Europe Today: Ukraine seeks urgent funding in Brussels as Russia's drones pound Kyiv

Name: Europe Today: Ukraine seeks urgent funding in Brussels as Russia's drones pound Kyiv
Uploaded: 2026-09-30T05:55:40+00:00
Duration: 19 min 39 s
Channel: euronews (in English)

00:14Good morning, it's Tuesday, September 29th, you're watching Euronews, and this is Europe

00:21Today.

00:22Coming up, Ukraine is turning to international partners to help cover its wartime spending

00:28needs, with Brussels set to bring together donor countries and financial institutions

00:33later today.

00:34Ukraine has cut its 24 billion euro funding shortfall to 18 billion euro through austerity

00:40measures, but it's unclear how the remaining gap can be plugged.

00:44Russia's recent escalation has added urgency to the search for funding.

00:50Pope Leo XIV has praised multilateralism as the best defense against the desire for dominance.

00:56And a speech in the French city of Metz.

00:59The pontiff lamented a world marked by conflict, from war and hunger to deteriorating personal

01:05relations, describing an increasingly uncivilized climate.

01:10He also criticized the lies and deception, he said, were fueling growing distrust between

01:16citizens and governments.

01:17And Euronews is hosting its Travel and Tourism Summit 2026 in Brussels today, bringing together

01:25policy makers, industry leaders and travel experts from across Europe and beyond.

01:30The summit examines the policies, technologies and investments shaping tomorrow's travel landscape,

01:36from sustainable mobility and destination management to infrastructure and tourism investment.

01:42Welcome to the program.

01:44I'm Stefan Grobe.

01:46Russia launched more than 120 drones at Ukraine on Monday, with President Zelensky saying almost

01:5290 of them were faster jet-powered models.

01:55In Kiev, a medical center was hit while another jet-powered drone struck the National Academy

02:00of Sciences in the heart of the capital in broad daylight.

02:04And while emergency crews were still working at the academy, our team witnessed what appeared

02:10to be an attempted double-tap attack aimed at rescue workers, with another Russian drone

02:16intercepted directly above the site.

02:19Our correspondent, Sasha Vakulina, was there and joins us now from Kiev.

02:24Sasha, you were at the scene when that second drone came in.

02:28What did you see?

02:32Another night of relentless non-stop attacks here in Kiev, when Russia used both missiles

02:37and also drones, including those jet-powered drones.

02:40And I think it's important to look at what is it that Moscow is trying to target.

02:44Now, some of the targets are the sites that we have seen Moscow trying to hit throughout

02:49the war.

02:50First of all, this is, of course, energy infrastructure.

02:52On Monday, Euronews was filming at the site of an energy site of one of the recent Russia's

02:58attacks in the Kiev region.

03:00But we had to stop the filming and we had to seek shelter because there was another drone

03:05approaching the same site, probably trying to hit the crews and the people working on

03:11fixing that energy site.

03:14But also, Moscow is increasingly targeting data centers and communication infrastructure.

03:19And you can already feel this here in Kiev with the internet connection and the mobile

03:23networks going rather patchy.

03:26And this is, of course, problematic both for the people in Ukraine, but also for Ukraine's

03:30military and the air defense.

03:32But most of Russia's strikes also are hitting residential and other civilian sites.

03:39One example is National Academy of Sciences here in the very center of Kiev.

03:44Now, emergency services working here confirmed to Euronews that this was most probably a direct

03:51hit by Russia's jet-powered drones.

03:54And that brings us to this big problem that Kiev and Ukrainian authorities are facing now is

03:59these drones and how to counter them.

04:01Huduma Zelensky said yesterday that Ukraine's interception rate when it comes to all of the

04:05drones stands at around 70 percent.

04:07When it comes to the jet-powered drones, those faster new ones, this is around 57 percent.

04:14Ukraine is indeed these days testing the new interceptors to counter them.

04:18But this is increasingly becoming a technological race.

04:21The way Russia adapts its weapons and tactics and then Ukraine is adapting and trying to intercept

04:27the new weapons and do that as quickly as it can.

04:31Because, of course, these are the attacks on the residents, on the people of Ukraine.

04:38Euronews crew were at the National Academy of Science in the immediate aftermath of Russia's

04:43attacks.

