The adoption of the law on settling the situation in the banking sector by Ukraine's Verkhovna Rada at second reading is a vital test, Head of the EU Delegation to Ukraine Matti Maasikas has said.

"And of course the pending legislation on the banking resolution is a litmus test in many ways. At the heart of it is the question. I mean, if I am not mistaken $15 billion of Ukrainian taxpayers' money has been in recent years put to the banking resolutions, to plugging the holes in the banking sector. One has to be sure that these situations may never occur again, since the banking resolution law. But one may ask also whether if such an amount of taxpayers' money has been put into the banking sector, what the government, what the central bank want to claim something back, doing (this) after the money went missing, to put in diplomatically, in the banks," he said in an interview with Interfax-Ukraine.

Maasikas also said that the transfer of EUR 500 million to the national budget of Ukraine under the macrofinancial assistance program in the form of a low-interest loan depends on the adoption of this law.

"So, in that sense, the IMF-related, but even more so, the Ukraine-related, Ukrainian-society related banking resolution law is a vital litmus test," the diplomat said.