Kuleba outlines Foreign Ministry’s ten victories in 2021

Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Dmytro Kuleba outlined ten major victories of the Ministry in 2021.

The minister summed up the results of 2021 during an online briefing, an Ukrinform correspondent reports.

According to the chief Ukrainian diplomat, ten major victories are as follows:

• Foreign Policy Strategy, Asian and African Strategy, Public Diplomacy Strategy, and Foreign Ministry's Communication Strategy (adopted for the first time over 30 years)
• Creation of the Crimea Platform
• President Zelensky's visit to the United States and building trusting relations with the new Biden's administration
• New economic opportunities for Ukrainian companies, expansion of Ukrainian exports
• Reinforcement of the Ukrainian army through the efforts of diplomats
• Launch of the Association Trio and EU's recognition
• Diplomacy for peace: de-escalation of security threats in the spring and mobilization of partners to develop a deterrence package against Russia now
• Evacuation of about 1,000 people from the Gaza Strip and Afghanistan
• Preservation of opportunities for Ukrainians to travel across Europe
• Pride for Ukraine, strengthened by the Foreign Ministry throughout this year

Kuleba called the creation of a holistic Foreign Policy Strategy the main achievement of the year.

"For the first time, the strategy structured our foreign policy, clearly balanced our interests and capabilities and brought our policy to a new level, made it proactive. Thanks to the Strategy, despite all the challenges and threats, Ukraine sees 2022 in with the strongest international positions since the independence," the minister said.

He stressed that the document leaves in the past multi-vector, non-aligned status, uncertainty, dependence on partnership, inferiority. "… And other defects of state growth, which we, unfortunately, suffered over the first decades after the restoration of Ukraine's independence," Kuleba stressed.

As reported, the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine approved the Foreign Policy Strategy on July 30.

On August 26, President Volodymyr Zelensky enacted the decision of the National Security and Defense Council of July 30, 2021 "On Foreign Policy Strategy of Ukraine".