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James O’Brien: The US Administration will stand by Ukraine to the moment they win the war
The American administration will support Ukraine to the moment they win the war started by Russia, stated on Thursday in Tulcea the Deputy State Secretary of the US for Europe and Eurasia, James O’Brien.
The statement was made during a press conference occasioned by the sixth meeting of the working group Romania-Ukraine-Republic of Moldova – European Commission- US, set up to ensure the necessary flow to the Ukrainian cereals transport, the main challenge of the Ukrainian economy after Russia started the war at the end of February last year and attacked the Danube ports in Ukraine.
"I'm telling you from the American administration's point of view, we will stand by Ukraine until they win. The commitment is firm and will continue. We know there are many difficult choices in the coming months, but we know one thing: Russia will continue to attack for at least the next year. The only question is whether we continue to stand with Ukraine and we will," said Assistant Secretary of State, Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs, US Department of State, James O'Brien.
Romania has proposed that during the period to come the volume of Ukrainian cereals transiting the territory to increase from three to four million tons per month, which is possible with the help of the project Primus,financed by the European Union, applicable starting on Thursday, which allows night navigation on the Sulina canal.
‘During the next period, we should make this programme Primus operational, namely 24 hours of navigation on the Sulina canal. We have all the equipment, we are at the point of training the personnel, and this is the first thing. The second is that the auctions in the Constanta Harbour for equipment to be finalized at the beginning of February, as we are talking about several auctions. They will help to increase the capacities. This would be the second target which we have to reach until the next meeting’ said the Romanian minister of transport, Sorin Grindeanu.
In his turn, the vice-premier of Ukraine, Oleksandr Kubrakov stated that his country faces Western borders blockades, fact which makes both the activity of the foreign companies and Ukrainian companies more difficult.
‘Exports doubled through road traffic, but there is potential to increase the capacity at the borders between Romania and Ukraine (…). From the beginning of this year, exports through the Romanian border check-points were worth three million tons per months of cereals, but the CFR infrastructure was not used to capacity. We have the potential to double this quantity, we increase the quantities through the Danube ports. We want to reach four million tons per months, but winter is a complicated period even for the Danube and the Black Sea’ mentioned Kubrakov.
The state secretary in the ministry of infrastructure in the Republic of Moldova, Mircea Pascaluta said that over fifty countries expect cereal from Ukraine and gave details about some measures used by the Moldavian authorities to support cereal transit from Ukraine.
The general manager of the General Department Mobility and European Transport in the European Commission, Magda Kopczynska said that the role of the six meetings developed under the format Romania-Ukraine-Republic of Moldova-European Commission- US and mentioned that for the connection projects EC allocated 250 million euro. Besides this sum, for the cooperation Romania-Moldova, EC allocated 11 million euro and for the cooperation Ukraine-Romania, 14 million euro.