KIEV, May 22 - The World Bank's Board of Executive Directors on Thursday approved three new projects for Ukraine amounting to $1.48 billion that will help drive forward the essential structural and macroeconomic reforms, the World Bank said in a press release.

"The country's leaders are determined to improve public services and back much-needed reforms, and we're determined to help them," the press release quotes World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim as saying.