You're reading: Yanukovych: Ukraine soon to have professional army

Ukraine will soon approve a strategy for the reform and development of the armed forces for the period until 2017, according to which military service will be performed under contract, Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych has said. 

Yanukovych said in an interview with the magazine “Ukraine and the World in 2013. Global Agenda,” a joint project of the New York Times News Service & Syndicate and the Segodnya newspaper, that the authorities plan to switch to a contract-based army. This is envisaged in a draft strategy for the reform and development of the Ukrainian Armed Forces for the period until 2017, which is to be approved soon, the presidential press service reported.

Yanukovych said that to ensure the effective fulfillment of this task, the authorities should take a number of measures to improve the competitiveness of military service.

“It is necessary to introduce mechanisms of motivation to attract young people to military service under contract, and extend their contracts for subsequent periods,” he said.

He said that among such motivations was the provision of servicemen with housing, the payment of decent salaries, as well as access to state-funded higher education during military service and full-scale military training.

“By resolving these and other tasks, we will create the conditions for the one hundred percent staffing of our army with servicemen under contract. Therefore, a final decision on the date of the transition will be made taking into account the capacity of the state regarding the fulfillment of the tasks mentioned,” Yanukovych said.

As reported, the Ukrainian Defense Ministry’s military reform envisages a reduction in the size of the Ukrainian army in the next five years from 192,000 to 70,000 people, and the cancellation of compulsory military service in the armed forces by 2017.