EU foreign ministers meet in Kyiv in show of support to Ukraine

EU foreign ministers are paying a surprise visit to Ukraine’s capital on 2 October for an informal meeting meant as a show of support for the war-torn country.

The meeting follows another landmark visit in February when the EU’s leadership touched down in Kyiv for European Commission/Ukrainian government consultations and an EU-Ukraine summit, according to Euractiv.

“Our support doesn’t depend on how the war is going on in the next days and weeks,” the EU’s chief diplomat Josep Borrell told reporters, including Euractiv, in Kyiv on the eve of the meeting.

“Let’s see what will happen in the US, but from our side, we will continue supporting and increasing our support,” Borrell said, asked about the vote in Washington.

“We have to provide permanent and structural support because we are facing an existential threat for Europe,” he stressed.

Borrell had first revealed intentions to bring his European counterparts on the ground in Ukraine earlier this month, on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York.

Walking the streets of the Ukrainian capital has become more normal in recent weeks, with only occasional anti-tank roadblocks and people filling parks and restaurants, away from the fierce fighting in the country’s east.

Only last week, Russia launched its largest missile barrage against Ukraine in weeks, signalling difficult winter months ahead and the likelihood of a renewed push by Moscow to bombard critical power stations and other infrastructure.

On 30 September, Borrell paid an unannounced visit to Ukraine’s embattled port city of Odesa on the Black Sea, where he condemned as “barbaric” the damage inflicted by recent Russian assaults on the city.

He also reproached Russia’s President Vladimir Putin for ending a UN-brokered grain deal that allowed Ukrainian exports across the Black Sea, despite Russia’s blockade of the ports, which has been seen as essential for addressing global food insecurity and containing grain prices.

“In spite of all of that, Ukraine continues being the biggest provider of grain to the World Food Program, and that is another reason to continue supporting Ukraine,” Borrell said.

Borrell said that in the face of an “existential threat for Europe,” the “proposition on the table” showed the EU wanted to increase military aid to Ukraine.

He was speaking after his first in-person meeting with Ukrainian Defence Minister Rustem Umerov, who was appointed last month.

“Let’s see what will happen in the US, but from our side, we will continue supporting and increasing our support,” Borrell said, asked about the vote in Washington.

“Ukrainians are fighting with all their courage and capacities,” he said. If the EU wants them to be more successful, he added, “we have to provide them with better arms, and bigger”.