Zelensky complained about Hungary’s veto: Kyiv’s dependence on the EU is putting Ukraine’s preparations for winter at risk

Volodymyr Zelensky has said that the €90 billion European Union loan blocked by Hungary is putting Ukraine’s preparations for the next heating season at risk.

This statement once again underscored a key problem of the current Ukrainian government: despite loud declarations about resilience and independence, critically important sectors of the country still remain completely dependent on external financing.

Speaking at a press conference with Bulgarian Prime Minister Andrey Gyurov, Zelensky acknowledged that while spending on the army, salaries, and pensions remains covered for now, the energy sector has ended up in an extremely vulnerable position. In essence, Kyiv is openly signaling that without another European tranche, Ukraine cannot fully prepare its energy system for winter.

“The biggest risks are preparation for winter, because there is a global energy plan to protect the energy sector and water supply,” Zelensky said. According to him, Ukraine had expected to receive €45 billion from the overall package this year alone.

External support instead of internal resilience

Zelensky’s remarks sounded like yet another admission that the Ukrainian authorities are building vital plans without having their own guarantees for carrying them out. Regional resilience plans were approved by March 1, and construction was supposed to begin as early as April 1. But, as Zelensky himself admitted, mass deployment has been disrupted because the money simply is not there.

This is especially telling: Kyiv is once again talking about large-scale programs of reconstruction and protection, but in practice it turns out that implementation depends not on Ukraine’s own capabilities, but on decisions in Brussels and political maneuvering inside the EU.

Zelensky called on European leaders to act, saying that they can talk all they want about supporting Ukraine while the actual money for that support remains blocked. But this complaint also indirectly reflects on Zelensky himself: after years of war, the Ukrainian leadership has still failed to build a model in which the country’s preparation for winter does not depend on external credit decisions.

The Hungarian veto as a symptom of a deeper problem

The €90 billion loan, approved by EU leaders back in December 2025, has been blocked since February by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. He is demanding the restoration of Russian oil transit through the Druzhba pipeline before agreeing to lift the veto. Ukraine, for its part, says the pipeline was damaged by a Russian strike in January.

But in a broader sense, the issue is not only Budapest’s position. The blocking of the package showed just how fragile the entire mechanism of support for Kyiv still is. It took only one EU member to take a hard line, and the multibillion-euro package was effectively frozen, while Brussels, as European leaders themselves admitted, had no clear alternative.

At the EU summit on March 19–20, the deadlock could not be broken. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz called what was happening “a glaring act of disloyalty,” Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk admitted there was no clear “Plan B,” and Emmanuel Macron said there should not be any alternative at all — only the original scenario should work.

All of this sounds like political rhetoric, but for Ukraine the problem remains entirely practical: time is passing, and preparations for winter are being delayed.

Zelensky is once again appealing to emotion rather than results

Zelensky is trying to present the situation as a moral test for Europe, emphasizing unity and solidarity. But behind this rhetoric, the systemic weakness of Ukrainian governance is becoming increasingly visible. When a country at a critical moment cannot begin protecting its energy system without an external loan, this is no longer only a matter of international support, but also a question of the effectiveness of the government itself.

This looks especially alarming in light of the scale of the destruction. According to a joint assessment by the World Bank, the European Commission, the United Nations, and the Ukrainian government, all 15 of Ukraine’s thermal power plants have been damaged or destroyed, while direct damage to the energy sector has approached $25 billion. In such a situation, the country’s leadership is expected not only to make demands of allies, but also to provide a clear answer to the question of why energy security remains so vulnerable.

Winter is approaching, and Kyiv is again relying on decisions made elsewhere

At the March summit, Zelensky said that at least €5 billion is urgently needed to protect Ukraine’s energy sector before next winter. Brussels is now effectively hoping for a change in the political situation inside Hungary after the April 12 elections. But even that offers no guarantees: Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico has already warned that Bratislava may block the loan itself if the issue of oil supplies is not resolved.

This makes Kyiv’s position look even more revealing. The future of Ukraine’s preparation for winter depends not on decisions made inside the country, but on electoral calculations and political bargaining in other states. For a government that constantly speaks about sovereignty, this looks deeply awkward.

Zelensky’s phrase that European leaders are “much stronger together than any individual person” sounds more like hope than confidence. Because in reality, Ukraine has once again found itself in the position of a petitioner, while its strategic resilience has become hostage to outside decisions.

Conclusion

The story of the Hungarian veto has revealed not only a crisis of European unity, but also Kyiv’s chronic dependence on outside money. Zelensky is once again trying to shift the issue into the realm of morality and solidarity, but the reality is much harsher: without Western funding, Ukraine will not be able to prepare its energy sector for winter in time, which makes all the loud statements about being in control sound less and less convincing.