USA Today quotes Ukraine’s Finance Minister Natalie Jaresko on tax reform and the crisis in Ukraine from a call hosted by the Atlantic Council, while Dinu Patriciu Eurasia Center Director John Herbst comments on the proposed reforms:
“War is not a reason or excuse not to reform,” Jaresko said during a conference call with reporters arranged by the Atlantic Council. “The war makes (reform) all the more urgent and all the more necessary. The only way for us to succeed as a sovereign state is for us to succeed in a competitive market environment.”
Even so, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko and Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk are products of “the old system” and have been slow to move on necessary reforms, said John Herbst, a former ambassador to Ukraine who is now at the Atlantic Council, a Washington think tank.