Riga, Feb 9 (LETA) - On Monday, the Riga City Council decided to donate EUR 100,000 to Ukraine.

As reported, the municipality has received requests from the Kyiv Regional State Administration, the European Committee of the Regions and the Embassy of Ukraine in Latvia for urgent and concrete support to Ukraine in the current emergency situation that has arisen in Ukraine's energy sector.

Ukraine needs generators, cogeneration equipment, energy storage systems or equivalent technical equipment.

Therefore, the Riga municipality will transfer EUR 100,000 from the Riga City Council's reserve fund to Ziedot.lv charity fund for the purpose of supporting Ukraine in the current emergency situation that has arisen in the Ukrainian energy sector.

Five members of the city council - Nikolajs Kabanovs and Jakovs Pliners from Stability party and Rudolfs Bremanis, Vjaceslavs Stepanenko and Lubova Svecova from Sovereign Power and Alliance of Young Latvians (SV/AJ) - voted against the aid to Ukraine.

Inna Djeri, Arturs Klebahs, Julija Stepanenko and Julia Sohina from SV/AJ did not take part in the vote.

According to Pliners, the Riga City Council budget is in deficit and "there are many sick children and elderly people in Riga who are waiting with fear for their January heating and electricity bills". He believes that first the people of Riga should be helped and then Ukraine.

Djeri also explained that she did not take part in the vote because, in her opinion, the main task of the Riga City Council members is to help the people of Riga, and only then to vote on aid to Ukraine.

As reported, the European Commission has announced that it will supply Ukraine with 447 emergency generators worth EUR 3.7 million. The generators are intended to restore electricity to hospitals, shelters and essential services.

"Russia's continued attacks on Ukraine's energy infrastructure are deliberately depriving civilians of heat, light and basic services in the middle of a severe winter," said EU Commissioner for Equality, Hadia Lahbib. "Their aim is to break the spirit of Ukraine. It will fail," she added.

Since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the EU has sent more than 9,500 power generators to Ukraine.

The European Commission has also provided more than EUR 1.2 billion in humanitarian aid to Ukraine's civilian population and at least EUR 3 billion to strengthen energy security.