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Victor Pinchuk — news, coverage & facts — IJR

Promoting Ukraine to join the European Union

In 2004, Pinchuk created Yalta European Strategy, an international independent organization to promote Ukraine joining the European Union. Its annual summer meeting in Yalta was a Ukraine-EU forum for debate and policy recommendations development. Since the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation these meetings have been taking place in Kyiv. In September 2013, Pinchuk and Tony Blair introduced Hillary Clinton's keynote address to the conference at Livadia Palace, with Bill Clinton in attendance. Stefan Fule, Paul Krugman, Alexei Kudrin, Shimon Peres, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, Larry Summers and other political and business leaders have attended. In September 2015, Pinchuk donated $150,000 to the Donald J. Trump Foundation in exchange for a 20-minute video appearance by Donald Trump shown at the conference that year in Kyiv. Michael Cohen solicited Douglas Schoen for the donation from Pinchuk, which was the largest outside donation the Trump Foundation received that year.

In 2015, Pinchuk promoted closer ties between Ukraine and the EU. He was an active participant in the World Economic Forum at Davos.

In December 2016, Viktor Pinchuk published an article in the Wall Street Journal "Ukraine Must Make Painful Compromises for Peace With Russia", in which he suggested that Ukraine temporarily abandon the prospect of EU membership, exclude NATO membership and make a compromise with Russia on the Crimea peninsula on purpose the achieving peace in Eastern Ukraine. The article drew criticism from Ukrainian political authorities of Ukraine. Then-President Petro Poroshenko canceled a visit to the Davos Ukrainian Lunch, which took place on January 19, 2017.

Former Vice-Prime-Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration of Ukraine Ivanna Klimpush-Tsintsadze said that the theses of Pinchuk's "peace plan" had already been used by Russian propaganda.

Russia's War Crimes House, formerly Russia House, is building 68, Promenade in Davos rented by Pinchuk, where he informs about Ukrainian civilian war deaths.

Philanthropy

Pinchuk has supported philanthropic projects in Ukraine. In 2006, he consolidated these activities under the Victor Pinchuk Foundation, as of 2013 considered the largest private Ukrainian philanthropic foundation. The foundation is active in the fields of health, education, culture, international affairs, human rights and local communities.

The foundation's projects include the largest private scholarship program in Ukraine "Zavtra.UA", the scholarship program for Ukrainian students studying abroad "WorldWideStudies", and the annual "Ukrainian Lunch" and "Philanthropic Roundtable" on the occasion of the World Economic Forum in Davos. The foundation supports and works with a variety of partners, including the network "Yalta European Strategy" created to promote Ukraine's European integration, the Clinton Global Initiative, the Kyiv School of Economics, Tony Blair Faith Foundation, the Brookings Institution, the Peterson Institute for International Economics, the Israeli Presidential Conference "Facing Tomorrow", and the legal clinics/legal aid projects of the Renaissance Foundation.

Its projects include giving $150,000 to the Trump Foundation as speaking fee in 2015, the creation of a network of modern neonatal centres throughout Ukraine ("Cradles of Hope"), cooperation programs with the Clinton Global Initiative, the Elton John AIDS Foundation and the ANTIAIDS Foundation of his wife Olena Pinchuk, the creation of the Kyiv School of Economics, a cooperation with the Aspen Institute, the opening of the first large scale contemporary art centre in Ukraine PinchukArtCentre, the production and promotion of a film with Steven Spielberg on the Holocaust in Ukraine, and support of local Jewish communities.

In June 2009, Pinchuk organized the Paul McCartney free concert on Independence Square in Kyiv in front of 500,000 people. As an initiative of the Pinchuk Art Center, in December 2009, Pinchuk announced a new $100,000 prize for artists under the age of 35. The Future Generation Art Prize is awarded every two years and is open to any young artist who applies online. Damien Hirst, Takashi Murakami, Andreas Gursky and Jeff Koons, artists whose work Pinchuk collects, serve as mentors to the finalists and the winner.

In February 2013, Pinchuk committed to giving half or more of his fortune during his lifetime and beyond to philanthropic causes, joining the Giving Pledge, a philanthropic initiative founded in 2010 by Bill Gates and Warren Buffett.

Pinchuk has donated from $10 to $25 million to the Clinton Foundation between 1994 and 2005. In 2000, Pinchuk hired former Clinton pollster Douglas Schoen on a $40,000 per month retainer. In 2004, Schoen introduced Pinchuk to Hillary Clinton. Between September 2011 and November 2012, Schoen arranged nearly a dozen meetings between Pinchuk and senior State Department officials, including Melanne Verveer. Emails released by Judicial Watch and obtained through FOIA requests showed that Pinchuk had been invited to dine at Hillary Clinton's home during her tenure at the State department, despite her spokesman's previous denial that they had met during that time. In March 2017, former Trump aide Monica Crowley registered as a foreign agent for Pinchuk.

In November 2014 in Kyiv, Pinchuk was presented with the 2014 Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytsky Award for his work in fostering Ukrainian-Jewish relations.

In June 2022 Pinchuk and his wife donated over £10 million to charity to support Ukrainian soldiers and civilians needing prosthetics, medical treatment, rehabilitation and other humanitarian aid for Ukrainians in the Russo-Ukrainian War. This was through the sale of a Jeff Koons sculpture.