The European Union will grant Ukraine another batch of financial support – this time half a billion euros of the new Macro-Financial Assistance (MFA) program. With the disbursement, the total amount of aid provided to Kyiv since 2014 will have reached 3.3 billion Euros, the largest amount of such assistance ever given to any non-EU country. Valdis Dombrovskis, Commission Vice-President responsible for the Euro and Social Dialogue, said that the EU is committed to political and financial support to Ukraine and he praised the timing of this assistance.
“Today’s European Commission decision on disbursement comes at a crucial moment when Ukraine and its people face a new aggression from Russia and need to see solidarity from international partners. Such aggressive behavior is not acceptable in today’s Europe,” Mr. Dombrovskis said. The program targets Ukraine’s financial needs and supports the implementation of a wide-ranging structural reform agenda. The funds are available to Kyiv in the form of low-interest long-term loans, conditional on the implementation of specific policy measures.
Ukraine has fulfilled the commitments agreed with the EU for the release of the first reimbursement under the MFA, which included some important initiatives meant to target corruption, boost transparency of company registers, enhance the predictability of the tax environment and boost the governance of state-owned enterprises. The EU continues supporting Ukraine in its reform endeavors, which includes further measures in the fight against corruption such as progress in making the High Anti-Corruption Court of Ukraine operational. MFA is part of the EU’s wider engagement with its neighboring countries and it is meant to help countries with balance-of-payments problems. On top of the MFA, the bloc supports Ukraine through several other tools including humanitarian aid, technical assistance, budget support and investment support.
