The political opening ceremony featured speeches and greetings from high-ranking guests as well as a plenary discussion offering a variety of perspectives on the funded collaborations.
The speakers unanimously acknowledged the great commitment of the Ukrainian and German universities involved in the projects. Prof. Dr. Joybrato Mukherjee (President of the DAAD) and Dorothee Bär (German Federal Minister of Research, Technology and Space) highlighted the impressive resilience of Ukrainian science in the face of the enormous challenges posed by Russia's war of aggression. H.E. Oleksii Makeiev (Ambassador of Ukraine to Germany) and, via video message, Prof. Dr. Mykola Trofimenko (Deputy Minister of Education and Science of Ukraine) emphasised the opportunities that the German-Ukrainian University Network (DUHN) offers for cooperation between the two countries in science and beyond. Harald Christ (founder and chairman of the Harald Christ Foundation for Democracy and Diversity) impressively demonstrated his commitment to Ukraine and underlined the broad support that DUHN receives from politics and society.
Representatives from universities and politics explored these topics in depth during apanel discussion entitled ‘German-Ukrainian University Network – Getting Stronger Together’. The discussion made it impressively clear that scientific cooperation is taking place in an extraordinary context and that Ukraine continues to need a wide range of support. At the same time, it was evident that Ukrainian universities have developed comprehensive skills that offer great learning potential for their German partner universities – both in terms of subject matter and in the areas of resilience and flexibility in teaching, learning and university administration. The participants emphasised that the DUHN is already a success simply by virtue of its creation. Also, it is an important instrument for the development of academic and political relations between the two countries. And the DUHN shows that cooperation as mutual learning, as give and take, as an equal partnership can succeed even under conditions of war with mutual respect, empathy, awareness of each other's strengths and a high level of commitment.
