Ukraine's State Enterprises to be Privatized

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine's new government will move quickly to privatize certain state enterprises and end a cozy relationship between business and government, Prime Minister Yuriy Yekhanurov said ahead of a visit to Washington.

PM Yuriy Yekhanurov
Mr. Yekhanurov, who took charge in August after President Viktor Yushchenko dismissed his previous Cabinet amid charges of corruption, said he also will seek improved trade ties with the United States.

Mr. Yekhanurov arrives tomorrow for a two-day stay, during which he is scheduled to meet with Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and other officials.

August and September were the most difficult," Mr. Yekhanurov said of the events that brought him to the prime minister's office. "It's always hard when there are arguments in the family."

But, encouraged by the successful sale of a state-owned steel mill last week, he said that he was "a very big optimist of what is happening" in Ukraine.

In Washington, Mr. Yekhanurov said, he will seek an end to restrictions under the 1975 Jackson-Vanick amendment, which denies normal trading status to countries that restrict emigration. He also is likely to ask the United States to sign a bilateral protocol advancing Ukraine's bid to join the World Trade Organization (WTO) in December.

Mr. Yekhanurov, 57, also wants the United States to recognize his country as having a market economy, a designation that would help it attract foreign investment and integrate into the West.

"Ukraine has several strategic assignments," said the prime minister, who holds a doctorate in economics. "Fulfilling those depends on Ukraine entering the WTO."

Mr. Yushchenko won a major political and financial victory last week with the sale of Kryvorizhstal, the country's largest steel-making plant, to Mittal Steel Co. in a nationally televised auction.

The mill sold for $4.8 billion, almost six times the price paid in an earlier sale to two of Ukraine's wealthiest men during the corruption-tainted administration of President Leonid Kuchma. That sale later was ruled illegal and voided by Ukraine's courts.

Mr. Yekhanurov said his government was so pleased with the auction that it is moving ahead with plans to sell three more state enterprises, including Ukrtelecom, the country's phone monopoly.

The president and Mr. Yekhanurov also have talked with some of Ukraine's wealthiest business leaders who acquired state enterprises during the Kuchma administration about paying the difference between the sale prices and realistic market values.

Mr. Yekhanurov was personally involved in the sale of state-owned enterprises as head of the State Property Fund during the 1990s. But he has a reputation as a champion of small- and medium-sized companies and an advocate of honest business.

Mr. Yekhanurov said his government is "looking at the experiences of other countries" to ensure that businessmen who enter politics will be unable to use their influence to profit financially.

"We don't have enough laws and practices of transferring [businesses] into blind trusts," he said.

Mr. Yushchenko fired the government of former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko in part because of charges of corruption on the part of government officials with outside business interests. Despite Mr. Yushchenko's pledges to end such practices, critics say, he still hasn't done enough to separate business from government.

Mr. Yekhanurov said some Ukrainians have grown disillusioned with the government in recent months, presenting a challenge for pro-presidential forces as they approach parliamentary elections in March.

Mrs. Tymoshenko will contest the elections at the head of her own party but is expected to cooperate with Mr. Yushchenko's Our Ukraine party in the next parliament.

"The only question for her is that she shouldn't set ultimatums," Mr. Yekhanurov said.

Source: The Washington Times

Ukraine Marks Anniversary of Prelude to Orange Revolution

KIEV, Ukraine -- A year ago, Ukraine went to the polls to elect a new president, but it also marked the beginning of the drive toward radical changes in the country which culminated in the "orange revolution."

Viktor Yuschenko (C) campaigning on October 15, 2004
After the vote On October 31, 2004, the republic's Election Commission, unable to sum up the results for several days, caused public resentment and suspicions regarding their authenticity.

Two more rounds were held to determine the winner. Viktor Yuchchenko who eventually won the race, and his government are credited by a majority of Ukrainians with considerable success in the provision of pensions, freedom of expression and the strengthening of Ukraine's international image, according to the latest study conducted by the Razumkov center.

More than 37 percent of the respondents said the situation with the provision of pensions had changed for the better; 32 percent of those polled praised Yushchenko for ensuring the freedom of expression while 30.5 percent noted improvements in Ukraine's image.

At the same time, sociologists detected decreasing confidence in the government. Almost 30 percent of the respondents attributed the falling confidence in authorities "to power abuse and corruption in higher echelons of power," 26 percent blamed the conflicts between top officials and related rows, while 13 percent blamed the slower economic growth.

The country is gearing up for the parliamentary election on March 26, 2005. The Central Electoral Commission requested more than 110 million dollars, its head Yaroslav Davydovich said.

The system of information protection during the voting will be certified at Ukraine's Security Service.

The investigation into the case of counting fraud at the presidential election has stalled, Davydovich said.

In May, the Ukrainian Interior Minister claimed that more than 500 cases involving 6,000 suspects had been opened over election fraud. Of those, 111 cases have been sent to court.

Source: Itar-Tass

Washington to Host Ukraine's New PM Yekhanurov

WASHINGTON, DC -- Washington will host Ukraine's new Prime Minister, Yuriy Yekhanurov, on November 1 and 2nd. This is the first official visit to Washington by Prime Minister Yekhanurov who arrives in Washington late on Monday.

Prime Minister Yekhanurov (R) with President Yushchenko
The Prime Minister will hold a series of meetings with top U.S. government officials, Congressional leaders, business executives, private voluntary organization officials, representative of the mass media, leaders of the Ukrainian-American community and lay flowers at the monument in Washington of Ukraine's national hero and most famous person, Taras Shevchenko.

According to government sources in Ukraine Prime Minister Yekhanurov plans to discuss the bilateral agreement Ukraine needs with the U.S. related to admission to the World Trade Organization (WTO) and granting it the status of a market economy country by the U.S. Department of Commerce.

Yekhanurov also intends to discuss Ukraine's graduation from the Jackson-Vanik amendment, the lifting of certain trade sanctions against Ukraine, and U.S. assistance for the country's further integration into the Euro-Atlantic communmity and the world economy.

Ukraine's energy independence will also be a major issue in Washington. Such topics as the Odesa-Brody pipeline, potential alternative sources of energy for Ukraine, and the U.S. government's decision to terminate funding for the Ukrainian Nuclear Fuel Qualification Program, which was designed to assist Ukraine in developing an alternative source for its nuclear fuel needs.

Ukraine now buys all of its nuclear fuel from Russia. Russian fuel runs Ukraine' nuclear power stations which provide over half of the electricity in the country.

On October 24, at a meeting with representatives of the diplomatic corps accredited in Ukraine, Yekhanurov said that Ukraine "is counting on broad U.S. participation in the Black and Caspian Sea regional cooperation, especially in the economic and energy spheres."

The United States intends to bring up with the PM the very high tariff imposed by Ukraine on the import of poultry which at the present time has shut down the export of poultry from the U.S. to Ukraine. Poultry has been the largest U.S. export to Ukraine.

The U.S. has also been concerned about the slow rate of progress being made in Ukraine regarding the implementation of reforms needed to improve the business and investment climate and also the lack of reforms in commercial law and improvements needed in the courts.

While in Washington Prime Minister Yekhanurov is reported to be meeting with such top U.S. government officials as Vice President Richard Cheney; U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice; Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns (former Governor of Nebraska), Secretary of Energy Samuel Bodman; and U.S. Trade Representative Rob Portman.

Plans indicate the Prime Minister will meet with Senator Richard Lugar, Chairman of the U.S. Foreign Relations Committee, and other Senators at a meeting on the Hill and also meet then with members of the Ukrainian Congressional Caucus.

Yekhanurov will meet the leaders of U.S. businesses who are active in Ukraine in a meeting at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Members of non-governmental organizations and others will meet the Prime Minister at a meeting sponsored jointly by the National Democratic Institute (NDI) and the International Republic Institute (IRI).

A presentation will also be made by the Prime Minister at the US-Ukraine Energy Dialogue conference in Washington.

Source: UNIAN

Yushchenko Son Says Bentley Arson Accusations Aimed Against Father, While President Loses People Trust

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko’s son, Andriy Yushchenko, has told a local on 5 Kanal TV that accusations of organizing the burning of a Bentley car that belonged to the publisher of a celebrity photo magazine could be aimed against his father’s image.

Paparazzi photos of Andriy Yushchenko and friend
He denied threatening the publisher, Walid Harfouche, who has repeatedly claimed that Andriy warned his brother, Omar, against publishing any more of his pictures, threatening he will make him “disappear”. Andriy denies even the fact of conversation with Omar.

“I learnt about the arson from the media, as anyone else. It was a big surprise when there was an attempt to connect me with the arson. As regards the photos, I can say that for this people do not usually burn cars. This is simply an attempt to improve Harfouche’s image or an act by my father’s opponents,” the president’s son commented on the Oct. 2 attack.

“If this situation concerned only myself I would not care. But this hits my father. We should understand that there will be more Harfouches and more scandals like this. My father’s opponents have enough imagination to continue this for a long time,” Andriy concluded.

Meanwhile since Yushchenko’s coming to power in January 2005 his trust ratings have first fallen to less than 50 per cent. Although 51 per cent of Ukrainians believed the president in September, now their number has fallen to only 44 per cent.

Yushchenko’s teenage son sparked a scandal earlier this summer when a Ukrainian Internet site reported on his allegedly lavish lifestyle, sparking an angry outburst from Yushchenko. The president later apologized, claiming Andriy has all copyright for Orange revolution memorabilia that lets him lead such a life. Later young man and his girlfriend were photographed by Harfouche’s reporters in Turkey, at a luxury resort.

This week Victor Yuchenko has made his annual income public to avoid further accusations. The chief of his staff Oleh Rybachuk told local media that last year the president made $12,000. The joint income of his wife Kateryna, daughters Sofiya and Khrystyna and son Taras slightly exceeds $40,000. The family also has about $200,000 in foreign bank accounts out of Ukraine. The issue of income declarations of Andriy Yushchenko, elder presidnt’s daughter Lina and the other adult members of the Yushchenko family is to be resolved by these people, Rybachuk said.

Source: MosNews

Ukraine Torn by Broken Promises

KIEV, Ukraine -- A year after the first round of the presidential election that set in motion Ukraine's Orange Revolution, few Ukrainians see much to cheer about.

The Orange Revolution millions on Independence Square
The millions who stood for weeks on Kiev's Independence Square to demand a free and fair vote achieved their main goals.

They kicked out a corrupt leadership, won freedom of speech and set the country on a path towards Europe.

But many feel let down by the politicians they put their trust in.

The dream team of Viktor Yushchenko and Yulia Tymoshenko - hero and heroine of the revolution, who became president and prime minister - proved incapable of fulfilling their promises.

They pledged an end to Ukraine's notorious cronyism, but after a few months officials were openly trading allegations of abuse of power for personal gain.

"The government acquired many new faces," Mr Yushchenko said as he responded to the crisis by sacking Ms Tymoshenko's government in September.

"The paradox is that the face of the government itself did not change."

Quest for power

He admitted frankly that he and millions of other Ukrainians had begun to be disappointed.

Most of those who are not disappointed are those whose hopes were not high in the first place.

"In a word, I am upset," says Marina Makarchuk, a 60-year-old retired nurse hurrying through Kiev's cobbled streets to her new job as a cleaner.

"I was counting on those promises that were made being fulfilled, but now that seems unlikely. I am disappointed. All governments are the same, everyone just wants power."

Lyudmila Les, a 43-year-old nursery school teacher, clutched her head as she struggled to find words for her frustration.

"Sometimes it almost seems as though the mafia has come to power," she said.

Despite a pledge to separate business from politics, Mr Yushchenko's first administration included three prominent business tycoons.

Ms Tymoshenko herself is rumoured to have made a vast fortune in gas before entering politics, but as prime minister she pushed policies that business disliked - including a review of thousands of privatisations.

Tycoons

This brought her into conflict with some of her pro-business ministers - and in the case of one reprivatisation, the two sides of the government openly backed rival bidders.

Ultimately, Mr Yushchenko accused Ms Tymoshenko of using her position to repay her debts - an accusation she rejected as nonsense.

[Viktor Yushchenko] has quarrelled with his friends and made peace with his enemies. I don't understand it

But Mr Yushchenko himself has not emerged entirely unscathed.

Few supporters objected that much when the tycoons who bankrolled his campaign received government jobs.

But as unconfirmed allegations of corruption swirled around the sacked government, the closeness of Mr Yushchenko's relationship with the tycoons - one is godfather to his son, and he is godfather to another's daughter - began to seem a liability.

The lifestyle of Mr Yushchenko's eldest son has also left journalists asking questions.

A $30,000 Vertu Mobile Phone
Where does a 19-year-old get a Vertu mobile phone and a $100,000 BMW, while paying a peppercorn rent to "friends" for a luxury flat? Might someone be trying to buy influence with the president by providing his son with these riches?

Old friends

They have received no answers, Mr Yushchenko angrily declaring his son's life off limits on grounds of privacy. However, officials say the car is no longer in Kiev.

Cynics also point out that Mr Yushchenko's nephew has become deputy governor of the Kharkiv region at a very young age, and that his son-in-law took over a corrugated iron factory when its previous boss - a friend of the family - was appointed minister of industry.

These presidential relatives may have earned their positions on their own merits, but many Ukrainians have an uncomfortable feeling that may not be the full story.

Plenty of other reasons are given for disappointment:

- Price rises and slowing economic growth

- The increasing size of bribes demanded by middle-ranking officials

- A justice minister (now replaced) who exaggerated his qualifications

- Continued failure to find the killers of a beheaded journalist

- The granting of immunity from prosecution to local councillors

- Reports of campaign funding from a Russian oligarch.

However, the continuing entanglement of business and politics tops the list.

The only other issue that causes as much frustration among former Orange Revolutionaries is the deal Mr Yushchenko struck with his old rival for the presidency, Viktor Yanukovych, in order to get his new prime minister approved by parliament.

"He has quarrelled with his friends and made peace with his enemies," says Lyudmila Les, the nursery school teacher.

"I don't understand it."

Source: BBC

Rich Mourn, U.S. Bans all Beluga Caviar

WASHINGTON, DC -- The government banned imports of beluga caviar and the sturgeon that produces the expensive eggs originating from the Black Sea basin.


Imports of beluga sturgeon, both its meat and eggs, will no longer be allowed from Bulgaria, Georgia, Romania, the Russian Federation, Serbia and Montenegro, Turkey, and Ukraine, the Interior Department's Fish and Wildlife Service said.

The ban is in addition to the agency's announcement on Sept. 30 that it was suspending all trade in the beluga sturgeon's caviar and meat from the Caspian Sea.

Interior Secretary Gale Norton said the bans would continue "until there is significant progress" with conservation programs in the Caspian and Black Sea regions.

"That's the key to the ultimate recovery of this threatened species," she said. "We're hopeful that this action will bring renewed attention to the plight of the beluga sturgeon, and that it will encourage the range countries to work to ensure its conservation."

A year ago, Fish and Wildlife officials listed all beluga sturgeon populations as "threatened" under the Endangered Species Act, a lesser category than "endangered." The decisions came in response to a December 2000 petition from a U.S.-based environmental coalition, Caviar Emptor.

Most of the world's beluga caviar is imported by the United States, usually originating from the Caspian and Black seas. Trade in beluga caviar is overseen by the United Nations' Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, or CITES, based in Geneva, Switzerland.

Source: AP

Ukraine Property Firm to List on London Stock Exchange

KIEV, Ukraine -- One of the Ukraine’s largest property developers, XXI Century, is set to float on the London Stock Exchange by the end of this year, in a move that will value the company at as much as £300m (E440m, $530m).


The company, the second ever Ukrainian firm to seek a London listing, has hired Dutch bank ING to prepare it for the float, The Business has learnt. XXI Century is expected to be the first in a series of Ukrainian entrepreneurial firms the bank will bring to market over the next year.

XXI Century, founded by Ukrainian-born Georgian Lev Partskhaladze, has seen the value of its portfolio expand eightfold in five years, and floating it on the London exchange will allow it to raise its international profile.

It develops shopping centres, high-end apartment blocks, business centres, and fast food restaurants, predominantly in Ukraine’s capital Kiev.

“They’ve been looking at raising capital on western financial markets for a while,” said a Kiev-based corporate financier.

“It’s like Ukrproduct. They’re just a small dairy company, but now they are in London, they are serious. That’s probably worth the hundred thousand dollars it cost,” added the financier.

Ukrproduct, which makes processed cheese and butter, raised £6m on London’s Aim growth market in February, drawing in 18 investment funds and 33 private investors.

ING has been targeting Ukrainian businesses built from scratch by their owners. It argues that the country’s industrial conglomerates, which would generate far larger fees, pose too many problems, because of the complicated way many of them gained the assets from the state.

Source: The Business Online

MSF Hands Over Ukraine HIV/Aids Programme

KIEV, Ukraine -- After a presence of six years in the Ukraine, the international medical aid organization Mèdecins Sans Frontiéres (MSF) is now handing over its HIV/Aids programme to the Ukraine Ministry of Health and national NGOs as LifePlus, Alternativa, UNITAS and Time to Live.

Ukrainian volunteer doctors at a MSF centre
Since 1999 MSF has set up a model for HIV/Aids patients that focused on offering ongoing care from the moment of the pre-HIV test counselling all the way to providing daily lifelong medication to the patients. With special attention to the medical care and the psycho-social support for patients.

This 'continuum of care' model has been developed and implemented with the Ministry of Health and the NGO partners. With increased international financial commitment to HIV/Aids and training of the staff of the Ministry of Health the ongoing care for these patients is now ensured.

"One of the remaining challenges is to combat the stigma and the discrimination that still surround the HIV/Aids patients in Ukraine, only then the HIV/Aids programme can be really successful. With strong leadership and further investment the model we have set up can be extended across the country," says Zahedul Islam, the departing MSF head of mission in Ukraine.

"Ukraine has one of the highest rates of HIV/Aids in Europe and only a small amount of people is aware of their status. To break through the stigmas that still surround the disease is the only way to offer the patients good treatment and a dignified way of living."

MSF's programmes were running in Odesa, Mykolayiv and Simferopol and concentrated on cutting the transmission of HIV/Aids from pregnant women to their babies; providing life-saving antiretroviral (ARV) treatment and establishing psychosocial programmes to help patients to adhere to their treatment.

In addition the organization trained up to 1,500 staff members of the Ministry of Health to ensure ongoing care. MSF participated in a national campaign to raise awareness about HIV/Aids and to reduce the stigma still surrounding the disease.

Source: Brama

Yushchenko Marks 61st Anniversary of Liberation From Nazis

KIEV, Ukraine -- President Viktor Yushchenko marked the 61st anniversary of Ukraine's liberation from the Nazis, laying flowers Oct. 28 at the Tomb of Unknown Soldier in a solemn ceremony.

Tomb of Unknown Soldier
"With the deepest sincerity, we express our thanks to our fathers and grandfathers, who with their own blood and unbelievable suffering won the right to live and be free," Yushchenko wrote in an address to the nation.

The low-key commemorations contrasted sharply to how the date was celebrated last year in the midst of Ukraine's bitter presidential election.

Former President Leonid Kuchma had hosted a big, Soviet-style parade in downtown Kyiv, attended by Russian President Vladimir Putin. The televised event - the first time that date was celebrated in such style - was widely seen as the Kremlin's political endorsement of Yushchenko's opponent, then Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych.

Yushchenko, a pro-Western reformer, went on to win the hotly contested race in an unprecedented court-ordered third round as tens of thousands of his supporters gathered in downtown Kyiv for what became known as the Orange Revolution.

This time, Yushchenko's brief commemorations were attended by Prime Minister Yuriy Yekhanurov, Kyiv Mayor Oleksandr Omelchenko and other officials.

Ukraine saw some of World War II's fiercest battles, when German troops and their allies seized its territory and were later driven out by the Red Army. Kyiv and many other cities suffered massive damage.

An estimated 7 million Ukrainians died in the war, and 2.4 million Ukrainian residents were sent to Nazi concentration camps.

Source: AP

Owners of Seized Ukrainian Ship to Pay Ransom to Pirates off Somali Coast

ODESSA, Ukraine -- The Ukrainian company that owns the cargo ship seized 10 days ago by pirates off the Somali coast will pay a ransom to free the 22 sailors, President Viktor Yushchenko's chief-of-staff said Oct. 28.


The pirates hijacked the vessel, Panagia, on Oct. 18 about 100 miles (160 kilometers) off the Somali coast.

The company is ready to pay the $700,000 (585,000 euros) ransom demanded by the pirates, Oleh Rybachuk told reporters, but refused to name the company, saying only that it was based in Ukraine's southern city of Odessa.

"The crew members are in normal conditions and face no threat to their lives," Rybachuk said, adding that Ukraine's Foreign Ministry would continue negotiations with the pirates.

The ship - which had been sailing under a Liberian flag and carrying iron ore from South Africa to Turkey - is currently anchored a few miles (kilometers) off Somalia's east coast.

Piracy is rampant near the coast of Somalia, an important shipping route. The African nation has had no effective central government since opposition leaders ousted dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991. The opposition then turned on each other, transforming the nation of 7 million into a patchwork of battling fiefdoms ruled by heavily armed militias.

Pirates have launched 23 attacks against ships off Somalia's coast since March 15, according to the London-based International Maritime Bureau, which tracks piracy around the world. Experts argue against paying ransom, warning that it only encourages the pirates, but many companies resort to the payments, saying that they have few other alternatives.

Source: AP

Hritsenko: Military Must Help End Stereotype of NATO as Aggressor

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine's defense minister asked the military Oct. 27 to help end the stereotype of NATO as an aggressor, as the ex-Soviet republic's leadership continues to press its goal for NATO membership.

Ukrainian Defense Minister Anatoly Hritsenko, front right, shares a lighter moment with NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer
Anatoliy Hritsenko told top military officers that unnamed political forces were spreading fears about the Western alliance. He asked the military's leadership to play a role in ending negative opinions, the Defense Ministry said.

President Viktor Yushchenko has made NATO membership a top goal. The alliance has said it will help Ukraine push through the necessary reforms, but has dodged questions about when it might offer membership to this nation of 47 million.

Many Ukrainians view NATO with hostility, fearing alliance membership would worsen relations with Moscow and ruin the defense industry, which has close links to Russia. Hritsenko also cited fears that NATO would put nuclear weapons in Ukraine, and that troops would be sent off to trouble spots worldwide.

Ukraine had 1,650 troops serving Iraq as part of the U.S.-led military operation there, but the move was highly unpopular and Yushchenko has order the contingent's pullout. The country, however, has participated in numerous other international peacekeeping missions, which Ukrainians generally support.

The defense minister told officers that the parliament would still oversee decisions like sending troops abroad, and said alliance membership would open up new markets to the defense industry.

Russia is wary about Ukraine's flirtations with its former Cold War foe, and opinion polls show that most Ukrainians also are concerned about possible membership.

During a visit by a senior NATO delegation last week, a small protest was held in eastern Ukraine and an opposition political party has called for a referendum on membership.

Source: AP

Orange Revolution Turns to Rot

KIEV, Ukraine -- No bad deed, it seems, goes unrewarded. Ukraine President Viktor Yushchenko recently received the Philadelphia Medal of Liberty and a prize from Britain's Royal Institute of International Affairs, both honors bestowed for his efforts to advance democracy.

