REUTERS
The European Union will allocate macro-financial assistance totaling EUR 600 million immediately after the International Monetary Fund disburses another loan tranche to Ukraine, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko told a meeting of the Regional Development Council in Kyiv Monday, March 20.
"Macro-financial assistance from the EU will come immediately after the allocation of the IMF tranche," Poroshenko said.
The president also noted that Ukraine’s continued cooperation with the IMF is a prerequisite for being provided financial assistance from other international partners of the country.
As UNIAN reported earlier, Ukraine receives the second tranche of macro-financial assistance from the EU in the amount of EUR 600 million without any additional conditions.
In April 2014, the European Union, which is one of Ukraine’s largest creditors and donors, declared its readiness to provide financial assistance totaling EUR 11 billion: EUR 1.6 billion in loans, EUR 1.4 billion in grants, EUR 5 billion from European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, and another EUR 3 billion from the European Investment Bank.
Within the credit program, Ukraine received only EUR 600 million. In 2015, the EU proposed a new package of loan assistance amounting to EUR 1.8 billion. Within the framework of the program, Ukraine has already received EUR 600 million. However, the allocation of the next credit tranches was suspended until the adoption by the Verkhovna Rada of bills on lifting the ban on roundwood exports, as well as on support for internally displaced persons. In 2016 Ukraine did not receive any credit tranches from the EU.
In early February 2017, President of the European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker said that the EU would allocate EUR 600 million for Ukraine even without an actual lifting of the export ban. It would be enough to register a corresponding bill in parliament, he said.
The IMF postponed indefinitely the date of its Executive Board meeting to decide on the allocation of a $1 billion loan tranche for Ukraine, previously scheduled for March 20.
According to the Ministry of Finance, the delay is due the need to clarify macroeconomic indicators due to the introduction of a trade blockade of the occupied territories of Donetsk and Luhansk regions by the decision of the National Security and Defense Council.