Von der Leyen pledges Ukraine €160m in aid, energy support from frozen Russian assets
With 80% of thermal plants destroyed, Kyiv is facing a difficult winter – but some worry EU support means higher prices for Europeans.
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00:00As the winter approaches, millions of Ukrainians have been left with limited access to electricity.
00:07The country is suffering from major power cuts on a daily basis.
00:11President von der Leyen announced on Thursday new EU support for Ukraine's energy security
00:16to keep people warm and the economy running.
00:19She also announced her visit to Kiev on Friday.
00:24We will make an additional amount of close to 160 million euros available for this winter.
00:32This includes 60 million euros in humanitarian aid for shelters and heaters, for example.
00:39And it includes around 100 million euros for repair works and renewables.
00:45And these 100 million euros come from the proceeds of the immobilized Russian assets in the European Union.
00:54Because it is only right that Russia pays for the destruction it caused, we know that more is needed.
01:02So we must keep transferring part of the proceeds from immobilized Russian assets to Ukraine's energy resilience.
01:11Approximately half of Ukraine's energy infrastructure has been destroyed,
01:15removing 9 gigawatts of power generation capacity.
01:19The EU Commission is now aiming to restore and export 4.5 gigawatts to Ukraine.
01:25But the Russian war on Ukraine also has consequences for energy prices in the EU.
01:30In a letter sent to the Commission President,
01:32the Greek Prime Minister called for European ways to address the effects of the war on the energy market.
01:41We know that we have in Europe, compared to the rest of the world, structurally too high energy prices.
01:47And one very clear goal of the new Commission, but also described in the Draghi report,
01:54is to lower structurally the energy prices.
01:58Once again, von der Leyen underlined that renewable energy and energy efficiency must play a big role in the EU's answer.