The international community continues to help Ukraine, a country invaded by the Russian troops.
The President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, announced, on Wednesday, at the Conference for the reconstruction of Ukraine, organized in London, the creation of a European fund worth 50 billion Euros in the coming years, necessary for the reconstruction of the country invaded by Moscow’s troops on February 24, 2022. The head of the European Commission says that the European Union has an additional responsibility towards Kyiv, since the authorities there claim that they are determined to lead their country towards admission into the Union.
The community program will be financed in three ways: European grants, loans and money obtained from the confiscation of Russian assets. The experts’ estimates regarding the costs of reconstruction already exceed 300 billion pounds and continue to grow, so, the international media write, the contribution of the private sector will also be necessary. And the US will provide additional aid, worth 1.3 billion dollars, for the Ukrainian economy, especially for its essential infrastructure, the American Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, announced, also in London.
The meeting is attended by dozens of political leaders and businesspeople from around the world, and for the president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, it was another opportunity to advocate for his country’s rapprochement to the European Union and NATO. The reconstruction of Ukraine, Zelensky added, must be based on trust between partners and a geopolitical context that guarantees that such conflicts will not occur again.
Meanwhile, the number of Ukrainian citizens who found employment in neighboring Romania after the outbreak of the war reached a new record on Wednesday, said the Romanian Labor Minister, Marius Budai. According to him, at the national level, 6,810 employment contracts were concluded for the Ukrainian citizens, the highest level since February 24, 2022 until now. Most Ukrainians employed in Romania, 1,452, are working in the manufacturing industry, and 1,181 in constructions. Another 737 are employed in the commercial field. From the point of view of the areas in which they chose to work, most Ukrainians, 2,770, found work in Bucharest, and 418 in Timiş county (west). More than four and a half million Ukrainians fled through Romania from the menace of the Russian invasion troops. Most of them continued their way to Western European countries, but over 85 thousand chose to stay here.
The Ukrainians say that especially the language barrier – their Slavic language has very few similarities with Romance Romanian – prevents them from finding a job and enrolling their children in school, in order to benefit from the financial aid offered by the Romanian state. The new program adopted by the Romanian authorities to support the refugees obliges every member of the family to work, and the children to go to a Romanian school.
Bogdan Matei, Radio Romania International
