The European Commission aims to double the EU’s military aid to Ukraine and has proposed earmarking another 500 million euros for this purpose, the bloc’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell said on Friday.
“This is what we are going to do, and I’m sure that the leaders will approve it this morning,” he told reporters as he arrived for the second day of a meeting of EU leaders in Versailles.
The EU is also considering imposing more sanctions on Russian oligarchs and the Russian economy, Borrell added.
The Russian invasion, the biggest assault on a European state since World War Two, has upended Europe’s security order and spurred EU capitals into rethinking what the bloc should stand for, its economic, defence and energy policies.
The 27 national EU leaders are meeting for the second day of a two-day summit in Versailles and are wrestling on how to reduce their reliance on Russian energy and bolster political and moral support for Ukraine in the face of Moscow’s invasion.
Leaders on Thursday condemned the “unspeakable suffering” Russia was inflicting on Ukraine but refused Kyiv’s appeal for rapid accession to the bloc and differed over the reach of sanctions against Moscow.
A large majority of EU leaders, though, support sending a strong message to Ukraine that it will be granted membership in the European Union eventually, Slovenia’s Prime Minister, Janez Jansa said on Friday.
Lithuanian President, Gitanas Nauseda, voiced his disappointment that a joint declaration did not go that far, adding that EU leaders should have given Ukraine candidate status.
“I wish Ukraine gets the candidate status now… but it was not possible today, but we will come back to this issue,” Nauseda told journalists.
Belgian Prime Minister, Alexander de Croo said Ukraine must respect all the necessary procedural steps before it can become a member of the European Union but closing the door on the country would be a mistake.
“We have to pull them towards our direction, towards our political operation. But becoming a member takes time, and that requires a lot of reforms,” he said.
