WARSAW

Poland will receive an advance payment of €5 billion ($5.5 billion) from the EU as part of the bloc’s recovery fund by the end of 2023, the country’s new prime minister said on Friday.

According to the Polish news agency PAP, Prime Minister Donald Tusk said this after his meeting with EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.

"We will receive an advance of 5 billion euros by the end of this year. This money will be earmarked for our energy independence," Tusk said.

Poland was supposed to receive €23.9 billion in grants and €11.5 billion in loans under the Recovery and Resilience Facility. However, the European Commission had blocked the disbursement of the funds due to a long-standing rule of law dispute with Poland's previous government.

For the release of the money, the European Commission had set a number of "milestones" for Warsaw to achieve.

In a statement from Poland's Ministry of Development Funds and Regional Policy responsible for the funds, it was reported that Warsaw applied for a payment of 6.9 billion euros from the fund in addition to the advance.

*Writing in Istanbul by Zeynep Cetin