The agreement, signed on April 30, establishes a joint investment fund between Kyiv and Washington and grants the U.S. special access to projects developing Ukraine's natural resources.
Ukraine is considering moving away from the U.S. dollar and closer to the euro as a benchmark for the hryvnia, National Bank Governor Andrii Pyshnyi told Reuters.
The Atesh partisan group claims it disabled communication at several Russian military facilities when it allegedly destroyed equipment at a transformer substation in the village of Mogiltsy in Russia's Moscow Oblast.
A sitting of the Verkhovna Rada, Ukraine's Parliament is livestreamed from the session hall in the media room, Kyiv on June 5, 2024. (Eugen Kotenko / Ukrinform/Future Publishing via Getty Images)
The Ukrainian parliament adopted a bill on July 18 granting the government the right to suspend payments on external public debt until Oct. 1.
The bill was passed immediately in two readings and supported by 231 votes, lawmaker Yaroslav Zhelezniak said. The new law gives the government the right to suspend the payments – if necessary – until an agreement with the holders of Ukraine's external debt is reached.
Proposed by President Volodymyr Zelensky's Servant of the People party, the legislation seeks to postpone payments of international sovereign debt and state-guaranteed obligations past its August deadline.
Ukraine struck a deal with its creditors at the onset of the Russian full-scale invasion to postpone the payments due to the war's pressure on the country's economy. The deal to freeze payments of around $23 billion is about to expire on Aug. 1.
While the first round of negotiations in June ended without an agreement, the second round of talks with the creditors is reportedly ongoing. Finance Minister Serhii Marchenko voiced confidence that a deal could be reached before the deadline.
"The adoption of the draft law is a necessary technical decision that gives the government flexibility before an agreement is reached," the Finance Ministry said.
Although foreign governments agreed to postpone Ukraine's debt payments until 2027, private bondholders have not done so.
Unless a deal is reached, Ukraine must begin payments within a 10-day period of Aug. 1 or officially default.
Martin Fornusek is a news editor at the Kyiv Independent. He has previously worked as a news content editor at the media company Newsmatics and is a contributor to Euromaidan Press. He was also volunteering as an editor and translator at the Czech-language version of Ukraïner. Martin studied at Masaryk University in Brno, Czechia, holding a bachelor's degree in security studies and history and a master's degree in conflict and democracy studies.
Liliane Bivings
