The European Investment Bank put its activities on hold in Ukraine, the bank’s representatives announced. The information was also confirmed by the bank’s President Werner Hoyer.
"For the time being the situation is so cruel that it would be politically the wrong signal, but also irresponsible vis-a-vis the people we asked to do the job, to be active on business in Ukraine," EIB President Werner Hoyer told a news conference.
Meanwhile, no information is available about the timing of this suspension. To remember, some weeks ago the EIB’s representatives said that considering the current economic situation and acute political unrest, the bank temporarily freezes its financial activity in any of investment projects in Ukraine. Instability in the country hampers right decision-making, the experts and analysts explain. Obviously, political unrest had affected the economic life of the region after the February bloodshed in the main square in Kiev. Mass disturbances and clashes exerted negative impact on the rate of the national currency, the hryvnia. Fueled by the news, the euro and U.S. dollar jumped to their 5-year highs on the interbank market.
The European Investment Bank was founded in Brussels in 1958 with the purpose of supporting underdeveloped European regions by granting them long-term loans. Since 2000, the bank had provided 45 billion euros in loans annually. In 2009, the volume of loans advanced to 79 billion euros a year.