‘Ukraine must set up the terms of peace’. An interview with EU Ambassador Matti Maasikas about helping Ukrainians and restricting Russians

The Head of the EU Delegation to Ukraine, Matti Maasikas, said Ukraine has the right to liberate its territories under military duress and must set up the terms of peace with Russia.

In an interview with Radio NV, he told how EU member state will stand by Ukraine until its victory despite threats from Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.

— As the Russian army is suffering defeat, Putin began intimidating not only Ukraine, but also the entire civilized world. He announced a mobilization and is now threatening nuclear action. Can we now talk about the EU’s response to this?

— We have already responded when the news about the so-called referendums, fake referendums, began to spread. Josep Borrell, who is in charge of the EU external action, said they will certainly not be recognized by anyone, no matter what efforts are made in this direction. This is the sovereign territory of Ukraine.

And it is Ukraine that must set up the terms of peace. It is up to Ukraine to liberate these territories, and Ukraine has every right to do so, in particular by military force. So, the EU’s response is already there.

— Can additional sanctions be introduced in response to the illegal ‘referendums’ by the Russian Federation in the occupied Ukrainian territories?

— Borrell clearly stated that new sanctions will be considered.

— Is it about the eighth package of sanctions? Or can there be special sanctions?

– It is still too early to say for sure. Developments are unfolding quite quickly these days.

— What can you say about the surge of support to Ukraine, in particular military, due to the escalation from the side of Russia?

– All this is being considered. Military assistance is arriving. Josep Borrell made a proposal for another half-billion disbursement for arms from the European Peace Facility. We clearly stated that we want Ukraine to win this war. And we do everything possible to help Ukrainians.

— What is the current EU support for Ukraine, if we are talking about humanitarian aid?

— According to the UN assessment, more than 15 million Ukrainians are in need of humanitarian aid. First of all, we focus on supporting those who are in Ukraine. Four million Ukrainians stay in the EU, but, of course, the needs of those in Ukraine are greater, especially of those who were forced to leave their homes – internally displaced citizens.

The European Commission has already disbursed EUR 348 million for humanitarian needs of Ukrainians. In addition, under the EU Civil Protection Mechanism, which also operates on the basis of contributions from the EU Member States, I am incredibly pleased that all the 27 EU countries, as well as partner nations – Norway, Turkey, North Macedonia – have contributed a total of EUR 433 million since the beginning of the Russian invasion. This is an extraordinary assistance.

We have provided and continue to provide massive assistance.

The European Commission’s Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection department, also known as ECHO, has opened its representation office in Lviv and Dnipro in addition to Kyiv. This work, which is carried out jointly with our partners, primarily UN agencies, is now in full swing.

Almost nine million people received food from us, more than seven million received health care assistance, and some 3.6 million people benefitted from cash aid. But we are aware that the needs are only growing. And now considerable attention is paid to how to survive the winter.

— 348 million is for Ukrainians who stay in the country. What about those people who were forced to leave and are now stay in EU countries?

— This 348 million is for Ukrainians in Ukraine. Of these, 15 million is used for Ukrainians who stay in Moldova.

Regarding those forced to leave, we are talking about four million Ukrainians who stay across the EU member states. In this case, aid to refugees is provided by the countries themselves, but there are also appropriations from the EU budget for such countries.

I want to emphasize once again that the most urgent needs now are in Ukraine. But for those who are in the EU member states, a temporary protection mechanism was introduced. The point is that Ukrainians fleeing the war and arriving to an EU country will immediately, almost automatically, obtain the same status as refugees. He or she (most often she) will have the right of residence, right to employment, medical care and education.

One of the most important issues, in addition to safety, is the education for children. A person is leaving his or her country with no idea for how long, with hope to return, and then sees that the war continues. And in the end, this person is faced with the choice to be made of whether to send children to school in the country where they ended up. And here, different EU member states have introduced different mechanisms to help Ukrainian children.

Germany actively hires Ukrainian language teachers. In my native country, Estonia, a separate school called Freedom School was opened for Ukrainian children in Tallinn, where they are taught in both Estonian and Ukrainian languages.

Flexible solutions are needed. Even if you sent your child to school this September 1st, you still want to return to Ukraine. And everything should be organized so that such education can be planned both in the long-term and in the short-term perspective; so that the children can return.

But I am very proud of the hospitality EU countries and communities have shown and continue to do. People are really welcome. And all these issues can be resolved. The most important thing is what is happening on the front line in Ukraine.

— Are these the main areas of work? Are there any housing recovery programs planned, such as development programs? The Russian army is destroying infrastructure, in particular residential estates.

– Of course. First of all, a distinction should be made between long-term programs such as the recovery of buildings, housing, apartment buildings, and urgent measures to help people survive the winter.

We have already talked about the humanitarian aspect, which focuses on getting through the winter and providing people with temporary housing. Of the mentioned 348 million, 83.6 million was allocated to build such housing. Another 44 million was appropriated to Sweden and Romania to manufacture those temporary housing units, which will then be brought to Ukraine.

