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Sunak also unveiled measures including US$3 billion of additional guarantees to unlock World Bank lending that Ajay Banga, president of the World Bank Group, said would allow his group to continue to help “people rebuild their lives after devastation”.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the EU would provide Ukraine with €50 billion for 2024-27, while US Secretary of State Antony Blinken offered US$1.3 billion in additional aid.
But Zelenskyy, speaking via video link, said his country needed more targeted help in “real projects” that would spur growth in an economy he said had moved far away from the oligarchic model of Ukraine’s immediate post-Soviet era.
“We must move from agreement to real projects,” he said. “There is a Ukrainian delegation that will present concrete things and we propose to do them together during my tour.”
Ukraine is seeking up to US$40 billion to fund the first part of a “Green Marshall Plan” to rebuild its economy, including developing a coal-free steel industry, a senior Ukrainian official said before the conference.
The total bill will be huge, with Ukraine, the World Bank, the European Commission and the United Nations estimating in March that the cost was at US$411 billion for the first year of the war. It could easily reach more than US$1 trillion.
Sunak and other Western officials hope the conference will encourage the private sector to use its resources to help speed Ukraine’s reconstruction by investing in small and medium-scale projects. He said more than 400 companies from 38 countries had signed up to the Ukraine Business Compact, a statement of support for Ukraine’s recovery.
But companies might still want to know whether nations can agree on a way of providing insurance against war damage and destruction. It was not clear how far the launch of the London Conference Framework for War Risk Insurance would help ease such concerns.
Source: CNA
