The EU is spending more money on Russian fossil fuels than on financial aid to Ukraine, a report marking the third anniversary of the invasion has found.

EU member states bought €21.9bn (£18.1bn) of Russian oil and gas in the third year of the war, according to estimates from the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (Crea), despite the efforts under way to kick the continent’s addiction to the fuels that fund Vladimir Putin’s war chest.

The amount is one-sixth greater than the €18.7bn the EU allocated to Ukraine in financial aid in 2024, according to a tracker from the Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).

Vaibhav Raghunandan, an analyst at Crea and coauthor of the report, said: “Purchasing Russian fossil fuels is, quite plainly, akin to sending financial aid to the Kremlin and enabling its invasion. [It’s] a practice that must stop immediately to secure not just Ukraine’s future, but also Europe’s energy security.”

The researchers compiled trade data to estimate the value of Russian fuels that were sold around the world in the third year of the invasion. They forecast data for February 2025, which is not yet available, based on imports in January.

In the calendar year 2024, the EU spent 39% more on Russian fossil fuel imports than it set aside for Ukraine. The aid figure does not include military or humanitarian contributions.

Christoph Trebesch, an economist at IfW Kiel, which was not involved in the analysis, said there was a striking gap between how much aid donors had mobilised for Ukraine compared with past wars, with European donors spending on average less than 0.1% of GDP a year.