What Marta Kos’s visit to Kyiv means: EU Ambassador Katarína Mathernová explains
EU Ambassador to Ukraine Katarína Mathernová:
Marta Kos - Commissioner for Enlargement - visited Kyiv yesterday (June 08). For the fifth time. It was a very full and interesting day.
Commissioner came with the announcement of 2.8 billion EUR financial injection from the Ukraine Facility for enacted rule of law, energy and public administration reforms
I was delighted to moderate an excellent discussion with Marta Kos, Deputy PM Taras Kachka, First deputy Soeaker of the Rada Oleksandr Korniyenko and one of the leading experts on EU enlargement. It followed a potent key note speech by Marta. The result was a lively and candid discussion, including joking about the Kos-Kachka plan. Marta said she sometimes talks to Taras more in a week than to her own husband. :))
One key message from Marta stood out for me: Enlargement is no longer merely a technical process. For the first time in history, it has real opponents – those who want both Ukraine and Europe to fail!
This places an even greater responsibility on both Ukraine to continue its transformative reforms and the EU to prepare in earnest for welcoming Ukraine. Ukraine must succeed. It provides Europe already today with security, while Europe helps Ukraine sustain the war effort and it also serves as the light at the end of a dark tunnel of a free, democratic and prosperous postwar future. It is a partnership from which both sides will emerge stronger.
The second major theme yesterday was women’s leadership. We talked about the women who today lead ministries, institutions, civil society organisations, anti-corruption bodies or private sector entities, while at the same time holding together their families and their country. The war has revealed their strength, but it has also reminded us that their voices must be heard more clearly where decisions about the country's future are made! That is why I welcomed Marta Kos’s initiative to create an informal network of women supporting Ukraine’s future.
We of course had intense and productive meetings on the need to maintain the reform momentum and upcoming key EU decisions with the Prime Minister Yuliya Svyrydenko and her ministerial colleagues and the leadership and committees of the Parliament of Ukraine.
The most moving moment for me was laying flowers at the Kyiv apartment building at Lukyianivka that Russia reduced to rubble with ballistic missiles during their largest attack on the city on 24 May. We were joined by Deputy PM Oleksiy Kuleba. It was not just a formality. Beneath what are now ruins, we saw children's rooms, kitchens and peaceful living rooms of families who, in a single moment, lost their loved ones, their health and their homes.
Ukraine’s European path is not just a political project. It is a fight for Ukraine’s European future, but also a challenge to our common enemy – Putin’s Russia. And it is a commitment to the people who, despite everything, have not lost hope.
Thank you Marta!
EU Delegation to Ukraine