Turkey, Romania, and Bulgaria will sign a joint agreement in January 2024 to counter the mine threat in the Black Sea, Turkish National Defense Minister Yashar Güler said, TRTHaber reported on Saturday, December 16.
“Within the framework of the Trilateral Initiative, launched under the leadership of our country against the mine threat in the Black Sea, on November 22-23, we held the third round of the meeting of the Task Force on Mine Action in the Black Sea, hosted by our ministry. We are also planning to hold a signing ceremony in Istanbul on January 11, 2024, with the participation of the defense ministers of the three countries,” said Yasar Güler.
The minister emphasized that Turkey responsibly and impartially implements the Montreux Straits Convention, which ensures balance in the Black Sea, and is determined to continue to do so.
German Foreign Minister Annalena Burbock said that Germany will send a EUR6.1 million humanitarian aid package to Ukraine, which includes generators and batteries, the German Foreign Ministry’s press service reports.
“With the winter protective umbrella that we are stretching over Ukraine, we are helping the population to survive the cold season. Not only in the form of air defense systems, but also generators, blankets, tents and batteries. Together with the German Federal Agency for Technical Assistance (THW), we are sending additional cargoes this winter for a total of EUR 6.1 million,” the press service quoted Burbock as saying in a statement published on the Foreign Ministry’s website on Friday.
At the same time, German Interior Minister Nancy Feser noted that another 500 power generators worth about EUR3.5 million would be transferred to Ukraine.
“THW is currently preparing to transport more than 500 additional power generators worth about EUR 3.5 million and has already delivered some of them to Ukraine. The goal is to help cities and towns, especially in areas close to the front line. To support Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, THW has already purchased more than 1,300 powerful power generators (up to 1,250 kVA) and 20 batteries,” Feather said.
She noted that more than 800 power generators and 15 storage batteries have already been delivered to Ukraine, which are used at Ukrainian thermal power plants, pumping stations, large bakeries and hospitals, as well as for decentralized supply to the population.
Preparations are also underway to transport more than 900 heaters, 1,700 winter sleeping bags, winter clothing and a mobile field kitchen to Ukraine. In addition, two drinking water treatment plants will be transferred to the State Water Resources Administration in the near future to provide clean water to the population.
SAP (Germany), a software and cloud services developer, plans to invest EUR2 million in the localization of its products in Ukraine in 2024, the Ministry of Digital Transformation reported on Facebook.
“Since the beginning of 2022, the company (SAP) has been supporting Ukraine by providing services and software licenses free of charge – now it has decided to continue doing so until the end of the first quarter of 2024,” Deputy Prime Minister for Innovation, Education, Science and Technology Development and Minister of Digital Transformation Mykhailo Fedorov wrote on Facebook on Friday.
According to the Ministry of Digital Transformation, the company’s technological support provided to Ukraine in 2023-2024 is estimated at EUR65 million.
Fedorov recalled that in 2023, the Defense Ministry introduced a system from SAP that helps manage some of the resources, in particular, it accelerated the processing of applications from brigades for the supply of items. As of today, 44 countries use SAP products in the defense sector, including 28 out of 31 NATO member states, the Deputy Prime Minister said.
According to him, SAP products also help in the field of medical procurement. “A cloud-based solution has been implemented in this area to quickly find and engage suppliers who can deliver critical goods. The company also helped to set up catalogs for searching and comparing prices for specific medical products, which made it possible to purchase them at lower prices,” Fedorov said.
The Ministry of Digital Transformation also reminded that SAP has recently launched an ERP solution for medium-sized businesses called GROW with SAP, and joining the SAP Business Network makes it easier for Ukrainian goods to enter international markets.
Earlier it was reported that the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine is implementing an automated defense resource management system based on System Analysis Program Development (SAP), which is one of the leading logistics systems in the world.
As of the end of November, agrarians of all regions of Ukraine harvested 78.3 mln tons of grains and oilseeds: 57.56 mln tons and 20.74 mln tons respectively.
As reported by the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food, grain and legumes were harvested on the area of 10 mln 471 thsd ha with the yield of 55.0 c/ha.
Compared to the same date a year ago, the total harvest is 32.9% higher, or 19.41 million tons, including 37.4% higher, or 15.66 million tons, of grains and 22.0% higher, or 3.74 million tons, of oilseeds. At the same time, it should be taken into account that this year corn has been harvested from almost 88% of the area, while a year ago – from 70%.
In addition, 11.80 mln tons of sugar beet were harvested from 248.0 thou hectares. And although its yield this year, unlike grains and oilseeds, is lower than last year, due to the expansion of the area by 38.1%, the yield is 31.1% higher than last year.
It is noted that only corn threshing will continue, while harvesting of all other crops has already been completed.