Victor Yushchenko receives the Philadelphia Liberty Medal, September 17, 2005
Ukrainians can be forgiven their puzzlement. Not long ago, they were ecstatic. Their Orange Revolution in the winter of 2004-2005 quashed an attempt by apparatchiks and oligarchs to preserve the corrupt status quo by rigging the presidential election. The revolution forced a new, closely monitored election, won by Yushchenko with his promises of democracy, economic reform and an end to cronyism and corruption.

But today, despite Yushchenko's continuing accolades outside Ukraine, hopes inside the country have been dashed. To survive a burgeoning corruption scandal and a major political fight between two of his top appointees, Yushchenko made a Faustian bargain. He joined in an alliance with Viktor Yanukovich, the Russian-backed candidate whose rigged victory in 2004 had touched off the revolution.

On one level, the disarray in Ukraine is not terribly surprising. Leaders of the Orange Revolution had little in common except their determination to scuttle the odious system erected by then-President Leonid Kuchma, who had chosen Yanukovich to succeed him.

But few supporters expected that less than a year after Yushchenko's election, his inner circle would be accused by his own chief of staff, Oleksandr Zinchenko, of massive corruption. Zinchenko resigned, but his charges triggered a barrage of mutual accusations and recriminations.

Yushchenko tried to contain the damage last month with a housecleaning that included the removal of his two most powerful lieutenants. He fired the telegenic and popular prime minister, Yulia Tymoshenko, and accepted the resignation of Petro Poroshenko, secretary of the Security and Defense Council. The two had been locked in a struggle to advance their political power and their own economic interests.

Tymoshenko's camp retaliated, accusing Yushchenko of accepting millions of dollars to finance his presidential campaign from the exiled Russian oligarch Boris Berezovsky. The president's acolytes accused Tymoshenko of incompetence and corruption, even though Yushchenko had consistently praised her and the Cabinet's performance. The accusations sullied the reputations of both the president and the ex-premier.

Yushchenko ordered the state prosecutor's office to look into the corruption allegations, but he quickly undermined the investigation by insisting that members of his administration, though not his Cabinet, were above reproach. When the prosecutor agreed, finding no wrongdoing by administration officials, the public reacted with broad skepticism, just at a time when the government needed public trust above all.

In an effort to salvage the situation, Yushchenko appointed Yuri Yekhanurov as prime minister. Honest, pragmatic and nonpartisan, Yekhanurov had previously headed the Ministry of Economics and was widely seen as perfect man for the job. However, with Tymoshenko's bloc voting against him, he failed by three votes to win parliamentary approval.

Yushchenko then turned to his nemesis in the 2004 election, Yanukovich. The two men cut a deal. On a second parliamentary vote, Yanukovich's Party of Regions, which had abstained in the first vote, cast 50 votes to approve the new prime minister.

Yushchenko supporters were incensed. They had demonstrated for countless hours in the dead of winter to overturn Yanukovich's victory. Now their leader had not only bargained with him but agreed to halt any punishment of officials who rigged the first presidential election. Yushchenko gave an across-the-board amnesty to officials involved in falsifying the results of that election or who had since been accused of criminal misconduct.

This is tantamount to legitimizing criminal activity of the Kuchma-Yanukovich clan, and it further erodes Yushchenko's popularity and effectiveness.

Source: Los Angeles Times

In Troubled Ukraine, These Heroes Keep Battling

NEW YORK, NY -- First came the punch: “I just had some Chicken Kiev prepared for him, because I am so happy he's not chicken anymore." Then the counter-punch: “That's not true. I bring you dessert on November 12th!"

Brothers Wladimir and Vitali Klitschko with Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko (L) during the Orange Revolution last year in Kiev
Those fighting words were exchanged recently by U.S. boxer Hasim Rahman and Ukrainian heavyweight Vitali Klitschko as Rahman presented the defending World Boxing Council champion with Ukraine’s signature dish at a press conference ahead of their November fight, which had twice been postponed because of injury.

Klitschko's snappy comeback is emblematic of a man who, together with brother and fellow heavyweight fighter Wladimir, have become the most popular goodwill ambassadors for change in Ukraine.

And, perhaps, the first siblings to simultaneously hold boxing's three top heavyweight titles.

It would certainly be a shot in the arm for their homeland. On the eve of the one-year anniversary of Ukraine’s Orange Revolution, President Viktor Yushchenko’s approval rating is at a 19.8 percent low and much of the country’s leadership is mired in corruption allegations.

The brothers are on track for the titles. Last month, Wladimir, 29, defeated Nigerian Samuel Peter to become the number-one contender for both the World Boxing Organization (WBO) and International Boxing Federation (IBF) titles. He expects to fight a championship contest in December. Meanwhile, Vitali, 34, will defend his WBC title against Rahman on November 12 in Las Vegas.

“That has always been our goal,” said Wladimir, a former WBO champion who won the super-heavyweight gold medal for Ukraine in Atlanta’s 1996 Olympic Games. “We have come close before. But when Vitali had the title, I did not, and when I had the belt, he did not. He is the WBC champion, and will be for a long time. Now, it is up to me again.”

More than just boxers

But boxing alone does not define the Klitschko brothers. “Boxing is our life, but our life is not only for boxing,” said Wladimir.

The brothers are smart (both have PhDs); worldly (they speak Ukrainian, Russian, German and English); and published authors (they co-wrote “Fitness Together With Us,” a best-seller in Germany). They’ve even made a splash in Hollywood (bit parts in “Ocean’s Eleven”) and they dabble in magic tricks.

And they have been doing their best to bring Ukraine from Soviet satellite to modern nation.

In last winter’s Orange Revolution, they played a prominent role — standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko on Kiev’s Independence Square, they rallied protesters who camped out for weeks in freezing temperatures to challenge a fraudulent election.

Humanitarian work sets an example

The brothers transfer the same focus that earns them success in the boxing ring to their goodwill programs around the world.

Through the Klitschko Brothers Foundation, they have raise AIDS awareness in Ukraine, where in a population of 48 million an estimated 360,000 people are infected with HIV — 60,000 of them under the age of 15.

In post-Soviet Ukraine, where the concept of community service has not fully blossomed, the Klitschkos understand their position as role models. They filmed a made-for-Ukrainian TV public service message in which they urge kids to stay off drugs.

The Klitschkos like to play a hands-on role in their philanthropy. When they helped fund the rebuilding of Kiev’s golden-domed St. Michael’s Cathedral, they took part in reconstructing the mosaic decorating the ceiling of the ancient church, which was razed in the 1930s by the Soviets in order to build its headquarters.

(And their humanitarian work is not restricted to Ukraine — they visited schools in Brazil’s slums through UNESCO’s “Education for Children in Need” program.)

Political activism

Vitali is the more politically active of the pair. He had to be talked out of canceling his fight against American Danny Williams last December when political tensions were heating up in his homeland after a fraudulent presidential election.

“I am a sportsman,” explained the older brother, who lives in Los Angeles with his Ukrainian wife and three young children and, at 6’8,’’ is two inches taller than his unmarried sibling. “But it was very difficult and painful for me to see what was happening in my country.” He wore an orange sash on his trunks during his victorious fight in support of the West-leaning candidate Viktor Yushchenko.

Instead, the brothers recruited a host of friends — from Sting to Joe Cocker — to voice their support to the crowds on Independence Square. It was important, Wladimir said, to show the protesters that the world was watching.

“With one single shot, the whole Revolution could have been different. That’s why we did this.”

At president's side

The older Klitschko travels with President Yushchenko and gives speeches on his behalf, and when the Ukrainian leader addressed the U.S. Congress in Washington in April, he was there with him.

“Wherever (Vitali) goes, people just huddle around him,” said Walter Nazarewicz, president of the Ukrainian Institute of America, which earlier this year presented its “Man of the Year” award to the Klitschko brothers. “[The two] really are all that they appear to be. There’s no question they could have a future in politics if they wanted one.”

Although the Klitschkos now live and train in the U.S. and in Germany — where they are wildly popular and are featured in television ads for Hugo Boss, Proctor & Gamble, Kellogg’s and Ferrero — they spend as much time as they can in Ukraine.

“We’re athletes. We spend a lot of time out of the country,” said Wladimir. But we’re following everything that’s going on.”

And Ukraine follows the Klitschkos. “Everyone knows them. In one way, as sportsmen. In a more important way, from the Orange Revolution, when they stood with Yushchenko on Maidan [Independence Square],” said Olena Litvak, a native Kievite.

If theirs seems like a formidable sibling act, like Serena and Venus with gloves, it is. But unlike the Williams sisters, you won’t find this duo in a head-to-head match-up.

“We love our mother too much to do anything like that,” said Vitali.

Source: MSNBC

Ally Cleared of Criminal Charge - A Trap for Yushchenko?

KIEV, Ukraine -- The Ukrainian Prosecutor-General's Office closed a criminal case against former National Security and Defense Council (NRBO) secretary Petro Poroshenko on October 20.

This was the only case launched against a member of President Viktor Yushchenko's inner circle following the accusations of corruption against his team in early September and the subsequent dismissal of Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, whose allies had leveled the accusations.

Caretaker chief prosecutor Serhy Vynokurov closed the case against Poroshenko, officially, due to the absence of corpus delicti, less than a week after Yushchenko dismissed Sviatoslav Piskun from the post of prosecutor-general.

This move was obviously ill timed, as accusations are now mounting against Yushchenko of covering up for his crony (Poroshenko is the godfather of one of Yushchenko's children). Yushchenko's rivals from Tymoshenko's camp also claim that he fired Piskun for opening the case against Poroshenko.

Ironically, Yushchenko had to task a Tymoshenko ally, Piskun, with investigating the corruption accusations leveled against his team. Thus on September 20, Piskun reported that five criminal cases had been opened against NRBO officials, but not against Poroshenko personally, he stressed.

Then Piskun attended the debates on Ukraine at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, where he was harshly criticized for mishandling the investigation into the September 2000 murder of journalist Heorhiy Gongadze. After that, Piskun's dismissal was only a matter of time, as the Gongadze case is a very sensitive issue for Yushchenko, who last spring promised that it would be solved within a few months.

But on October 10, Piskun sensationally charged Poroshenko with "hampering a legitimate business activity of two companies constructing a building," a crime carrying a 5-10 year prison sentence. The case centered on a scandal-ridden construction project in Kyiv. A high-rise residential building, whose construction was launched under former president Leonid Kuchma, dominates the right bank of the River Dnieper in Kyiv, dwarfing the nearby historic landmark, the Monastery of the Caves, an imbalance that apparently violates building codes.

Shortly after coming to power, Yushchenko promised to check the site and reportedly pledged to demolish it if courts ruled that the building was unlawful.

Poroshenko claimed that in March the construction companies offered him a bribe in order to save the skyscraper, which, he said, he indignantly refused and "sent them packing." But the companies offer a different story, claiming that Poroshenko demanded a share in the project in return for allowing the construction to continue -- a charge that Poroshenko repeatedly denied. But this charge served as the basis for the criminal case against him.

Yushchenko sacked Piskun on October 14 without explanation, which was probably a mistake. Yushchenko's foes and their media might have interpreted subsequent developments differently, had he openly blamed Piskun for mishandling the Gongadze case or for failing to punish the officials who were involved in election rigging last year.

On October 19, Tymoshenko's right-hand man, former Security Service (SBU) chief Oleksandr Turchynov, released a statement for the media, saying that Yushchenko had urgently ordered Vynokurov to close the case against Poroshenko. Turchynov forecast that the criminal case would be "closed quietly today or tomorrow."

The case was closed the following day, just as he predicted. Speaking in an interview with Segodnya, Vynokurov denied that he was ordered to do so by Yushchenko. And Poroshenko told a news conference on October 22 that a court had cleared him of the charge on October 21.

But this will not prevent rumors and new allegations about Poroshenko's influence on Yushchenko from spreading. Piskun told Inter channel that he would sue Yushchenko for firing him, which, he claimed, was illegal. But Piskun made a point of not directly accusing Yushchenko, suggesting that Yushchenko was prompted to fire him by people from his entourage "who are dishonest and indecent." He also insisted that there was no reason to close the case against Poroshenko.

Piskun's story was fully in line with the myth portraying Yushchenko as a weak, indecisive, and easily manipulated character, which media outlets linked to Tymoshenko have contributed to spreading since long before the Orange Revolution.

And Poroshenko, who was Tymoshenko's main rival in the under-the-carpet struggle for the post of prime minister after the revolution, has been demonized as the eminence grise manipulating Yushchenko behind the scenes.

These myths have only been fuelled by the speed of the recent developments involving Poroshenko: October 10 – the prosecutor-general charges Poroshenko with corruption; October 14 – Yushchenko fires prosecutor-general without explanation; October 20 – the caretaker chief prosecutor closes the case against Poroshenko; October 21 – a court clears Poroshenko.

Source: Eurasia Daily Monitor

Pyskun Files Appeal Challenging Dismissal

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine's former top prosecutor filed an appeal against President Viktor Yushchenko's decision to fire him, a presidential adviser said Oct. 26.


Canned Prosecutor Svyatoslav Pyskun
Svyatoslav Pyskun asked a Kyiv court to return him to the powerful post of prosecutor general, said Mykola Poludenniy, a legal adviser to Yushchenko.

Pyskun was sacked earlier this month and Yushchenko's office later accused the prosecutor of dragging out important investigations.

"Everything was done according to the law," Poludenniy told The Associated Press.

Pyskun, who could not be reached for comment, had been an unpopular figure and many of Yushchenko's Orange Revolution supporters criticized the president for not dismissing Pyskun earlier.

He claimed that he was sacked because of a criminal investigation into one of the president's closest allies, Petro Poroshenko. The abuse-of-office case against Poroshenko was closed last week after Pyskun was fired.

Pyskun had also served as the country's top prosecutor under former President Leonid Kuchma, but was fired in 2003 after Kuchma accused him of trying to politicize the powerful office.

Pyskun countered that Kuchma fired him because he had come close to making key arrests in the 2000 killing of investigative journalist Georgy Gongadze, a murder that Kuchma's critics accused him of ordering.

Pyskun also challenged that dismissal and a court ordered his reinstatement.

Source: AP

Ukraine Says Has No Bird Flu, But On Alert

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine has no recorded bird flu cases but has tightened its border controls as the deadly virus spreads in neighbouring Russia and Romania, senior officials said on Wednesday.


"Over the last month or month and a half we have implemented a number of measures to prevent the spread of bird flu to Ukraine," Yuri Melnik, deputy prime minister, told a news conference.

"There are no registered cases of bird flu in Ukraine for now. But the disease is on our southern and northern borders. All our institutions are ready to prevent or limit it."

Ukraine's neighbours -- Romania, Russia and Turkey -- have confirmed the presence of the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu.

Parliament last week imposed a six-month ban on imports of poultry from all countries.

The government tightened controls over farmers living near the borders and ordered them to keep birds indoors.

The Agriculture Ministry, the Health Ministry and veterinarians are also testing wild birds and established special telephone lines to coordinate preventive measures.

Source: Reuters

Yushchenko Says a Tenth of Ukrainian Population May Die of AIDS in 5 Years

KHARKIV, Ukraine -- Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko said that the rate at which AIDS is spreading in the country has reached a "frightening" level and that the situation requires immediate reform of public health.


Yushchenko said that, in five years, the number of AIDS-infected people will increase 2.5 times and reach a mortality rate of 26 infected per 100,000 citizens.

"The rates at which the disease is spreading are awful. If the rates remain constant, then Ukraine will loose 10% of its population by 2010," Yushchenko said at the all-Ukrainian meeting of family physicians in Kharkiv.

The president said that he is worried by the increase in the number of those who suffer of cancer, cardiovascular diseases and tuberculosis.

The tuberculosis mortality rate is now 80 cases per 1,000 people, compared with five years ago when it was 60 cases per 1,000 people, the president said. Yushchenko said that the disease is spreading in "poorly monitored social groups.""This is a challenge to society and we should face it," Yushchenko said.

Yushchenko said that "malign diseases" are responsible for 12% of deaths in Ukraine. He said that the problem of the spread of cancer can no longer be ignored. Yushchenko said that "political means" in fighting these diseases should be worked out.

Source: Daily News Bulletin

Yushchenko: UkrTelekom Should Probably be Next Privatization

KIEV, Ukraine -- UkrTelekom, the national phone company, should probably be the next in the list of state-owned assets that will be sold to investors, President Viktor Yushchenko said Tuesday.


UkrTelekom, which operates local and long-distance and international telephony, has been losing its market share due to the booming cell phone markets, Yushchenko said explaining why the assets must be sold fast.

“There is a list of strategic companies whose privatization is a pressing matter,” Yushchenko said. “I would start this list with UkrTelekom.”

Prime Minister Yuriy Yekhanurov said Tuesday his government has been already looking into ways of privatizing UkrTelekom, but refused to provide any details.

The comments may provide clues to investors and analysts that are speculating which assets will Ukraine sell next following the successful privatization of steel giant Kryvorizhstal.

Mittal Steel, the world’s biggest steelmaker, agreed Monday to pay $4.79 bln for 93% stake in Kryvorizhstal, Ukraine’s largest acquisition deal ever, exceeding the government’s original price expectation of $3 billion.

“The modernization that has taken place on [telecommunications] market day after day is narrowing room for maneuver by UkrTelekom,” Yushchenko said. “Unless we conduct privatization fast and effectively, we’ll be losing potential that could bring financial benefits.”

Ukraine’s telecommunications market has been increasingly turning mobile and dominated by two cell phone operators, UMC, owned by MTS of Russia, and Kyivstar, majority owned by Telenor of Norway.

Considering attractiveness of the cell phone segment, the government has been considering allocation of a cell phone license to UkrTelekom before to increase its value before the privatization.

The government owns 92.8% stake in UkrTelekom, while the privatization of 42.8% stake has been repeatedly debated and delayed for almost a decade.

Last time the government planned to sell the stake was in August 2004, but the privatization had been delayed to prevent any fraud and manipulation ahead of the last year’s presidential election.

Source: Ukrainian Journal

U.S. Supports Ukraine's Aspirations, Says State's Kramer

WASHINGTON, DC -- The United States remains committed to supporting Ukraine’s political and economic transformation and is stressing the “urgent need” for Ukraine to press forward with economic reforms and “redouble efforts to combat corruption,” says a State Department official.

David Kramer, deputy assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs, made these remarks at a panel discussion hosted by the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) in Washington.

Speaking on a panel titled “After the Orange Revolution: the U.S. and Ukraine,” Kramer said bilateral relations “are on a new track, characterized by open dialogue and closer cooperation.”

He said that during the preceding week, he and Assistant Secretary of State for Economic and Business Affairs E. Anthony Wayne went to Kiev, Ukraine, to meet with current and former Ukrainian officials and members of the Rada (Ukraine’s parliament), and to convey messages of continued U.S. support.

Wayne said in a speech at Kiev International University that the United States is optimistic “that with the confirmation of Prime Minister Yekhanurov and other new Cabinet members, the process of economic reform is back on track.”

Yekhanurov was appointed after Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko dismissed much of his original Cabinet in September, amidst internal divisions and accusations of corruption.

Kramer told the SAIS audience that “we stand ready to help through support for the development of democracy, for help with anti-corruption efforts, and for economic reforms. Ukraine can count on the continued support of the United States.”

He said he remains optimistic about the future of the former Soviet republic. “The atmosphere in Ukraine is very different today. ... The media operate more freely, respect for citizen’s rights has improved and the courts appear to be more independent.”

He cited as proof of the new atmosphere the extensive Ukrainian press coverage of the corruption allegations, as well as reporting on the lavish lifestyle of Yushchenko’s son. He added that “no country has made the transition from communism to democracy without ups and downs. … We need to have realistic expectations.”

Although Kramer acknowledged that factions and personal rivalries present significant challenges for Yushchenko’s government, he called threats of separatism “over-exaggerated” and “a red herring.”

Kramer said he had been impressed while in Ukraine with the government’s commitment to economic reforms and anti-corruption measures, and to setting aside personal animosities to cooperate on these issues. The new prime minister “said all the right things,” he noted. “There is some hope that the new government … will act as a cohesive team.”

ECONOMIC REFORMS

Kramer described progress on economic reform as “slow,” noting that now that Yushchenko no longer has a majority in the Rada, the passage of crucial legislation “will be considerably more difficult.”

One area where this could hurt Ukraine is in its bid for World Trade Organization (WTO) membership, Kramer said. Calling Ukraine’s admission “the priority of the year,” the deputy secretary personally met with Finance Minister Victor Pynzenyk, as well as former presidential candidate Viktor Yanukovych during his recent trip.

Ukraine’s admission to the WTO “is a priority for us,” Kramer said. “The U.S. will not be able to complete bilateral negotiations with Ukraine if the government does not work with the Rada” to approve a package of reforms required to meet WTO norms. Today, I read that Mr. Yanukovych – after telling me last week that he was supportive of WTO -- is now attaching significant conditions to the support of WTO passage.”

During Yushchenko’s visit with President Bush in April, the Ukrainian president himself called corruption the Number 1 problem at home. Kramer said that while he and Wayne were in Kiev, they reinforced the importance of taking corruption seriously.

“We feel an obligation to stress to the Ukrainian government that its reputation and image are extremely important,” he said. “And both of those are founded on the fact that [the Yushchenko government] was going to be a new, different, clean team. The government needs to translate words and intentions into actions and accomplishments. ... This is going to be a very tall order.”

“Of course,” he added, “that’s very easy for me to say sitting here in Washington.”

Source: U.S. Department of State

Ukraine Discusses Spending Windfall Funds

KIEV, Ukraine -- Lawmakers on Tuesday argued over how to spend the massive windfall earnings from the privatization of Ukraine's flagship steel plant - the single largest foreign investment ever for the former Soviet republic.

Ukraine's Verhovna Rada or Parliament
The world's largest steel producer, Mittal Steel, acquired Kryvorizhstal for 24.2 billion hryvna (US$4.8 billion, euro4.04 billion) Monday, well above what analysts had predicted. The sale of the mill, which produces 20 percent of Ukraine's entire metal output, is equivalent to about 20 percent of this year's anticipated budget revenues.

Ukraine has no experience with receiving such a windfall, and lawmakers are divided over whether to use the money for social needs, cover the budget deficit or to develop the country's economy.

"We are creating a mechanism so that this money is used to benefit every Ukrainian," President Viktor Yushchenko said, according to his office.

He mentioned a number of projects, including modernizing apartment buildings, offering support to villages and developing high technology and science.

Finance Minister Viktor Pinzenyk said the government also plans to cover the budget deficit and pay off state debt. However, Socialist and opposition lawmakers, who opposed the sale, proposed compensating Ukrainians who saw their bank savings wiped out during the Soviet collapse.

"Money must be given to Ukraine's people who really owned Kryvorizhstal," said opposition lawmaker Nestor Shufrych.

"Every Ukrainian citizen must feel that the state sold their property and everyone must receive something from it," said Socialist lawmaker Mykola Rudkovsky.

Others pleaded for restraint.

