Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has said that the financing of the country’s armed forces has increased by almost three times, and a Ukrainian soldier will receive at least Hr 10,000 from Jan. 1, the press service of the head of state reported on Sept. 17.
According to the report, Poroshenko recalled in an interview with the Public Television channel in Kropyvnytsky that the new figures of Ukraine’s draft state budget for 2019, which were considered at a meeting of the National Security and Defense Council (NSDC), had already been presented. The necessary instructions were made to the government after the meeting.
“I have signed my demand that today the level of remuneration, the level of financial support for a Ukrainian soldier should be higher than the average salary in industry. At my insistence, a soldier in the Ukrainian Armed Forces should receive at least Hr 10,000 from Jan. 1,” Poroshenko said.
As reported, on Sept. 6, Ukraine’s National Defense and Security Council (NSDC) approved the main parameters of Ukraine’s defense budget for 2019. According to it, more than 5 percent of GDP will be directed to the needs of the national security and defense sector as a whole. Absolute figures of the defense budget approved by the NSDC were not made public. According to the forecasts made at the end of August after a special meeting at the NSDC, Ukraine’s defense budget for 2019 will amount to about Hr 200 billion.
Among the voiced priorities of the country’s defense budget for 2019 are the development and purchase of modern high-precision missile weapons (missile systems and complexes, including cruise missiles); armament; armored vehicles; high-precision means of destruction, ammunition and special chemical products, strengthening air defense systems and the capabilities of Ukraine’s Air Force, implementation of state policy in the field of cybersecurity, implementation of measures to develop and modernize the system of special communication and information protection and testing missiles and ammunition.
