Next week's European summit promises to be one of the most complicated in recent years. The objectives of the European Council called to mark a milestone on Ukraine's path towards the European Union – its deputy prime minister, Olha Stefanishyna, has defined the event as “existential” for her country – are seriously compromised by the prime minister's veto threats Hungarian, Viktor Orbán, but also because of Berlin's internal political problems, which could leave Kyiv without the financial lifeline it needs to safely face 2024.
Despite the diplomatic offensive launched by the president of the European Council, Charles Michel, who traveled to Budapest last week to speak personally with him about his reservations about these plans, Orbán has stuck to his refusal to extend budgetary aid to Kyiv. and to give the green light to the opening of EU accession negotiations. Those who thought that his veto threats were conditional on the unblocking of aid that Brussels keeps blocked due to its repeated violations of the rule of law have been disappointed: despite the fact that the European Commission is preparing to authorize Budapest's access to 900 million euros of the European Recovery Plan, which has not yet been implemented as a result of the precarious situation of the rule of law in the country, the Hungarian leader has hardened his stance and is now even opposed to the idea of discussing the possible start of negotiations with Kyiv.
“The proposal is not in the interest of many member states, certainly not of Hungary,” and “we are in a position to say no, no matter how much we are pressured,” Orbán warned in an interview on Hungarian public television in which maintains that the issue should not even appear on the agenda of the summit on December 14 and 15 and proposes as an alternative to talk about a “strategic partnership” with Kyiv while accusing the Commission of having presented a “poorly prepared” proposal and "unfounded."
The president of the European Council maintains the plan to debate the matter next week. “We are going to have an in-depth debate with the leaders of the Twenty-Seven to assess what decision to take,” Michel told the Reuters agency yesterday in Dubai, from where he recalled the EU already has an association agreement with Ukraine. In reality, Orbán's reservations affect the entire European strategy towards Ukraine – a neighboring country with which it has different conflicts in relation, for example, to the situation of minorities – and this is what he stated in a letter in which he demands a thorough review of financial assistance plans, military support and your relationship with the club.
But this is not Michel's only headache ahead of next week's European Council. The Twenty-seven will try to reach an agreement on the review of the EU's multi-annual budget framework, which the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, has proposed expanding by 66 billion euros to address new needs, from guaranteeing sustained macrofinancial aid to Ukraine for all of 2024 (50 billion) for measures related to immigration or promoting competitiveness.
The proposal received a frosty reception at the October summit, especially from Berlin, which asked Brussels to dig into its budget and redirect other items to free up the funds necessary to finance these initiatives. The situation has become even more complicated following the ruling of the German Constitutional Court that declared illegal the reallocation of funds to alleviate the economic impact of the pandemic that were not used for measures to facilitate the accelerated energy transition in the 2023 budget. .
Beyond the internal consequences of this ruling, Berlin has warned its European partners that its political and budgetary margin is even smaller and is only committed to reaching a solution regarding aid to Kyiv, its top priority. This position faces not only Orbán's veto threats but the risk that other member states – for example, Italy – will oppose an agreement that resolves the Ukrainian problems but does not guarantee more funds for immigration control measures.
The Spanish presidency of the Council yesterday presented an alternative proposal that reduces by almost half, to 36,000 million euros, the amount that the Twenty-seven should contribute to the community budget to face the challenges that have arisen since it was agreed, before the pandemic and of the war in Ukraine. With the formula proposed by Spain, which proposes redirecting certain spending items and includes the income that could be obtained from investments with currently frozen Russian assets, the contribution to Kyiv would remain intact. Today, however, pessimism prevails in Brussels about the possibilities of reaching an agreement this year and several sources remind that Ukraine will not automatically go into suspension of payments on January 1, so the negotiations could be prolonged.
For Kyiv, the EU's internal problems in reaching an agreement could not come in the first place. The war with Russia enters a delicate phase after the failed counteroffensive and the Biden administration's proposal to provide them with 60 billion euros in military and budgetary aid is blocked in Congress. White House Budget Director Shalanda Young has sent a letter to leaders on Capitol Hill with a stark warning: "current money runs out at the end of the year" and if the United States does not send additional funds, Russia will "deactivate knees to Ukraine on the battlefield.