"The main thing is not to eat up the money instead of putting it toward economic development," said Kost Bondarenko, a political analyst at Kiev's Institute of National Strategy.

Pinzenyk insisted that all new spending would only be done within the framework of the budget, rejecting concerns that the money would be "eaten up."

"When we pay a salary to a teacher, we are spending money on the country's economic development," Pinzenyk told The Associated Press in a telephone interview.

When the mill was first sold off in a murky deal in 2004, Ukraine received five times less. That sale to former President Leonid Kuchma's son-in-law Viktor Pinchuk and tycoon Rinat Akhmetov was annulled earlier this year.

Oleksandr Peklushenko, an ally of opposition leader Viktor Yanukovych, argued that the money should be used to improve the country's investment climate, but he warned the government not to hurry to spend it.

The mill's former owners still have legal appeals pending before the European Court of Human Rights. Mittal Steel also still has 60 days to deliver the cash.

Economics Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk warned such a huge influx of cash into the economy could trigger inflation.

Monday's televised auction was hailed as a huge success for President Viktor Yushchenko, who held it up as a show of transparency. Pinzenyk said it should be a good sign for investors.

"I hope it will become a new era of privatization in Ukraine," he said.

Source: AP

Yushchenko Re-Affirm's Ukraine's Euro-Atlantic Goals

KIEV, Ukraine -- Last week President Viktor Yushchenko took steps to re-affirm Ukraine's desire for Euro-Atlantic integration. "Ukraine is a European country. I will never accept the idea that it is not," he told London's Royal Institute for International Affairs.

President Viktor Yushchenko
Western governments and international organizations heard these claims many times under former president Leonid Kuchma. But by his second term, they were seen as little more than empty rhetoric.

Ironically, some West European governments now fear that Yushchenko is actually serious in his endeavor to bring Ukraine into Euro-Atlantic structures. This fear is especially acute within "old Europe," where EU enlargement fatigue set in after last year's expansion.

The failure of referenda on a new EU constitution in France and the Netherlands, coupled with stalling over accession talks with Turkey, are products of this fatigue, and Ukraine's Orange Revolution did not ease this pre-existing condition.

The United States and Poland continue to be Ukraine's strongest supporters. The recent rightward shift in Poland's elections will only increase Warsaw's support for Ukraine's Euro-Atlantic integration. Ukraine is set to create a joint battalion with Poland and Lithuania (UkrPolLitBat) based on the Ukrainian-Polish battalion (UkrPolBat) performing peacekeeping operations in Kosovo.

In London at the Royal Institute and in Kyiv at a joint Ukraine-NATO commission, Yushchenko outlined three phases for Ukraine's Euro-Atlantic program.

First, Yushchenko hopes that the EU would grant Ukraine market economic status while Britain holds the rotating presidency. According to British Ambassador to Ukraine Robert Brinkley, London hopes that the EU will grant this status before the December EU-Ukraine summit in Kyiv.

Securing WTO membership should facilitate relations with the EU. Yushchenko predicted that market-economy status and WTO membership would lead to the signing of a Ukraine-EU free-trade agreement in 2006. Such a free-trade agreement would reinforce the limited nature of Ukraine's involvement in the CIS Single Economic Space.

Nevertheless, WTO Director-General Pascual Lami is pessimistic about Ukraine achieving WTO membership in December. If Ukraine fails in its WTO drive this year, it will be because Yushchenko and his government did not sufficiently ensure that parliament adopted all WTO-required legislation before the summer recess on July 8.

Clouding the issue further is National Security and Defense Council Secretary Anatoly Kinakh's statement supporting a synchronized Russian-Ukrainian WTO membership drive.

Second, Yushchenko plans to move from a NATO Intensified Dialogue on Membership Issues to a Membership Action Plan (MAP) in May 2006. Speaking at the Ukraine-NATO commission, Yushchenko was equivocal, "Arising from the fact that NATO is an active guarantor of stability in Europe, Ukraine is preparing for full membership in this organization".

NATO has reiterated its open door policy, which has always distinguished that institution from the EU. NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer outlined Ukraine's membership in NATO as a stepping-stone to EU membership, as it traditionally has been for past aspirants. "NATO is ready to assist in providing all manner of assistance and support to this state [Ukraine] in this area," de Hoop Scheffer declared.

Scheffer and the chairman of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, Pierre Lellouche, both said that Ukraine had every chance of joining NATO in the future. But receiving a MAP in 2006 does not provide a membership date. Such a date is more realistically situated in Yushchenko's second term (2009-14), rather than the over-optimistic 2008 or 2009 put forward by Foreign Minister Borys Tarasyuk and the Ukrainian media.

NATO has emphasized that it wants concrete action, not empty rhetoric. NATO specified three areas for Kyiv to target in addition to holding free and fair elections in 2006. Ukraine should also take more resolute action against corruption, improve the rule of law, and raise public support for NATO membership (Reuters, October 7).

According to surveys by the Democratic Initiatives foundation, only one in ten Ukrainians know what NATO is and why Ukraine should join it. One-third of Ukrainians support membership, one-third are opposed, while and the final third are unsure.

Third, EU membership remains the most difficult component of Ukraine's Euro-Atlantic integration process. After a firm closed-door policy under Kuchma, the EU has slightly warmed toward Kyiv. EU Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso told visiting Prime Minister Yuriy Yekhanurov, "Our door remains open".

In the same manner as NATO, Barroso reiterated the importance of "action" to back up membership goals. Specifically, Ukraine should "show its commitments to European values and standards," Barroso advised.

Yushchenko is also hoping that the EU takes three steps: market economic status in 2005, a free trade regime in 2006, and an association agreement in 2008.

The September cabinet crisis has not altered Yushchenko's support for closing the gap between Ukraine's domestic policies and its foreign policy goals. This determination makes Yushchenko different from Kuchma, who allowed a gulf to form between his pro-Eurasian domestic policies and his rhetoric in support of Euro-Atlantic integration.

Three concrete steps that might satisfy both the EU Commission President and the NATO Secretary-General would be for Kyiv to move urgently to appoint Ambassadors to the United States, Britain, and France, three key Euro-Atlantic countries.

Source: Eurasia Daily Monitor

Mittal Steel Wins Crucial New Auction of Ukraine Giant

KIEV, Ukraine -- With a bid of 4.8-billion dollars, the world's top steel maker Mittal Steel won a re-run auction of Ukraine's Kryvorizhstal giant, in a sale the "orange revolution" government hopes will calm investor jitters and attract foreign investment.

Kryvorizhstal steel mill in Krivoy Rog
Mittal was declared the winner of the 93.02-percent stake in Ukraine's largest steelworks after a bidding war with a consortium led by France's Arcelor pushed the price up by more than one billion dollars in an auction televised live on two national channels.

President Viktor Yushchenko, for whom the sale was a key test of his government's avowed commitment to transparency and free market, hailed the result, saying that the sale price exceeded by 20 percent all privatization proceeds in post-Soviet Ukraine.

"What happened today shows that Ukraine is capable of holding an honest privatization," Yushchenko, who was present in the building where the auction took place though he did not attend the sale itself, said in televised comments.

At his side, a jubilant Prime Minister Yury Yekhanurov echoed the sentiment.

"International investors today have felt that the climate in Ukraine has changed," he said.

The winning price far exceeded expectations that the plant would be sold for slightly higher than three billion dollars.

"It was a huge sum... a fantastic sum," a beaming Dmytro Parfenenko, deputy head of the State Property Fund who oversaw Monday's auction, told reporters afterward.

After the sale, Yushchenko met with Lakshmi Mittal, the Indian-born British billionaire whose family owns the Netherlands-based Mittal, whose German affiliate was the buyer during Monday's auction.

Mittal told reporters later in the day that the new owners intended to raise annual production to 10 million tons, up from current seven million tons, and that the mill's entire 56,000 workforce would keep their posts.

"I'm really a bit nervous," he said. "We're a foreign company, we have to learn more about the country, more about the people... (but) we're very confident of what we're doing, we're the most successful steel company in the world."

Kryvorizhstal's current output boosts by 10 percent Mittal's worldwide production capacity, which stood at 70 million tons before the sale. In 2004, the giant delivered 42.1 million tons to the international markets.

The stakes of Monday's highly-scrutinized sale for Yushchenko and his team are high.

The authorities hope to use the funds to plug a budget deficit and to increase social spending ahead of a key parliamentary vote next year, and also aim to convince foreign investors to put aside doubts and pour badly-needed funds into the country.

Analysts hailed the auction as a major victory for Yushchenko ahead of crucial legislative elections next March.

"The sale of Kryvorizhstal demonstrates that... Ukraine is entering a post-oligarchal era," said Vadim Karasyov, a political analyst in Kiev. "The position of the president and the new government are quite strong."

Yushchenko came to power early this year after leading last year's "orange revolution" on vows of fighting corruption and carrying out reforms necessary to set ex-Soviet Ukraine firmly on a pro-Western path.

But despite massive positive sentiment that followed the "orange revolution," investors have stayed away, spooked by contradictory messages from the government on reviewing past questionable privatizations, and foreign direct investment dropped by 14 percent during the first half of this year.

Kryvorizhstal was initially privatized last year in a contest that saw the nation's largest steelworks sold to two top insiders of the former regime for 800 million dollars.

The sale became a symbol of the corruption and cronyism that was rampant under former president Leonid Kuchma, and Yushchenko vowed to review the auction after he assumed power earlier in the year.

A court in April ruled last year's auction unlawful and ordered the stake returned to the government.

The repeat sale has been vigorously opposed by several factions in parliament, including opposition Communists and the Socialists, which have several members in the current government.

Last week the chamber passed a non-binding resolution demanding the steelworks remain in state hands, and following Monday's auction the chief of the State Property Fund Valentina Semenyuk, a Socialist, said she was resigning from her post in protest of the sale.

Source: AFP

NATO to Give Kiev a Hand With Reforms

VILNIUS, Lithuania -- NATO pledged Monday to help Ukraine push through military reforms seen as essential to prepare the country for membership in the Western alliance -- a prospect viewed with concern by Russia.

Ukrainian Defense Minister Anatoly Gritsenko (R), shakes hands with NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer (L), after NATO members signed a 'Letter of Intent' to provide extensive training to rapidly enhance the professional skills of key civilian officials in Ukraine's Ministry of Defense
The alliance, anxious not to alarm Moscow, dodged questions at a meeting of defense ministers about whether Ukraine might be included in 2008, when NATO is expected to take in new members from the Balkans.

"NATO reaffirmed its open-door policy and intends to offer maximum help in the implementation of the necessary reforms" to Ukraine's oversized armed forces, NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said. "A timetable, I can't give you."

Ukrainian Defense Minister Anatoly Gritsenko said he had won over NATO allies to the cause of Ukraine's membership, which he said could not be stopped, despite Russia's concerns and widespread opposition among Ukraine's public opinion.

"Ukraine's foreign policy course towards NATO, I believe, is irreversible," Gritsenko said at a news conference. "After today's discussion, we changed the position of those that were more skeptical."

Gritsenko said the pace of military modernization would make it ready to join in 2008. "I am certain that, on the Ukrainian side in the military sphere, we'll be prepared by then," he said.

Ukraine's NATO ambitions are strongly supported among the 10 former communist nations that have already joined the alliance. Some other allies are more wary about expanding so far eastward into former Soviet territory and insist the government in Kiev must first push through reforms to underpin a fragile democracy, tackle widespread corruption and streamline the outdated Soviet-era military apparatus.

Apart from U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld -- who left early -- defense ministers from the old Western members of NATO kept away from the talks, sending lower-level officials.

However, allies did commit to helping Ukraine with issues such as retraining officers discharged after military cuts and disposing of surplus weapons. Britain engaged to lead a program training Defense Ministry officials to ensure effective civilian control over Ukraine's forces.

"This is a crucial element in any part of security sector reform," British Armed Forces Minister Adam Ingram said. "If you don't have civilian control ... the security sector reform will not succeed."

Monday's meeting was the latest in a series of contacts that underline NATO's drive to improve relations with Ukraine since last year's Orange Revolution, which brought in pro-Western President Viktor Yushchenko. He has made membership in NATO a key goal despite opposition from Russia and many Ukrainian citizens.

Gritsenko, a key ally of Yushchenko, sought to allay the fears of both, saying NATO membership would not lead to nuclear weapons being stationed on its territory and would not destroy jobs in Ukraine's important arms industry.

He said the Russians could see that Poland, Lithuania and other former Soviet bloc states that joined NATO over Moscow's strong objections did not pose the kind of security threat that Moscow once feared.

Source: The Moscow Times

President Celebrates as Sale Shows Change From Old Guard to the New

KIEV, Ukraine -- The re-privatisation of Ukraine’s biggest steelworks was President Yushchenko’s first big victory in his quest to rid Ukraine of the corruption and economic mismanagement that have plagued it since 1991.

Victor Yushchenko meets with Lakshmi Mittal
And it came just in the nick of time. Mr Yushchenko came to power in last year’s Orange Revolution, pledging to eradicate official graft, overhaul public finances, attract more foreign investors and take Ukraine into Nato and the European Union.

He highlighted last year’s sale of Kryvorizhstal for a fraction of its market value as one of the worst economic abuses committed under Leonid Kuchma, the former President, and pledged to reverse the deal.

Until yesterday, however, almost all of his reforms had been stalled by a power struggle between the Orange Revolution’s leaders, which sent his popularity ratings plunging.

The infighting and intrigue burst into the open last month when he was forced to sack Yuliya Tymoshenko, the Prime Minister, and her entire Cabinet. With crucial parliamentary elections looming in March, many Ukrainians started to grumble that the new government was no better than the former one.

Yet yesterday’s auction demonstrated live on Ukrainian television the fundamental difference between the old guard and the new.

Under Mr Kuchma, a crown jewel of Ukrainian industry was sold at a knockdown price to two Ukrainian oligarchs with close links to the presidential administration. One of the oligarchs is Mr Kuchma’s son-in-law. Under Mr Yushchenko, the same company was sold for six times that to a major international company.

That one deal brought more money into the federal budget that all the other privatisations since Ukraine won independence from the collapsing Soviet Union in 1991.

The Ukrainian Government plans to use the proceeds to plug a budget deficit and increase social spending, a move that will boost Mr Yushchenko’s standing for the parliamentary polls.

And according to the State Property Fund, it is already planning its next major privatization. Dmitry Parfenenko, the Property Fund’s deputy chairman, identified the incomplete Krivy Rih Oxidized Ore Mining and Enrichment Combine as the next on the list.

Mittal Steel and Sinosteel are believed to be interested, as are Ukraine’s Inhulets and Poltavsky iron ore producers and Russia’s Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK).

Source: The Times

Mittal Steel Buys Kryvorizhstal for $4.8 Billion

KIEV, Ukraine - The world's largest steel producer, Mittal Steel Co., bought Ukraine's flagship steel plant Kryvorizhstal from the state in a televised auction Monday for more than $4.8 billion.

In this image taken from video provided by Ukraine government representatives of the world's largest steel producer, Mittal Steel, celebrate after they successfully bought Ukraine's Kryvorizhstal Steel Mill
The high-stakes auction had been a campaign promise of President Viktor Yushchenko, part of his bid to prove to investors that the former Soviet republic is committed to transparency and open for foreign investment. Yushchenko was there to watch.

Mittal Steel bought the mill for 24.2 billion hryvna, well above what analysts had predicted and more than five times what former President Leonid Kuchma's son-in-law and another Ukrainian tycoon paid for the mill in 2004 — a sale that Yushchenko called a theft and that was annulled after he became president this year.

"Today you saw the evidence that if Ukrainian privatization had occurred honestly, we could have received big financial opportunities to solve all kinds of concerns, including social concerns," Yushchenko said. "What happened today showed that Ukraine is able to conduct an honest privatization according to the law."

The sale of Kryvorizhstal, which produces 20 percent of Ukraine's entire metal output, becomes the single largest foreign investment ever in this former Soviet republic. It also brought in 20 percent more cash than all of Ukraine's other privatizations combined, Yushchenko said.

Competing against Netherlands-based Mittal was the Industrial Group Consortium, which brings together the Industrial Union of Donbass and the world's second-largest steel producer, Luxembourg-based Arcelor SA, as well as the Ukraine-registered LLCSmart-Group.

The auction began with all three companies sticking sealed envelopes in a glass bin. State officials pried open the case and using scissors and sliced apart the envelopes to read the starting bids. The consortium linked to Arcelor had offered the highest starting price, 12.6 billion hryvna (about $2.5 billion).

The sale then went to an open auction.

Bidding was feverish. Representatives of the three competing companies sat at separate desks and raised white placards to hike the price up in 100 million hryvna ($20 million) increments. The main bidding soon was between Mittal and the Arcelor consortium.

As the bidders raised the price, people in their teams frantically worked the phones. The mood was tense, with the auctioneer repeatedly going down to "one ... two ..." before a bidder stepped in and raised the price again.

Former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, who had spearheaded the privatization effort, flashed a huge smile when the bidding ended.

The decision to sell such an industrial gem, however, was not universally popular. Some 150 protesters gathered outside the State Property Fund, which conducted the sale, chanting and holding placards reading: "The People Own Kryvorizhstal." A metal fence was erected around the building, with police and community volunteers, wearing orange, standing guard.

Parliamentary critics twice last week mustered enough votes to press the government to halt Monday's sale of the 93.02 percent stake in the mill, but Yushchenko shrugged off their nonbinding appeal, just as he has the legal challenges waged by the mill's former owners.

The head of the State Property Fund, Valentyna Semenyuk, a Socialist Party member, has also made her displeasure over the sale known. She was hospitalized over the weekend, her office said, and did not participate.

The mill, which produces 8 million metric tons (8.8 million short tons) of steel a year, was returned to the state in June after the government challenged its privatization under Kuchma.

Legal appeals by the Pinchuk-Akhmetov consortium were rejected, but one appeal is pending before Ukraine's Supreme Court. The two tycoons have also launched a challenge before the European Court of Human Rights.

Last week, a U.S.-based investment group, acting on behalf of the former owners, sued in U.S. District Court in Manhattan in a bid to stop the resale.

"The investors must stop and think," Pinchuk was quoted as telling the news Web site Ukraynska Pravda. "Say you want to buy an apartment but you are told this apartment is the subject of a court case. Will you risk buying this apartment? I don't think so."

The government's policy of rolling back questionable privatizations, spearheaded by Tymoshenko, was canceled last month, but Kryvorizhstal's resale never was put in question.

Source: AP

Ukraine's Yushchenko Banks on New Steel Mill Sale

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine's largest steel mill goes on the auction block for a second time on Monday, a sale touted by President Viktor Yushchenko's liberal administration as a milestone in coaxing back wary investors.

Three firms are in the running to buy the Kryvorizhstal plant in central Ukraine and have submitted sealed bids to be opened in an open tender, broadcast live from 0800 GMT.

The starting price for Ukraine's biggest post-Soviet sell-off is 10 billion hryvnias, although authorities hope the sale will bring in half as much again.

Each entrant, once the envelopes are opened, will have the chance to bid up the price.

In the running are the world's top steel maker Mittal and two Ukrainian firms -- LLC Smart Group, with Russian links, and Industrial Group, controlled by France's Arcelor.

The auction is seen as a key event in defining the reformist agenda of the administration propelled to power by last year's "Orange Revolution" rallies.

Throughout the long campaign that ultimately led to his victory, Yushchenko denounced as "theft" the plant's original sell-off in June 2004 for $800 million, below other offers.

Court rulings struck down the sale won by a group led by industrialists with close links to Yushchenko's predecessor Leonid Kuchma. The president described the new privatization as a "moral obligation" last week.

Ukrainska Pravda, the country's most authoritative Internet news site, said at the weekend Industrial Group was the favored candidate for an administration which has predicated all decision-making to a long-term drive for European integration.

"A success for Arcelor would be a signal for other Western giants that one can invest billions in Ukraine," it wrote. "It would also serve as a political beacon."

Jolted by eight months of infighting that culminated in his dismissal of radical Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, the president has vowed to proceed with a new sale.

But he promised an end to "reprivatizaton", the watchword for a mass review of sell-offs while Tymoshenko was in office. Together with new premier Yuri Yekhanurov, he faced down two votes in parliament last week demanding a halt to the sale.

Western investors mostly stayed away from Ukraine during Tymoshenko's term in office. Growth over the first nine months of 2005 slowed to 2.8 percent -- its lowest level in five years.
About 10 companies had expressed an interest in the sale for a time. But the field was reduced, analysts say, by conditions on production imposed by authorities and by the worsening of conditions on world steel markets.

Source: Reuters

Rumsfeld Applauds Ukraine's NATO Progress

VILNIUS, Lithuania -- Ukraine, the former Soviet republic whose aspirations to join NATO are opposed in Moscow, is making strong strides toward reforming its oversized military and meeting the alliance's criteria for membership, U.S. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Sunday.

U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, left, walks with Lithuanian Defense Minister Gediminas Kirkilas prior to a meeting at a NATO-Ukraine High-Level Consultation at the Presidential Palace in Vilnius
"Progress has been made and we encourage it," Rumsfeld said at a news conference with Lithuanian President Valdas Adamkus, who also expressed optimism that Ukraine eventually would join NATO.

On the final stop of a weeklong trip that began in Asia, Rumsfeld joined the defense ministers of nine other NATO countries for a conference Monday to review Ukraine's progress and examine how they can keep Ukraine on track to overhauling and reducing its military.

Washington is pushing hard to help Ukraine, but enthusiasm seems weaker among NATO's other members. Fewer than half of the 26 member countries sent their defense ministers to Vilnius for the conference, which is the fourth in a series of annual meetings.

After meeting with Rumsfeld, Ukrainian Defense Minister Anatoly Gritsenko told reporters that he is confident his government can overcome two other major obstacles to NATO membership: the low opinion that most Ukrainians have of NATO and the opposition in Moscow.

"I don't see it as a really serious issue," Gritsenko said, referring to Russian objections.

He said the Russians have seen that the Baltic states, which joined NATO in 2004 over Moscow's strong objections, do not present the kind of security threat that the Russians had once feared. Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia were part of the Soviet Union until it crumbled in 1991.

In a separate news conference with Rumsfeld, Lithuanian Defense Minister Gediminas Kirkilas said his country's success in raising the level of domestic public support for NATO could provide lessons for Ukraine.

"Right now in the Ukraine public opinion, unfortunately, supporting NATO is very, very low, about 20-25 percent," he said. "They have to make a lot of effort" to overcome that, he added.

Kirkilas said the people of Ukraine have been subjected to years of anti-NATO propaganda.

The Ukrainian defense minister made a similar point in his comments about strengthening public support. He said the government needs to undertake a more vigorous public education effort and address what he called old stereotypes about NATO that he predicted would be "easily broken."

Among the mistaken stereotypes, he said, is that NATO membership would mean the stationing of nuclear weapons on Ukrainian soil.

At his news conference with the Lithuanian president, Rumsfeld was asked whether the United States, as the leading power in NATO, should take responsibility for the anti-NATO sentiment in countries such as Ukraine. "It seems to me that NATO's polices stand on their own," the defense secretary replied.

NATO has been working to build closer ties with Ukraine since last year's "orange revolution" that brought too power pro-Western President Viktor Yushchenko.