04:44And with the emergency crews still working there at the center, another Russian drone was coming

04:50towards our way.

04:51And we had to seek shelter in what was apparently Moscow's attempt to attack the rescue workers

04:59working there on the site.

05:01Take a look at what happened on Monday.

05:10We are standing right at the site of the attack here in Kyiv's city center.

05:15This here is the National Academy of Science, which was hit earlier.

05:20And as the rescue teams are working here, as you can see, there was another attempted attack

05:25right now with the air defense intercepting another drone right above the site.

05:36At around half past one, there was a direct hit.

05:39A jet-powered drone struck a three-story building of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine.

05:45Can you confirm that this is a civilian building?

05:48That's the building.

05:49You can see it right at the entrance.

05:51That's the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine.

05:54Nothing else.

05:55Here, it's basically a business center and other buildings.

06:00We're standing at the site of a Russian drone attack in the very center of Kyiv.

06:06The Capitol's emergency service has confirmed to Euronews that this was a direct hit by a jet-powered

06:13drones.

06:14Now, these are newer, faster drones that Russia has been using a lot these days.

06:19And, in fact, there are no breaks between the air raid alerts and the drone attacks in the

06:25Capitol these days.

06:25And you can see the rescue workers here working right behind me.

06:29The emergency services also confirmed that here in the center of Kyiv, next to this building

06:33and in the building itself, there are no military targets.

06:36This is the National Academy of Science of Ukraine.

06:45All right, Sasha Vakulina, thank you very much for this update under the most stressful

06:50conditions.

06:52But it's not only the capital, Kyiv, that was pounded by Russian strikes.

06:56In rural areas, Ukraine's agricultural economy is directly targeted, including export routes

07:03in the Black Sea.

07:04Our correspondent, Merit Gwynn, spoke to the Ukrainian Agriculture Minister Taras Visotsky

07:09and asked him whether the country could still rely on its main export corridor.

07:15Unfortunately, since the end of July, that's already for two months, the situation is really

07:22critical.

07:23We are not able to export agricultural commodities through our deep water ports of Odessa region.

07:31Why it is so critical?

07:32Just an example, in June 2026, 90% of agricultural commodities were exported through this channel.

07:44That means that the biggest and the main channel of export logistics has been closed since the

07:52end of July.

07:54And what can Ukraine's partners do here?

07:58Is it about providing more protection in the Black Sea?

08:00Is it about opening alternative export routes, for example, for the Baltics?

08:05Or are you at a point where you say, actually, we need a broken deal with Russia?

08:10We are currently working with our partners, including the European ones, simultaneously on a few tracks.

08:19One of them is to develop the EU solidarity lanes, that's alternative routes.

08:25And so far, we have some progress.

08:28When we look at the September numbers, we can state that around 40-45% of export is done through

08:39these EU solidarity lanes.

08:41Definitely, we keep working on protection, because we do understand the best guarantee instrument

08:47is to have enough military forces, military power to protect these routes from all of these

08:54rocket records, and also we are ready to create the safety conditions in the Black Sea for all of

09:02the civil goods, including Ukrainian agricultural commodities.

09:05We are open for it.

09:07And do you think that impact on pricing for consumers could be felt beyond Ukraine's borders as well,

09:14if this crisis persists in the Black Sea?

09:16Actually, it's already happening.

09:18We can already see that on average, the grain prices have increased by 25%, and this is a lot.

09:2825% it means if you multiply it for the overall grain and food consumption out of grain within a

09:38year,

09:38it could be even up to 60 billion US dollars additional costs of all of the consumers' consumers' Roosevelt.

09:46The price increase is already happening.

09:48Finally, Minister, we see that Russia is really stepping up its strikes on Ukraine.

09:55The winter is coming.

09:56How fearful are you now, both for Ukrainian farmers in terms of the impact on them,

10:03but also broader for the country going into this winter?

10:08Of course, during all of these almost five years of food conversion, we have been constantly preparing.

10:14Ukrainians are resilient, but it's very hard.

10:17Of course, the level of risks currently is the biggest since the beginning of the full-scale invasion.

10:23And it's very hard really to prepare just for everything.

