Further IMF aid should be strictly tied to concrete progress by Ukraine in adopting EU-standard changes,

Henrik Larsen, who served as an EU political adviser in Ukraine from 2014 to 2019, wrote in an Atlantic Council blog. Headlined ‘US Support for Ukraine Should be Ties to Reform Progress,’ the article notes that the IMF ‘pause’ holds up $2.9 billion from the IMF and €600 million in EU aid. “The IMF should publicly state its unwillingness to disburse this money unless Ukraine demonstrates a convincing track record of convictions in high-level corruption cases,” wrote Larsen, now a Senior Researcher at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich. “As long as Ukraine refuses to deliver on these long-standing commitments, the government will be forced to go to the financial markets for loans with much higher interest rates.”