German Galushchenko

Of course, the beginning of the full-scale invasion was a challenge for us, because three hours before this full-scale war started, we were disconnected from Russian, Belarusian grids. And the energy system was in isolation mode, like an island. And it was a challenge, especially in the conditions of war. But of course, a lot of change from that time.

winter russians only strengthen the attacks to the energy infrastructure that is one of the main targets still for them and just to say that from 22 we already had more than 30 massive attacks to the energy infrastructure. What I mean by massive, that is something around 300 missiles and drones at once, at one day, which are attacking only energy infrastructure.

But that is not saying about everyday attacks, which we are not calling massive, but it happens every day.

I mean, energy is a key infrastructure for the economy in each country. What has happened with these massive attacks, that is, of course, in the situation with the restriction of supply for the people. or, let's say, blackouts, or everything that have direct impact to the growth of economy and to the, let's say, way of living of the people.

But in our case, for instance, last year, they started attacks to the energy from March 22. And all year, they are attacking the energy infrastructure, not only in wintertime. In winter, they only strengthen these attacks. Even some international organization said that this would be very difficult winter, like 18 to 20 hours without electricity supply.

But in fact, we withstood and we do not have any restriction for our people from December.

No, I think I know that negotiation is going on on that. But of course, that is, first of all, a question of investment and money to extract. You're absolutely right. And another point is why we need additional generation in Ukraine to provide supply of electricity for extraction of these minerals.

Because I could hardly imagine we would restrict supply to our households and to extract the minerals. So that's why it's a lot of things which are very, very connected in line of this mineral deal or agreement, whatever.

In fact, I think that is a really, really good story. I mean, if we are talking about that the investments would go to this extraction or the production or whatever, because that is huge money. And the more private business or, I mean, the foreign companies would come to invest to Ukraine and would be present in Ukraine, I think, of course, it would bring more, let's say, security.

I think a lot depends on the war. At least in the energy, what I see for many years already, from the beginning of full-scale innovation, we had a lot of projects with a lot of big companies who want to be in Ukraine. We have the biggest storage in Europe, in Ukraine. So we could use the storage for security of supply for the region, for instance.

We could increase generation in peace condition, especially again, so we will see what happened with Zaporizhia, but we could increase generation in the country and supply electricity to Europe. which we did in 2022. I think that's one of the reasons why Russians starting some massive attacks to the energy infrastructure.

Because in 2022, I mentioned that three hours before the war, before the big war started, we were disconnected. And we were connected to European grids on 21 days after. It was 16 of March. And then we started exporting electricity to Europe, even at war in 2022. What it means for Russians? Just reduce of using Russian gas in Europe because they could buy Ukrainian electricity.

And I think that also shows that potential is really huge.

I see these messages now that there is discussion. So the war would be over someday. And so let's go back to Russia. I think that would be the biggest mistake of Europe. And I think a lot of countries understand that, you know, because unfortunately, even when we are talking about the gas, that is always used not only as a commodity.

but also as a tool to manipulate the government, to manipulate the prices. And you remember the situation in 2022 when the big war started, how Russia manipulated European prices, was increased prices on gas in Europe. And it was like totally shocked for everyone. And then they have to provide some emergency measures to, let's say, to put some caps on that. And I mean...

The dependence always dangerous, always dangerous. Dependence. We could say about Russia or some other, but no matter if you are dependent on one side or one country, it's always dangerous.

Thank you. Thank you very much.