10:27So, first of all, the focus is on military air defense systems.

10:33It's very critical to have enough of military air defense systems to save all of this infrastructure.

10:42Ukrainian Agriculture Minister Taras Visotsky speaking to Merit.

10:47As the war in Ukraine continues, Europe faces a difficult question.

10:52How far is it prepared to go to support Kiev and increase pressure on Moscow?

10:57From sanctions and financial aid to military support,

11:00and the growing threat of Russian hybrid attacks across Europe,

11:04the EU is trying to balance solidarity with Ukraine against the rising costs and risks at home.

11:10To talk about this, I'm now joined by Tobias Kremer, a German Social Democrat in the European Parliament,

11:16where he's a member of the Committees on Foreign Affairs, Security and Defense,

11:20and the Delegations for Relations with the U.S. and with NATO.

11:24Good morning and welcome to the set.

11:26Good morning. Thank you for having me.

11:27So, when you see and hear all these reports, what's your reaction?

11:33I mean, to me, that just shows the utter desperation of Putin,

11:39who has turned this already illegal and criminal campaign into just a campaign

11:45where he doesn't even focus his attacks on the battlefields,

11:49because he knows he can't progress on that.

11:51I think we've calculated his progress is slower than that of a snail, really.

11:56But he's now really focusing on attacking civilians,

11:58and he's not just attacking civilians in Ukraine who are suffering every day.

12:02But what we are seeing there is that he even goes so far of saying he knows that this grain

12:08export,

12:09he's hurting the Ukrainian economy, but he's also hurting people all over the world,

12:13especially in the global south, who are so dependent on grain exports from Ukraine.

12:17And he knows that this will cause famine.

12:19He knows this will cause death in Africa and other parts of the world.

12:22And Putin is so desperate that he just goes in there and tries to cause as much harm as possible.

12:27But that is just criminal. Let's be honest.

12:28Having said that, where does the EU stand on Ukraine right now?

12:33Is it still as long as it takes when it comes to support?

12:37Or do we already see the limits of sustained help for Ukraine?

12:43I think what we need to understand is that this war that Putin conducts in Ukraine, against Ukraine,

12:49is not purely about Ukraine.

12:51And Putin has said that very, very clearly.

12:52For him, this is a war against the European order of peace.

12:58It's a war to undermine the unity of NATO.

13:00And it's a war to undermine the way we are living in our free democracies.

13:04And we see the hybrid attacks.

13:05It's not just Ukraine that's attacked.

13:07I'm from Germany.

13:08We had these attacks.

13:09And they're no longer hybrid.

13:10We had proper attacks in Leipzig, where you had drones that could have caused real damage and cost lives.

13:17And I think there is a growing understanding in Europe that we are defending here also our way of life,

13:23our liberty.

13:23And that supporting Ukraine is really necessary, not just for Ukraine, but also for our own security.

13:29And the cost of Ukraine failing would be so much higher for us than the cost of supporting Ukraine.

13:35So I think there is determination in Europe.

13:36We are the biggest supporters of Ukraine.

13:38But I also think we have to think very clearly what levers do we have now and to start thinking

13:42creatively.

13:43I still think we should use the frozen assets, for instance.

13:46That would have been my next question.

13:48I mean, the EU just extended sanctions on 3,000, give or take, individuals and entities.

13:56After a long and arduous process, right, what should be the next step, the next action against Russia that the

14:06EU should take?

14:06I mean, I think we really should look at what hurts Putin and what does he care about.

14:12How can we use the levers we have to leverage for peace?

14:15And I think it would be poorly advised to just go into Putin's escalatory spiral where he might have an

14:23advantage.

14:23So it's not necessarily about like having hybrid attacks against Russia, but really looking where does it hurt Putin.

14:28And Putin, we see, unfortunately, he doesn't care about the life of his soldiers.

14:31He doesn't care about Russian lives.

14:32But what he does care about is his wallet.

14:34And we still have over 200 billion frozen assets in European bank accounts.

14:40And I think we really should be looking very closely of how we can turn that into a leverage for

14:45peace to show Putin, you are continuing this war, you are escalating this war.

14:50It's time you start paying for it and really using that.

