“We are waiting for a good time to visit Ukraine. We don’t want to go empty-handed,” Lahbib said after the interview. She points out that Belgium has been working for some time on a number of concrete avenues to support the war-ravaged country. “We are identifying a number of projects that should help Ukraine get through the winter as well and safely as possible, and to support reconstruction. My trip to Ukraine will be coordinated accordingly.”
Lahbib and Koeleba also spoke at length about the prosecution and punishment of war crimes in Ukraine and the role of the International Criminal Court. The need for weapons was also discussed. A few days ago it was announced that Belgium will supply another 12 million euros in weapons and ammunition. At the end of last month, at the suggestion of Lahbib, the government had already released 8 million euros for the purchase of first aid equipment, winter clothing, night vision goggles and medicines for the Ukrainian soldiers.
Lahbib had already met Koeleba for the first time at the end of last month at a European Council of Ministers in Prague. There they talked about the much-discussed trip to the Crimea that Lahbib had made before she took office as a minister as an RTBF journalist. The peninsula was part of Ukraine, but was illegally annexed by Russia in 2014. Before the meeting in the Czech Republic, the minister had also emphasized in a letter to Koeleba that Crimea is illegally occupied by Russia.
On Monday in New York, the issue was only briefly discussed at the beginning of the conversation. “The meeting was cordial. He (Kuleba, ed.) told me at the beginning that the message has been well received by the Ukrainian people. It can be said that the incident, as you call it, if there was an incident at all, is closed Minister Lahbib concluded.