But NATO has stopped short of giving Ukraine a date for opening official talks on membership, saying the timetable depends on the pace of reforms to modernize the military, tackle corruption and strengthen democracy.

Yushchenko has made membership in NATO a major goal, but many Ukrainians, particularly in the Russian-speaking east, are less happy about joining their former Cold War foe.

A small group of protesters shouting "NATO Out!" greeted NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer in the eastern city Donetsk on Thursday when he led an alliance delegation on a visit to Ukraine.

During the trip, de Hoop Scheffer repeated his promise that NATO's doors will remain open for Ukraine if it completes the necessary reforms. Yushchenko last week expressed hope that membership talks could begin next spring and some Ukrainians are hopeful it could be included when NATO nations are expected to decide on the alliance's next expansion at a summit meeting in 2008.

But de Hoop Scheffer refused to discuss a timeline.

Source: AP

Ukraine Prepares for Steel Mill Auction

KIEV, Ukraine -- For the first time in this ex-Soviet republic's history, a major industrial enterprise is slated to go under the hammer live on television.

Mittal Steel
Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko has staked his reputation on the auction to privatize the Kryvorizhstal steel mill, Ukraine's biggest. His opponents are determined to block it.

Parliamentary critics twice last week mustered enough votes to press the government to halt Monday's sale of the 93.02 percent stake in the mill, but Yushchenko shrugged off their nonbinding appeal, just as he has the legal challenges waged by the mill's former owners.

"There won't even be talk of reconsidering the decision," Yushchenko said Friday, adding that a repeat auction was necessary "first of all, morally and politically."

"We want the repeat sale to show one thing: breaches in the law ... will be corrected," Yushchenko said.

Kryvorizhstal, which produces 20 percent of Ukraine's entire metal output, was sold last June by the state for US$800 million (euro665 million) in a privatization widely condemned as rigged. The buyers: Former President Leonid Kuchma's son-in-law, Viktor Pinchuk, and coal-and-steel-magnate Rinat Akhmetov.

During last year's Orange Revolution, Yushchenko called the sale a "theft" and pledged it would be reversed.

Oleh Rybachuk, Yushchenko's chief-of-staff, said that "if (the auction) is successful, it will show that you can trust what the Ukrainian government says."

The world's two largest steel producers, Mittal Steel and Arcelor, are expected to participate.

The opening price is 10 billion hryvna (US$2 billion, euro1.6 billion) but analysts expect the price could be driven as high as 17.7 billion hryvna (US$3.5 billion, euro2.9 billion). The sale could generate 10 percent of the country's annual budget revenues - a huge cash influx that Yushchenko's government desperately needs.

But the 450-member parliament is determined to put the brakes on. This week, it passed repeated appeals to the government to stop the auction and hold on to what is considered Ukraine's flagship mill. Even the head of the State Property Fund, which is conducting the auction, has made little secret of her displeasure at having to surrender this valuable state enterprise.

"I stood for and I still stand by the position that such profitable factories must remain in the hands of the state," said State Property Fund head Valentyna Semenyuk, a member of the Socialist Party, which has led the parliamentary challenge to Monday's sale.

The mill, which produces 8 million tons (8.8 US tons) of steel a year, was returned to the state in June after former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko's government successfully challenged its privatization under Kuchma.

Legal appeals by the Pinchuk-Akhmetov consortium were rejected, but one appeal is still pending before Ukraine's Supreme Court. The two tycoons have also launched a challenge before the European Court of Human Rights.

Last week, a U.S.-based investment group, acting on behalf of the former owners, sued in a U.S. District Court in Manhattan in a bid to stop the resale.

"The investors must stop and think," Pinchuk was quoted as telling Ukraine's Ukraynska Pravda Web site. "Say you want to buy an apartment but you are told this apartment is the subject of a court case. Will you risk buying this apartment? I don't think so."

His lawyers have dispatched letters to the potential bidders warning them of the situation, Pinchuk said.

The three confirmed bidders, however, don't seem scared. Mittal Steel, the world's largest steel producer, had been blocked from participating in last summer's auction for what it claimed were dubious reasons.

This time, Mittal will be competing against the Industrial Group consortium, which brings together the Industrial Union of Donbass, Ukraine, and the world's second-largest steel producer, Arcelor.

The third bidder is the Dnipropetrovsk, Ukraine-registered LLCSmart-Group, reportedly linked to a Russian steel magnate.

Originally, the Ukrainian government had hoped for at least 10 bidders, but analysts said the smaller number isn't much of a disappointment.

"Mittal and Arcelor were considered the favorites anyway and the government would like to sell it to a multinational Western-based company," said Tomas Fiala, managing director of the Kiev-based investment bank, Dragon Capital.

The government's post-Orange Revolution re-privatization policy, spearheaded by Tymoshenko, was canceled last month, but Kryvorizhstal's resale never was put in question. Yushchenko has said it is a matter of honor.

Government officials have already begun salivating over the extra funds the mill's sale will bring. Security Council head Anatoliy Kinakh promised that the money would go toward social programs, while other officials have bandied about ideas such as redeeming some domestic debt and boosting the share capital of the two state-owned banks.

Source: AP

Bird Flu Spreads Across Europe

LONDON, England -- A parrot imported from Latin America has become the first bird to die of avian flu in Britain, bringing the danger of the deadly virus much further west across the European Union as the global battle against the disease continued.


Meanwhile yet another avian flu outbreak was reported in Russia, this time in the southern Urals region of Chelyabinsk, and among swans at a Croatian lake.

Officials confirmed cases of the virus found in the parrot from Surinam, which died in British quarantine.

The parrot tested positive for the H5 strain of the bird flu virus. It arrived in Britain from South America last month and had been held with a consignment of birds from Taiwan, Britain's agriculture ministry said.

The chief veterinary officer declined to speculate whether it had the lethal H5N1 strain, which has spread to Romania and Turkey.

In Moscow, the emergencies ministry said 31 birds in Sunaly, a village in the Chelyabinsk region, had died.

In another six cases the diagnosis had been confirmed.

A Russian agriculture ministry official said the risk of the lethal strain occurring in Moscow or surrounding area was minimal, despite an outbreak in Tula, 300 km south of Moscow.

Russian veterinary services said on Friday they suspected the bird flu virus had now spread to 24 areas, including 20 in the Novosibirsk region of Siberia, three in the Kurgan region and one in the southern region of Stavropol.

The Tula village of Yandovka, where the lethal H5N1 strain of the virus which has killed 61 people in south-east Asia since 2003 was found, has been quarantined for three weeks.

All poultry there has been killed and burned.

Neighbouring Ukraine has slapped a six month ban on poultry imports.

Croatia said further tests were needed to determine if the virus detected in the dead swans was the H5N1 strain, feared to be the precursor of a human pandemic, or more widespread form of epidemic, that could kill millions.

The six swans were found in the lake at Zdenci in eastern Croatia, one of 20 sites Croatian veterinary services have put under increased surveillance as part of a huge operation to take samples from wild birds.

The French agency for food safety AFSSA recommended increased scrutiny of wildlife, but stopped short of proposing poultry be confined.

The United Nations' bird flu envoy flew into China yesterday, where more than 91,000 birds have been destroyed to stamp out a new outbreak.

"The international community needs to cooperate fully to protect the health of the world's people," Chinese Health Minister Gao Qiang told UN envoy David Nabarro.

In Thailand, doctors reported the seven-year-old son of a Thai farmer who died of bird flu had also contracted the disease, but they said the virus had not mutated and still cannot pass easily among humans.

The farmer - the 61st human victim of the virus worldwide since late 2003 - died after slaughtering and eating a sick chicken.

"In this case the boy may have contracted the disease from the area where the chicken was dying. The boy had close contact with the virus (from being around sick chickens) and possibly from handling the birds' excrement," Siriraj Hospital director Prasit Watanapa said.

In Romania, officials said a suspected new case of bird flu had been detected in the north-east only hours after assurances that the outbreak of the deadly H5N1 virus had been contained to two south-eastern locations.

The World Health Organisation (WTO) warned against "scaremongering" but it also said each additional human case was making it easier to develop human-to-human transmission of the disease.

The Czech agriculture ministry banned sales of chickens in markets and exhibitions or sale of other birds in public places.

The government of the principality of Liechstenstein has banned rearing free range poultry for the next few months following a lead by neighbours Austria, Germany and Switzerland.

Migratory birds believed to be carriers may next take the virus to Africa, the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) said, warning that the continent would be an "ideal breeding ground" because of close contact between people and animals.

Scientists have said Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda were particularly threatened as they host millions of migratory fowl flying to warmer climes during the European winter.

Source: AFP

September Crisis Over, but Strategic Problems Remain for Yushchenko

KIEV, Ukraine -- President Viktor Yushchenko has declared that the political crisis in Ukraine is over. The turmoil began on September 5 with allegations of corruption within his inner circle. Parliamentary Speaker Volodymyr Lytvyn, a close ally of Yushchenko's, added that there are no longer grounds to speak about a "political crisis" in Ukraine.

The reprieve will be short-lived, as the constitutional reforms coming into effect in January will make it imperative for Yushchenko to obtain a parliamentary majority after the March 2006 parliamentary elections.

Current polls show Yushchenko's People's Union-Our Ukraine (NSNU), the Yulia Tymoshenko bloc, and Regions of Ukraine all poll about 20% each. Three other parties likely to enter parliament -- the Communists, Socialists, and Lytvyn's People's Party -- all poll less than 10% each. With just 5% support, Lytvyn may become the power broker for creating a parliamentary majority.

These low levels of support across the board mean that Yushchenko will need to compromise with the other two large blocs of votes – the Tymoshenko bloc or Viktor Yanukovych's Regions of Ukraine. But a compromise with either political force will bring problems.

Tymoshenko has always demanded a high-profile position in exchange for her cooperation, either prime minister or speaker of parliament. But after Tymoshenko's poor economic performance as prime minister this year, Yushchenko is unlikely to offer her this position again.

After widespread dismay over the memorandum signed between Yushchenko and Yanukovych in September, Yushchenko will have even more problems cutting a deal with his former rival for the presidency. A 2006 NSNU-Regions of Ukraine parliamentary majority would be seen as a betrayal of the Orange Revolution, reform prospects, and Ukraine's Euro-Atlantic integration.

In the short term, Yushchenko needed to end the immediate crisis if he is to improve his public standing and ratings in the six months remaining before the elections. After eight months of drifting, elite infighting, wasted opportunities, and too-frequent travels abroad, Yushchenko needs to re-assert his authority.

The crisis gave Yushchenko an opportunity to clean out his government before his first year as president ends. Yushchenko's son, Andriy, embroiled in scandal earlier this year, is no longer seen in a $120,000 BMW "on loan" from a member of Yushchenko's entourage, although he still has his $30,000 cell phone.

Yushchenko's only major strategic mistake during the crisis was the deal with Yanukovych. Almost half (47.2%) of Ukrainians supported Tymoshenko's firing and the subsequent political house-cleaning. Yet two-thirds of the new government headed by Yuriy Yekhanurov are holdovers from Tymoshenko, including three Socialist ministers.

Gone are Serhiy Teriokhin (minister of economics) and Mykola Tomenko (first deputy prime minister for the humanities) from the Reforms and Order Party. Reforms and Order party leader Viktor Pynzenyk remains finance minister, but he may lose his party post at an upcoming party conference.

Serhiy Holovatiy replaced Roman Zvarych as justice minister. Unlike Zvarych, whose educational background led to a scandal, Holovatiy is a well-known legal expert who was justice minister in the mid-1990s and headed the Ukrainian Legal Foundation. Holovatiy was expelled from the Tymoshenko faction after he voted for Yekhanurov as prime minister.

In return for his agreeing to be justice minister, Holovatiy demanded the removal of Prosecutor Sviatoslav Piskun, who was duly fired on October 14. Interior Minister Lutsenko has complained that his Ministry found it impossible to work with the prosecutor's office, which was blocking investigations at the local level. The new team at Justice and the Prosecutor's office may spur progress toward resolving Kuchma-era crimes.

Yushchenko also sacrificed several family members, businessmen who helped financed his campaign and the Orange Revolution. Yushchenko fired transport minister Yevhen Chervonenko, his bodyguard in the elections; Davyd Zhvannia, minister of emergency situations; and Petro Poroshenko, secretary of the National Security and Defense Council (NRBO). Both Zhvannia and Poroshenko are godfathers to Yushchenko's children.

The removal of Poroshenko and other businessmen helps repair Yushchenko's image of not relying on oligarchs, as had former President Leonid Kuchma. Poroshenko in particular has very low popularity ratings on a par with Kuchma. Nevertheless, Yushchenko has always defended Poroshenko and other now-removed businessmen from allegations of corruption. Even if these allegations are not proven, Yushchenko would be making a strategic blunder by allowing Poroshenko and other former entourage members to join the NSNU 2006 election list.

In other personnel decisions, Oleksandr Tretiakov's position as first adviser to Yushchenko has been eliminated. Tretiakov, whose business interests lie in the energy sector, had earned a reputation for controlling access to Yushchenko.

Anatoly Kinakh, first deputy prime minister under Tymoshenko, is now NRBO secretary. Kinakh, whose Party of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs polls barely 1.1%, is a poor choice for this position. Under Kuchma, NRBO secretaries were experienced in national security affairs, but Kinakh -- like Poroshenko before him -- has no background in this field. One of Kinakh's first policy steps was to raise the possibility of Ukraine and Russia jointly integrating into the WTO, a position welcomed by Russia.

Three key ministers have kept their jobs for now. Defense Minister Anatoly Hrytsenko and Foreign Minister Borys Tarasyuk are both staunchly pro-Western. Interior Minister Yuriy Lutsenko is currently purging his corrupt ministry.

Yushchenko survived the September political crisis, but still-bigger challenges lie ahead: winning the 2006 elections and taking control of parliament.

Source: Eurasia Daily Monitor

Ukraine Looks To Be More Democratic

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine has already made two steps toward the “democratic world”!
New times demand new professionals – new quality, in everything.

The first thing that forms democracy is the ruling voice of "the people"-- those being governed. People that are well informed about the actions of the parliament, government and the inside life of their own country, and know much more about what happens behind their backs than the international agencies do – this is what it means to live in democratic country. But to want to change something for the better means to know for sure what is wrong.

Events of October 20 will take a very important place in the history of Ukrainian democracy. A memorandum was signed between the National TV-company of Ukraine and organization “Inter-news Ukraine”. According to this document, from today, steps on three main paths will be taken daily: reforming of the journalistic education, making standards of the information journalism stronger and to make “real society channels”.

From today, there will be much less information with the label “not for press” (that means not for ‘ordinary people”), and 90% of the security sector will be opened to be observed and talked over, that will help people to understand what national security involves. “A journalist speaks for the society he is a part of, and getting such rights he must deeply realize his responsibility. Nobody says that’ll be easy, but a dignified country needs dignified journalism!”, commented the representatives of BBC Tony Horsen.

To provide information of vital importance requires great efforts. But above all, it is the field for forming an intelligent and informed nation, one that is aware of what's happening in the world. Journalists should not be afraid to ask bold questions, and politicians should be willing to answer all the ten questions that have been asked by journalists (and not five out of ten, as that was before).

Ukraine must start getting out of its glass box, and become more a part of the world.

Source: SOP

Ex-Owners of Ukrainian Steelmaker Sue

NEW YORK, NY -- The former owners of Ukrainian steelmaker Kryvorizhstal have sued the Republic of Ukraine, seeking to stop the resale of the steel mill next week.


Viktor Pinchuk (L) and Rinat Akhmetov (R)
The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan on Oct. 14, was brought by a U.S.-based investment group, Addox Corp.

It said a significant ownership interest in nine companies that bought the steelmaker in June 2004 was held by businessmen Rinat Akhmetov and Viktor Pinchuk, the son-in-law of former Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma.

Addox holds 10 percent of the American Depositary Receipts of the Nozhnedneprovsk Pipe Plant, which in turns holds 10 percent of Industrial Metallurgical Union, which Pinchuk and Akhmetov used to buy Kryvorizhstal.

Pinchuk and Akhmetov paid $800 million.

The mill was renationalized this year under the new administration and there are three registered bidders for a new auction that will take place Monday.

In its lawsuit, Addox said the government of Ukraine and the Industrial Group Consortium, which was the losing bidder when the plant was sold last year, colluded to secure a Ukrainian court ruling declaring the sale illegal.

The lawsuit charged that the government sought to seize the plant in retribution for public statements made by Akhmetov during the 2004 elections and because of political positions taken by Akhmetov and Pinchuk.

Source: AP

Pirates Hijack Ship With 22 Ukrainians off Somali Coast

MOGADISHU, Somalia -- Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry officially confirmed Friday that gunmen have hijacked a vessel manned by a 22-strong Ukrainian team off the coast of Somalia, the RIA-Novosti news agency reported.

The hijacked Panagia
The Panagia was hijacked on Oct. 18 as it sailed north from South Africa to Turkey carrying iron ore, a Foreign Ministry spokesman said.

Earlier, international news agencies reported that the ship was hijacked in the pirate-infested waters off the coast of lawless Somalia.

Pirates seized the MV Pagania, flying a Liberian flag, on Wednesday as it sailed northward from South Africa to Europe with a cargo of iron ore and have demanded a $700,000 ransom for its release, media reports said.

“They took over the vessel about 90 nautical miles off the Somali coast, near the Puntland region,” said Andrew Mwangura of the seafarers’ assistance program from the Kenyan port of Mombasa.

“They are demanding $700,000 before they release the ship and the crew,” he told AFP.

In Mogadishu, officials with Somali militias in control of the capital confirmed the attack and said negotiations between the hijackers and the vessel’s owners had already begun. “The gunmen are inside the ship now,” one official told AFP on condition of anonymity. “The negotiations are under way, some money must be paid.”

Piracy has become epidemic in the unpatrolled waters off the coast of Somalia, where are least 23 hijackings and attempted seizures have been recorded since mid-March, according to the international maritime bureau (IMB).

“Ships are advised to keep as far away as possible from the Somali coast,” the IMB said in its latest weekly piracy alert issued on Tuesday before the Pagania was seized.

Source: MosNews

Prosecutors Close Criminal Case Against Yushchenko's Close Ally

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukrainian prosecutors closed the abuse-of-power investigation against President Viktor Yushchenko's close ally, Petro Poroshenko, a spokesman for the Prosecutor General's Office said Friday. "There is nothing criminal in the actions of Poroshenko," spokesman Oleksiy Bebel said.

Poroshenko, the former head of Ukraine's Security and Defense Council, was being investigated for allegedly hindering the business activity of two companies that constructed an expensive apartment building in downtown Kiev.

Bebel said a commission of eight prosecutors had reviewed the evidence and decided to close the case.

Last week, Yushchenko fired top Prosecutor Svyatoslav Piskun, who has blamed his dismissal on the Poroshenko case.

Bebel denied all allegations.

"Our prosecutors did everything according to the law and Constitution; there is no political motive in the case," he said.

The accusations of corruption against Poroshenko surfaced last month and culminated in his resignation and the dismissal of former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, whom Poroshenko accused of being behind the allegations. The government's collapse represented the biggest political crisis to face Yushchenko since he won last year's presidential election, the AP reports.

Opinion polls show that it has significantly damaged support for Yushchenko. Poroshenko, a confectionary tycoon, was one of the top financiers of last year's Orange Revolution.

Source: Pravda

Belarus Begins to Revive Its Poisoned Lands

VIDUITSY, Belarus -- The winter rye is already sprouting green in the undulating fields of the state cooperative farm here. The crop this summer - rye, barley and rape - amounted to 1,400 tons. Best of all, said Vladimir Pryzhenkov, the farm's director, none of it tested radioactive.

Radiation hotspots resulting from the Chernobyl nuclear power plant accident
This is progress. The farm's 1,600 hectares, or 4,000 acres, are nestled among some of the most contaminated spots on earth, the poisoned legacy of the worst nuclear accident in history: the explosion at Chernobyl's Reactor No. 4 on April 26, 1986.

Almost a quarter of all of Belarus remains radioactive to varying degrees, including some of its prime farmland, but two decades after the catastrophe, Pryzhenkov's farm represents a part of the government's effort to put the country's contaminated land to good use.

In 2002 the checkpoints disappeared, no longer restricting access to this region near the Russian border, some 240 kilometers, or 150 miles, from Chernobyl. Families began returning; some had never left; all needed jobs.

And so the farm here in Viduitsy, no longer known as the Karl Marx collective but still state-owned, reopened two years ago, with millions of dollars' worth of new harvesters and other equipment provided by the government of President Aleksander Lukashenko.

Pryzhenkov, assigned here from another farm in what he called a promotion, has also begun breeding horses and cattle for beef, though not milk. Milk produced here would be far too dangerous for human consumption.

"This was all falling apart," he said as he drove a battered UAZ jeep over the farm's muddy, rutted roads. "There was nothing for the people to do here."

Lukashenko, a former collective-farm boss, declared last year that it was time to revive contaminated regions. He outlined an improbably hopeful vision of new homes and villages, of new industry, of rejuvenated farms growing peas, onions and potatoes. "Land should work for the country," he said.

Lukashenko's authoritarian decrees on this and other topics have prompted fear and even ridicule, but a scientific study released last month by seven United Nations agencies and the World Bank more or less agreed.

The study concluded that the aftereffects on health and the environment had not proved so dire as first predicted. It recommended that the authorities in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus take steps to reverse the psychological trauma caused by Chernobyl by encouraging investment and redevelopment. Lands where agriculture was banned or severely restricted could be safe for growing crops again if farmers used techniques to minimize the absorption of radioactive material by food.

"It is desirable to identify sustainable ways to make use of the most affected areas that reflect the radiation hazard," the report recommended, "but also revive the economic potential for the benefit of the community."

The report's conclusions have stirred controversy. Greenpeace International denounced it as a whitewash intended to support the expansion of nuclear energy. Even a member of Lukashenko's government, Valery Gurachevsky, the scientific director of Belarus's committee on Chernobyl, called parts of the report "too optimistic."

But here in the contaminated countryside, where entire villages were left to rot amid an invisible scourge, the underlying principle is a welcome one.

Gennady Kruzhayev, 38, had just begun working on the Karl Marx collective farm when the accident occurred. He has since drifted from job to job. He drove a taxi. He pumped gas. On this day he was atop a tractor, plowing the rich black soil in preparation for the sowing next spring. "The main thing," he said, "is to have jobs."

The Chernobyl disaster spewed radioactive materials over all of Europe, but naturally the areas closest suffered the most: Russia, Ukraine and Belarus, then republics of the Soviet Union.

The Soviet authorities declared an emergency exclusion zone within 30 kilometers of the reactor, a circle straddling the border between Ukraine and Belarus. The zone remains closed except to the workers overseeing the reactor's decontamination and safety, a few pensioners who have drifted back and, increasingly on the Ukrainian side, curious tourists on macabre day trips.

The contamination - particularly from cesium 137, as well as the more deadly strontium and plutonium - hardly remained within that circle. Areas that remain as radioactive as parts of the exclusion zone appear on Belarus maps as irregular splashes of red across much of the eastern part of the country.

