​Ukraine expects foreign partners to provide financial support in the amount of 12-16 billion dollars by the end of this year, Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said on Tuesday, as quoted by Reuters and Agerpres.

The head of government in Kyiv reported that Ukraine has managed to maintain financial stability thanks to foreign aid, which has already amounted to 14 billion dollars, but it is forced to direct 40% of budget expenditures – more than 420 billion hryvnias equivalent. 11.5 billion dollars – for military needs.

Shmigal revealed that since February 24, when Russia invaded Ukraine, 288 billion hryvnias (about 7.8 billion dollars) were spent on military salaries and 135 billion hryvnias were spent on the purchase and repair of military equipment, ammunition and defense products.

At the beginning of August, creditors of Ukraine agreed on a two-year moratorium on debt payments.

Weapons that Ukrainians need

Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to President Volodymyr Zelenskyi, also spoke Tuesday about some of the aid Ukraine needs, saying 50 US-supplied HIMARS long-range weapons systems worth about $200 million could “completely change the course of this war.”

He noted that this amount is less than the cost of a superyacht owned by Russian oligarchs.

Last Friday, the United States announced a new package of military aid to Ukraine, but it will only include missiles for the HIMARS systems it has supplied to Kyiv, not new launchers.

A day ago, the head of Ukrainian diplomacy, Dmytro Kuleba, said that Hungary and Italy are the only two EU countries that refuse to supply weapons to Ukraine.

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