Defence spending in Ukraine has increased 6 times since end of February 

This was stated by Ukraine’s Minister of Finance Serhiy Marchenko in an interview with RBC-Ukraine.

When asked how much the defence budget of Ukraine has grown, the Ministry of Finance head replied that "Compared to the pre-war budget, it has increased by 6 times."

At the same time, according to the minister, Ukraine continues to provide social guarantees.

"We have stable expenditures: education, social protection, healthcare and others. And the military budget has grown 6 times, now it is 31.7% of GDP, almost half of the budget goes to the security and defence sector," Marchenko said.

According to him, the reduction of the official staff will not help to save on some expenditures.

"I would not raise the question of reducing expenditures, because, firstly, mass reduction of officials will be followed by high costs. Secondly, there are not so many high-quality personnel in the system, it is important to preserve them, so any changes should not lead to losing control over the state power system," Marchenko said.