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according to xinhua news agency, european commission president ursula von der leyen, who is visiting ukraine, said on september 20 that the eu will provide ukraine with a loan of 35 billion euros. russian foreign ministry spokeswoman zakharova said that the eu's use of the proceeds from the freezing of russian assets to provide weapons to ukraine means that the eu has completely lost its independence.

on the 20th, von der leyen said on the social platform "x" that the loan was "part of the g7's commitment." previously, the leaders of the g7 announced in june that they would provide ukraine with a $50 billion loan with the interest on russia's frozen assets as collateral.

the new york times reported on the 20th that the 35 billion euro loan announced by the eu is about 39 billion u.s. dollars, which is less than the 50 billion u.s. dollars agreed by the leaders of the group of seven in june. the united states originally planned to provide 20 billion to 25 billion u.s. dollars of loans, but the condition was that the eu would extend the review and update frequency of sanctions against russia to three years to ensure that russian assets can be frozen for a longer period of time and not be affected by changes in eu sanctions against russia. however, the modification of this deadline requires the approval of all eu member states, and hungary opposes it. in order to break the deadlock, eu officials finally decided to provide ukraine with a smaller loan without the participation of the united states, and von der leyen said she was "absolutely confident" that the united states and other countries would eventually provide funds.

currently, eu member states and the european parliament still need to vote on the loan announced by von der leyen on the 20th. if the proposal gets the required number of votes, brussels plans to release the funds to ukraine before the end of the year.

ukrainian president zelensky said at a joint press conference with von der leyen on the 20th that ukraine will use the funds for energy, air defense and weapons procurement. von der leyen stressed that the eu will help ukraine maintain winter electricity supply when its energy infrastructure is severely damaged.

according to cctv news, the international energy agency released a report on september 19, saying that due to the unprecedented scale of russian military attacks on ukraine's energy infrastructure this year, ukraine's energy system is facing severe challenges this winter. the report said that the russian military's attacks have caused ukraine to lose more than two-thirds of its power generation capacity. after entering the heating period, energy shortages will have a serious impact on ukrainian hospitals, schools and other facilities.