European leaders including Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelenskiy meet in The Hague on Tuesday to launch an International Claims Commission to compensate Kyiv for hundreds of billions of dollars in damage from Russian attacks and alleged war crimes.

Unveiling her plan on Dec. 4, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the EU would cover two-thirds of Ukraine’s needs for 2026 and 2027, for a total of 90 billion euros ($105 billion). International partners would fill the gap.

Ukraine claimed it carried out an underwater drone strike on Dec. 15, the first such attack in maritime warfare, that critically damaged a Russian Kilo-class attack submarine at the Russian port of Novorossiysk,

The European Union’s effort to tap Russian assets as the main source of international funding for Ukraine is becoming “increasingly difficult” as leaders struggle to agree on a framework, the bloc’s top foreign policy official said.

The European Union on Friday indefinitely froze Russia’s assets in Europe to ensure that Hungary and Slovakia, both with Moscow-friendly governments, can’t prevent the billions of euros from being used to support Ukraine.

European Union member states have approved nearly $2.7 billion in funding for Ukraine as part of a plan to bolster the war-besieged nation's recovery, reconstruction and modernization.

European officials are growing concerned that an emerging US-brokered peace deal in Ukraine could be exploited by Russia, paving the way for a re-invasion of territory in the war-battered nation’s eastern Donbas region.

The president said he had exchanged “pretty strong words” with European leaders, while Russia signaled it saw itself as increasingly on the same page as the U.S.

Germany is undergoing a significant military rearmament. The change has been driven by the ongoing war in Ukraine and U.S. pressure on Europe to shoulder more of its defense.