14:53And I think it's especially important to do that now because what we are seeing in the next few months,

14:57also with the G20 invitation of Putin into the United States,

15:01I think we as Europeans should go there with a plan, not just reacting, but actually saying here we have

15:06a peace plan.

15:07And we worked it out with Ukraine and talked to Putin to nothing else, the G20, but Ukraine.

15:12All right, Tobias Krämer, thank you so much for coming on the show this morning.

15:16I should mention also that you will be a speaker at tomorrow's Euronews Defense Summit here in Brussels.

15:21Looking forward to that.

15:25So for his last public appearance of his apostolic visit to France, Pope Leo chose the border city of Metz

15:32to speak on the future of Europe,

15:34giving a distinctly political dimension to a visit to France that has sparked scenes of spiritual jubilation

15:41and stressing the importance of unity on a continent where nationalist movements are gaining strength

15:47and Russia's war against Ukraine now in its fifth year shows no sign of abating.

15:53To analyze the Pope's visit to France, I'm now joined by Austin Ivory,

15:58a fellow in contemporary church history at Oxford University and author of two biographies of Pope Francis.

16:05Good morning. Great to have you on the show.

16:07Good to be with you.

16:09So to you, what was the most surprising element about Leo's speech on Europe?

16:16Well, I wasn't wholly surprised by it in the sense that the content, I think, was typical of him,

16:22his commitment to peace, to multilateralism.

16:25What surprised me, I think, was the passion with which he's able to challenge Europe at the moment to say,

16:31you know, are you preparing for peace or are you preparing for war?

16:35In other words, are you constructing the institutions that will lay the basis for a new world order,

16:41which will contain and prevent war, make war unthinkable?

16:44Or are you simply increasing the budgets for your military spending, assuming that there will be more war?

16:50So I found that very, very challenging and very striking.

16:54Also, I think the return to the roots of Europe, it was a very challenging speech in terms of,

17:00you know, what are the true values that have made Europe?

17:02And he talked about the European history, but he also talked about the example of Robert Schumann.

17:07He was speaking in Metz, which was the place where Robert Schumann lived and had his work.

17:14And it's really Schumann as one of the great architects of the European Union.

17:18He focused on what made that possible after the war to build that new order.

17:24So Leo, you know, this is a great theme of his pontificate.

17:26He sees that the world order has crumbled, is crumbling, probably has crumbled.

17:31And now is the task to build that new world order.

17:35We've seen Pope Leo receive huge public enthusiasm.

17:39Does that give him greater political and moral influence?

17:42Or should we be careful not to confuse popularity with influence?

17:47Well, I'm struck.

17:48I was struck, of course, by the popularity of him at his visit.

17:52Very similar, by the way, to his visit to Spain in June.

17:56From the sort of papal point of view, what this marks, I think, is the beginning of a new

18:02mission to Europe, if I can put it that way.

18:04Under Pope Francis, it was important to rebalance the church.

18:07The church is a global missionary body.

18:10Europe is no longer, if you like, the center of Catholicism.

18:13I think what Leo is doing is he's saying, actually, yes, he agrees with that.

18:18But he's also saying we need to build in Europe on what is happening, which is that young people

18:24are returning or coming to faith, not because they were brought up in any way religious,

18:30but because they are seeking and searching for meaning.

18:32And we've had something like a 400 percent increase in new Catholics in France since

18:38COVID.

18:39And so a big part of his this trip, I think, just as it was in Spain, was to sort

18:45of take

18:46that desire for meaning, that search for for values and to just say, look, the church is

18:52here ready to receive you.

18:53And one of the things he did when he was addressing the French church was to say, look, the church

18:57itself has to change.

18:59You know, we have to be come a different kind of church if we are to walk with the seekers

19:04and the searchers among the young searches for meaning.

19:07But, yeah, his popularity was extraordinary.

19:09Just to see the streets full like that was remarkable.

19:12All right.

19:13Austin Ivory, an expert on the modern papacy at Oxford University.

19:16Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts with us.

19:18And that's it for today.

19:20For the rest of the news throughout the day, Euronews has you covered as usual.

19:26I'm Stefan Grobe and I see you tomorrow.

Europe Today: Ukraine seeks urgent funding in Brussels as Russia's drones pound Kyiv

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