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The Russian war against Ukraine has disrupted the lives of millions of Ukrainians. An estimated 4,2
million refugees have left Ukraine to neighbouring countries, from where they are progressively
moving also to other European Union countries. In the face of this immediate and growing
humanitarian crisis, EU and Ukrainian operators share the conviction that Ukrainian refugees should
continue to have affordable accessto connectivity to stay in touch with family and friends and to access
the Internet and reliable sources of information.
The signatories of this Joint Statement have taken, as of the first days of this crisis, many different
actions to help ensure connectivity across the board. EU operators have distributed and will continue
distributing millions of SIM cards free of charge to allow Ukrainians to stay connected in the EU.
Furthermore, EU operators have offered free or heavily discounted international calls and SMS to
Ukraine, have enabled free outbound roaming for EU customersin Ukraine, have provided connectivity
and charging at central points where refugees gather, have offered donation of essential equipment
to Ukrainian operators and maintained essential international connection nodes. In parallel, Ukrainian
operators continue to keep the connectivity within Ukraine functioning, despite military aggressions.
From the early days of this crisis, Ukrainian operators also ensured resilience of their networks within
the country and offered free roaming to Ukrainian people that fled the war.
In light of this devastating war, the signatories of this Joint Statement from the EU side stand in full
solidarity with Ukraine and the Ukrainian people. Recognising the importance of connectivity, in
particular in times of crisis and under these exceptional circumstances, EU and Ukrainian operators
stand ready to continue making these unprecedented voluntary efforts to alleviate the consequences
of the humanitarian crisis by providing connectivity support on a collaborative basis to those fleeing
their home to safety in the European Union. At the same time, the Ukrainian signatories of this Joint
Statement commit to pass on the full benefits of the voluntary measures applied by their EU
counterparts to Ukrainian end users.
In this context, the signatories underline that, for EU operatorsfree or heavily discounted international
calls to Ukraine can be very costly, and so can free international calls for Ukrainian operators to EU
countries, due to high unregulated international termination fees charged at wholesale level. At the
same time, the Ukrainian operators, operating under war conditions have limited other revenue
sources to maintain their networks and services, and are exposed to growing wholesale roaming out-
payments for their subscribers now displaced to the EU.
The signatories of this Joint Statement seek to ensure that parties work to establish a coordinated
approach involving efforts on both sides, facilitated by BEREC and the Ukrainian National Regulatory
Authority NCEC. Operators in EU and Ukraine, including those providing transit where relevant, would
agree to voluntarily and bilaterally lower wholesale roaming charges and lower the wholesale charges
for terminating international calls through commercial agreements, to enable the sustained provision
of affordable connectivity to refugees from Ukraine. That coordinated approach would minimise
additional costs for both EU and Ukrainian operators, while enabling each to cover their respective
costs, in order to enable as best possible communication for those fleeing the horrors of war. In this
respect, it is important that operators on both sides of the border do their utmost to ensure that
charges for Ukrainian consumers are kept at the minimum.
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