Ahead of the Ukraine Recovery Conference in Berlin on 11 - 12 June 2024, UNECE Executive Secretary Tatiana Molcean visited Kyiv from 4 to 6 June to discuss UNECE support for the country's reconstruction and recovery with Ukrainian government officials, the United Nations Country Team, the Delegation of the European Union to Ukraine, and other international partners.
Ms. Molcean emphasized UNECE's readiness to help Ukraine manage the socio-economic and environmental impacts of the ongoing war, in particular energy efficiency and sustainable resource management, housing and urban development, innovation policies and digitalization of supply chain information exchange, management of contaminated sites and reconstruction of transport networks.
UNECE's support for the green recovery of Ukraine and reconstruction of its energy infrastructure, with emphasis on energy resilience, were the main topics of Ms. Molcean's discussions with Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Yevhen Perebyinis, and Deputy Ministers of Energy, Svitlana Hrynchuk and Roman Andarak.
Ms. Molcean met with Ruslan Strilets, Minister of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources, emphasizing UNECE's readiness to provide Ukraine with further technical assistance to address immediate and emerging environmental challenges, especially when it comes to the safety of industrial operations, building resilient energy system, and managing water pollution.
With the Minister of Health, Viktor Liashko, the UNECE Executive Secretary discussed further cooperation between Ukraine and UNECE under the Protocol on Water and Health and the Transport, Health and Environment Pan-European Programme (THE PEP), as well as efforts to promote road safety.
Sustainable urban development and recovery, including progress under UNECE's UN4UkrainianCities initiative in the cities of Kharkiv and Mykolaiv, were the focus of exchanges with Deputy Ministers for Communities, Territories, and Infrastructure Development, Nataliia Kozlovska and Serhiy Derkach. UNECE support to the drafting of a new law to establish affordable rental housing and of a new housing policy on housing stock management, as well as mobility and transport strategies, were also on the agenda.
With Denise Brown, UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in Ukraine, the UNECE Executive Secretary discussed the UN's work on the ground, especially providing support to the city of Kharkiv under UNECE's UN4UkrainianCities project, which will be presented at the Ukraine Recovery Conference in Berlin on June 10, to explore the city's current challenges and future recovery.
In her exchanges, Ms. Molcean sought support for the UNECE-initiated Informal Inter-Agency Coordination Group on the Environmental Assessments for Ukraine to inform the country's post-war green reconstruction and recovery.
