Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelensky has said that the reconstruction of the country’s war-torn Donbass region will cost more than 10 billion euros.

Speaking at the Ukraine Reform Conference, which brings together the country’s international partners from the public, private and non-profit sectors, Mr Zelensky urged foreign investors to take part in the rebuilding of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions of eastern Ukraine.

“According to tentative estimates, the restoration of Donbass will cost over 10 billion euros. We will hold a related forum in Mariupol this fall, and foreign investors who wish to finance infrastructural and humanitarian projects in Donbas are welcomed to join,” the president said at the conference, held in Toronto, Canada.

Mr Zelensky stressed that Ukraine was committed to join the International Monetary Fund’s new reform package once the country’s new government is formed after parliamentary elections on July 21. “We would like to continue our relations with the IMF. I want to place emphasis on that,” he told IMF first deputy managing director David Lipton on July 2.

During a meeting with the World Bank’s director for Europe and Central Asia Cyril Muller, Mr Zelensky also announced what he called a “major privatisation” that he expects to start “already in 2019”, adding that Ukraine will seek assistance from the World Bank for the implementation of infrastructure projects in the Donbass region.

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Photo: Official website of the president of Ukraine