15 Aug 2022 17:10

Ukrainian Rada raises state budget spending by 270 bln hryvni through domestic borrowing

MOSCOW. Aug 15 (Interfax) - A 2022 budget expenditure increase by 270 billion hryvni, including over 269 billion hryvni in national security and defense spending, has been approved by the Verkhovna Rada following a proposal put forth by the Servant of the People faction.

The bill to raise this year's budget spending was approved by 287 Ukrainian MPs on Monday, Ukrainian media outlets said.

"The implementation of this legislation will lead to a growth of the state budget's deficit and the maximum size of debt by this amount," an explanatory note to the bill said earlier. According to Yaroslav Zheleznyak, deputy chairman of the Verkhovna Rada's tax and finance committee, the bill in question was drafted by the government.

Under the bill, the amount of spending for the Defense Ministry has increased by 241.16 billion hryvni, spending on paying salaries by 145.3 billion hryvni, spending for the Interior Ministry by 22.86 billion hryvni, for the Security Service of Ukraine by 2.46 billion hryvni, and for the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Defense Ministry by 2.22 billion hryvni.

Furthermore, 715.7 million hryvni were added to the government's Reserve Fund.

In addition, the bill raises the amount of domestic borrowing to 794.1 billion hryvni, the maximum size of the budget's deficit to 1.09 trillion hryvni and the maximum size of state debt to 3.6 trillion hryvni.

An amendment allocating 12.7 billion hryvni to Naftogaz of Ukraine to purchase natural gas using a loan issued by the Canadian government was not included in the final version of the document, Zheleznyak said.