While Trump is shutting down USAID and cutting off international financial aid, our country is strengthening close ties with other partners willing to support Ukraine in its reconstruction and economic recovery efforts. Among them, France holds a key position, having already provided €200 million for modernizing critical infrastructure and continuing to actively engage the international community in Ukraine's rebuilding process. Amid the growing interest of French businesses in the Ukrainian market and the deepening of bilateral relations between Kyiv and Paris, Ukrinform spoke with the French President's Special Envoy for Aid and Reconstruction in Ukraine, Pierre Heilbronn.

How does France assess the challenges of rebuilding Ukraine? Which sectors are the most promising for French investors? Is the French business community ready to expand its presence in Ukraine? And what does the future of the economic partnership between Kyiv and Paris look like? Pierre Heilbronn shared his insights on these and other topics during our conversation.

FRANCE WORKS ON DIRECT FINANCING TO UKRAINIAN MUNICIPALITIES FOR 450 MILLION EUROS

- France actively supports Ukraine through various projects and financial contributions. There are 19 projects for the restoration of critical infrastructure with your support that were approved. How do you assess the effectiveness of the implementation of these projects? Are you facing any difficulties or challenges in the process of their implementation?

- This is one of the tools we've deployed to support Ukraine. It's a small part of our support, which is much larger, through the European Union, because we are the second contributor to that. And in 2025, we'll probably have the largest amount ever of European support to Ukraine, which in fact France finances in a large proportion because of its size in Europe. 85% of the support of the international community to Ukraine will be European in 2025. 90% if you add the UK. And France is a very large part of that.

We've deployed and developed other instruments, the opening of the mandate of the Agence Française de Développement, which is our development agency that has now an office in Ukraine and which works all around the country, also on technical assistance, direct financing to Ukrainian municipalities for 450 million euros for the next three years, so 2025-2027. And there is this tool which is these 200 million on critical infrastructure.

We’ve received in a few weeks, in fact, requests for a total of 800 million euros. So, it shows also that French companies are very much interested in supporting Ukraine because Ukraine is a country of opportunity.

Yulia Svyrydenko coordinated all the different ministers to select 19 projects out of 70, totaling 800 million euros. These projects are to be implemented by 17 companies.

In Bucha, for example, where they will finance the digital substation, which will allow to distribute of electricity for a large part of Kyiv. That's one example of the 19 projects, which is deployed by G-Vernova with DTEK.

The maximum limit for disbursement of this fund is 18 months, which is quite different from traditional development instruments that ordinarily take much longer.

The geography of projects covers more or less the whole of Ukraine, but also it creates jobs in France, in seven regions, and that's very important also to sustain French public support because when you see that it creates also jobs in French factories, this is conducive also to increase support to Ukraine over time.

THE SECOND SUPERHUMANS CENTER WILL BE OPEN IN ODESA THIS YEAR

- Mr. Heilbronn, you participated in the launch of the training of Ukrainian radiation therapists and surgeons at the National Academy of Surgery in Paris. Are there other similar examples of French investment in Ukraine's human capital planned?

- The most important asset of Ukraine is its people in many ways. That's very important in the health sector, we've been supporting the reconstruction of hospitals. We've been also providing medical equipment like mammographs.

These days, I will also sign with Viktor Liashko seven projects that are part of this fund and relate to healthcare equipment.

We are very proud that one-third of all the cooperation of Ukrainian hospitals with foreign hospitals are with French hospitals. We will finance the second Superhumans center in Odessa after Lviv. It will open within a year.

We supply medical equipment to fight cancer, French-made mammograms to Ukrainian hospitals. Not every French hospital has such high-quality equipment.

As for mental health, which is a huge priority for your government, for the first lady, here we have defined a rather ambitious program of support for Ukrainian centers.

For people returning from the front, it is very important to be part of the functioning of society. We have experience, and this also gives us a certain advantage in the field of health care, social assistance, psychological support, and economic supply - to make these veterans part of the future of Ukraine, without any prejudice regarding disabilities and mental health problems.

RENEWABLE ENERGY PROJECTS IN THE CHORNOBYL`S EXCLUSION ZONE

- France has allocated almost 6 million euros for the development of projects in the Ukrainian nuclear industry. Last December, you signed a corresponding agreement in the presence of Energy Minister Herman Galushchenko. What specific initiatives are planned to be implemented with these funds? Which has already started? Is your visit to Chornobyl related to the implementation of such projects?

- I visited many times Chornobyl in my past lives when I was working in EBRD. And in fact, the safe confinement around the Chornobyl plant has been built by a consortium with French companies, Bouygues and Vinci. So there is a long history around Chornobyl in terms of French support to Ukraine.

There are new challenges, obviously, with this drone attack. So, I'm going there, with Svetlana Grinchuk, who invited me to see what the needs are, also linked to this new drone attack. It's too early to tell you a bit about additional support on Chornobyl.

The money allocated to the nuclear sector it's more about ensuring that nuclear power plants can safely continue to produce electricity and to allow the regulator in Ukraine to say, that parts of turbines, for example, are replaced in due time.

Nuclear energy is a critical source of production of electricity in Ukraine at the level of 60%, which is, by the way, more or less mirroring the energy mix in France, because we have really the same energy mix now and in the future, based on nuclear and renewable energy.

I'm interested in looking again at renewable energy projects, solar energy. So, my visit to Chornobyl will allow me to better understand what can be done using the potential of the exclusion zone there to meet the energy needs of Ukraine.

UKRAINE AND FRANCE HAVE THE SAME VIEW ON ENERGY SECURITY

-You said that investments in Ukraine will strengthen Europe. How do you convince the other politicians or businessmen that Ukraine can become an asset for Europe's strategic autonomy?

- I think in defense it's quite an obvious case because the European industrial base and the Ukrainian are complementing each other. We have very high-end, hugely technologically advanced production, obviously which adds to the Ukrainian capacity. Ukrainians have developed in some sectors incredibly successful equipment in drones obviously. I visited, when I was here last time in February, a missile factory which is producing day and night, quite cheap and effective weapons that are used every day on the front. I think it's a source of inspiration, of operational innovation for European industry.

The issue of how we can build these security guarantees relies both, as President Macron said, on a very strong Ukrainian army well-equipped, but it's also based on a European Union which draws on this capacity and builds and steps up its capacity in terms of production and innovation. And I think we have a lot to learn from Ukraine.

At the same time, Ukraine has an urgent need for missiles, and visits or discussions regarding the needs of the Ukrainian army take place daily. We are trying to provide more. We announced €2 billion more last week. President Macron mentioned that after his meeting with President Zelensky.

I think this is an area of mutual interest, but we are a large agricultural power. Ukraine is one of them. I think these are more complementary than in a competition, and we need more self-sufficiency in Europe, on the European continent. It's part of the food safety we are trying to build.

On energy, the same thing. Energy security, we have the same view. Probably we are the most aligned two countries on the continent about the future path of energy security in Europe based on the mix of nuclear and renewable.

I think we have everything to make the continent stronger based on joining efforts and understanding that each of us can do our things. If we combine our forces, we will be much stronger, and more self-reliant, and we see also in defence, France has taken a choice in the last decades to build its capacity, not to depend on anybody else, both on the nuclear but also on conventional arms. We saw that it can be useful in certain circumstances to have the capacity also to rely on European friends and your own capacity to assert your interests, your values, in quite an unpredictable world.

Yurii Chornyi, Kyiv

Photo: Yevhen Kotenko