Those areas remain off-limits, at least in theory. All around the red spots are areas with lower levels of radiation. Signs nailed to trees mark some forbidden areas. Some areas become apparent only when one notices that everything around is deserted and silent. The authorities distributed hand-held radiometers, but few people use them.

More than 130,000 Belarussians were relocated in the years after Chernobyl, but often only a few kilometers away. About 1.3 million Belarussians, or more than a tenth of the people, live in contaminated areas, though officials say that, with certain precautions, they face little health risk.

In these areas, which suffered economic collapse, farming never stopped entirely. Instead, the state's farms adopted measures to minimize contamination of crops, like using calcium-based fertilizers. Some crops absorb less radiation anyway. Some that do not are used only for fodder.

Since Lukashenko came to power, the government has tried to expand agriculture in the region, removing restrictions on less contaminated areas. Gennady Antsipov, who oversees reclamation for the country's Chernobyl committee, said the process was complicated and, despite Lukashenko's urgings, deliberate.

Of 260,000 hectares of contaminated land, only 14,000 have so far been returned to active agricultural use, though in a periodic survey last year the government identified still more land that could be reclassified as less dangerous and reclaimed.

"Why should we rush this issue?" Antsipov said in an interview in the capital, Minsk. "It is like sending someone to the moon just to prove we can colonize it."

Lukashenko's government, despite its diplomatic isolation, has also worked closely with international agencies, including a program with the UN Development Fund, to improve crop yields and limit contamination of food products. All are intended to promote livelihoods.

"We are trying to provide people a fishing rod, not a fish as we did before," Valery Shevchuk, the Chernobyl committee's deputy chairman, said.

Over time, the radioactive materials, especially cesium 137, with a half-life of 30 years, will decay, but living and working in the contaminated parts of Belarus will not soon be normal.

In Viduitsy, Pryzhenkov pointed to fields that remain too hot to grow even fodder for animals. With precautions, he said, food grown on other fields here is safe.

Vera Brausova, 73, who lives in Krasny Kukhani, picks mushrooms despite government warnings that they absorb high levels of radiation. Living on a pension, what choice does she have? Asked about health concerns, she said she lived through World War II, Chernobyl and a fire that burned down the first house she was evacuated to. "What health are you talking about?" she said.

Gennady Bakhanov, the region's director of agriculture, said a healthy life in Chernobyl's shadow, as it were, depended on education and a basic precautions. "This is the trouble," he said. "It is invisible. There is no smell. This is why people act as they did before."

He drove into his native village, Samotevichy. It was abandoned. Most of its wooden homes were buried, lest they catch fire and send radioactive particles into the air. He spoke wistfully of the villagers.

"Maybe in 20 or 50 years," he said, "they will come back."

Along the village's road, two men appeared. Nikolai Makarov and Vladimir Nesterenko, both in their 40s, moved back to this forsaken place a few years ago. They had been picking apples in orchards long ago abandoned.

"After a glass of moonshine," Nesterenko said, "you can eat anything."

Source: International Herald Tribune

Ukraine Deputies Fear Bird Flu, Ban Poultry Imports

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine's parliament on Thursday imposed a six-month ban on poultry imports from all countries in a bid to protect the former Soviet state from the deadly bird flu detected in neighbouring states.

Bird flu treatment Tamiflu is seen at a pharmacy in Zurich. Swiss drugmaker Roche will not let patents stand in the way of getting its Tamiflu drug to patients in case of a bird flu pandemic
The law, which must be signed by President Viktor Yushchenko to come into force, was backed by 229 deputies in the 450-seat assembly. Nobody opposed, 12 abstained and 143 deputies did not vote.

Ukraine has already banned poultry imports from Romania, Turkey, Greece and some Russian regions due to bird flu.

Romania detected new cases of bird flu in the Danube delta, shared with Ukraine, one of them in a village 10 km (six miles) from the border.

On Monday, Romania said the bird flu outbreak was limited to Ceamurlia de Jos and Maliuc, 40 km (25 miles) to the north. All 21,000 domestic birds in those two villages have been culled.

Ukraine's Agriculture Minister Oleksander Baranivsky said farmers in areas near the Romanian border were being told to keep close watch on domestic birds.

Ukraine imports about 350,000 tonnes of poultry meat per year, mostly from the United States.

Source: Reuters

South Korea, Ukraine to Triple Volume of Trade by 2010

KIEV, Ukraine -- South Korea and Ukraine agreed Thursday to triple the amount of annual bilateral trade to US$3 billion by 2010, South Korean officials said.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Yuri Yekhanurov (R) and his South Korean counterpart Lee Hae-chan (L) answer questions during a news conference in Kiev
The agreement was reached at a meeting between South Korean Prime Minister Lee Hae-chan and his Ukrainian counterpart Yuri Yekhanurov. The bilateral trade volume reached $1.07 billion in 2004.

Lee arrived in Kiev earlier in the day for discussions with Ukrainian leaders on ways to boost cooperation between the two countries.

During the one-hour talks, the two sides also decided to allow South Korean travellers to visit Ukraine for 90 days without a visa as part of measures to streamline visa issuing procedures.

They also agreed to extend the term of validity of multiple visas from the current one year to five, exempt visa processing fees and waive visas for diplomats, on a mutual basis.

Lee and Yekhanurov announced the results of their talks in a joint press conference that followed soon after.

In addition to the agreements, the two sides shared opinions on the need to peacefully settle the dispute over North Korea's nuclear weapons program for the world peace and stability and cooperate to set up a permanent peace regime on the Korean Peninsula.

Lee expressed thanks for Ukraine's support for Seoul's efforts toward the peaceful settlement to the nuclear disarmament issue and Yekhanurov pledged continued support and cooperation.

Reaffirming that the two countries are working closely on the global stage, the two sides agreed to react jointly to key international issues, including increasing threats of terrorism.

Lee also conveyed South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun's invitation for Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko to visit Seoul.

After the talks, South Korea's Vice Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan and Ukraine's Minister of Transportation and Communication Viktor Bondar and Economy Minister Arseniy Yatseniuk signed an agreement on maritime cooperation, economic aid and technical cooperation.

Shortly after the talks with the Ukraine's prime minister, Lee will discuss ways to boost exchanges between legislators of the two countries with House Speaker Volodymyr Lytvyn.

On Friday, Lee will pay a visit to Yushchenko and meet with the country's Foreign Minister Boris Tarasyuk and Kiev Mayor Alexander Omelchenko.

Lee will return to Seoul on Sunday.

Source:Asia Pulse News

Ukraine Must Carry Out Reforms

KIEV, Ukraine -- NATO’s doors will remain open for Ukraine if the former Soviet republic undertakes a set of defence, political and economic reforms, the alliance’s secretary general said Wednesday.

Ukraine's President Viktor Yushchenko (L), welcomes NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer (R)
Jaap de Hoop Scheffer stopped short, however, of giving a timeline for Ukraine’s entry into the alliance. "I cannot talk ... about weeks, months or years," de Hoop Scheffer told reporters after a meeting with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Borys Tarasiuk and Defence Minister Anatoly Gritsenko.

After coming to power in January, President Viktor Yushchenko made membership in both NATO and the European Union key goals for Ukraine.

Recently, Yushchenko has said that talks on possible NATO membership could begin next year, and many analysts have predicted that the country could receive an invitation during NATO’s 2008 summit. Top Ukrainian defence officials have suggested it would take Ukraine three years to meet NATO’s requirements.

The Western alliance has said that Ukraine must first reduce and modernize its bloated military, prove its democratic credentials and fight corruption. De Hoop Scheffer has also said that the next year’s "free and fair parliamentary vote will be considered a milestone."

"Reforms are essential, and they have to be done," he said. NATO has stepped up cooperation with Ukraine since last year’s Orange Revolution, and de Hoop Scheffer said the alliance was ready to assist Ukraine "wherever and whenever necessary" to implement the reforms.

Gritsenko said Ukraine would continue its role in NATO peacekeeping efforts and would extend the mandate for its battalion in Serbia’s southern province of Kosovo. He also said Ukraine was ready to offer its transport planes for ferrying NATO troops to peacekeeping missions in Afghanistan and Sudan.

De Hoop Scheffer was to meet later with Yushchenko and participate in a meeting of Ukraine’s top security body _ the National Security and Defence Council.

Anatoly Kinakh, the council’s head, said the meeting would feature discussion on adjusting Ukrainian laws to meet NATO and EU standards.

Opinion polls indicate that many Ukrainians, particularly in Russian-speaking eastern and southern regions, remain suspicious of NATO, their old Cold War foe.

Gritsenko tried Wednesday to dispel some of what he described as "Soviet-era stereotypes" about the alliance, saying, "NATO will not deploy nuclear weapons in Ukraine." Gritsenko also said that eventual NATO membership would not mean the withdrawal of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet from the southern Ukrainian port of Sevastopol, where it has permission to stay until at least 2017.

Source: International News

Prosecutor Who Investigated Yushchenko's Wife is Sacked

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine's recently dismissed prosecutor general has mounted a fierce attack on President Viktor Yushchenko, accusing the leader of the orange revolution of trying illegally to close an investigation into Kateryna Yushchenko-Chumachenko, his own wife.

Ukraine's sacked Prosecutor-General Svyatoslav Piskun
Svyatoslav Piskun, who was the country's prosecutor general until last Friday, claimed he had been fired because he opened an inquiry into allegations that Mr Yushchenko's US-born wife had flown a group of her relatives to Kiev from the US on a specially chartered plane for her husband's inauguration as president earlier this year.

Mr Piskun said the bill amounted to £155,000 and he wanted to know where the money came from, inferring that it may have been linked to a discredited Ukrainian businessman wanted for money laundering in the US.

"My dismissal was a direct consequence of my refusal to submit to political pressure," he said.

This is not the first time that Mr Yushchenko's family members have been dragged into a political row. His teenage son, Andrei, was criticised for leading a flashy lifestyle seemingly beyond his modest student means, while Kateryna was accused of working on behalf of the US government, allegations she has quashed in court.

Mr Yushchenko and his allies dismiss Mr Piskun's claims saying he was sacked for incompetence. The main reason, they say, was his failure to wind up a politically explosive investigation into the killing of the investigative journalist Georgy Gongadze in 2000.

Mr Yushchenko's credibility has come to rest on the case's successful prosecution. A parliamentary committee accused Leonid Kuchma, Mr Yushchenko's predecessor, of ordering the abduction but Mr Kuchma has been left alone.

Source: Independent Online

Yushchenko Says Joining NATO is Ukraine's Strategic Goal

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko said Wednesday that gaining full membership in NATO accords with his country's national interests and is an unswerving strategic goal.

Ukraine's President Viktor Yushchenko (R), and NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer (L), during their press conference in Kiev
During a meeting between top Ukrainian and NATO security officials, Yushchenko said NATO membership would give his country substantial benefits, according to the Ukrainian National Information Agency.

Yushchenko said Ukraine hopes to fully join NATO and the European Union, which he claimed will guarantee Europe's safety and stability.

Ukraine, a former Soviet republic, has been seeking entry into the military alliance over the past years.

In 2002, the then President Leonid Kuchma first announced the country's wish to join NATO. Yushchenko reiterated the goal after taking office as president in early 2005.

NATO membership "is a powerful incentive for the transformation of society, aimed at deepening democracy, strengthening human rights and freedoms," Yushchenko said at Wednesday's meeting, which was also participated by NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer.

The alliance has repeatedly said Ukraine must first reduce and modernize its bloated military, prove its democratic credentials and fight corruption.

De Hoop Scheffer said NATO is ready to assist Ukraine "wherever and whenever necessary" to implement the reforms."

"Reforms are essential, and they have to be done," he said, adding that NATO's door will always be open to Ukraine.

The NATO chief also said next year's parliamentary vote in Ukraine, if free and fair, "would be considered a milestone."

Some analysts predict that Ukraine could receive an invitation to join the alliance during NATO's 2008 summit.

Source: Xinhua

Azerbaijan Opposition Leader Freed in Ukraine

SIMFEROPOL, Ukraine -- A key Azerbaijani opposition leader was released today after being detained by police in Ukraine and was considering whether to return to Baku from self-imposed exile ahead of key elections next month, officials said.

Azerbaijani riot police push an opposition activist in Baku. Azerbaijani police detained hundreds of supporters of self-exiled opposition leader Rasul Guliyev
A court in this southern Ukrainian city ordered the release of Rasul Guliyev, who was detained here on Monday by police acting on a warrant from Interpol in response to a request from the government of Azerbaijan, where Guliyev is wanted on embezzlement charges.

'There is no reason to arrest him,' Judge Nina Starova said, rejecting prosecution arguments to prolong the detention of Guliyev, who was detained during a stopover in Ukraine on a flight from Britain bound for Azerbaijan.

A spokesman for Azerbaijan's opposition Democratic Party, Sardar Jalaloglu, confirmed that Guliyev had been released, but said he had not yet decided whether to go ahead with his planned return to Baku, where authorities have made clear they would arrest him immediately.

Guliyev would hold consultations with supporters in Kiev before making a decision on whether to return to Azerbaijan, Jalaloglu said.

Authorities deployed a massive security force in Baku and at the international airport outside the city on Monday in anticipation of Guliyev's anticipated return, an event seen as likely to shake the government ahead of parliamentary elections on Nov 6.

Guliyev is a former speaker of the Azerbaijani parliament and a one-time powerful businessman in the former Soviet republic. He fled to the United States in 1996 and officials in Baku have accused him of embezzling 100 mln usd in government money.

Yesterday, President Ilham Aliyev, quoted by state media, described Guliyev as an 'international mafioso'.

Source: AFX News

Yushchenko Orders Sweeping Anti-Bird Flu Measures Throughout Ukraine

KIEV, Ukraine -- President Viktor Yushchenko Wednesday ordered sweeping measures to be taken throughout Ukraine to prevent an outbreak of a bird flu that could be deadly to humans and devastating to the poultry industry.

President Viktor Yushchenko
The measures, ranging from restrictions on imports, border crossings to strict monitoring of domestic poultry production, are the most massive coordinated effort in recent memory aimed at preventing a virus.

Yushchenko moved to introduce the measures after bird flu had apparently found its way to Greece, the first country of the European Union to report the case. The bird flu spreads following several cases reported in Turkey and Romania, near the border with Ukraine.

Yushchenko urged local authorities to strengthen control over domestic poultry producer, equip the central anti-flu laboratory with necessary equipment, anti-virus drugs, disinfection chemicals and other measures. Local television stations have been instructed on warnings to be broadcast should the virus be identified.

A special commission to be set by the government within three days will have to come up with a detailed plan by Nov. 1 on preventing the spread of the virus and minimizing consequences should it strike.

The government is concerned Ukraine may be not ready to combat the virus in a timely fashion that may lead to its quick spread of through Ukraine.

The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization said Wednesday recent appearance of the H5N1 bird flu strain in Romania and Turkey confirmed the virus had been spreading along the pathways of migratory birds outside Southeast Asia.

U.N. experts believe the virus is so active that it could easily mutate into a form that would quickly spread from humans to humans and kill millions of people around the world.

Ukraine, just like Romania, is a natural place for migratory birds to make their stop on the way to Africa and the Middle East, which dramatically elevates the risk of the infection, analysts said.

Reacting to these concerns, local authorities in Odessa and Kherson regions have ordered shooting of migratory birds to see whether they carry the virus. About 100 birds had been shot in Odessa and about the same in Kherson earlier this month, but no virus had been found, officials have said.

Ukraine’s Agriculture Ministry, anticipating the possible affect from the migratory birds, has ordered major poultry producers last month to keep their domestic birds indoors.

Oleksandr Baranivskiy, the agriculture minister, has been visiting Romania earlier this week, and agreed with his counterparts from Romania and Moldova to coordinate efforts fighting the bird flu.

Source: Ukrainian Journal

Free to Mourn the Orange Dream

KIEV, Ukraine -- If journalists in Ukraine are enjoying a new air of freedom since the Orange Revolution, it is a freedom which allows them to question the very heroes of that political phenomenon.

Serhiy Leshchenko writes for the website of Ukrainska Pravda. One of Ukraine's most popular sites, it was started by Georgiy Gongadze, the journalist infamously kidnapped and murdered in 2000 for - it is widely believed - his outspoken criticism of the authorities at the time.

Mr Leshchenko began working for Ukrainska Pravda several days before Gongadze's disappearance but he refuses to be compared to the dead journalist who has become an iconic figure in Ukraine, a symbol of struggle for the freedom of speech.

Nonetheless, Mr Leshchenko's articles are written in the same style of uncompromising belief in the rule of the truth.

Mr Leshchenko's feelings about the current president, like those of many of his compatriots, have changed a lot since he reported from Kiev's Independence Square, the Maidan, almost 12 months ago.

He calls the past year in Ukraine a year of wasted opportunities because the authorities, he believes, failed to make use of a tremendous degree of trust that Ukrainians had put in them to go ahead with a lot of badly needed and keenly awaited reforms.

"Yes," he says, "there was no other choice last autumn and, even now, knowing everything that went wrong, I would still do exactly the same things I did. At the time we simply had no alternative."

Deaf ears

When asked to name one thing that went most "wrong", he says:

"The government failed to become transparent. It doesn't respond to criticism.

"Sure, you can criticise it now more easily, you know you won't get arrested or killed, but it's not making any difference. Freedom of speech is just one part of a democratic society: The authorities have to respond to it. Otherwise, it's one-way traffic."

Several months ago, Mr Leshchenko carried out a journalistic investigation into the lifestyle of President Yushchenko's son Andriy.

Reports spoke of a $100,000 car, luxury mobile phone and evenings out at an expensive Kiev bar.

Mr Leshchenko says he has never acted on anybody's orders and was not working for Mr Yushchenko's political opponents.

The journalist says he was driven by promises given by Viktor Yushchenko himself when he swore in front of revolutionary crowds to fight corruption in Ukraine.

When forced to give explanations of his son's lifestyle at a press conference, President Yushchenko angrily brushed aside hints of wrongdoing and said he had told his son to stuff receipts from the bar into the journalist's face to show everything was paid for.

Such investigations, he said, were driven by envy or desire to undermine him.

Strange days

Serhiy Leshchenko was not the only journalist shocked at such a response from the previously mildly spoken president, known for his gallant manners.

But it is perhaps unsurprising that in recent months a few articles on the Ukrainska Pravda website have been signed "Serhiy Stuffed-Face".

Mr Leshchenko says the story with the president was the most personal - but not the most disappointing - episode in a year-long series of disillusionments.

These include a lack of real progress with economic reform, embarrassing squabbles in the president's team and sometimes inexplicable political alliances with former opponents including Viktor Yanukovich, for many an odious figure in Ukraine.

Hardly anything has been done to promote fairness in the media: TV channels are said to impose self-censorship by cutting out any vaguely controversial programmes to avoid potential problems with the authorities.

New government appointments appear to be awash with nepotism not seen even when Leonid Kuchma was in power.

Bribery is said to have increased manifold.

Mr Leshchenko corrects himself: "I shouldn't talk about disappointment - just of sadness."

His main task now, he says, is to stop himself becoming a cynic.

Source: BBC News

Yushchenko Defies Parliament on Kryvorizhstal Sale

KIEV, Ukraine -- Viktor Yushchenko, Ukraine's president, pledged on Tuesday to go ahead with next week's $2bn planned sale of Kryvorizhstal, the country's flagship steel mill, despite a last-ditch bid in parliament to block the auction.

Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair (L) greets Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko (R) on the steps of 10 Downing Street in London
Speaking during a visit to the Financial Times, Mr Yushchenko insisted yesterday's parliamentary vote to maintain state control of Kryvorizhstal was only a political resolution with no legal force.

“Yes, of course this is a bad signal [to investors]. But it has a purely political meaning, nothing more,” Mr Yushchenko said.

While Mr Yushchenko was in London, the authorities in Kiev announced that three bidders had put down $200m deposits to participate in Monday's auction: Mittal Steel, the world's largest steel group; Luxembourg-based Arcelor, bidding jointly with Industrial Union of Donbass, a leading Ukrainian group; and LCC Smart Group, a Ukrainian company controlled by Vadim Novinsky, an entrepreneur linked to the Russian steel magnate Alisher Usmanov.

Mr Yushchenko's government took control of Kryvorizhstal after the courts invalidated the privatisation carried out under former president Leonid Kuchma, who surrended power to Mr Yuschenko late last year in the Orange Revolution. The aggrieved buyers – Viktor Pinchuk and Rinat Akhmetov, two businessmen linked to Mr Kuchma – have warned potential investors of possible future legal action.

Mr Yushchenko is trying to reach a compromise with the business community following his dismissal last month of prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko, Mr Yushchenko's Orange Revolution ally who had sought a wide-ranging radical review of Kuchma-era privatisations.

Mr Yushchenko promised to focus on a few high profile cases, which he would seek to settle not through the courts but through “mutual agreement” with the current owners.

He indicated the beneficiaries of untransparent privatisations could be asked to make extra payments.

“We’re saying: ‘You didn't steal the factories, but you did get them at an inadequate place and this must be corrected.’”

Seeking to reassure investors, Mr Yushchenko said he had developed a dialogue with business leaders at meetings over the past month, including a gathering with heads of 25 groups last Friday.

“The government has passed away from the politics of confrontation to the politics of mutual understanding with regard to the problem of privatisation,” said the president.

Mr Yushchenko, who was in London to receive the Chatham House Prize, an award for services to international relations, also predicted that the Orange Revolution would inspire people in other parts of the former Soviet Union.

“Millions of people have begun think differently about freedom and about democracy, in the whole terrain of the former Soviet Union... There is now a new way of doing things, the Orange Revolution way.”

Source: Financial Times

Ukraine’s Ex-Prosecutor General Says Was Fired After Probe Into President’s Ally

KIEV, Ukraine -- The former prosecutor general of Ukraine, Svyatoslav Piskun, said he was fired because he opened a criminal investigation into one of the president’s closest allies.


Fired Prosecutor General Svyatoslav Piskun
In an interview quoted by AP, Piskun said Viktor Yushchenko was unable to press him to close the case, so he decided to fire the prosecutor.

“My firing is a direct consequence of my refusal to submit to political pressure,” Piskun said.

Piskun’s office launched an abuse of power investigation last week against former National Security and Defense Secretary Petro Poroshenko, a confectionary tycoon who was one of the top financiers of last year’s Orange Revolution that brought Yushchenko to power.

On Friday, Piskun was dismissed. He was earlier criticized over the lack of any notable success in investigating the murder of Georgy Gongadze, an opposition reporter killed in 2000.

Piskun was earlier prosecutor general under former Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma but was fired in 2003. Kuchma accused Piskun of trying to politicize the powerful office, but Piskun countered that Kuchma fired him because he had come close to making key arrests in the Gongadze case, a murder that Kuchma’s critics accused him of ordering. A court ordered Piskun to be reinstated in December 2004, and Yushchenko kept him after his inauguration. Recently, Piskun instigated criminal proceedings against Kuchma.

Pressure on Piskun mounted last week after Yushchenko named one of the prosecutor’s top critics to the post of justice minister. Piskun’s office countered by boosting its activity, including launching the probe into Poroshenko, who had resigned from his post in September amid accusations of corruption. Yushchenko has repeatedly called the allegations baseless.

