Austria is interested in rebuilding Ukraine and will continue to provide humanitarian aid
Austria is interested in implementing projects to rebuild Ukraine and will continue to provide humanitarian and financial support to our country.
This was discussed during the meeting of the Deputy Chairperson of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine with the President of the National Council of Austria Walter Rosenkranz in Vienna. This is the first face-to-face meeting between the leadership of the Ukrainian Parliament and the newly elected Speaker of the Austrian Parliament.
The Vice Speaker Olena Kondratiuk thanked Austria for its assistance and care for nearly 80,000 Ukrainian internally displaced persons. She emphasized that Austria is a neutral state and cannot provide military assistance, but it has provided 800 million euros of humanitarian and financial support to Ukraine.
"We really appreciate this contribution. We also look forward to Austria's support for Ukraine's membership in the EU and the opening of the first negotiation clusters. We appreciate Vienna's position: no peace talks on Ukraine without Ukraine," emphasized Olena Kondratiuk.
"For Austria, Ukraine has always been and remains something special. Our military neutrality prohibits us from sending even a single bullet, but nothing will prevent us from contributing to the reconstruction of Ukraine and humanitarian aid," said Walter Rosenkranz.
He added that Austria is interested in restoring educational and medical infrastructure, as well as in investing in the Ukrainian economy.
The Deputy Chairperson of the Verkhovna Rada also thanked Austrian business, which includes almost 200 companies that have not stopped operating in Ukraine since the beginning of the war. The parties also discussed assistance to Ukrainian children and the implementation of humanitarian initiatives.
"I emphasized russia's gross violations of the rights of Ukrainian children: their illegal deportation, eradication of Ukrainian identity and militarization. This is the threat to 1,600,000 of our children in the temporarily occupied territories," said Olena Kondratiuk.
The Vice-Speaker of the Parliament of Ukraine also appealed to the President of the National Council of Austria with a request to promote the recovery and psychological rehabilitation of Ukrainian children of war in Austria.