MOSCOW, February 8. /TASS/. Ukraine's debt to Western creditors in 2023 may exceed the size of the country's GDP by 1.5 times, Nikolay Azarov, former Prime Minister of Ukraine (2010-2014), announced on Wednesday.

"According to results from last year, the volume of Ukrainian GDP has fallen by more than a third (from $200 bln to $128-130 bln). Moreover, according to experts, in 2023 the decline in GDP will continue, and Ukraine's public debt by the end of the year may rise from the current $107 billion to $180-200 billion. In this case, Ukraine's total debt to Western creditors will be approximately 1.5 times the size of the country's economy," he wrote on Facebook (outlawed in Russia, owned by the Meta corporation, which is recognized as extremist in Russia).

The former Prime Minister stressed that filling the budget of Ukraine "now depends entirely on Western assistance."

Earlier, Azarov noted that Ukraine "feeds itself from the hand of NATO countries" and will cease to exist as a state without Western lending. According to the National Bank of Ukraine, in 2022 Kiev received $32.1 billion from Western partners. The largest amount of assistance was provided by the United States in the amount of $12 billion.

Ukraine's need for Western funding will only increase as the country passes a budget for 2023 with a record $38 billion deficit. Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky has already offered the West to cover it in full. The National Bank expects that in 2023 the amount of financing provided to Kiev by Western partners will exceed $38 billion. In the meantime, the head of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Finance, Daniil Getmantsev, admitted that Ukraine cannot spend the available money without the consent of Western countries, as any expenses and changes must not contradict their vision.