First "defence" tranche from EU’s EUR 90 billion loan for Ukraine was smaller due to contract delays, media reports
The delay in the payment to Ukraine of the first "defence" tranche of EUR 6 billion from the EU’s EUR 90 billion loan is linked to the fact that Kyiv submitted more than 250 contracts for the procurement of Ukrainian-made drones to the European Commission for review late. As a result, the European Union did not have enough time to verify them.
This was reported by European Pravda, citing sources, Censor.NET informs.
Reason is Kyiv’s delay in submitting contracts
Ukraine submitted more than 250 contracts to the European Commission too late as part of the first EUR 6 billion "defence" tranche from the EUR 90 billion package, and as a result was able to receive only EUR 3.9 billion by the end of June.
"Ukraine submitted more than 250 contracts for the procurement of domestically produced drones to the EU for assessment. They amount to thousands of pages of text, and some of them have not yet been signed and were presented as drafts. It takes time to process them if this is to be done seriously," the publication’s source said.
In view of this, as of 30 June, it proved possible to pay Ukraine only EUR 3.9 billion of the planned EUR 6 billion.
Moreover, according to the publication, Ukraine has so far submitted contracts worth only EUR 5 billion out of the EUR 6 billion.
As soon as the European Commission completes its assessment of the contracts, Ukraine may expect another transfer of EUR 1.1 billion at the beginning of July. According to European Pravda’s sources, this is expected in the coming days.
"Kyiv still has to additionally submit the texts of legal documents for another billion to Brussels — and on their basis claim another EUR 1 billion (or EUR 0.9 billion as planned the day before), for Ukrainian drones," European Pravda writes.
Background
As a reminder, on 30 June, the European Commission allocated EUR 3.9 billion as part of the first tranche of EUR 6 billion, which will be used to purchase drones.
