Dangling €1.2 billion in emergency macro-financial aid to Ukraine, Josep Borrell, the EU’s de facto foreign minister, told reporters in Kyiv yesterday that the money will only be released if Ukraine gets back on track with the IMF.

Dangling €1.2 billion in emergency macro-financial aid to Ukraine, Josep Borrell, the EU’s de facto foreign minister, told reporters in Kyiv yesterday that the money will only be released if Ukraine gets back on track with the IMF. The day before, Prime Minister Shmygal called Alfred Kammer, the new head of the IMF’s European Department, and asked him to send a review mission to Ukraine. Under the standby agreement signed in June, a review mission was to come to Kyiv in the summer and a second tranche, of $700 million, was to follow in September. Now, with Western ambassadors complaining that Ukraine is backsliding on anti-corruption commitments, it seems unlikely that Ukraine will get a second tranche of IMF money this year.