Opening remarks

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen.

It's a good opportunity for Ukraine to convince our partners that we are moving towards not only defence reform, of course, but also are paying serious attention to reforming wider security sector, including special services, the interior troops, border protection troops, which during Soviet times were rather closed for the society.

I am here to present to you and you have on your tables, the White Book, defence policy of Ukraine for the last year, and according to the ministerial order this book will be published annually and I want to be frank and say you that it's unprecedented level of transparency. First, for Ukrainian society, for the experts (?), it was published in Ukrainian, and also for our foreign partners to understand where Ukraine is and where it's heading in terms of defence and security policy.

Ukraine is committed to all peacekeeping missions we are taking part of, including those NATO-leds and we are paying serious attention to the development of our peacekeeping potential for the future.

I want to thank, on behalf of the government of Ukraine, all of you for helping Ukraine through different PfP Trust Funds to deal with the disposal of surplus munitions, light weapons, MANPADS, for retraining our retired service men to help them be adapted for the civilian life, and also for training of civilian personnel for the Minister of Defence.

Thank you very much.