Name: EU agrees €90bn loan for Ukraine but without using Russian assets | BBC News
Uploaded: 2025-12-24T16:59:23.000Z
Duration: 5 min 56 s
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To-infinitive

European Union leaders have agreed a deal to give Ukraine a loan of more than $100 billion.

Past simple

President Zelensky said the support truly strengthens our resilience.

Gerund

The European leaders failed to reach an agreement on using frozen Russian assets to help Ukraine.

Most of Russia's $245 billion worth of assets is in the, in the EU are held in Belgium.

Kyiv is months from running out of cash and President Zelensky had warned that without secure funding in place, Ukraine would soon have to cut back on producing drones.

He has urged Russian assets remain immobilized.

In fact, today's decisions are crucial contribution to achieve a just and lasting peace in Ukraine because the only way to bring Russia to the negotiation table is to strengthen Ukraine.

Well, let's go live to Brussels now and speak to my colleague Reggie Vaidanan.

Regina, you've been following these talks over the past day or so.

Just talk us through what the European leaders have agreed here.

Well, these talks went right through the night we were here at 9 o' clock yesterday more than.

But EU leaders didn't actually come out with an agreement until after three in the morning.

So that gives you a sense of just how much was at stake and just how many differences of opinion there were here in Brussels.

Now in the end, EU leaders went for their plan B rather than their plan A.

The plan A that you touched on earlier, which was proposed by the President of the EU Commission backed by people like Germany's Friedrich Merck, was to use frozen Russian assets held here in Europe to back a reparations loan for Ukraine.

And There are around 200 billion euros of frozen Russian assets.

But in the end there were reservations, notably from Belgium, the country where the lion's share of those assets are held.

Belgium's Prime Minister concerned that his country could face legal challenges from Russia if this frozen assets were used as a loan and, and

that his country would be forced to repay it personally.

So they were trying to do a deal, Catherine, to see if there was a way they could spread that risk.

But in the end that deal didn't come to fruition.

So the plan B is to have an EU backed loan for Ukraine as you say there around $100 billion.

So some progress in a way, Ukraine still getting the money it wants.

But we've heard from the Kremlin on the obviously they're quite pleased that their assets are not being used in this way.

So they will of course portray this as a victory and we've heard from the special envoy from Russia saying that law and sanity won out.

And Reggie, the leaders there will continue to meet today.

And all of this in light of those negotiations to end the war in Ukraine that will continue this weekend.

So just to be clear, this is an EU meeting that had lots of things on the agenda.

And dealing with Ukraine, Ukraine's finances was just one of the things on the agenda.

There are no talks here to try and secure peace for Ukraine.

We know that the U.S. of course, is anchoring those talks.

And there are more talks expected in Florida over the weekend.

The US Specs expected to meet with more Russian officials and separately with Ukrainian officials.

President Trump still hopeful that he can get a peace deal in the coming days or weeks.

We have heard from France's President Emmanuel Macron after the talks.

He concluded in the early hours saying that he does believe that the EU needs to re engage with Russia when it comes to talks for peace.

Because at the moment, of course, it's really only the US that has had direct talks with Russia when it comes to securing peace.

What we've seen here in Brussels is a focus on trying to ensure that Ukraine gets additional financial support.

But of course, that search for an end to the Russian invasion continues on with more diplomacy in the United States at the weekend.

That's my colleague, Virginia Virginathan live in in Brussels for us.

Well, Maximilian Hess is a fellow in the Eurasia Program at the Foreign Policy Research Institute.

He says this is a moment of weakness for the European Union, despite agreeing this loan for Ukraine.

What has been agreed here is to lend Ukraine the money secured over European budgets in the future, with the potential to still use the Russian frozen assets that are frozen in Belgium and elsewhere.

The real hesitation had come because of Belgium and reservations over that.

Ones that I think, frankly, are the result of Russian pressure campaigns and a disinformation campaign around the results, the potential results of legal action that Russia is taking.

Russia's already launched over 100 lawsuits around the frozen assets within its own legal system.

And Russia itself ignores almost every international court judgment that's been issued against it, which also resulted in tens of billions of damages against it.

So this is a real moment of weakness for the European Union.

It has to be said, even though the funds are flowing and Ukraine needs them, it has once again succumbed to Russian disinformation and pressure.

And just to say that President Putin is expected to hold his annual televised press conference in about an hour's time.

We'll bring you some of that here on BBC News, as well as analysis of what he has to say.