Billions on the Table as Europe Doubles Down
The money is already starting to move. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen confirmed that the EU would transfer the first tranche of €3.2 billion from its pledged €90 billion loan to Ukraine on Thursday. That is just the beginning. She added that the first portion of €6 billion set aside specifically for drone production would begin flowing to Kyiv within days.

Von der Leyen also announced that a joint investment fund backed by the EU alongside France, Germany and Poland — designed to support Ukraine's reconstruction — is ready to be deployed and could unlock around €500 million before the year is out. Since Russia launched its full-scale invasion in 2022, the EU and its member states have collectively provided Ukraine with more than €200 billion in economic, financial and military assistance. The message from Brussels was clear: that support is nowhere near finished.

"Now is the time to invest in Ukraine," von der Leyen said, pointing to the fact that Ukraine had just this month opened its first cluster of accession negotiations with the EU. She framed Ukraine's European path not as a distant ambition but as an obligation the bloc must now work to fulfil. "The determination of the Ukrainian people has shown the world that their European choice cannot be broken. And now it is our task to turn that choice into a reality," she added.

A Historic City Hosting a Forward-Looking Conversation
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk had a deliberate reason for choosing Gdańsk as the venue. This is the city where the Second World War began, and decades later, where the Solidarity movement of the 1980s lit the spark that helped dismantle communism across Eastern Europe. Tusk leaned into that symbolism as he opened the conference.

"If we work together wisely and with open hearts, we will overcome all evil and rebuild what evil people are destroying," he told those gathered. It was a moment that felt heavier than a typical opening address — and intentionally so.

The conference brought together a significant lineup of European leadership. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Lithuanian President Gitanas Nausėda, Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babiš and Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico were all expected to attend alongside Tusk, von der Leyen and Svyrydenko. The agenda spans five areas — business, security and defence, EU integration, regional development and human capital — covering nearly every dimension of what rebuilding a war-affected nation actually requires.