"When we took office, we had an external debt worth US$ 73 billion. Today, the debt commitment of Ukraine makes up US$ 66 billion. Minus US$6 billion is our answer to those who say that we can take loans and incur additional debts. We have learned to take loans and reduce debts," stressed Prime Minister of Ukraine Arseniy Yatsenyuk in the Parliament during the report of the Government of Ukraine for the year’s activity on Friday, December 11.

He stressed that the Government takes these loans "exceptionally for the reason to replace the expensive loans taken by the previous governments with cheaper and long-term loans and reduce the debt burden".

Arseniy Yatsenyuk expressed gratitude to the Parliament for they had supported restructuring of the debt liabilities of the country: "When we came to the Ukrainian Government, the total debt of Ukraine amounted US$ 73 billion. It wasn’t us who accumulated these debts - for four years of the previous regime they had taken US$ 35 billion. We have conducted restructuring, thus part of the debt was written off while another part of debt payments was suspended for four years".

The PM noted that due to the restructuring the Government had managed to reduce the public debt by nearly UAH 10 billion as planned for 2016.

In addition, the Government and the Parliament have agreed to restructure debts of the Savings Bank and the Ukreximbank: "We have restructured the debts of the Ukrzaliznysia, the Pivdenne Design Office, the Ukravtodor.

"Our common objective to reduce debts and ease the debt burden is being implemented," said Arseniy Yatsenyuk.