The EU found a way to override Hungary’s veto on military aid to Ukraine – media

The European Union will change the model for financing military support to Ukraine through the European Peace Fund to avoid Hungary’s continued veto. RMF24 reported this on Sunday, October 7, citing its own sources.

It is noted that on Wednesday next week a political agreement should take place between EU ambassadors on the rules for providing aid to Ukraine in the amount of 50 billion euros received from interest in fixed assets of Russia. We are talking about a loan from the G7, for which the EU plans to allocate up to 35 billion euros.

According to the publication, the draft decision stipulates that a significant part of the funds will go to programs financed from the EU budget, and only 5% to the European Peace Fund, for which the European Union will pay member countries for military expenses. aid transferred to Ukraine. The majority is enough for a decision, so Hungary will not be able to veto it.

Continued obstacles from Budapest are one of the reasons why the EU plans to move away from using the European Peace Fund as the main instrument of military support for Ukraine.

Until now, about 90% of the funds from the income from the frozen assets of the Russian central bank have been directed to support Ukraine through the Peace Fund: the EU agreed to such a decision in June, which exceeded to Hungary’s resistance, and a month later the first tranche was transferred there.

The head of EU diplomacy, Josep Borrell, said that in addition to the first tranche, at the end of the year they want to send another 1 billion euros in the same way to support Ukraine.

As is well known, Hungary has long been opposed to the EU providing joint military support to Ukraine. Budapest is also blocking seven other decisions related to arming Kyiv, worth around 6.6 billion euros.

A mechanism was developed to bypass Hungary’s veto on the purchase of weapons – Borrell