KIEV, Ukraine (AP) – War-torn Ukraine is a long way from Wood Dale, Illinois.
But Natalie Jaresko, the country’s new finance minister who was born and raised in the Chicago suburbs, says she feels just as much at home here as she takes on a daunting task: overhauling a Soviet-era economy at a time when public finances are being drained by war.
It’s been a baptism of fire for the 49-year-old former banker, who only got her Ukrainian citizenship the day she was appointed minister in December but has lived in the country for over two decades. She hopes the fact she is not part of the entrenched political elite will help as she attempts a root-and-branch reform of the economy.
“I don’t see myself as a politician,” she told The Associated Press at her office in the Ukrainian capital, Kiev. “I’m a technocrat minister and I don’t have a political career ahead of me. I’m not running for office.”
The job is as big as it is urgent.