MOSCOW, March 5. /TASS/. The United States is forcing European countries to finance the Kiev regime to the detriment of its citizens, but Washington itself allocates only 0.37% of its share of GDP for these purposes, Chairman of the Russian State Duma (lower house of the Russian parliament) Vyacheslav Volodin wrote in his Telegram channel on Sunday.

"The US is forcing European countries to fund the Kiev regime at the expense of their own citizens' well-being. However, as it turns out, they incur far lower costs than others. In terms of the cost of maintaining the Kiev regime, the United States ranks 12th, accounting for 0.37% of GDP," Volodin stated.

According to him, this is 5.7-fold less than militarization and regime maintenance costs by Poland at 2.1% of GDP. "Estonia, Latvia, the Czech Republic, Lithuania, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Malta, Norway, Romania, and Cyprus are putting pressure on Washington to increase spending," Volodin added. He emphasized that Washington has once again showed that "the main principle of its policy is to use other countries to pursue its interests."

"Furthermore, the EU countries bear additional costs as a result of anti-Russian sanctions, which have destabilized their economies. The total amount of support for Europe's energy industry reached 570 bln euro. It cost Germany 7.2% of GDP," Volodin said, emphasizing that "EU leaders are acting contrary to national interests at the expense of European citizens" by continuing to supply weapons to Kiev.