. The Ukrainian military intelligence agency HUR recently estimated that Russia can produce 10,000 long-range strike drones and decoys each month. Mounting damage increases Ukraine’s financial needs, as the country scrambles to keep the lights on.

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欧洲清算银行（Euroclear）位于比利时布鲁塞尔的总部。图片来源：Ansgar Haase/picture alliance via Getty Images

帮助欧洲邻国在政治上仍然很受欢迎，但在经济压力下重新武装会导致可用于援助的资金减少。

德里克·比萨乔 (Derek Bisaccio)，国际预测公司

国际预测

欧洲领导人将于下月会晤，商讨如何帮助乌克兰填补预计700亿欧元的预算赤字。但由于经济环境严峻，各国都在努力重整军备，直接援助能力受到限制；与此同时，比利时继续反对将冻结的俄罗斯资产转化为贷款。

据基尔经济研究所称，自2022年以来，西方提供的1700亿欧元（1895亿美元）财政援助一直是基辅在俄罗斯全面入侵后维持财政运转的关键。但美国在特朗普第二任期内大幅削减了援助，使得欧盟、加拿大、日本、挪威和英国不得不承担大部分负担。

今年早些时候，欧盟批准了一项向乌克兰提供900亿欧元贷款的计划，贷款期限至2027年，其中三分之二将用于购买武器，其余部分用于预算支持。迄今为止，已拨付约140亿欧元，预计到年底，这一数字将增至450亿欧元。

但俄罗斯对关键基础设施的袭击和其他压力意味着基辅 2027 年的预算赤字仍将达到约 700 亿欧元。

欧洲各国政府正在增加国防开支。2021年，北约欧洲成员国的国防预算平均占GDP的1.6%左右，低于北约当时设定的2%的目标。此后，北约已将目标提高至GDP的2.5%，并在去年的峰会上承诺在未来十年内将“核心”国防开支提高到GDP的3.5%。

与此同时，它们还面临着债务不断攀升和经济增长放缓的双重困境。欧元区国家的平均债务占GDP比重接近89%，欧盟整体平均水平接近83%。受特朗普政府时期贸易战和能源冲击的影响，根据国际货币基金组织最近的预测，欧元区经济到2026年仅能增长1.1%。一些北欧成员国的财政状况远好于其南部和西部成员国。

预算前景日趋不明朗。据欧盟统计局（Eurostat）数据显示，欧元区9月份年通胀率升至3.8%，远高于欧洲央行（ECB）2%的目标。欧洲央行在6月和9月的会议上均已加息，预计在今年剩余的两次会议上还会再次加息。物价上涨可能迫使欧洲央行继续收紧货币政策，增加政府预算中的偿债支出。

在欧盟内部，支持乌克兰的呼声依然普遍高涨，但严峻的经济环境使得各国政府难以在增加自身国防开支的同时，再增加对乌克兰的援助。欧洲各国政府在国内也因重整军备而饱受批评。例如，意大利获准从欧盟的“欧洲安全行动”（SAFE）贷款机制中获得高达149亿欧元的拨款，用于帮助其重整军备。然而，罗马方面仅向SAFE申请了约80亿欧元，因为总理乔治娅·梅洛尼领导的政府在是否应该通过举债来增加国防开支的问题上，与执政联盟内部和反对派的批评者展开了激烈的争论。

被冻结的俄罗斯资产

因此，欧盟国家再次寻求其他方式来支持乌克兰的预算。其中最显而易见的方案之一是将冻结的俄罗斯金融资产转化为对基辅的贷款。

2022年2月俄罗斯入侵伊拉克后，七国集团冻结了俄罗斯政府在海外持有的证券。高达3000亿美元的资产因此被冻结，至今仍处于冻结状态，其中包括存放在欧洲金融体系中的约2100亿欧元。

尽管本金未动用，欧盟已开始利用这些证券的利息收入援助乌克兰，理由是俄罗斯作为侵略者，理应赔偿对乌克兰造成的损失。这笔资金已产生约80亿欧元，其中38亿欧元已交付乌克兰，剩余42亿欧元则预留用于偿还欧盟或七国集团对乌克兰的贷款。

据POLITICO报道，今年9月，德国和其他欧盟成员国再次提出将俄罗斯资产转化为贷款援助基辅的议题。柏林方面认为此举对欧盟来说是“双赢”，既能帮助基辅解决财政需求，又能弥补欧盟即将出台的多年期预算中原本拨给乌克兰的部分资金缺口。

但围绕没收俄罗斯资产的政治局势几乎没有任何改变。

比利时托管着大部分俄罗斯资金，这些资金存放在位于布鲁塞尔的欧洲清算银行（Euroclear）。比利时政府否决了一项在2025年扣押这些资金的提案，担心独自承担扣押资金的法律和财务风险。今年早些时候，俄罗斯央行在俄罗斯法院起诉欧洲清算银行，要求归还这些资金，理由是其非法扣押。两个月后，法院裁定支持俄罗斯央行的诉讼请求，但法院无权强制执行该判决。

由于担心法律风险，布鲁塞尔方面很可能会再次否决这项提案。

比利时首相巴特·德·韦弗10月21日对记者表示：“我确信，欧盟委员会不会提出通过与俄罗斯资产相关的新操作来满足乌克兰的融资需求。我对此确信无疑，因为他们就是这么说的。”

欧洲领导人正准备在 11 月举行会议，敲定明年对乌克兰的援助事宜，欧盟已经开始敦促其他伙伴增加对基辅的援助。

局势日趋紧迫。乌克兰的拦截器储备已基本耗尽，使其城市和电网极易遭受俄罗斯的攻击。乌克兰军事情报机构HUR近期估计，俄罗斯每月可生产1万架远程攻击无人机和诱饵无人机。不断加剧的损失使乌克兰的财政需求日益增长，该国正竭力维持电力供应。

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