It was the final day at the House but there was no letting up for us in terms of the sheer breadth of information that our panels covered.
We began with, ‘Passion, Principles, and Sacrifice: A Conversation with Dr. Meaghan Mobbs on Saving Lives, Honoring Heroes, and Defending Freedom in Ukraine’, a truly fascinating and moving panel moderated by Ambassador John Herbst (Director, Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center).
Dr. Mobbs (President, Romulus T. Weatherman Foundation) explained that her relationship with Ukraine went back to when she was a child, when her father, President Trump’s Special Envoy for Ukraine Keith Kellogg, commanded the storied 82nd Airborne division. She’s since been to Ukraine 22 times.
She criticized the Biden administration for not doing a good job explaining why this conflict mattered so much to Americans and declared they had not appreciated that “superpowers don’t worry about escalation, we are the escalation!”.
She welcomed the new Trump era of ‘peace through strength’ as a much-needed reorientation for American leadership and said that Americans were “tired of politicking without action” as had happened so often under the Biden administration.
She declared that supporting Ukraine was the “most America First thing we could do”, praised Ukraine as having the “most combat effective, combat exposed force in the world” and noted that it was a “remarkable thing that I have never been asked by anyone in Ukraine for a handout, I have only ever been asked for a hand up”.
The first afternoon panel, ‘Ukraine: A $12 Trillion Critical Mineral Superpower’, provided key arguments on why foreign nations, and particularly the US, needed to appreciate the country’s mineral capabilities.
The panel was moderated by Lenna Koszarny, Ukraine House Organizing Committee Member and Horizon Capital Founding Partner and CEO, and heard insights from Oleksiy Sobolev, First Deputy Minister of Economy of Ukraine, RDML (Ret.) Michael Hewitt, Co-Founder & CEO IP3 Corporation, Sergii Voitsekhovskyi, Board Member, BGV Group Management, and Oleksandr Kravchenko, Managing Partner, McKinsey Ukraine.
Hewitt was emphatic in arguing that the conversation in the Trump administration was all about “getting off of Chinese graphite, getting off of Russian uranium and Russian fuel, and the most important country to help us do that is Ukraine’.
He went on to champion the role Ukraine could play here in satisfying global needs – “Ukraine has the technology, Ukraine has the people, Ukraine brings in nuclear power and all of a sudden you are satisfying the climate change agenda, the energy sovereignty agenda, the energy dominance agenda”.
Koszarny supported this position, noting that Ukraine had “over 300,000 tech specialists” and could be an ally in AI development.
Sobolev pointed out that ‘The majority of the critical raw minerals, the titanium, the uranium mines, the lithium, are on the territory that is controlled by Ukraine, some of them 100s of km away, some of them 1000s.’
The second afternoon panel, ‘Leadership, Competitiveness, Sustainability: Success Stories of Ukraine’s Top Investors and Enterprises’, elaborated on the achievements of the private sector.
The panel was moderated by Katya Soldak, Editorial Director, Forbes Media’s international editions, and heard insights from Matteo Patrone, Vice President, Banking, EBRD, Duncan Nightingale, Chairman of the Supervisory Board, Ukrnafta, Alexander Garkavij, Director of Railway Products Division, Interpipe, and Lenna Koszarny, Ukraine House Organizing Committee Member and Horizon Capital Founding Partner and CEO.
Patrone was effusive about the value add in investing in Ukraine – “The moment to invest in Ukraine is now. Out of the 6.2 billion euros we have put the work in (Ukraine), we have not lost a penny”.
Nightingale spoke about the progress that had been made in gas storage capability, remarking that Ukrnafta were “creating a power generation business using our own gas” and that there would consequently be a “much more resilient and threat-resistant power grid going forward.”
Koszarny praised the excellent conditions that existed for investment here – “there is an investment climate and ecosystem in the country where human capital is absolutely fantastic, which creates opportunities for investment both in the private and public sectors.”
The final panel of the week gave the audience fresh insights into the campaign to seize Russian state assets, ‘Release the $350bn in Frozen Russian Assets: Shifting the Cost Burden from Western Taxpayers to the Aggressor’.
The House once again heard insights from the leaders of this campaign Sir William Browder, Founder and CEO Hermitage Capital Management, and Yuliya Ziskina, Senior Legal Fellow, Razom. Other panelists were Iryna Mudra (via video link), Deputy Head, Office of the President of Ukraine) and Artem Shevalev, Alternate Board Director at the EBRD. The panel was moderated by Herbst.
Browder spoke powerfully about the significant runway that would be allowed to Ukraine to continue the fight if these monies were confiscated and given to them.
He argued that the alternative would be dire, a refugee crisis with 15 million Ukrainian refugees fanning across Europe and potential further incursions by Putin into Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia.
Ziskina, hailed by Herbst as the “intellectual leader” of this campaign, made the case that the “circumstances around these assets had completely changed” and so the conditions were right to take action now.
In particular, she destroyed the myth that all the assets were held in Europe in Euroclear, pointing out that “90 per cent of Russian reserves are being held in cash in banks around the world” so coordinated global action would be effective here.
Browder was cautious about what the new US administration would mean for Ukraine and said it had been a “nerve-wracking transition” and that while people around President Trump had spoken reasonably about conditions for a ceasefire, he was still unclear what Trump felt the contours of a peace deal should look like.
But as a dealmaker, Browder argued that if Trump didn’t want to “give American money to Ukraine to support them… [he should] grab the $300bn”.
The day finished with closing remarks from Ukraine House Executive Director Ulyana Khromyak who praised the unrelenting efforts of the organizing committee, the wonderful speakers and moderators together with everyone who had made the House such a success this year.
This was followed by another brilliant networking event, this time supported by Kyiv School of Economics.
Ukraine House Davos is co-organized by UMAEF, Victor Pinchuk Foundation, and Horizon Capital and led by Executive Director Ulyana Khromyak.
The Ukraine House Davos Organizing Committee is composed of: Jaroslawa Johnson, President and CEO, UMAEF; Svitlana Grytsenko, Member of the Board, Victor Pinchuk Foundation; and Lenna Koszarny, Founding Partner and CEO, Horizon Capital.
Ukraine House Davos is made possible this year thanks to our generous sponsors, most notably our Gold Sponsors the Temerty Foundation and Interpipe, our Panel Sponsors Marsh McLennan and BGV Group Management, as well as Networking Sponsors Kernel and Kyiv School of Economics.
Stay tuned as we continue to explore, connect and shape a brighter global future together.
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