One thousand days of war – 1,000 days of EU support

“One thousand days ago, Russia tried to wipe Ukraine off the map. And for one thousand days, Russia has failed – because of Ukraine’s resistance, and the sacrifice of your heroes. Today is a day of mourning, but also a day of promise. We promise to keep standing by your side, for as long as it takes,” Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, said in a video message today.

19 November marks 1,000 days since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. On 24 February 2022, Russia launched an unprovoked war of aggression against the neighbouring country.

To mark this day, the EU said it was committed to providing continued political, financial, economic, humanitarian, military and diplomatic support to Ukraine and its people, for “as long as it takes and as intensely as needed”. Since the start of the war, the EU and its member states have provided around €122 billion in support for Ukraine and its people.

In her statement, Ursula von der Leyen reassured Ukrainians that European and Western support would continue to flow: €50 billion until 2027 from the European Union and €50 billion dollars until 2026 from G7 countries and the EU. She also announced an additional €65 million in support of an initiative to buy school meals for Ukrainian children.

Von der Leyen also said that the progress of Ukraine towards joining the EU is “impressive, even more so while you fight an existential war”.

“We know that one day not so far away you will be part of our Union,” she said. “And I am confident that we can move to the next stage in our negotiations. Ukraine’s future is in our Union. Your freedom is our freedom. And our Union is your home.”

At the Foreign Affairs Council, held yesterday in Brussels, EU High Representative Josep Borrell said the recent biggest missile attack on Ukraine showed that Putin “does not look willing to negotiate, but to escalate the war in order to fulfil his goals. His goals have been clear since the beginning: to conquer, to occupy and to subjugate Ukraine, a European country, a candidate country to the European Union.”

Since the start of the full-scale war, the EUNEIGBOURS East website has been collecting on a daily basis all the information about the EU’s multidimensional support to Ukraine during the war. All the latest news on EU support for Ukraine is available on our Stand With Ukraine page. Our EUEnlargement page highlights the most important facts about Ukraine’s ongoing EU accession process and explains that process step by step.

We have also released a YouTube video, available in Ukrainian with English subtitles, about the EU’s support for Ukraine’s reconstruction. This edition looks at how the EU is helping Ukraine to stay energised despite Russia’s targeted attacks on the country’s energy infrastructure.

Find out more

Von der Leyen statement

Josep Borrell press remarks after the Foreign Affairs Council

EU solidarity with Ukraine