Delegation from Ukrainian partner city Chuhuiv visits Kuldīga
Representatives of the Ukrainian city of Chuhuiv, which has been a partner of Latvia's Kuldīga municipality since 2021, are visiting this week. They met local leaders, toured local institutions and shared their experience of running municipal services during wartime.
A delegation from the Ukrainian city of Chuhuiv is visiting the Kuldīga municipality in western Latvia this week. It includes the chair of the Chuhuiv city council, Halyna Minayeva, and Viktoriia Khomenko, head of the International Relations Department. Chuhuiv has been a partner city of Kuldīga since 2021, and the visit is meant to review the cooperation so far and discuss how it can develop.
Meetings and visits
The guests met Inese Astaševska, chair of the Kuldīga municipal council. They discussed the existing cooperation and its future prospects, including possible joint projects. The delegation learned about the work of the municipal administration and visited Kuldīga hospital, Kuldīga Centra Secondary School and the library. They also toured Kuldīga's old town, which is on the UNESCO World Heritage List.
Wartime experience
On 20 October, the Chuhuiv representatives took part in a seminar organised by the Latvian Association of Local and Regional Governments, titled "Municipal resilience and continuity of services in crises: lessons from the August storm and Ukraine". Minayeva spoke there about how a local government keeps services running during war. Khomenko also shared her experience of this during the visit to Kuldīga.
How the partnership began
The partnership between Kuldīga and Chuhuiv began on 14 December 2021, when the heads of the two municipalities signed a cooperation memorandum. They agreed to exchange experience and develop joint initiatives. The link was established only a few months before Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The first Chuhuiv delegation visited Kuldīga in May 2023, and Minayeva was part of that visit as well.
