Any member state that wants to buy ammunition for Ukraine outside EU can receive reimbursement from European Peace Fund - Borrell.

Josep Borrell explained how the €5 billion European Peace Fund could be used.

This was reported by Censor.NET with reference to Ukrinform.

EU High Representative Josep Borrell, answering the question whether the money allocated is available not only to promote the production of military equipment in the EU, but also to develop Ukraine's defence industry to produce these weapons and ammunition in the place where they are intended, explained:

"The Assistance Fund for Ukraine is designed to help Ukraine, not to develop the European defence industry. I have made it very clear today that any member state that wants to buy ammunition outside the European Union, has an offer or knows where to buy it, they can do so and receive a legitimate reimbursement from the European Peace Fund."

He noted that member states wishing to supply weapons and ammunition to Ukraine can get them from anywhere - from their own stockpiles, from the European defence industry, from any supplier in the world. For example, the Czech Republic's initiative to supply 800,000 rounds of ammunition to Ukraine is perfectly legitimate in order to use the Ukrainian Assistance Fund to partially offset the costs of the member states involved in this initiative.

"If member states agree to use the proceeds of frozen Russian assets, these resources could also be partially placed in the European Peace Fund, which would increase our assistance to Ukraine. We have been talking about this for several months now. This money will also be used to increase the capacity of the defence industry in Ukraine. We have to push this industrial capacity of the defence sector in Ukraine at home, and at the same time continue to provide weapons for Ukraine. That is why we have this instrument, the European Peace Fund," Borrell stressed.

He recalled that such an extra-budgetary instrument as the European Peace Fund was created for a very simple reason. Under EU law, the EU budget cannot be used to purchase weapons. At the same time, an intergovernmental extra-budgetary fund is free from such legal restrictions.

"So we can say for sure that the Ukrainian Fund was created to help Ukraine, and only for this purpose," the EU High Representative said.

Read more: EU countries have not yet adopted decision to use returns from Russian assets in Ukraine’s interests - Borrell