As reported, this season’s winter wheat plantings amounted to 4166 thousand hectares (-834 thousand hectares compared to the previous one), winter barley – 536 thousand hectares (-255 thousand hectares), and rapeseed – 1374 thousand hectares (+110 thousand hectares).
According to the newly revised forecast of the Ministry of Agrarian Policy, in 2023, farmers will be able to harvest 81.3 mln tons of grains and oilseeds, including 59.7 mln tons of grains and 21.6 mln tons of oilseeds.
As part of its European integration obligations under the Espoo Convention, Ukraine has closed a 20-year dispute with Romania over the implementation of its requirements during the construction of the Danube-Black Sea Canal on the sidelines of the Ninth Meeting of the Parties to the Espoo Convention, Minister of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources Ruslan Strilets said.
“We have done our homework and come a long way in bringing the project in line with the requirements of the Convention. After all, Ukraine cares about good neighborly relations and compliance with international law. We are willing and able to find common ground and correct the mistakes of the past,” he wrote on Facebook from the meeting in Geneva.
Strelets thanked Romanian Minister of Environment, Water and Forestry Mircea Fechet for supporting this historic decision and Moldovan Minister of Environment Iordanca Iordanov for his professional and diplomatic chairmanship of the meeting of the Meeting of the Parties to the Convention.
The Ukrainian minister added that the Ukrainian delegation in Geneva also managed to achieve two more victories, including the refusal to elect a representative of Belarus to the working bodies of the Espoo Convention, which was supported by 34 countries.
“At the 43rd session of the Convention on Long-range Transboundary Air Pollution, Moscow was deprived of the status of host of the Meteorological Center “Vostok” of the EMEP program. This was voted for by 33 countries out of 35 member states. The international environmental research center will now be based at the Jožef Stefan Institute in Ljubljana, Slovenia. We hope that it will soon work in the Ukrainian Hydrometeorological Center!” – Mr. Strelets also wrote.
The Espoo Convention is an international agreement initiated by the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe, which entered into force in 1997 and is named after the Finnish city of Espoo (or Espoo), where it was signed in 1991. According to the document, the procedure for assessing the environmental impact of potentially hazardous projects should be carried out not only within the state, but also in neighboring countries that may be affected by the impact of these facilities.
As reported, in August 2004, Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma opened the first part of the canal to traffic. At the same time, on September 1, the European Commission protested to Ukraine over the continuation of the construction of the canal in the Danube Delta, which is under UNESCO protection. The European Commission called on Kyiv to stop construction until an assessment of the impact that the canal could have on the environment in the river delta is conducted. In addition, Romania said it would challenge the construction of the canal.
According to the decision of Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko, in June 2005, work on deepening the Danube-Black Sea Canal through the Bystryi Estuary was suspended to allow for an expert assessment. The examination by the commission of the Ministry of Environmental Protection of Ukraine found that the canal did not cause any harm to the environment.
Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry emphasized that Ukraine proceeds from the premise that the resumption of navigation in the lower Danube is a sovereign right of the state and is aimed at restoring the situation that historically existed in this region before 1994.
At the time, the Ukrainian side claimed that its position was confirmed by international experts during a visit to the actual site of the work in the Danube Delta. Thus, since the beginning of the restoration work, representatives of the Ramsar, Berne, Aarhus, Espoo, International Commission for the Protection of the Danube River, European Commission, Council of Europe, and World Wildlife Fund have visited the lower Danube. The mission’s recommendations contained three main requirements for Ukraine: not to start work on the second stage of the project until the environmental impact assessment of the second stage is completed; to hold public hearings on the environmental impact of the project; and to conduct systematic environmental monitoring during the project, which should involve international experts and representatives of Romania. According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ukraine has fulfilled all three requirements.
However, the dispute continued, and Ukraine also put forward counterclaims to Romania under the Espoo Convention regarding its projects in the Danube Delta.
JSC “Ukrzaliznytsia” (UZ) has built at its own facilities a grain carrier adapted for transportation both on the Ukrainian gauge of 1520 mm and on the Euro gauge of 1435 mm, the company reported on Friday.
“For the first time in the history of Ukraine made a grain carrier at the production facilities of “Ukrzaliznytsia”, maximally adapted for transportation of cargoes on the territory of Ukraine and the gauge 1435 mm of the European Union countries,” – the release quotes the words of the head of the board of directors of UZ Evgeny Lyashchenko.
According to him, Ukrzaliznytsia plans to launch serial production of such cars.
According to the UZ release, the new development is a hopper car of model 19-8005-U, designed for transportation of grain and other bulk food cargoes. Its load capacity is 70 tons, body volume 104 cubic meters, 02-VM gauge, five loading and six unloading hatches, design speed of 120 km/h.
UZ noted that the use of the new car will reduce the cost of logistics and simplify the procedure for approval of international rail transportation, as it meets the requirements applicable to the infrastructure of EU countries.
