Zelensky Asks the EU for at Least €70bn More Next Year
Volodymyr Zelensky told EU leaders in Brussels that the war will cost €155bn in 2027 and that “we need at least €70bn more from you – for defence, for weapons, and for our resilience”. He answered Donald Trump’s description of Kyiv’s renewed refinery strikes as “a disgrace” by saying: “If I don’t stand up to this… who else will?” Starlink speeds, he said, are still not fully restored.
The money is the hard part. The EU’s €90bn plan agreed last December was meant to cover two-thirds of Ukraine’s needs for 2026–27, and the shortfall has put Russia’s €210bn of frozen assets back on the table; Belgium, which holds most of them, remains opposed, and Mr Zelensky floated an EU-controlled custodian instead. Ursula von der Leyen promised a 22nd sanctions package: “We will not lift any sanctions unless Russia stops the war.” Washington is moving the other way: the American diesel deal with Moscow, which Mr Zelensky says will “put more money straight into Putin’s pocket”, is the root of the quarrel. A bipartisan group of senators has asked the Pentagon’s inspector general to investigate the Starlink curbs.