Source: MosNews

September Crisis Over, But Strategic Problems Remain For Yushchenko

KIEV, Ukraine -- President Viktor Yushchenko has declared that the political crisis in Ukraine is over. The turmoil began on September 5 with allegations of corruption within his inner circle. Parliamentary Speaker Volodymyr Lytvyn, a close ally of Yushchenko’s, added that there are no longer grounds to speak about a “political crisis” in Ukraine.

The reprieve will be short-lived, as the constitutional reforms coming into effect in January will make it imperative for Yushchenko to obtain a parliamentary majority after the March 2006 parliamentary elections.

Current polls show Yushchenko’s People’s Union-Our Ukraine (NSNU), the Yulia Tymoshenko bloc, and Regions of Ukraine all poll about 20% each. Three other parties likely to enter parliament -- the Communists, Socialists, and Lytvyn’s People’s Party -- all poll less than 10% each. With just 5% support, Lytvyn may become the power broker for creating a parliamentary majority.

These low levels of support across the board mean that Yushchenko will need to compromise with the other two large blocs of votes – the Tymoshenko bloc or Viktor Yanukovych’s Regions of Ukraine. But a compromise with either political force will bring problems.

Tymoshenko has always demanded a high-profile position in exchange for her cooperation, either prime minister or speaker of parliament. But after Tymoshenko’s poor economic performance as prime minister this year, Yushchenko is unlikely to offer her this position again.

After widespread dismay over the memorandum signed between Yushchenko and Yanukovych in September, Yushchenko will have even more problems cutting a deal with his former rival for the presidency. A 2006 NSNU-Regions of Ukraine parliamentary majority would be seen as a betrayal of the Orange Revolution, reform prospects, and Ukraine’s Euro-Atlantic integration.

In the short term, Yushchenko needed to end the immediate crisis if he is to improve his public standing and ratings in the six months remaining before the elections. After eight months of drifting, elite infighting, wasted opportunities, and too-frequent travels abroad, Yushchenko needs to re-assert his authority.

The crisis gave Yushchenko an opportunity to clean out his government before his first year as president ends. Yushchenko’s son, Andriy, embroiled in scandal earlier this year, is no longer seen in a $120,000 BMW “on loan” from a member of Yushchenko’s entourage, although he still has his $30,000 cell phone.

Yushchenko’s only major strategic mistake during the crisis was the deal with Yanukovych. Almost half (47.2%) of Ukrainians supported Tymoshenko’s firing and the subsequent political house-cleaning. Yet two-thirds of the new government headed by Yuriy Yekhanurov are holdovers from Tymoshenko, including three Socialist ministers.

Gone are Serhiy Teriokhin (minister of economics) and Mykola Tomenko (first deputy prime minister for the humanities) from the Reforms and Order Party. Reforms and Order party leader Viktor Pynzenyk remains finance minister, but he may lose his party post at an upcoming party conference.

Serhiy Holovatiy replaced Roman Zvarych as justice minister. Unlike Zvarych, whose educational background led to a scandal, Holovatiy is a well-known legal expert who was justice minister in the mid-1990s and headed the Ukrainian Legal Foundation. Holovatiy was expelled from the Tymoshenko faction after he voted for Yekhanurov as prime minister.

In return for his agreeing to be justice minister, Holovatiy demanded the removal of Prosecutor Sviatoslav Piskun, who was duly fired on October 14. Interior Minister Lutsenko has complained that his Ministry found it impossible to work with the prosecutor’s office, which was blocking investigations at the local level. The new team at Justice and the Prosecutor’s office may spur progress toward resolving Kuchma-era crimes.

Yushchenko also sacrificed several family members, businessmen who helped financed his campaign and the Orange Revolution. Yushchenko fired transport minister Yevhen Chervonenko, his bodyguard in the elections; Davyd Zhvannia, minister of emergency situations; and Petro Poroshenko, secretary of the National Security and Defense Council (NRBO). Both Zhvannia and Poroshenko are godfathers to Yushchenko’s children.

The removal of Poroshenko and other businessmen helps repair Yushchenko’s image of not relying on oligarchs, as had former President Leonid Kuchma. Poroshenko in particular has very low popularity ratings on a par with Kuchma. Nevertheless, Yushchenko has always defended Poroshenko and other now-removed businessmen from allegations of corruption. Even if these allegations are not proven, Yushchenko would be making a strategic blunder by allowing Poroshenko and other former entourage members to join the NSNU 2006 election list.

In other personnel decisions, Oleksandr Tretiakov’s position as first adviser to Yushchenko has been eliminated. Tretiakov, whose business interests lie in the energy sector, had earned a reputation for controlling access to Yushchenko.

Anatoly Kinakh, first deputy prime minister under Tymoshenko, is now NRBO secretary. Kinakh, whose Party of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs polls barely 1.1%, is a poor choice for this position. Under Kuchma, NRBO secretaries were experienced in national security affairs, but Kinakh -- like Poroshenko before him -- has no background in this field. One of Kinakh’s first policy steps was to raise the possibility of Ukraine and Russia jointly integrating into the WTO, a position welcomed by Russia.

Three key ministers have kept their jobs for now. Defense Minister Anatoly Hrytsenko and Foreign Minister Borys Tarasyuk are both staunchly pro-Western. Interior Minister Yuriy Lutsenko is currently purging his corrupt ministry.

Yushchenko survived the September political crisis, but still-bigger challenges lie ahead: winning the 2006 elections and taking control of parliament.

Source: Eurasia Daily Monitor

Queen Bestows Award on Ukrainian President

LONDON, UK -- The Queen has conferred Ukrainian president Viktor Yushchenko with an award for his role in ushering in his country's peaceful 'orange revolution' last year.

Britain's Queen Elizabeth II (L) presents to Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko (R) the Chatham House Award at Mansion House in central London
He was presented with the Chatham House Prize at the Mansion House in London last night.

He is the first recipient of the prestigious award, which honours individuals adjudged to have contributed the most to improving international relations.

Before the ceremony, Mr Yushchenko met Tony Blair to discuss an EU-Ukraine summit in Kiev.

Mr Blair, as the current holder of the EU presidency, will chair the summit in December.

Mr Yushchenko was expected to have raised the issue of the ex-Soviet Republic's entry into Nato and the EU.

He wants to see the creation of a free trade area between the Ukraine and the EU within 12 to 15 months and talks on possible Nato membership next spring.

Mr Yushchenko has called for more 'orange revolutions' across the world.

Source: DeHavilland

Yushchenko to Get Award in London

LONDON, UK -- Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko is to be given an award in London for the role he played in Ukraine's peaceful Orange Revolution last year. The Chatham House Prize will be presented by Queen Elizabeth II.

Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko
Mr Yushchenko will also meet UK Prime Minister Tony Blair to plan for an EU-Ukraine summit in Kiev.

Ahead of his two-day visit Britain, Mr Yushchenko told the BBC there could be more Orange Revolutions - or peaceful protests for change - across the world.

Mr Yushchenko was swept to power in December 2004, following a re-run of rigged presidential elections.

EU aspirations

He is the first recipient of the prestigious award by Chatham House which was previously known as the Royal Institute of International Affairs.

Mr Yushchenko was declared the prize's winner for ensuring that last year's momentous political changes in Ukraine did not trigger a conflict within Europe.

After receiving the award, Mr Yushchenko is due to meet Mr Blair.

The talks are expected to discuss preparations for the EU-Ukraine summit later this year.

This is being seen in Kiev as a sign that Ukraine's pro-Western aspirations are being taken seriously, the BBC's Helen Fawkes in the Ukrainian capital says.

But Mr Yushchenko faces serious problems at home, our correspondent adds.

Opinion polls show that his popularity has fallen significantly, and the coalition which was formed during the Orange Revolution has collapsed since the entire government was sacked last month, she says.

BBC forum

Speaking to BBC's Talking Point last week, Mr Yushchenko said his country had "set a good example for the millions of people who still cherish freedom and democracy".

He also said that an inquiry was closing in on the likely cause and perpetrators of the poisoning attempt on his life.

"There are more than 10 possible scenarios which the investigators are looking at," he told interviewer Bridget Kendall.

He said the Orange Revolution had brought new "freedom and democracy" to the Ukraine but also put the country on the world map.

"It is pleasing that Ukraine is now known all over the world. We have given the world a wonderful example of human behaviour," he said.

The Ukrainian president was responding to questions submitted by BBC listeners and website users.

Source: BBC News

Ukraine President Says Closing In On Poisoner

LONDON, UK -- Ukraine President Viktor Yushchenko said his country's "Orange Revolution" set a good example for those who cherish freedom and that an inquiry would find those who poisoned him.

Viktor Yushchenko before (L) and after (R) poisoning
New information has been uncovered on the type of poison and its properties, he said in an interview with the BBC. Yushchenko's face was disfigured by what doctors have described as an intentional poisoning with dioxin last year.

"I am sure this crime will be solved," he said, adding that those behind the poison attack were probably Ukrainians.

Yushchenko defeated Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich in a December presidential vote after November's election was cancelled by the Supreme Court due to massive fraud.

The Ukrainian president said the revolution, which brought him to power nearly a year ago, was funded by "millions of people" some who turned up at his party's headquarters with envelopes "stuffed with cash".

The Ukrainian president responded to questions submitted by BBC listeners and Web site users and was asked about investigations into the murder of journalist Georgy Gongadze who was kidnapped five years ago.

Asked whether former President Leonid Kuchma would have immunity if the trail led to his involvement, Mr Yushchenko said: "No he won't. Everyone is equal before the law. There is absolutely no doubt about it."

Yushchenko said the previous government was "failing as a team" and that he was forced to take action when the country's economy stopped growing. He said his government has since corrected the downward trend.

"So I hope by the end of the year the growth rate will reach 4.5 to 5 percent, which would be among the best in Europe. And we are improving our relations with investors," Yushchenko said.

He said he hoped Ukraine would be in place to join the World Trade Organisation by the end of the year and it was his aim that the country could also become a member of the European Union in three years time.

On how this would effect relations with its neighbour Russia and President Putin, he said: "Our strategy is aimed towards Europe, but it doesn't mean we are acting or scheming against Russia or anyone else."

Yushchenko would not be drawn on questions about whether he supported a movement seeking political change in another neighbour Belarus, saying the situation was complex.

"I am sure that supporting democratic forces in Belarus can only work if you talk to people. So I think there should be a dialogue and we should be giving Belarus a chance to change. And this is what lies behind our approach," he said.

Source: Reuters

Infiniti Announces Entry Into Ukrainian Market

KIEV, Ukraine -- Nissan Motor Ukraine announced plans to launch its luxury Infiniti brand in the Ukrainian market, starting at the end of 2007. Ukraine is the second country selected for Infiniti expansion in Eastern Europe, following the entry into Russia in 2006.

Nissan Infiniti
Nissan Motor Ukraine, which was established in April 2005, is currently seeking Infiniti dealer candidates, with the first dealer appointment planned for the Kiev area. The independently owned and operated Infiniti dealers will offer complete services, including new and pre-owned vehicle sales, vehicle service and parts and accessories support.

Infiniti's entry into the Ukraine market is part of the global expansion of the brand set forth in Nissan's latest comprehensive three-year business plan, NISSAN Value-Up, which was announced in April 2005.

Sales of Infiniti originated in the United States in 1989, where it has become one of the fastest growing luxury brands in recent years. Taiwan and the Middle East began selling Infiniti vehicles in the past few years, followed by Korea in August 2005. Along with Ukraine, Infiniti will launch sales organizations in Russia, China and ultimately Japan.

Located in Kiev, Nissan Motor Ukraine's operations currently include Sales, Marketing and after sales activities through 9 official Nissan dealer outlets.

Source: PR Newswire Europe

Yushchenko Foresees Orange Future

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko believes there could be more Orange Revolutions across the world, mirroring his party's success.

In an interview for the BBC, he says his country has "set a good example for the millions of people who still cherish freedom and democracy".

He talks of the effects of his party's rise to power nearly a year ago.

He also says an inquiry is closing in on the likely cause and perpetrators of the poisoning attempt on his life.

Speaking to BBC's Talking Point, he said new information has been gained on the type of poison used and its properties.

"There are more than 10 possible scenarios which the investigators are looking at," he told interviewer Bridget Kendall.

"I am sure this crime will be solved," he said, adding that those behind the poison attack were probably Ukrainians.

I'm sure that the Orange Revolution set an example for the millions of people who still cherish freedom and democracy, whether they live in Russia, Belarus or anywhere else

He said the Orange Revolution brought new "freedom and democracy" to the Ukraine, but also put the country on the world map.

"It is pleasing that Ukraine is now known all over the world. We have given the world a wonderful example of human behaviour," he said.

"And I'm sure what happened last year is something people are proud of in Western Europe and the United States too, because it shows our common humanity, regardless of where we live."

He talks about how the revolution was funded by "millions of people" some who turned up at the party's headquarters with envelopes "stuffed with cash".

Murdered journalist

The Ukrainian president was responding to questions submitted by BBC listeners and website users. Many questioned Mr Yushchenko on the months that have followed his party's election success, with some condemning the revolution as "total farce" and "failure" due to its inability to make economic reforms.

The sacking of former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko and her entire government, replaced by Yuri Yekhanurov, was cited as causing upset to Ukrainians.

Mr Yushchenko said the previous government was "failing as a team" and said he was forced to take action when the country's economy stopped growing.

Now, he claimed, his government had corrected the downward trend: "So I hope by the end of the year the growth rate will reach 4.5 to 5%, which would be among the best in Europe. And we are improving our relations with investors."

He added that talking with the opposition was crucial to creating a united Ukraine.

The president was questioned on the investigations into the murder of journalist Georgy Gongadze who was kidnapped five years ago.

Asked whether former President Kuchma would have immunity if the trail led to his involvement, Mr Yushchenko said: "No he won't. Everyone is equal before the law. There is absolutely no doubt about it."

On business at home, Mr Yushchenko pledged that efforts were taking place to tackle the country's long history of corruption, setting new rules for a "transparent and competitive market".

He hoped the Ukraine would be in place to join the World Trade Organisation by the end of the year and it was his aim that the country could also become a member of the European Union in three years time.

'Good dialogue'

On how this would effect relations, with its neighbour Russia and President Putin, he said: "Our strategy is aimed towards Europe, but it doesn't mean we are acting or scheming against Russia or anyone else.

"We are simply following our own national interest. And this is what I stand for as President."

Asked if he would be supporting the bid for democracy in Belarus, the president said: "There are very complex processes at play both inside Belarus and in the political discussions surrounding it.

"I am sure that supporting democratic forces in Belarus can only work if you talk to people. So I think there should be a dialogue and we should be giving Belarus a chance to change. And this is what lies behind our approach."

Questioned on whether Russia could experience its own Orange Revolution, he said: "I'm sure that the Orange Revolution set an example for the millions of people who still cherish freedom and democracy, whether they live in Russia, Belarus or anywhere else.

"We set a good example and I can only applaud those who want to change their country for the better."

Source: BBC News

Leftists, Nationalists Scuffle in Ukraine Over WW2

KIEV, Ukraine -- Nationalists and leftists, still divided over the role of a Ukrainian guerrilla movement in World War Two, skirmished in the centre of Kiev on Saturday, with police in hot pursuit to keep them apart.

A veteran of the wartime Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) holds a portrait of UPA leader Stepan Bandera during skirmishes which broke out during rallies in central Kiev October 15, 2005 devoted to the 63rd anniversary of the founding of UPA. Communists and other leftists denounce any notion of official recognition for the UPA, which fought both Nazi invaders and Soviet troops in the war
Both sides had wanted to mass in Independence Square, site of last year's "Orange Revolution" protests, to mark the 63rd anniversary of the founding of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), which fought both Nazi invaders and Soviet troops.

As a few thousand communists and other leftists marched down Kiev's main street, fistfights broke out with demonstrators from the nationalist UNA-UNSO group sporting black and red armbands.

Eggs, milk cartons and other projectiles were hurled, but no one was seriously hurt. Riot police confronted protesters from both sides and ringed the area to prevent new clashes.

Unhealed wounds over wartime activity reflect current divisions between nationalist western Ukraine, more prone to look to the west for inspiration, and the Russian-speaking east, more sympathetic to Moscow.

Leftists denounce any notion of "rehabilitation" or official recognition for the UPA, which numbered 100,000 in western Ukraine at its peak in 1943 during German occupation.

Nationalists want authorities to grant UPA veterans status as war combatants. UPA veterans, their ranks thinning each year, had been due to parade on Saturday, but the event was cancelled because of fears of violence and only a handful turned up.

Rival groups of roughly equal size, many of them elderly protesters, shouted slogans at each other across police lines in the square, where President Viktor Yushchenko addressed vast crowds in last year's election campaign.

"Yushchenko wants to rehabilitate the traitors. He's afraid to say so out loud," Natalya Vitrenko of the leftist Progressive Socialist Party told supporters from the back of a truck.

Nationalists in western Ukraine, who had suffered repression when the Soviet Union seized their region from Poland in 1939, joined the UPA en masse in a bid to secure an independent state.

Tens of thousands of other Ukrainians donned Nazi uniforms and fought the Red Army in a unit known as the SS Galicia.

Soviet Ukraine suffered huge losses in what Russians and many Ukrainians still refer to as the Great Patriotic War. Estimates of dead are put at eight million or more.

Post-Soviet Ukrainian governments have failed to persuade Red Army and UPA veterans to stage joint commemorations.

Source: Reuters

Ukraine's Yushchenko Makes Public Peace Offer to Rival Yanukovich

KIEV, Ukraine -- President Viktor Yushchenko of Ukraine said in an interview that he has made a public peace offer to Viktor Yanukovich, his arch rival in last year's Orange Revolution.

Yanukovich (L) and Yushchenko (R)
He indicated that their parties could work together after parliamentary elections next March.

Yushchenko's comments to the Financial Times went further than a recent political agreement signed with Yanukovich -- Ukraine's former prime minister and a one-time presidential contender -- according to the British daily.

That deal mainly addressed short-term pre-election issues such as the 2006 budget.

The president told the newspaper he wanted to end divisions between the west, which voted for him, and the east, which backed Yanukovich, in last year's protracted presidential election.

"Europe has shown us what can be achieved with solidarity, tolerance and mutual understanding," said Yushchenko, referring to the continent's history in the years after World War II.

"I have not been talking to Mr Yanukovich. I have been talking to 13 million people who represent principally eastern Ukraine," he said.

The president hopes to reassure investors who have voiced concern about the possible negative effect of rows between members of the Orange Revolution and the industrial barons, who are largely based in the east, said the FT.

Yushchenko's words were also designed to pressure his Orange Revolution ally Yulia Tymoshenko, whom he dismissed as prime minister in September.

The president said he still hoped his Our Ukraine party could agree to run jointly in the elections with Tymoshenko and her supporters, but only if she "demonstrated wisdom" and avoided "back-stage politics", the FT reported.

In addition, Yushchenko would not rule out a coalition with Yanukovich's Regions.

At the same time, he indicated that he would most likely link with a centrist bloc being formed by Volodymyr Lytvyn, the speaker of parliament.

Turning to the new, largely technocratic government of Yuri Yekhanurov, who replaced Tymoshenko, Yushchenko pledged it would restore investors' confidence by acting in a transparent, professional and "apolitical" way, the FT said.

Source: AFP

Three Bidders Pay Deposits for Ukraine Steel Mill

KIEV, Ukraine -- Three bidders for Ukraine's largest steel mill Kryvorizhstal have so far paid deposits to take part in the privatisation tender this month, the State Property Fund said on Friday.


The Kryvorizhstal plant
Ukraine is to sell the Kryvorizhstal plant, whose privatisation in 2004 was ruled illegal by courts, at a new auction on Oct. 24. Bids will be accepted until Oct. 17.

The fund said in a statement that the world's top steelmaker, Mittal Steel, and two Ukrainian companies -- LLC Smart Group and Industrial Group had paid deposits worth 1 billion hryvnias ($200 million).

Prime Minister Yuri Yekhanurov this week said 10 bidders had submitted bids for the country's biggest privatisation since independence in 1991. Other bidders include France's Arcelor and Russian steel producer Severstal.

Russian steelmaker Evrazholding has said it would take no part in the auction.

The starting price for a 93 percent stake in the steel plant is set at 10 billion hryvnias ($2 billion). Officials hope to fetch about $3 billion.

Kryvorizhstal was sold in June 2004 to a consortium with close links to the previous administration for $800 million -- a price below other offers.

Jean Lemierre, President of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, said on Friday that a successful sale was key to reforms in the ex-Soviet state.

Source: Reuters

Former Ukrainian Official Arrested, Faces Deportation

ORLANDO, FL -- Federal agents in Orlando have arrested a top former Ukrainian government official wanted on corruption and voter-intimidation charges in his homeland.


Volodymyr Shcherban
Volodymyr Shcherban, 51, was picked up Wednesday at his downtown Orlando apartment in the upscale Echelon at Uptown complex on north Orange Avenue.

Shcherban spent Wednesday night at the Orange County Jail before being taken to the Krome Detention Center near Miami on Thursday to await a deportation hearing. He is being held without bail.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents said Shcherban arrived in the country at Miami's airport on April 9 on a visitors B-2 visa, which expired Saturday. Agents knew of his whereabouts for months, but only acted after he overstayed his authorized six-month visit, a violation that makes him subject to deportation.

"Although no extradition treaty exists between the United States and the Ukraine, justice will be served by initiating the deportation process and returning this individual to his country," said Frank Figueroa, the ICE special agent in charge of the Tampa office, which oversees operations in Central Florida.

Shcherban is a former governor in the Donetsk and Sumy regions of the Ukraine and is accused of collaborating with the former Russian-backed regime of President Leonid Kuchma, who ruled the Ukraine for 10 years. According to a U.S. Department of State report on human rights, Shcherban was implicated in the crackdown on student protests in August 2004.

In May, Ukrainian prosecutors also issued an arrest warrant for Shcherban on charges of threats, extortion, intimidation and exceeding government authority in connection with November's elections, which led to a national crisis and then a run-off poll.

Last year, Kuchma's handpicked successor Viktor Yanukovych lost the bitterly contested election to opposition leader Viktor Yushchenko, who later said Kuchma had tried to assassinate him.

Yushchenko, now the country's president, suffered near-fatal dioxin poisoning in the months leading to last fall's presidential election, which left his once-smooth face sallow and pocked.

No one answered the phone at Shcherban's Echelon at Uptown apartment Thursday evening, and his immigration attorneys in Miami could not be reached for comment. Shcherban and his wife had moved to Orlando in July.

Source: Orlando Sentinel

Yushchenko Dismisses Ukrainian Prosecutor General

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko has dismissed Prosecutor General Svyatoslav Piskun, local media reported. No reasons for the decision have been given by officials in Kiev so far.

Fired Prosecutor General Svyatoslav Piskun
In September the president sacked the government led by his Orange Revolution ally Yulia Tymoshenko. Piskun also used to be a close ally of Yushchenko. Fired in 2003 by former president Leonid Kuchma he returned to the office via the courts after the opposition came to power in 2004.

