PRESS RELEASE: AUSTRALIAN ENERGY SUPPORT REQUESTED BY UKRAINE DURING MH17 WEEK

Following a meeting between Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba at the ASEAN Summit in Cambodia, it is requested that Australia consider providing energy supply and infrastructure to Ukraine, according to Ukraine’s Ambassador to Australia and New Zealand, His Excellency Vasyl Myroshnychenko.

Ambassador Myroshnychenko said: ‘Prime Minister Albanese and Foreign Minister Kuleba had a very positive discussion in Phnom Penh. It shows the mateship of Australia and Ukraine in standing up for democracy and sovereignty against autocracy and illegality.’

‘Ukraine really needs the mateship now. This weekend, the humanitarian situation in Ukraine became catastrophic after numerous missile attacks that led to damage to more than 40% of our energy system. This led to blackouts all over Ukraine and big problems with heating, water supply and waste disposal.’

‘Our goal is to help our people through immediate recovery of critical energy supply, diversification of energy sources, and the development of crisis stock.’

‘It would be invaluable to Ukraine to again receive coal supply from Australia, a world leader. It is also a great engineering nation, and can help us with generators – to keep essential services like hospitals and water treatments plants going – and via transformers to restore the overall system.

‘As we head into a hard winter, we are this week also sadly reminded of the terrorist attack on Malaysian Airlines Flight 17 which brought our two countries together through the blood shed by 298 people, including 38 innocent Australians who were killed. This week, a court in The Hague decides the verdict of the Putin proxies who committed that heinous crime.’

‘Those Australians have not died in vain. Ukraine, with Australia’s support, fights their murderers on a daily basis. It is those murderers who now intentionally fire missiles at Ukraine’s cities and knocking out electricity, heat, and water of millions of regular people.’

‘While Ukrainians are determined to survive this hard winter, and while our troops are making advances on the battlefield, the additional support we request from Australia would have life-saving impact,’ said Ambassador Myroshnychenko.

The Ambassador said he looked forward to discussions with the Commonwealth Government and also with State Governments, for whom energy aid may be a practical way to give assistance to Ukraine to end the war sooner.

‘A return to peace takes the pressure off cost-of-living here and creates opportunities for Australian business in the rebuilding of Ukraine, where Australia is now immensely and rightfully respected,’ the Ambassador said.

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