There is also long-term assistance, which is not humanitarian aid in legal terms. You probably saw last week that the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, announced EUR 100 million disbursed to Ukraine for the reconstruction of schools. All this work is now actively underway.

— Is this a program that is being implemented together with the president’s wife Olena Zelenska?

— Indeed! Mrs. Zelenska was a distinguished guest during President von der Leyen’s most important statement of the year in Strasbourg at the European Parliament — 2022 State of the Union Address. Then, together, they visited two schools in Irpin – one that still remains destroyed, and another, which was reconstructed with EU funding.

— Can you share more details regarding medical assistance, which is also very important, since many hospitals have also been destroyed.

— The work in this direction is also underway. In particular, we provide treatment assistance for the wounded military personnel in the EU. For this, we carry out medical evacuation.

And we collaborate closely with WHO on all healthcare-related issues.

— Medical rehabilitation of Ukrainians in the EU is also a very important issue. Countries also provide such assistance, in particular to wounded warriors.

— Yes, they do. In fact, we’ve been doing it since 2014. Accordingly, we have developed models that we can apply. And we use them.

— What can you say about the further development of assistance given Putin is going to escalate. Destruction will be growing, and more and more people who will be seriously crippled in this war. What does the EU plan for next year?

— There are different courses of action. The first and largest is aimed at the future recovery of Ukraine.

Both in Ukraine and in all partner countries, in their capitals, they are working to develop a way to manage these hundreds of billions of euro for reconstruction, on how to prioritise, how to engage all stakeholders, regions, cities, villages.

The principles were agreed at the Ukraine Recovery Conference in Lugano in early July. Currently, efforts are underway to build a reliable and properly functioning structure. It is not there yet.

Donors discuss this issue with Ukraine. And, accordingly, there is a discussion going on within Ukraine itself. When EU leaders say that ‘we will stand for Ukraine until victory’, this is not vanity. This is exactly what we have in mind, and we had to tailor our help for it. Every year, the EU provides approximately EUR 200 million to Ukraine purely in assistance through various projects.

One of the first decisions adopted by the European Commission already in March was the permission for all projects engage themselves in strengthening Ukraine’s resilience. Therefore, EUR 200 million was channelled to strengthening resilience of Ukraine.

There are also new initiatives such as the school reconstruction program. A decision was made to provide 330 million euro in budget support, and EUR 300 million endorsed for institutional capacity building — everything that strengthens resilience of Ukraine.

The EU has pledged to provide Ukraine with 9 billion euro of macro-financial assistance this year to support Ukraine’s state budget. One billion has already been paid. [Recently] a decision was approved about 5 billion.

Ukraine has a budget deficit of EUR 5 billion every month. Thanks to the contributions of donors, in particular the EU, the state budget should balance out by the end of this year.

But 2023 is coming, and discussions and reflections on how to help Ukraine are already beginning. There are many different areas, but we stand with Ukraine.

— Will all these financial plans be fulfilled this year? We have already witnessed the discussion regarding 9 billion euro: Germany advocated that this should not be part of the macro-financial assistance, but that this money should come to Ukraine in grants.

— Indeed, regarding the remaining three billion. One billion was paid out, with regard to another five, it was decided to disburse it within macro-financial assistance, which is a low-interest loan. And there is still three billion that has to be discussed within the EU regarding how it is going to be settled. This is more of a technical budgetary matter. This is not a political issue — to support or not to support Ukraine. I am convinced that since both the European Commission and its President have pledged to provide the EUR 9 billion, the money will come.

— Several countries limited of entry of Russian citizens into the territory of EU countries.

— Regarding issues around EU visas for Russians, the ministers of foreign affairs of the EU member states decided to completely suspend the visa facilitation agreement for Russia. This means that obtaining Schengen visas by citizens of the Russian Federation will become significantly more expensive, will require more time, and the scope of opportunities will decrease greatly.

Certain diplomatic developments also took place. As a result, the diplomatic missions’ staff of the EU member states in Moscow and St. Petersburg was extremely reduced. Therefore, even if they wanted to, the member state embassies would not be able to process visa applications as quickly as before.

Thus, it’s stopped anyway. And let some Russian citizens in Moscow think about skipping across to Nice next weekend! It will be impossible! He or she does not get a visa, even if everything is fine with the documents or purpose of travel.

You know, available options to get to the EU have drastically decreased. EU airspace is closed for commercial flights from Russia. And now four out of five EU member states that have land borders with Russia are actually closed to Russian tourists.

Yes, one can enter these countries on humanitarian grounds. It is important to let in Russians who want asylum or when they want to escape Russia for political reasons. Such people still have a possibility to arrive and ask for asylum. But for tourists, four-fifths of the EU land border on Russia have been closed in fact.

Source: Radio NV