Piskun told journalists that he is now going to file a lawsuit again. “No one is allowed to break the law, including the president, you and me…,” he was quoted by the Forum news agency as saying.

“It is forbidden to fire a man, even if he is a street cleaner, without any legal grounds,” he said explaining that according to Ukrainian law a prosecutor general can be dismissed only if his term has expired, if he is ill for more than four months, if he combines the job with another one or if he gets a vote of no-confidence from the parliament.

Remarkably, hours before his dismissal Piskun also ordered the dismissal of several policemen from the town of Dzerzhinsk, who were reportedly involved in trafficking under age Ukrainian girls abroad for the purpose of sexual exploitation.

Svytoslav Piskun, 46, begun his career in his native city of Lviv, western Ukraine. He worked in the Office of Public Prosecution for 14 years. In 1997-2002 he took up the office first as a deputy and later as the head of the investigation department of the tax police attached to the National Tax Administration of Ukraine.

In July 2002 a parliamentary majority voted for his candidacy for the post of prosecutor general. In October 2003 he was dismissed by Leonid Kuchma. In February 2004 Piskun was appointed assistant secretary to the National Security and Defense Council, but 11 months later, when the Orange Revolution ousted the previous regime, the Pechersk court of Kiev reinstated him as prosecutor general.

Source: MosNews

Lutsenko's Brave Stand on Immunity

KIEV, Ukraine -- For months I believed the greatest result of the Orange Revolution was that Ukraine was now to be a country of laws, not men. Simply put, the millions of people on Independence Square protesting election fraud proved that no one, not Viktor Yanukovych, not Leonid Kuchma, is above the law.

Interior Minister Yuriy Lutsenko
Sadly, last week, President Viktor Yushchenko took a giant step to undo that legacy.

A new law that he signed gives immunity from prosecution to deputies not only in the national parliament, but on regional and local legislative councils – more than 200,000 people.

The law is a terrible one. It puts a whole new slice of Ukraine’s ruling class beyond the reach of the justice system. It’s bad enough that members of the Rada here in Kyiv have always had immunity. But now even lawmakers in Ukraine’s small towns will be able to commit crimes, if they choose to, in the confidence that there’s no way they can be punished.

Caste system

The idea that members of Ukraine’s political class should have superior legal rights to the rest of the populace is profoundly undemocratic. It’s straight from the Soviet era, when society was divided into two classes: a tiny one of Communist Party elites who were above the law, and the huge one consisting of the masses those elites controlled.

But a fundamental principle of a democratic society is that the rulers are no better than those they rule, and that they have to be subject to the laws they themselves make. Anything else is unjust.

Besides the philosophical objections to immunity, there are practical ones. Immunity creates government corruption because it gives corrupt people an incentive to run for office. Any system in which a criminal’s first choice for refuge is a government institution is a system that needs changing.

Then there’s the massive distrust among the population that immunity creates. Obviously, few citizens of democratic countries believe their legislatures are corruption-free. But they can at least be relatively sure that if evidence of corruption comes to light, the person in question will be investigated. Take the current case of U.S. Congressman Tom DeLay, a powerful Republican who might soon face trial on corruption charges. In Ukraine, DeLay would be untouchable.

A strong stand by Lutsenko

What motivated President Yushchenko to sign this damaging legislation isn’t clear. Whatever the reasons, however, Ukrainians should protest loudly against it – just as Interior Minister Yuriy Lutsenko is doing.

In a meeting with journalists in Uzhhorod last week, Lutsenko revealed that in Ukraine at the moment, 1,026 government officials have been accused of crimes in office. These crimes, he said, have cost the government Hr 18 billion. Lutsenko also said that 112 of these officials occupy posts in the highest levels of government, or on the second-highest level.

Then Lutsenko put his job on the line, saying: “If the Constitutional Court doesn’t strike down the Rada decision about granting immunity to deputies of the assemblies, then as a sign of protest, I’ll resign.”

Good for him.

It’s hard to know what motivated President Yushchenko to take this terrible step. Rumor has it that he did so to pay back Viktor Yanukovych, who favors immunity, and who was instrumental in getting Yushchenko’s pick for prime minister, Yuriy Yekhanurov, approved by the Rada. Whatever the reason, though, it’s a bad thing, just as immunity for Rada members is a bad thing. Let’s hope that other high government officials show the same courage Lutsenko did in decrying this blow against Ukrainian democracy – and that the Constitutional Court has the wisdom to strike it down.

Source: Kyiv Post Editorial

President of Ukraine Strives to End Divisions

KIEV, Ukraine -- Viktor Yushchenko, Ukraine's president, has made a public peace offer to Viktor Yanukovich, his bitter enemy in the Orange Revolution, indicating their parties could work together after next March's parliamentary elections.

Viktor Yanukovich (L) and Viktor Yushchenko (R) - Friends again?
In an interview with the Financial Times, Mr Yushchenko went beyond a recent political agreement he signed with Mr Yanukovich, which mainly addressed short-term pre-election issues such as the 2006 budget.

Speaking in his gilt-and-marble office in Kiev's presidential administration building, Mr Yushchenko said he wanted to end divisions between a pro-Yushchenko west and eastern regions that voted for Mr Yanukovich in last year's presidential elections.

"Europe has shown us what can be achieved with solidarity, tolerance and mutual understanding," said the president, referring to the continent's post-1945 history. "I have not been talking to Mr Yanukovich. I have been talking to 13m people who represent principally eastern Ukraine."

Mr Yushchenko was aiming to reassure investors who have expressed concern about the disruptive effects of disputes between supporters of the Orange Revolution and industrial barons largely based in the eastern part of the country who benefited from links to former president Leonid Kuchma.

The comments were also aimed at putting pressure on Yulia Tymoshenko, Mr Yushchenko's firebrand ally in the Orange Revolution, whom he dismissed as prime minister last month. Mr Yushchenko said he still hoped his Our Ukraine party could agree to run jointly in the elections with Ms Tymoshenko and her supporters, but only if she "demonstrated wisdom" and avoided "back-stage politics".

Asked whether a coalition between Our Ukraine and Mr Yanukovich's Regions party was possible, Mr Yushchenko would not rule it out.

Mr Yushchenko indicated he was most inclined to link with a centrist bloc being formed by Volodymyr Lytvyn, the speaker of parliament, which is backed by prominent industrialists including Viktor Pinchuk, Mr Kuchma's son-in-law.

Mr Yushchenko said Mr Lytvyn's bloc might beat that of Ms Tymoshenko for third place in the elections after Our Ukraine, which the president said would win, and Regions.

Recent polls have shown the political groups of Mr Yushchenko, Ms Tymoshenko and Mr Yanukovich with roughly equal support of about 20 per cent of eligible voters, while Mr Lytvyn's group is far behind with support of 5 or 6 per cent.

Mr Yushchenko spoke on a wide range of domestic and international issues. While his face is still scarred from last year's poisoning, he seemed otherwise unaffected by the attack which almost killed him.

While he talked, he drank from an orange coffee mug emblazoned with last year's presidential election slogan "Yes! Yushchenko". But his mood was far removed from the heady atmosphere of the Orange Revolution. The president talked bluntly of the damaging economic effects of the political arguments that have divided the Orange Revolution's supporters. He agreed that an opportunity had been wasted and said "mistakes" had been made, particularly in economic policies.

The Tymoshenko government had disturbed businesspeople with "populist" promises to spend public money and to review "several thousand" Kuchma-era privatisations. After gross domestic product data showed an increase of 6.5 per cent in January, when Mr Yushchenko took power, it has since decreased to 1.6 per cent in August.

The president pledged the new, largely technocratic government of Yuri Yekhanurov, who replaced Ms Tymoshenko last month, would restore investors' confidence by acting in a transparent, professional and "apolitical" way.

He brushed aside questions about corruption claims levelled at some of his closest supporters, saying no evidence of corruption had been found. He explained his recent decision to extend legal immunity from MPs to local council members as a "shortcut" that avoided a wasteful battle in parliament while he referred the issue to the constitutional court.

Mr Yushchenko said the proposed sale of Kryvorizhstal, Ukraine's flagship steel mill, would go ahead as planned this month. The sale, expected to fetch more than $2bn (€1.7bn, £1.1bn), follows court action to recover Kryvorizhstal from its previous owners, including Mr Pinchuk, who bought the mill for $800m last year.

Mr Yushchenko said the state retained the right to review other past privatisations but indicated he would seek compromises.

He reiterated a pledge to end the long-standing domestic deadlock over Ukraine's bid to join the World Trade Organisation and secure membership by the end of the year.

Source: Financial Times

Orange Revolution Oligarchs Reveal Their True Colours

KIEV, Ukraine -- The high hopes for Ukraine after Yushchenko took power are being dashed as rival elites squabble over spoils.

Viktor Yushchenko (C) during the romantic "Orange Revolution"
Those who doubted how revolutionary Ukraine's "orange revolution" would turn out to be have no reason for pleasure now. The massive disappointment felt by tens of thousands in Kiev, which recent visitors report, far outweighs any intellectual satisfaction there is in having predicted that Viktor Yushchenko's assumption of power would not transform the country, politically or economically.

Indeed, "realists" like myself were also wrong. We did not expect things to unravel so fast.

So when Ukraine's president comes to London on Monday to receive the Chatham House prize from the Queen, it will be as much less of a hero to his supporters than nine months ago. The prize was awarded mainly for his keeping the country at peace while performing a balancing act between Russia and the west.

He is not being honoured for his domestic record, which has been mediocre. Like the ex-Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev, Yushchenko has become a child of the Soviet system who is more popular abroad than at home.

The indictment is long. The winning coalition that orchestrated last winter's street protests collapsed in disarray last month. Leading members accused each other of corruption. Inflation has risen while the rate of growth has fallen by half.

Promises to reverse the crony privatisations of the 90s have not been kept. Had the disagreements centred on serious policy issues, the regime's splits might not have damaged Ukraine's image much. The country has hard choices to make over the pace and scope of reform. But the row that led to the departure of Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, the heroine of last winter's barricades, was a sordid squabble among rival oligarchs - exactly the scenario sceptics warned of last year.

Far from being motivated by a genuine wish to promote democracy, many leading Yushchenko-backers only wanted to grab a greater share of the post-Soviet pie. The government crisis came to a head over a lucrative ferro-alloy plant in Nikopol.

Initially taken over by Viktor Pinchuk, the son-in-law of Yushchenko's predecessor, Leonid Kuchma, it was re-allocated after several conflicting court orders to an oligarch backed by Tymoshenko, herself a multi-millionaire from earlier privatisation deals. Charges flew that the judges had been unfairly leaned on. There was also a power struggle between Tymoshenko as prime minister and Yushchenko's friend, the tycoon Petro Poroshenko, who served as secretary of the national security and defence council.

Ukraine's parliament is also a playground of oligarchic interests. Dmitriy Vydrin, the director of the European Integration and Development Institute in Kiev, was quoted as saying this summer: "When you look at what is happening in parliament, you see too many factions which are still being influenced by the big businesses. The government has not pushed through enough changes or reforms to break those links."

Ukraine under Yushchenko remains what it was when he took office - a pseudo-democracy and a pseudo-market economy where neither the rules of business nor of political competition are transparent, fair and honest. Access to power is blocked to those outside the newly rich managerial elite from Soviet times. Transparency International puts Ukraine several notches higher on its corruption list even than Russia.

Reforming a system of this kind is not easy, but Yushchenko has done nothing to improve the climate of impunity. No oligarch has been charged with tax or other violations that could lead to prison. Desperately seeking a parliamentary majority to approve his new prime minister, Yushchenko even signed a memorandum of understanding last month with Viktor Yanukovich, the man he defeated last December who was widely accused of rigging the first two rounds of the presidential election.

Fury over false counting was the key issue that fuelled last year's protests. Hundreds of thousands wanted European standards of democracy and persuaded themselves they would get them. No wonder many now feel their man's election morality is no better than his opponent's. As part of his understanding with Yanukovich, Yushchenko promised his former rival immunity from any charges of electoral fraud.

Yushchenko has also failed to make serious headway on the issue he once named as a touchstone of democracy - the case of Georgy Gongadze, an investigative journalist who was decapitated in 2000. The alleged killers, three policemen, are in jail, but no trial is going forward. Senior figures from the Kuchma days who are alleged to have ordered the crime, and are still useful in shoring up Yushchenko's power, remain at large.

A second touchstone is the plan to reduce the president's power next year and give parliament the right to name the prime minister. It was agreed last winter as part of the compromise that ended the street confrontations. With parliamentary elections due in March and a strong chance that Tymoshenko, now Yushchenko's opponent, will win a majority, will the president implement this change? As president, he will only control defence and foreign policy.

The final issue is foreign policy. Western governments that funded or backed Yushchenko's victory directly and through civil society channels hailed it as a black-eye for Russia and a "seismic shift westwards in the geo-politics of the region", in the words of Adrian Karatnycky of the US organisation Freedom House.

Ukrainians expected easier EU entry, but the EU has not opened its door any wider. On relations with Moscow, Yushchenko has been pragmatic. He knows he has to import gas from Russia. Ukraine has little room for manoeuvre and, unlike Tymoshenko, who was hated in Moscow, the new prime minister says Kiev does not want to jeopardise ties to its eastern neighbour.

The main difference since Yushchenko came to power concerns Nato. Near the end of his term Kuchma came out against Ukraine joining, as did Yanukovich. Yushchenko took the opposite line - one reason why Washington wanted him to win. But polls show that while most Ukrainians aspire to join the EU, the majority are against Nato. They probably see it as unnecessary and potentially destabilising.

Will Yushchenko halt preparations to join, or continue on the grounds that Ukrainians need to be "educated" to see the alliance's value? This too is a test of whether those who exploited the romantic excitement of the "orange revolution" are the democrats they claimed to be last year.

Source: Guardian Unlimited

Ukraine: Is the Revolution Over?

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine's Orange Revolution late last year raised hopes that an honest, new government would reduce official corruption and unleash that country's enormous economic potential.

At times, during the "Orange Revolution", nearly 1 million people filled Kiev's Independence Square
During the Orange Revolution, Viktor Yushchenko's name echoed across Kiev's Independence Square as hundreds-of-thousands of Ukrainians reversed a fraudulent presidential election and put Mr. Yushchenko in office. But after just nine months, the President's Chief of Staff resigned, after leveling corruption charges against the highest levels of the new administration. The ensuing crisis has disenchanted many in Ukraine.

Ukrainians Disappointed with the Government

Expressing disappointment with politicians, however, is something ordinary Ukrainians did not have freedom to do in the past. For centuries, Ukrainian political rivalries were hidden from the public or led to bloody social upheavals. According to Ukrainian historian Orest Subtelny of York University in Toronto, Canada, the current crisis in is unusual in Ukraine's history, but not in the history of democracies.

Professor Subtelny says, "In parliamentary democracies, we often see governments falling, governments being dismissed. For example, we see a very serious crisis in Germany right now, which everyone knows will be resolved sooner or later and the system will go on."

President Yushchenko initially appointed Yulia Tymoshenko as prime minister, despite the fact that her socialist economic views contradicted his own free market position. After abruptly dismissing Ms. Tymoshenko, the President, in need of votes for a new prime minister, signed a political agreement with Viktor Yanukovych, the man who allegedly tried to steal last year's presidential election.

Andriy Usov, a member of the Pora Party, which actively supported the Revolution, says the agreement was shortsighted.

"Yanukovych has not led any political processes in Ukraine for a long time," says Mr. Usov. "I'm disappointed that Yushchenko's advisors and Yushchenko himself made such a move because they revived Yanukovych as a political leader in Ukraine."

At the same time, the dynamics of independent nationhood enable Mr. Yanukovych to advance his interests in Kiev, rather than in the capitals of former empires that once ruled Ukraine. From this perspective, historian Roman Szporluk at Harvard University's Ukrainian Research Institute says the Yushchenko-Yanukovych agreement promotes that country's political integration because it recognizes a substantial segment of voters in eastern and southern Ukraine who supported Mr. Yanukovych in the presidential election.

According to Professor Szporluk, "These people see that they do have a stake in Kiev, that their voice is heard there and that makes them, I think, more attached to the idea [and] reality of a single Ukrainian nation."

Reforming the Government

Ukrainians dismiss all politicians as dishonest. Pora Party activist Andriy Usov, however, notes that a certain level of corruption exists in virtually every country and calls upon ordinary Ukrainians to take an active interest in their government. "My fellow Ukrainians - you made a revolution, however, that was but the first and certainly not the last step. You should continue to closely monitor the actions of Ukrainian authorities and the situation in Ukraine," says Mr. Usov.

Political observer Valeriy Chaliy at the Razumkov Center, a research group in Kiev, adds that politicians have a special obligation to institute reforms and to set an example of moral leadership.

Mr. Chaliy says, "Today, the only important thing is that all politicians prepare not only to win a certain number of seats in Parliament, but also start thinking today about how they will compromise and how they will cooperate for the good of the country."

Mr. Chaliy warns that the failure of politicians to cooperate and to govern responsibly could have serious consequences. He says, "A desire could emerge for a return to an iron hand; to a strong form of presidential rule."

Many observers say that Ukraine's leaders reflect the country's corrupt social and economic system, which has forced even grandmothers to trade cigarettes on the black market. They say the ideals of the Orange Revolution appear trapped in a viscous cycle of corruption and poverty with deep roots in the Soviet and Tsarist past.

Opposition activist Andriy Usov says the first organized attempt to break that cycle -- the Orange Revolution -- demonstrated the emergence of civil society in Ukraine and a sense that people can control the nation's destiny. Asked about the political future of President Yushchenko, Mr. Usov says recent weeks have shown that it is pointless to make predictions for individual politicians.

"I'm more interested in making political predictions for ideas rather than people," says Mr. Usov. "The ideals of the Orange Revolution will surely live on because they are timeless and universal. Our position is for or against ideas. The spirit of Independence Square should continue always regardless of politics or any kind of crisis in Ukraine."

The Orange Revolution is admired around the world as a remarkable display of democratic ideals. At the same time, hard political realities make it difficult to realize those ideals. To the extent that Ukrainians openly and actively seek to improve their society, analysts say, they will be keeping their revolution alive.

Source: VOA News

"A Step Towards Normalcy"

KIEV, Ukraine -- In its quest to democratize the planet, Washington has invaded countries, funded fighters, convened high-level summits and pushed transcontinental trade pacts. Oddly, it has yet to "graduate" Ukraine from an antiquated human-rights measure that, if left in place, could slow the spread of freedom in the former Soviet Union.


The 1974 Jackson-Vanik amendment, designed primarily to restrict Soviet exports to the U.S., remains a canker sore in U.S.-Ukrainian relations. Most every senior Ukrainian official, from President Viktor Yushchenko to Foreign Minister Boris Tarasyuk, both of whom traveled to the United States this month, has called for lifting it.

This emphasis on Jackson-Vanik might seem to be misplaced; Ukraine gets annual waivers from the provision, so Ukrainians' access to U.S. markets is not curtailed. But it has political and symbolic meaning for a nation still struggling to overcome its Soviet past.

There is a widespread feeling among Ukrainians that their country cannot be considered "normal" as long as this remnant of the old days lingers.

Lifting Jackson-Vanik would cost the U.S. nothing. President George W. Bush has signaled support for taking action. So, too, have foreign-policy mavens, Republicans and Democrats alike, on Capitol Hill, as well as Sovietologists and Russia scholars at the State Department and the National Security Council.

So what's the holdup? Simply put, American democracy is getting in the way of democracy overseas. Parochial congressional interests -- involving everyone from chicken farmers to movie stars -- are stalling efforts, spearheaded by Republican Sen. John McCain and Rep. Henry Hyde and Democratic Rep. Tom Lantos, to lift Jackson-Vanik from Ukraine.

While most everyone who cares about geopolitics and democracy in the former Soviet Union backs graduating Ukraine from Jackson-Vanik, some members of Congress have found the provision useful when bargaining with Kiev and other former Soviet capitals such as Moscow.

Case in point: In 2002, after Russia and Ukraine imposed quotas on U.S. poultry imports, Democratic Sen. Joseph Biden rescinded his support for lifting Jackson-Vanik.

Similarly, the Motion Picture Association wants authorities in Ukraine to protect intellectual property rights. American oil and gas executives want access to Ukraine's energy markets. And bankers, lawyers, hotel owners, car manufacturers, venture capitalists and other potential investors want Ukraine's banking, torts and law-enforcement systems cleaned up so they meet Western standards of transparency and accountability.

All of these groups have, directly and indirectly, led lawmakers to take a cautious stance on lifting Jackson-Vanik. Their demands are reasonable, and Ukraine would be wise to listen to Western officials seeking to bring the ex-Soviet republic into the liberal fold. Nor can Sen. Biden and other lawmakers be blamed for representing the interests of their constituents.

But delaying an end to Jackson-Vanik -- for whatever reason -- would hinder the democratic transition by depriving Mr. Yushchenko of a much-needed political win and, possibly, complicating Ukraine's efforts to be admitted to the World Trade Organization.

This would be an ironic twist. Jackson-Vanik was never intended to be a bargaining chip for opening markets to U.S. business. It was meant to punish the Soviets for restricting Jewish emigration, and it did so by barring Moscow from gaining "most favored nation" status. In other words, Jackson-Vanik sought a human-rights end via trade-related means.

Never mind that the country Jackson-Vanik was intended for no longer exists. (A similar argument convinced many Republicans a few years back that the U.S. should pull out of the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.) What matters is that Jackson-Vanik, once meant to foster progress, now runs the distinct risk of impeding it.

Even Jewish groups concerned that Ukraine has yet to confront its past -- including support of many Ukrainians during World War II for Hitler's holocaust and the pogroms of the czarist and Soviet eras -- want Jackson-Vanik lifted now. Despite legitimate reservations, these groups recognize that it's time to take this step.

Consider the American Jewish Committee. An Aug. 2 letter from David Harris, the AJC's executive director, to all 535 members of Congress states: "The Jewish community has come a long way since the end of communism in 1991 and the re-establishment of Ukrainian independence....To be sure, some difficult issues remain.

First, there is still work to be done by the government in the matter of restitution of Jewish communal property. And second, manifestations of anti-Semitism, though condemned by the government and by no means unique to Ukraine in today's world, remain a matter of concern. Even so, the current vitality of the Jewish community is a remarkable sight to behold."

Referring to a recent trip taken by AJC representatives to Ukraine, Mr. Harris concludes: "One issue in particular on the minds of those officials with whom we met is the hope for graduation from the Jackson-Vanik Amendment, a goal we fully share."

Graduating Ukraine from Jackson-Vanik does not mean anti-Semitism is no longer a problem in Ukraine. It means helping an embattled leader continue doing what must be done -- razing the old regime and constructing a new economic order.

In a little more than five months, voters will decide whether they want this new order in important parliamentary elections. At stake is Ukraine's nascent democracy and, less obviously, reform movements in Russia, Belarus, Moldova and Central Asia; efforts to curb arms and drug trafficking; and the international struggle pitting the civilized world against terrorists and the criminal states propping them up.

"Lifting this amendment would send a positive signal to the Ukrainian people," said Sergiy Korsunsky, charge d'affaires at Ukraine's embassy in Washington. It would show, Mr. Korsunsky explained, that President Yushchenko is accomplishing something.

