The proportion of European Union citizens who either “fully approve” or “totally agree” with financial and military support for Ukraine has decreased substantially since the start of the Russian invasion, according to a recent survey, though a majority still want to provide some assistance to Kyiv.
According to the latest Eurobarometer survey in August 24 percent of EU citizens said they “totally agree” with “financing the purchase and supply of military equipment and training to Ukraine,” compared to 33 percent who said they “fully approve” of this taking place in April 2022, two months into the invasion. Total support for providing Ukraine with military funding has fallen from 67 percent to 48 percent over the same period, with the proportion opposed rising from 26 percent to 34 percent.
Ukraine has made some gains since launching its much-anticipated counteroffensive in June but has failed to make a major breakthrough that would cut Russia’s land bridge to Crimea, which President Putin seized and annexed in 2014. There are concerns in Kyiv that crucial Western support could start to wean, particularly with key elections upcoming in both the United States and a number of European countries.
The Eurobarometer poll found that 26 percent of EU citizens “totally agree” with “supporting Ukraine financially and economically,” versus 42 percent who fully approved in April 2022. An additional 38 percent said they “tend to agree” with financial support for Ukraine, bringing the total figure for support to 64 percent.
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By comparison in April 2022, another 48 percent said they “tend to agree,” giving a combined figure for support of 80 percent. The proportion who oppose financial support for Ukraine fell from 16 percent to 28 percent over the same period.
The most recent Eurobarometer polled 26,514 EU citizens across the 27 EU member states between August 24 and 31.
It also found the proportion who fully or totally support sanctions on Russia fell from 55 percent to 46 percent between April 2022 and August 2023, while the proportion who said the same thing about welcoming refugees from Ukraine declined from 55 percent to 36 percent. In total, including those who said they “tend to agree,” 71 percent of EU citizens backed sanctions on Russia and 76 the welcoming of Ukrainian refugees.
Newsweek reached out to the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry via email for comment.
According to a British Ministry of Defense intelligence report, hundreds of Wagner fighters have returned to the frontlines with a particular focus on the eastern city of Bakhmut, which they played a crucial role in capturing earlier this year. Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin was killed in a plane crash in August which has been widely blamed on those loyal to Putin, following an aborted mutiny in June.
Over the past few weeks, Ukraine has conducted a number of strikes on military targets in Crimea including the headquarters of the Russian Black Sea Fleet on September 22.
Speaking to Ukrainian news outlet Pravda, Mykhailo Podolyak, an advisor to Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky, said: “The Russian Federation is in a lifelong state of panic that’s why they threaten everyone. To compensate for their panic, they always say that we are going to go somewhere, do something, and so on.”