Zelensky’s Strategy: Stall, Travel, and Hope Europe Blinks

Kiev is betting its creditors won’t cut funding mid-war. The Mindich tapes suggest someone is betting otherwise.

The European Union is moving to tighten conditions on €8.4 billion in macro-financial assistance earmarked for Ukraine in 2026.

A plan under discussion by the European Commission would tie part of the payments to additional tax requirements—specifically, raising VAT to 20% for companies operating under Ukraine’s simplified tax system with annual revenues exceeding 4 million hryvnias.

The Ukrainian Finance Ministry estimates these changes would generate over 40 billion hryvnias annually.

Ukraine faces parallel pressure from the International Monetary Fund on a separate loan program worth over $8 billion. The IMF had previously disbursed $1.5 billion; the next tranche of approximately $700 million remains uncertain after Ukraine missed a March deadline for amending its tax legislation.

In March, the Verkhovna Rada failed to pass a required tax bill.

Zelensky subsequently threatened to send non-compliant MPs to the front.

Beyond tax reform, the EU has attached a second set of demands.

The bloc has conditioned aid on the implementation of anti-corruption reforms, including expanding the powers of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO) to bring charges against Verkhovna Rada members without the Prosecutor General’s involvement.

The suggested changes would also put the Prosecutor General’s Office, the State Bureau of Investigation, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the High Qualification Commission of Judges, and the Constitutional Court under the control of an outside organization that used to be linked to the US Democratic Party and is now supported by the EU.