As bombing and shelling ripped through Ukraine’s towns and cities in the first week of the invasion, the Ukrainian government still made a scheduled interest payment to its private lenders on time. The lenders — mostly international finance institutions, banks, and hedge funds — are all queuing up to collect their debts, with no sign of respite.

The people of Ukraine are fighting for their survival while dealing with huge humanitarian needs, mass displacement, and the horrific siege conditions in Mariupol. And yet they are seeing urgently needed resources flow out of the country to foreign creditors.

Ukraine’s total external government debt amounts to $54 billion. The country is set to pay $7.3 billion in debt repayments this year alone. More than half is due to private lenders like banks and hedge funds, while most of the rest is owed to multilateral institutions such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank, and the European Investment Bank. The current fall in the value of Ukrainian hryvnia against the US dollar will only exacerbate the debt burden, as foreign debts are owed in dollars, heaping extra pressure on the government to find the funds to repay its loans at a time of foreign invasion and extreme economic disruption.