Ukraine’s President Approved National Security Strategy

The President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyi signed a decree “On the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine decision on 14 September 2020 “On the National Security Strategy of Ukraine,” the President’s Office reports.

“The National Security and Defence Strategy of Ukraine was developed on behalf of the President of Ukraine. It defines the main state policy directions in the national security field. In particular, the Strategy describes Ukraine’s national interests priorities and national security provision; the state policy goals and main directions in the national security sphere; the actual and forecasted threats to national security and interests of Ukraine, given the foreign policy and domestic conditions; the main directions of the state’s foreign policy to ensure its national interests and security; the directions and objections of the security and defence sector reformation and development; the resources necessary for its implementation,” the statement informs.

The Strategy states that Ukraine seeks peace, and “people, their life and health, honour and dignity, inviolability and security is the highest social value.”

The Strategy is based on three main principles of state policy in the national security field, namely, deterrence (defence and security capabilities development to prevent armed aggression against Ukraine); resilience (the society and the state’s ability to adapt quickly to the changes in the security environment and to maintain sustainable functioning, in particular, by minimising the external and internal vulnerabilities); interaction (strategic relations with core foreign partners development, first of all, with the European Union and NATO and their member states, the USA, pragmatic cooperation with other states and international organisations based on the national interests of Ukraine).

The Strategy takes into account the recent changes related to the crisis in the world economy, the emergence of new factors that affect the international security environment, the COVID-19 spread caused by the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, as well as the unsafet increase of extreme natural and technology-related risks emergency.

The President’s Office stressed that the National Security Strategy of Ukraine is the basis for the other strategic planning documents development.

Bohdan Marusyak