Volodymyr Zelenskyy told allies on 24 August that Ukraine faces a $27bn financing gap for the rest of 2026. The European Commission said on 2 September that Ukraine has drawn €3.2bn against an €8.35bn target for the year, and that a revenue-mobilisation law stuck in the Verkhovna Rada is one of twelve conditions for the next payment of about €3.7bn.
Kyiv's own Parliament is holding up Kyiv's own money, weeks before the heating season. the Commission disbursed a €3.9bn tranche for Ukrainian drones as recently as June, so the pipe works when the conditions are met.
That shortfall has revived an argument Brussels thought it had settled. Roughly €210bn of Russian central bank assets sit frozen in the EU, most of it at Euroclear, the Belgian depository that settles and holds international securities, which pays Ukraine €3bn to 5bn a year in windfall profits while the principal stays untouched. Belgium blocked outright confiscation in December 2025 because Euroclear would carry the legal liability, and the bloc fell back on a €90bn joint-borrowing loan instead.
Ukraine has now proposed moving custody of the assets from Belgium to the EU, which moves the liability without using the word confiscation, and more than 120 members of the European Parliament want the question reopened. Kyiv has been living off the interest on money nobody will hand over.
