The European Union has announced a decision by which it excluded Ukraine from the list of countries for which it is recommended to lift the restrictive measures imposed on unnecessary travel to the EU due to coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.
“Following consideration under the recommendation to gradually remove temporary restrictions on non-essential travel to the EU, the Council has updated the list of countries, special administrative regions and other entities and territorial authorities for which travel restrictions should be lifted. In particular, Singapore has been removed from the list and Ukraine,” according to the decision made public on Tuesday.
At the same time, each EU member state has the right to decide “to remove temporary restrictions on non-essential travel to the EU for fully vaccinated travelers.”
As stipulated in the Council’s recommendation, this list will continue to be reviewed every two weeks and updated as appropriate.
The decision was made due to the growth of COVID-19 disease.
Ukraine was included in the list, which is reviewed every two weeks, on July 15.
Ukraine and Poland are planning to launch high-speed trains between the capitals.
“Recently I’ve been to Poland, talked with my counterpart in the Polish government. They support our idea, they are interested in it. They have also figured out that high-speed trains of 300 km+ are super-expensive and definitely not about economy. But as for 250 km+, we completely coincide with them in technical requirements, and now our teams are already starting to work. That is, we have agreements that our Italian company, which is developing a feasibility study, will work with the two railways,” Minister of Infrastructure of Ukraine Oleksandr Kubrakov said during the Big Construction: New Railway forum in Kyiv.
He also stressed that a preliminary understanding of the cost of the project and its roadmap is expected by the end of the year or in January 2022.
For this project, according to Kubrakov, a preliminary feasibility study is already being developed.
During a telephone conversation, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky and President of Poland Andrzej Duda agreed to exchange visits and hold a number of events dedicated to the landmark anniversary dates of Ukrainian-Polish relations, the 30th anniversary of Poland’s recognition of Ukraine’s independence, the establishment of diplomatic relations and the signing of the Treaty on friendship and cooperation.“The sides exchanged views on the difficult situation that has developed on the Polish-Belarusian border. The head of the Ukrainian state informed about the security situation on the Ukrainian-Belarusian border and the measures that are being carried out and will be taken for its proper protection,” the presidential press service has said.Particular attention was paid to coordinating the positions of the parties in countering the Nord Stream 2 project. The interlocutors were unanimous in their assessments of Nord Stream 2 primarily as a security threat and confirmed their unwavering commitment to further opposition to the project.“This is in the interests of the energy security of Europe as a whole,” Zelensky said.It is noted that the heads of state paid special attention to promising projects of cooperation in the energy sector, in particular, to establish alternative routes for gas supplies.Zelensky briefed Duda about the development of the security situation in eastern Ukraine.
Public representatives, together with students, lecturers and the administration of International European University, planted about 900 pine trees at Holosiivskyi National Natural Park.
The organizers called this event #хвойна_туса (pine meet-up), which was supported by the Silpo supermarket chain and initiated by SD Platform NGO.
Our journalists talked to Kateryna Davydkova, the coordinator of environmental matters at SD Platform NGO, about the idea and further plans.
“I try to extensively involve the university community in ecologically vital initiatives. The idea originated from the importance to enrich our country with trees. It’s painful to watch mass deforestation and wood sales. By the way, coniferous forests destroy bacteria in our air and clean our lungs, especially after COVID-19. The #хвойна_туса initiative took place in Vinnytsia and twice in Kyiv. Our International European University regularly joins eco-initiatives and supports the environmental consciousness of young people. In general, around 900 pine trees were planted at Holosiivskyi National Natural Park. Forest officers held a workshop on the proper technique of tree planting and maintenance. Our lungs were filled with useful coniferous air. We believe that our pine trees will also produce phytoncides in a year, which are quite beneficial to human health,” Kateryna said.
It is a great pleasure that International European University promotes an eco-friendly lifestyle, as forests are the lungs of our planet, which have suffered a lot this year and which recovery is crucial to each citizen. Taking the responsibility for the planet and its future, being conscious and caring about environmental problems: it’s about the IEU family.
Activists and students are going to plant more trees in the spring.
Primary registrations of used cars imported from abroad in Ukraine in October exceeded 56,100 vehicles, which is 50% more than in the same month of 2020, and 3% more than in September this year, according to the Ukrautoprom association.“The larger number of registrations of imported used cars was recorded only in February 2019. Then, as now, the surge in registrations was associated with the end of the period of preferential legalization of cars with euro-number plates,” the association said on the website.As reported, preferential conditions for customs clearance will be valid until November 10, 2021 – 180 days from the date of their entry into force. For combatants, the deadline is 270 days, until February 8, 2022.According to the report, the share of used foreign cars of the total registration of passenger cars in October increased to 87.7%, i.e. new cars were registered 85.7% less.The most popular brand among the customs cleared used vehicles was Volkswagen with 10,500 registrations, Renault was second with 4,599 used cars, the third result is for Ford – 4,322 vehicles. Opel followed it in the list, the used cars of this brand were chosen by 4,290 Ukrainians, and Skoda closes the top five with 4,015 cars.In total, in January-October 2021, Ukrainian license plates received for 411,700 imported used cars – 47% more than a year earlier and almost five times more than the number of new passenger cars.In 2020, 353,400 used foreign passenger cars were registered in Ukraine, which is 4.1 times more than sales of new cars (85,500 units).
