Ukraine says it needs €500m to rebuild critical port facilities damaged by Russia

Ukraine needs an initial €500 million ($570 million) to rebuild the most important infrastructure facilities at its Black Sea ports destroyed by constant Russian missile and drone attacks, a government minister said on Friday.

Almost 400 port infrastructure facilities have been damaged as a result of Russian attacks during more than three years of war. Seaports are critical for Ukraine, which ships more than 90 per cent of its exports by sea.

"The main critical infrastructure facilities for ports and shipping that we have already lost have been identified...and now we have to restore them," Andriy Kashuba, deputy minister of territorial development, told the Black Sea Security Forum in Odessa.

Ukraine currently operates three major seaports in the Odessa area. Other Black Sea ports suspended operations after Russia launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022.

Kashuba said the total cost of rebuilding the ports' infrastructure was estimated at around one billion euros.

That figure is dwarfed by the total estimated cost for Ukraine's overall reconstruction and recovery. The World Bank last December put that cost at $524 billion (€506 billion) over the next decade, or about 2.8 times the country's estimated nominal GDP for 2024.

Many industrial and residential infrastructure facilities across Ukraine have been destroyed or severely damaged by Russian attacks.

(Reporting by Yuliia Dysa, writing by Pavel Polityuk Editing by Gareth Jones)