Belgium floats invoking emergency provision to provide joint EU debt for Ukraine – Euractiv

That is according to four EU diplomats, Ukrinform reports, citing Euractiv.

According to them, joint debt is the only other alternative to the reparations loan that has been officially proposed by the European Commission.

Like sanctions policy, issuing joint debt backed by the headroom of the EU long-term budget requires the unanimous support of all EU27.

One EU diplomat said European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde raised this prospect of invoking Article 122 during last week’s meeting of EU finance ministers in Brussels.

"I will quote Christine Lagarde when she said, if you can use [Article] 122 in a sanctions regime decision, prolonging the immobilization, then surely you can use it for issuing debt against the EU budget headroom," the diplomat said.

Another said that the idea would be to use Article 122 to use qualified majority voting to amend the EU's regulation for its long-term budget for joint borrowing.

The EU's legal service ruled out invoking Article 122 to issue joint borrowing during yesterday's meeting of EU ambassadors, two EU diplomats said.

Another EU official noted that it's technically possible to issue common EU debt without unanimity if it is not backed by the EU budget headroom.

The push comes amid Belgium's continued resistance to a floated EUR 210 billion "reparations loan" to Kyiv using immobilized Russian sovereign assets, the vast majority of which are held by Euroclear, a Brussels-based securities depository.

It also comes after EU countries voted last week to indefinitely freeze the Kremlin funds using Article 122 of the EU Treaties

An EU leaders' summit on December 18 is expected to adopt a final decision on financing Ukraine in 2026-2027. Discussions on the format of such financing are still ongoing, while the European Commission is promoting the reparations loan as the most effective option.

Photo: omr.gov.ua