Yulia Svyrydenko - The Economist Who Will Lead Ukraine's Wartime Government

NDTV

a day ago

Ukraine:
Yulia Svyrydenko, who championed a vital economic accord between Ukraine and the United States, defines a generation of young Ukrainian politicians who have steered their country through the tumult of war.
The 39-year-old, who was appointed to lead Ukraine's teetering economy just months before the Kremlin launched its full-scale assault in February 2022, was put forward on Monday by President Volodymyr Zelensky to be the country's next prime minister.
Svyrydenko gained prominence this year during fraught negotiations around the minerals deal that nearly derailed ties between Kyiv and its most important military ally.
The deal was central to a disastrous televised spat between Zelensky and US President Donald Trump in February 2025.
But Svyrydenkonot long after travelled to Washington to finalise the agreement that many Ukrainians hoped would placate Trump by giving him a sellable victory and ensure more critical US support for Kyiv.
"She was the key and the only person leading these negotiations. She managed to prevent them from unravelling," said Tymofiy Mylovanov, a former economy minister who worked with Svyrydenko.
Mylovanov, who now heads the Kyiv School of Economics, said Svyrydenko preferred a level-headed approach to politics and avoided confrontations.
"She's professional. She keeps her cool," he added in comments to AFP.
'Young, smart, determined'
She would be taking over the helm at a precarious moment for the country that is exhausted after more than three years of full-scale war and dependent on allies broad for its survival.
The role of prime minister does not typically include a say on military strategy or the frontline war effort, where Zelensky and his military chiefs call the shots.
Yet Svyrydenko is central to a young generation of Ukrainian leaders, like Zelensky, who have steered the country through the Russian invasion and contrast starkly with the Soviet-styled elites that dominate in Russia.
She was not yet 30 when the Kremlin helped foment a violent overthrow of authorities in eastern Ukraine, as popular protests demanded Kyiv pursue closer integration with Europe.
And her native region of Chernigiv, which borders Russia and its war ally Belarus, was briefly occupied at the start of the invasion launched in February 2022.
"Svyrydenko is emblematic of the Ukrainian people's resilience," then-US Secretary of Commerce Rina Raimondo wrote of her in Time Magazine in 2023.
"With young, smart, and determined leaders like her at the helm, Ukraine's postwar future is looking brighter than ever," Raimondo added.
In infrequent public appearances Svyrydenko is soft-spoken but communicates purposefully at a break-neck-pace in Ukrainian or accented English.
She also moved through the ranks of government quickly, after graduating with honours from the National University of Trade and Economics and a brief spell in the private sector.
She held a variety of posts in her native Chernigiv region before being appointed by presidential decree as deputy head of the president's office in 2020. Less than one year later, she became a deputy prime minister and economy minister.
Ukrainian media has reported that Svyrydenko has long held political ambitions.
RBC-Ukraine, a business publication, said that Zelensky had blocked her previous attempts to become prime minister, citing sources that she would be better-suited to the role in a post-war period.
Svyrydenko has said that civil service was a part of her life since childhood, when both her parents worked in government.
"I saw how they devoted themselves to serving the community, how their hometown and its improvement were their core values," she recently told Ukrainian media.