Signaling that they could be prepared to increase funding, investment and support, the European Union and its partner institutions are sending a mission to Ukraine’s Azov Sea region.
Senior officials from the EU’s delegation to Ukraine will visit the troubled coastal region next week, from Jan. 28-31, to assess the economic, social and political situation there before assessing how they can provide further, deeper support.
The EU delegation said on Jan. 25 that Thomas Mayr-Harting, managing director of the European External Action Service, or EEAS, and Peter Wagner, director of the Support Group for Ukraine, or SGUA, would lead a mission to the region along with representatives of several EU services and institutions.
On Jan. 24, a spokesperson for the European Investment Bank, or EIB, told the Kyiv Post that the bank would also be joining the mission as it seeks to “assess areas of potential investment” and, jointly with the EU, “expand their economic presence” in the region.
A similar fact-finding mission by senior British members of parliament that visited the Azov region in late December came to the conclusion that the Azov ports of Mariupol and Berdiansk were suffering greatly, with U.K. lawmakers calling it a “slow strangulation” and “economic warfare” waged by Russia.
The EU mission will meet with local authorities, as well as other groups and stakeholders in the Ukrainian Azov Sea cities of Mariupol, Berdiansk and Melitopol. Officials will also meet with local and regional administrations, councils, civil society groups and the business community.
They will also visit schools and other educational institutions.
EU officials note that the visit takes place in coordination with a number of other high-level missions and visits from other EU member states, adding that their findings and assessments will help them “intensify support” for the region and “build upon (existing) programmes… in cooperation with European financial institutions”.
Some observers expect that the European Union and its related financial institutions could announce new investments and funding for the region, that western lawmakers have said is “extremely vulnerable” to ongoing, economic pressure from Russia.
EU officials have noted that Ukraine’s Azov Sea region has been “severely affected” since Russia’s escalation against Ukraine in the Kerch Strait and Azov Sea, in which merchant ships were harassed for months before Ukrainian navy boats were attacked in international waters near the strait on Nov. 25, 2018.
In 2018, Ukraine’s Azov Sea ports of Mariupol and Berdiansk received about 6.6 million tons of goods. Should Russia blockade Ukrainian access to the sea entirely, as it seems to be doing, the ports will face annual losses of up to $2 billion, experts say.
To keep exports alive, Mariupol and Berdiansk have been increasingly reliant on the Azov region’s overburdened and outdated railways or highways to get their goods to safer ports with access to the Black Sea, such as Mykolaiv or Odesa.
However, overland cargo from Mariupol or Berdiansk must currently pass through Volnovakha, some 30 kilometers south of the Russian-held city of Donetsk and a 10-minute drive from the warzone. If Russian-backed forces wanted to, they could block Mariupol’s exports on land just as easily as they have crippled them at sea.
John Whittingdale, a British member of parliament and frequent visitor to Ukraine who currently chairs the U.K.-Ukraine All Party Parliamentary Group in London says that roads and rail should be a top priority for funding.
“The main roads are in a terrible state,” he told the Kyiv Post on Jan. 25. “And I heard about the need to upgrade the rail line – for the steelworks there, employing 30,000 people, they need alternative means to get raw material in and their products out.”
