Olesia Safronova
The Ukrainian Government canceled 367 regulations, the
National Bank has softened a number of foreign exchange restrictions, while the
European Union put forward conditions for Ukraine to receive a
EUR 600 million assistance package , at the same time failing to resolve
the main political issue of the past years - the introduction of a visa-free
regime. These are the main economic news of the outgoing week.
This has been a rather difficult week for Ukraine. The
anniversary of the Revolution of Dignity, one of the major events in the
country’s recent history, coincided with the Ukraine – EU summit, which in many
ways was a landmark for Ukraine because a key issue on its agenda was visa
liberalization. Three years ago, millions of Ukrainians took to the streets of
their cities because of their reluctance to tolerate lawlessness of authorities
and because of the opportunistic reversal of Ukraine’s foreign policy toward
Russia and the rejection of the country’s European future in favor of gas
discounts or the purchase of government bonds by the government of the
neighboring country.
Since the time of the Maidan, Ukraine has experienced many
dramatic events – the annexation of Crimea, the war in the east, Moscow-imposed
trade restrictions, the loss of 20% of the production capacity, and the need
for serious reforms under the circumstances when every “free” hryvnia is
allocated for the army and defenses, rather than the economy.
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