An interview with Christine Kohut, member of Portail de l’Ukraine. Interviewer: Clémence Lavialle.

In the last days of 2020, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed off on a new Inland Water Transport law. This was finally passed by parliament after many long years of disputes.

It has become clear to Ukraine with regards to Russian scare tactics that concessions will not solve any problems, but rather display the weakness of the West.

On February 2nd Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed a presidential decree sanctioning Lviv oligarch Taras Kozak’s companies which owns three pro-Russian television channels. Unofficially, these channels are controlled by Viktor Medvedchuk, Putin’s right-hand man in Ukraine. The US election victory of Joe Biden has stiffened western and Ukrainian resolve to take on Russian President Vladimir Putin at a time when he is facing growing opposition at home.

The question of information warfare and disinformation have become hot topics since the 2014 crisis in Ukraine. Nevertheless, one should not assume that this threat was invented by Russian President Vladimir Putin as the Soviet Union had practised dezinformatsiya and mokryie dela (wet affairs – assassinations) for decades.

The European Union currently faces several domestic issues. It is still a union of member states, whose leaders have different approaches towards many challenges, and still has no common army or military strategy. That is why US engagement in the region is still necessary, just as it was in the 1990s after the fall of communism.

“America is back” – that is how Joe Biden began his speech regarding his foreign policy priorities. What does that mean for the world and Europe in particular? Since the Second World War, no US president has brought so much foreign policy expertise to the White House. Biden probably has the most significant international experience among current world leaders, and especially amongst American politicians.

A review of Yupak. By: Serhiy Serhiyovych Saigon. Publisher: Bilka, Kyiv, 2020

The latest ceasefire introduced in July 2020 was the only, albeit significant, achievement regarding Donbas in the last years. Recent signs, however, indicate that the situation may dangerously escalate in the coming weeks.

When Ukrainian President Zelenskyy announced that he would seek Mikhail Saakashvili’s appointment as deputy prime minister, commentators were split. For some, Zelenskyy was displaying a serious intent to kickstart reforms by appointing a seasoned anti-corruption warrior. For others, he was simply engaging in a public relations campaign to distract attention from his limited achievements in his first year in office, especially from his controversial removal of some high profile and credible reformers from office.

Paid surrogacy and the practice of egg donation remain unresolved regulatory issues in both Poland and Ukraine.

Data on the attitudes of the population in Donbas to integration with the West or East, reveals a choice that is not viewed as mutually exclusive.

Recent elections in Moldova, Georgia and Ukraine have proven that positive democratic changes are difficult to achieve but are still very possible. Even though oligarchs retain much of their power, political newcomers, civil society and the diaspora are turning into key players shaking up the status quo.

The political transformations that occurred in Moldova, Georgia and Ukraine in the second half of 2020 will have long-lasting consequences on the democratic development of these critical countries in the region. Each of them has made qualitative steps forward, leaving behind more oligarchic-centric rules of the game.

Ukraine is the eighth country in the world in terms of nuclear power plant capacity. The country is now in the process of repairing, modernising and finding new technologies to meet the electricity demand. However, a focus on management and transparency is still necessary in order to have a safe, effective and publically profitable nuclear power sector.

Nuclear energy began to develop actively and significantly in the second half of the 20th century. This boom was primarily due to the dynamism felt in all sectors of industry which was based on large numbers of labour and massive electricity demands. Yet, the beginning of the 21st century started to see a decline in this sector. Today competition in the energy sector contributes to the fact that energy markets are developing very rapidly and energy resources are becoming more affordable.