The EESC President in Ukraine

Met dank overgenomen van Europees Economisch en Sociaal Comité (EESC) i, gepubliceerd op dinsdag 14 juli 2015.

Henri Malosse, President of the European Economic and Social Committee i, is on mission in Kiev and Odessa from 14 to 16 July. He will meet today with Petro Porochenko i, President of Ukraine, and discuss the relations between Ukraine and the European Union.

On this occasion, President Malosse will also dialogue with key representatives of Ukrainian civil society, such as Patriarch Philaret, Mustafa Dzemilev, Commissioner on the Affairs of Crimean Tatars, and Iryna Gerashchenko, Head of the European Integration Committee of the Ukrainian Parliament.

In Odessa, the EESC president will meet the Governor of the region, Mr Saakashvili, as well as active NGOs in the region.

Back in December 2013 when the first demonstrations began, with a EESC delegation, President Malosse went to Maidan square in Kiev. Subsequently, the EESC invited at one of its plenary sessions Ruslana Lyzhychko, figurehead of the Maidan protests, and Oleksiy Honcharuk, one of the spokespersons of the Maidan civil society protests, to come to Brussels.

As a result of President Malosse's on-going involvement in support of Ukrainian civil society, he was recently placed on the travel black list by the Russian authorities.