A major two-day reconstruction conference for Ukraine co-hosted in Poland in the city of Gdansk started on Thursday but was overshadowed by the absence of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
The conference aims to attract investment in the country's economy and businesses. For the first time, several billion euros are expected to be raised for Ukraine's security and defence sectors. European leaders and Nato Secretary General Mark Rutte are expected to attend.
Ukraine expects to sign more than 160 agreements worth more than €10 billion euros ($11.3 billion), Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko said. She added that the first €3.2 billion tranche from the EU's €90 billion loan would be announced today.
In a speech, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said that Ukraine's outlook had improved from last year's conference. “One year ago … the situation for Ukraine was dark,” Ms von der Leyen said.
“Today, the outlook is different. Ukraine has made progress on the battlefield, we have strengthened Ukraine’s economic foundations, we have advanced its European path and we have created new opportunities for investment and growth.”
The EU will also be transferring a €6 billion support package for drone production in the coming days. European states stepped up their aid to Ukraine last year as the US halted its own support under President Donald Trump.
But Mr Zelenskyy's absence shifted the focus away from helping Polish businesses to win contracts in Ukraine to smoothing over bilateral relations.
Ms Svyrydenko stood in for Mr Zelenskyy in an effort to avert tensions in Poland after the Ukrainian President named a Ukrainian military unit after a nationalist unit that is said to have massacred Poles during the Second World War.
Ms Svyrydenko laid out her intentions before the conference. “Our delegation has a clear mission: to secure concrete agreements that will strengthen Ukraine's defence capabilities and resilience while expanding economic co-operation with our partners,” she said.
Polish President Karol Nawrocki last week stripped Mr Zelenskyy of the order of the White Eagle, Poland's highest state honour. This was described as a “strategic error” by Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha.
Poland represents Ukraine's biggest ally in the EU as well as a being in a strategic position for humanitarian and military support.
Speaking before the conference, Swedish Foreign Affairs Minister Carl Bildt compared Ukraine's economic potential to Poland's. “If you look at the long-term potential of Ukraine, it is clearly to be another Poland in terms of the economic development. In certain areas, Ukraine has even better potential than Poland had,” he said.