Mr. Yushchenko might be a flawed leader, but his aspirations overlap with the West's aspirations for Ukraine. That is what matters. By lifting Jackson-Vanik this year, before the parliamentary campaign begins in earnest, Washington would let everyone know that the Ukrainian president is not alone.

Source: Wall Street Journal Europe

Former Ukrainian Governor Arrested in Tampa at Ukraine's Request

KIEV, Ukraine -- A former Ukrainian governor was arrested in Florida at Ukraine's request on fraud and extortion charges, prosecutors and police said Thursday.

Ukraine's Prosecutor-General's Office accused Volodymyr Shcherban of abusing his position as the former head of the northern Sumy region to cause losses of tens of millions of dollars to Ukraine. The charges against him also include abuse of power.

Shcherban ran the regional government until January, when President Viktor Yushchenko assumed office and replaced many high-ranking regional officials. A few now face criminal charges linked to their time in office.

Shcherban was detained Wednesday in Tampa, said Inna Kisel, spokeswoman for Ukraine's Interior Ministry. The U.S. Embassy in Kiev said it was checking on the report.

Ukraine's Prosecutor-General Svyatoslav Piskun had begun the process of asking for Shcherban's extradition, his office said.

Ukrainian media reported that Shcherban allegedly conducted 50 financial transactions involving $47.8 million in the weeks before he left Ukraine.

Source: AP

Former Ukrainian Governor Detained in U.S. on Embezzlement Charges

KIEV, Ukraine -- Former governor of the Sumy region in Ukraine Vladimir Sherban has been detained in the U.S. at the request of the Prosecutor General’s Office in Kiev, RIA Novosti reported.

Vladimir Sherban
Sherban is facing charges of exceeding his commission, extortion and fraud that caused huge damage to the state estimated at tens of millions of dollars, prosecutors said.

In two weeks before leaving Ukraine he and his associates reportedly withdrew $48 million, including $22 million in cash, from bank accounts.

Ukraine’s Prosecutor General Svyatoslav Piskun is currently negotiating with his U.S. colleague on the issue of the former governor’s extradition to Ukraine.

Sherban was earlier put on the international wanted list and Ukrainian authorities asked the U.S. to help determine his whereabouts.

Source: MosNews

Call for Opening of Independent Investigation Into Paparazzi Attack Case

KIEV, Ukraine -- Reporters Without Borders urged President Viktor Yushchenko to open an independent and transparent investigation after a Molotov cocktail attack on the car of managing editor of the monthly Paparazzi as it was about to publish photos and an article critical of the president's son.

The Firebombed Bentley
In the early morning attack on 30 September, a Bentley belonging to Walid Harfouch, which was parked in front of his Kiev home, was badly damaged after the windows were broken and the firebomb hurled in.

"Journalists on this magazine have been suffering constant harassment and we remind the authorities that there can be no exception to the principle of protection of sources," the worldwide press freedom organisation said.

The 62,000 circulation magazine was about to publish photos of the president's son, Andriy Yushchenko, along with an article headlined, "How the tsarevich spends his holidays".

The president ordered Interior Minister Yuri Lutsenko to investigate the case on 2 October. At a press conference the following day, Lutsenko said that Harfouch had not made any link between his newspaper and the attempted assault.

"That is untrue", Harfouch himself told Reporters Without Borders. "The record of my statement has been posted on our website www.paparazzi.com.ua".

"They are obviously determined to brush this case under the carpet and we are victims of a campaign of denigration on the part of the authorities. Journalists on Paparazzi are suffering constant harassment from the Fraud Squad who want them to reveal who took the photos of Andriy Yushchenko" said Harfouch.

The magazine's offices have been occupied by police officers since 3 October. The magazine had a tax investigation slapped on it on 5 October. The investigators have not interviewed any of the witnesses to the attack but seized all the photos of the president's son that were at the magazine.

"They accused us of wanting to stage "a publicity stunt" for the magazine and to get the insurance for my car. That is absurd. The car was brand new and hadn't even been insured," Harfouch added.

Source: ForUm

Yushchenko Tries to Reverse His Ratings Slide

KIEV, Ukraine -- Last week Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko appealed to the nation in an effort to reverse the dwindling popular trust in his government and to save the parliamentary election campaign for his party.

Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko
Over four days Yushchenko gave an extensive interview to four TV channels, addressed an open-air rally in Lviv, and gave a two-hour press conference in Kyiv.

Yushchenko's message was that power-hungry former prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko, who had undermined stability and slowed economic growth, is no longer with him, and that his new team is pragmatic and goal-oriented.

Less than six months ahead of the parliamentary election, pollsters are registering disturbing trends for Yushchenko and his People's Union-Our Ukraine (NDNU) party. A public opinion poll conducted on September 15-25 by Ukrainian Barometer showed that popular trust in Yushchenko had dropped from 57% in June to 38% in September.

And a poll conducted at the same time jointly by Democratic Initiative and the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology revealed that were the parliamentary vote held today, NDNU would come in third with 14% of the popular ballots, behind the opposition Party of Regions and Tymoshenko's bloc, with each around 20%.

If this trend is not reversed and the constitutional reforms shifting some presidential powers to the parliament come into effect on January 1 as planned, Yushchenko's team may be elbowed out from the government after the polls by the likes of Tymoshenko and former prime minister Viktor Yanukovych, who remains leader of the opposition Regions party.

While post-revolution enthusiasm has been waning, economic growth has slowed and investors have steered clear of Ukraine. In August, for the first time since 1999, GDP fell by 1.6%, and the inflow of foreign investment dropped some fourfold compared to 2004.

This inevitably damaged popular trust in Yushchenko. Tymoshenko's dismissal by Yushchenko, and the subsequent signing of a reconciliation memorandum with presidential election rival Yanukovych badly affected Yushchenko's popularity among the most radical of the Orange Revolution's supporters.

Meanwhile, Tymoshenko threatens to hijack potential NDNU voters, accusing the party's top figures, like former National Security and Defense Council secretary Petro Poroshenko and NDNU parliamentary faction leader Mykola Martynenko, of corruption. In this situation, the nation was expecting Yushchenko to speak up, and he did so.

Ukraine's four major TV channels – UT1, Channel 5, Inter, and 1+1 – broadcast a 35-minute interview with Yushchenko during prime time on October 4. Yushchenko said that restoring stability in the country was the main task for his government now, and he admitted, "Many are deeply disappointed with the government team, which has failed to reach an accord that could have helped to form a single political force."

Yushchenko, however, made it clear that restoration of his alliance with Tymoshenko is unlikely: "If Ms. Tymoshenko seeks power for the sake of power, I am not her partner." Yushchenko accused Tymoshenko of scaring away investors with the re-privatization campaign and promised that the new cabinet of Prime Minister Yuriy Yekhanurov would be pragmatic: "They do not bear the burden of political promises."

However, the massive re-privatization campaign spearheaded by Tymoshenko was actually triggered by Yushchenko's own election promise to take illegally privatized facilities back from owners linked to the previous [Yanukovych] government.

On October 6, addressing a crowd of roughly 100,000 people in the central square of western Lviv, Yushchenko explained why he had banished Tymoshenko from the government. He accused her of preparing articles of impeachment against him when she was still prime minister and of deliberately undermining the state budget.

Yushchenko again accused Tymoshenko of launching indiscriminate re-privatization, and said that the attempted takeover of Nikopol Ferroalloys Plant in August was the last straw (Tymoshenko has been accused of collusion with tycoon Ihor Kolomoysky).

However, speaking in a city where Tymoshenko's popularity threatens to eclipse his own, Yushchenko tried to give the impression that bridges have not been burned: "There is still time, and perhaps they will be on the same side with the healthy forces."

On October 7, Yushchenko, fending off questions from journalists at a press conference in Kyiv, pledged no more squabbles between the cabinet, his secretariat, and the National Security and Defense Council. Yushchenko's main argument was that his new team is "apolitical," which might also be interpreted as meaning that his team is no longer bound by the populist promises of the Orange Revolution. The news conference was broadcast live by three national TV channels.

During his PR marathon, Yushchenko avoided comment on the recent allegations that Russian émigré tycoon Boris Berezovsky contributed to funding his victorious presidential campaign.

Earlier he had flatly denied the allegation. This controversy remains another serious potential threat to Yushchenko's popularity. On October 7, the Communist Party issued a statement urging Yushchenko to resign and the Prosecutor-General's Office to open a criminal case over "the betrayal of national interests and the violation of electoral legislation."

Source: Eurasia Daily Monitor

Arch-Important Witness

LONDON, England -- The Mitrokhin Archive, the most scandalous book about the KGB, was published six years ago. The continuation of the story of the KGB’s secret operations has just been released, after the author’s death, to bring more sensations.

The Mitrokhin Archive
Any literary critic will say that a sequel is normally inferior to the first book in both content and reader’s attention. Publishers of the UK version The Mitrokhin Archive, Volume 2: The KGB and the World and The World Was Going Our Way: The KGB and the Battle for the Third World US edition had good reasons to be afraid that KGB officer Vasily Mitrokhin and British intelligence historian Christopher Andrew’s joint work would have a similar fate. The amazing success of the first Mitrokhin Archive was, after all, the result of quite a fancy story [see the article below].

The publishers’ apprehensions did not come true, though. Many events described in the book have been widely covered long before. But they get some evidence only now. The book greatly broadens the view on the KGB’s role in the international policy. Many national heroes of emerging countries are now seen in a drastically different light.

Vano

The first and, probably, the main victim of the second volume of The Mitrokhin Archive is Indira Gandhi, code-named “Vano”. The documents disclosed in London state that India’s most famous woman was a KGB agent. It is quite obvious that she was under practically unlimited influence of the Soviet intelligence.

The KGB started paying attention to Indira Gandhi as early as in the mid-50s but at that time, she played an insignificant part of someone who could influence her father Jawaharlal Nehru, the first leader of the independent India. The first present that the KGB gave to Indira in 1955 was a fur coat. Gifts were getting more and more valuable. In the 1960s, the Soviet secret service bankrolled the election campaign of some prominent leaders of India’s ruling party, and after the party split up the Soviet supported Gandhi’s faction. From this moment, the Soviet influence on Indira Gandhi and her party became total. The KBG papers say that the Soviet intelligence service deliberately fostered the Indian’s distrust to the United States by constantly providing her with materials on the links of the opposition with the stateside intelligence. Gandhi’s fear of conspiracies ended up in paranoia.

Meanwhile, the KGB still financed the ruling party of India. Suitcases full of money were sent right to the prime minister’s residence. By late 1970s, the Soviet secret service funded several ministers, many regional leaders, ten newspapers and one news agency. Not a single step in India’s foreign policy was at odds with the Soviet diplomacy. Here is an example that could show how many spies worked for the USSR in the country. When an Indian minister offered a KGB against to sell important information and charged $50,000 for it, he got a refusal since this information was no longer a secret for the Soviet Union. It would be certainly impossible without the leadership of “dear Ms. Indira Gandhi”, aka “contact Vano”.

Leader

In contrast, the KGB’s efforts in Latin America were not that successful. Judging by the document published in the second volume of The Mitrokhin Archive, a major victory of the Soviet secret service was Chile’s Salvador Allende’s rise to power in early 1970s. The Soviet gave him the code name “Leader”.

Allende’s victory cost the KGB $420,000. The documents published in London do not answer the question whether Allende knew where the money for his election campaign was coming from. But even if he did not, he must be suspecting. It was not the Soviet Ambassador to Santiago that he regularly met as the main Soviet representative after assuming power but it was a KBG chief in Chile, Svyatoslav Kuznetsov, who personally “guided” Allende. The president’s lover, Miria Kontrereas Bell, known in Moscow as “Marta”, organized the meetings. It was at the first date with Kuznetsov that the Chilean leader agreed to launch the military and intelligence service reform to strengthen the mutual understanding between the two countries.

The KGB, however, soon realized that Allende was not the best candidate to contest the CIA in Chile. He was quite diligent in realizing all Soviet recommendations but he evidently lacked the rigidity. He was unwilling to turn Chile into a second Cuba. What is more, he was sure that the people would back him without the Soviet’s support, and evidently took pride in being the first Marxist to rise to power in Latin America democratically.

The KGB’s work halted when the new Soviet Ambassador to Chile, who would not play the part of the mission’s nominal head, arrived in 1972. The opposition between the member of the Communist Party’s Central Committee Alexander Basov and the KGB chief in Chile Svyatoslav Kuznetsov drowned the idea on the creation of the pro-Soviet regime in Chile. In September 1973, unreformed units of the Chilean army rebelled, and Salvador Allende shot himself with the rifle Fidel Castro had given him as a present.

Hydrologist

The project to turn Nicaragua into a socialist state was somewhat more successful for the KGB. The documents that Mitrokhin made public have it that Carlos Fonseca, the founder of the Sandinista National Liberation Front, who countered the pro-US regime and finally rose to power, was an active KGB agent, known as “Hydrologist”.

The Front was initially created not only to seize power in Nicaragua but also as to form sabotage groups to act throughout the whole of Northern and Central America. At the end of the 1960s, that a Sandinist group was sent to Mexico to examine the region with the view to carry out sabotage operations in the United States. Almost all operations of the Sandinists were fulfilled under the control or, at least, with the agreement of the KGB chiefs in Chile. It was the case in 1978 when a group led by Eden Pastora, another Sandinist and a future leader of contras, seized the building of the Nicaraguan Parliament and took the deputies hostages. Beforehand, Pastora agreed upon the details of the operation, aimed to release the imprisoned Sandinist leaders, with the KGB chief in Managua. The undertaking went off well. Pastora, the released leaders and a $500,000 ransom arrived in Cuba. The island was still the base of the KGB’s activities in the regions, and was called “Outpost” in the state committee’s documents.

The Second Caribbean Crisis

Fidel Castro did not catch the eye of the Soviet intelligence straightaway, in defiance of the popular opinion. According to the papers of Mitrokhin’s archive, the Soviet made first contacts with Castro only after he assumed office. It took the KGB some time to examine him until they let him make the island the Soviet outpost in the Western hemisphere.

The documents on Cuba are perhaps the tritest from Mitrokhin’s archive. Many things published now have been already widely known for a long time. And yet, the book contains some new and interesting details. For one, when Raul Castro, the younger brother of Fidel Castro went to Czechoslovakia to buy armaments, KGB agents in Prague reported that the second man in Cuba slept in his shoes and showed an exceptional fastidiousness in relationships with women demanding that all prostitutes who visited him be blond.

Readers of the second volume of The Mitrokhin Archive will naturally be surprised to learn that Cuba could have become the reason for the third world war twice, not only once, as was earlier thought. The book cites a report on the meeting between Fidel Castro and some Soviet general who went to Havana on inspection in 1982. The Cuban leader offered his country’s territory as a base to station nuclear missiles, which, as he claimed, was an adequate response to the basing of American missiles in Europe. The Mitrokhin Archive does not describe the reaction of the Soviet. This time was the beginning of constant reshuffles of General Secretaries in the USSR, and the KGB, as all other parts of the system, probably had to time to consider Cuba’s proposal.

After WWII Mitrokhin worked for a while in Kharkov, Ukraine at the military procurator's office. Mitrokhin died in the UK on January 23, 2004.

Source: Kommersant

Yushchenko Poisoning was 'Assassination Bid'

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine's top prosecutor said on Wednesday that President Viktor Yushchenko's dioxin poisoning was meant to kill him.

The comments by Prosecutor General Svyatoslav Piskun are the bluntest remarks to date from the prosecutor's office and mark the first time that prosecutors have called the poisoning an assassination attempt against Yushchenko, who was at the time the opposition leader and presidential candidate.

"It was not a poisoning, it was an assassination attempt," Piskun said. "We have absolutely proven that Yushchenko was poisoned with the aim of murder."

Yushchenko has long maintained that the massive dioxin poisoning he suffered during last year's bitter presidential race was an attempt to kill him. Yushchenko was knocked off the campaign trail for weeks, and his face was left severely pockmarked.

No one has been charged in connection with the poisoning, though Yushchenko maintains that the investigation is proceeding and that those responsible will face justice.

Piskun spoke Wednesday during a meeting with activists from the new political party Pora, a youth movement that was one of the main organisers of the Orange Revolution demonstrations that helped usher Yushchenko into power.

Source: AP

Ten Companies to Bid for Ukraine Mill

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ten companies are expected to bid for a majority stake in Ukraine's biggest steel mill later this month, in what could become the biggest privatization auction in this ex-Soviet republic's history, the prime minister said Wednesday.


Kryvorizhstal Steel Mill
Yuriy Yekhanurov did not identify the companies participating in the Oct. 24 auction and the government has refused to release a full list.

"We have 10 real challengers," Yekhanurov was quoted as saying by the Ukraine-Interfax news agency at the beginning of a Cabinet session.

The starting price was set at $2 billion, well above the $800 million paid last year by a consortium partly owned by former President Leonid Kuchma's son-in-law.

After a long legal battle, the government seized control of the mill in June, calling the earlier sale an outright theft.

Kryvorizhstal produces more than 20 percent of all metallurgical products in Ukraine. When it was sold last year, some of the world's largest steel companies, including Severstal and U.S. Steel, cried foul after their bids were rejected.

President Viktor Yushchenko had made the re-privatization of Kryvorizhstal a campaign issue during last year's Orange Revolution.

The cash-strapped government desperately needs the income from the sale to help fund next year's budget, experts say.

Source: AP

Yushchenko Ally Vows to Fight Allegations

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine's former top security official pledged Tuesday to fight abuse of power allegations as prosecutors launched a second investigation targeting the close ally of the president.


Petro Poroshenko
The move by prosecutors represents a huge fall for Petro Poroshenko, who until last month headed the powerful Security and Defense Council and counted himself as part of President Viktor Yushchenko's inner circle. Poroshenko, a millionaire who backed the Orange Revolution, promised to clear his name in court.

"The court case will prove the allegations are just absurd," said his spokeswoman, Irina Friz.

Prosecutors accused Poroshenko on Monday of interfering in the construction of a luxury apartment complex across from parliament. Ukrainian media reported that he threatened to block construction unless he received shares in the project - although he denied it.

Meanwhile, prosecutors issued an unusually high-profile appeal for information in connection with a fatal Sept. 25 car accident in northern Ukraine that allegedly involved Poroshenko's security escort. Although the statement did not mention Poroshenko by name, the investigation increases the pressure on him.

The accident has already drawn heavy media interest.

Some analysts suggest there may be political undertones to Prosecutor General Svyatoslav Piskun's actions. Yushchenko last week appointed one of Piskun's biggest critics as justice minister, suggesting the prosecutor's dismissal could be imminent.

By attacking Yushchenko's ally, Piskun may be vying for a place in the team of ousted Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, who now opposes the president, said Mykhailo Pohrebynsky, a political analyst with the Center for Political and Conflict Studies.

The Prosecutor General's Office refused to comment.

Some have also suggested that the investigations of Poroshenko could be a sign that Yushchenko has withdrawn his support from his close friend.

The rumors around the prosecutor's actions show just how politicized Ukrainian life remains, particularly ahead of parliamentary elections in March. That vote has assumed even greater importance after the split in the Orange Revolution team laid the stage for a real political battle.

Source: AP

Prosecutors Accuse Poroshenko of Abuse of Power

KIEV, Ukraine -- Prosecutors accused President Viktor Yushchenko's close ally Petro Poroshenko, the former head of Ukraine's Security and Defense Council, of abuse of power.

Accused Petro Poroshenko
"Investigators checked facts, questioned witnesses and decided to open a criminal case," said Yuriy Boyko, a spokesman for the Prosecutor General's office.

Poroshenko is suspected of hindering the business activity of two companies that constructed a building in downtown Kyiv, Boyko said.

Irina Friz, Poroshenko's spokeswoman, refused to comment on the charges.

The accusations of corruption against Poroshenko last month culminated in his resignation and the dismissal of former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, whom Poroshenko accused of being behind the allegations. The government's collapse represented the biggest political crisis to face Yushchenko since he won last year's presidential election. Opinion polls show that it has significantly damaged support for the Orange Revolution leader.

The charges against Poroshenko relate to a skyscraper apartment building still under construction on a hill above the Dnipro River in a historic part of the Ukrainian capital. In 2003, the Kyiv city planning council gave approval for the construction of the 20-story building, which was rumored to be the most expensive housing in Ukraine. The next year, the investor decided to increase the number of floors to 25. Even though the investor never received approval, 22 floors were built.

After coming into office at the beginning of this year, Poroshenko allegedly demanded a controlling packet of shares from the construction companies, according to the Interfax news agency. Poroshenko denied all the allegations, claiming that he was offered a bribe but refused it.

The construction of the elite building has triggered anger among Ukrainians and senior officials, who protested that it could damage the Ukrainian Orthodox Church's Monastery of the Caves located on the same hill.

Source: AP

A Reform by Any Name …

KIEV, Ukraine -- In heady, tumultuous December the world watched with admiration as, in the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s overturning of the manifestly rigged election results, the Ukrainian Verkhovna Rada [Parliament] swiftly passed a “package” of amendments to electoral laws, as well as constitutional changes affecting the role of President and parliament, which Leonid Kuchma just as rapidly signed into law.

The Ukrainian president, Leonid Kuchma (R), and the parliament speaker, Vladymyr Lytvyn (L), show the signed document agreeing electoral and constitutional reform in December 2004
There seemed cause for enthusiasm: after all, not only were electoral changes being introduced which could eliminate the possibility of further shenanigans, but the likely new President was actually prepared to hand over some of his powers to parliament. Laudable, indeed!

Perhaps not surprising, although regrettable, nonetheless, that little heed was taken of reputable human rights organizations such as the Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group (KHPG), the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union (UHHRU) and the many constitutional law experts, who had previously presented well-argued grounds for rejecting the constitutional amendments being suggested. In December they again spoke out publicly against the same amendments and the manner in which they were being pushed in as a condition of agreement to crucial electoral law amendments.

Since this hybrid creation has raised its head again in woefully similar circumstances, it would be well to consider these behind-the-scene deals before turning to the substance of our concerns. The “package” vote of December could be described in less salubrious terms. When bargaining turns into blackmail is a moot point we will leave to the reader to determine.

Clearly, in the conditions that existed in December, there was urgent need for laws which would eliminate vote rigging, and enable the voice of the people to be heard not only on “Maidan” (Independence Square in Kyiv and central squares in many other cities throughout Ukraine), but by the Central Election Committee and those trying at all cost to hold on to power.

However the fact that so few noted the (apparently) improbable band of those pushing for the “package”, including the head of Kuchma’s Administration, the leader of the socialists and of the communists, might surely have made more observers raise an eyebrow or two … Not to speak of the extraordinary haste with which the outgoing President was prepared to sign these changes into law.

In September 2005, the honeymoon over, Yushchenko faced his first major crisis. This article concerns more fundamental issues – unconstitutional amendments to the Main Law of the Nation, and we will leave it to others to debate the wisdom of his moves. The fact remains that at a time of political impasse, the President signed a Memorandum with his former presidential opponent, the first point of which is a commitment to introduce the “political reforms”.

Again, remembering the millions who stood in freezing December conditions day and night defending their choice of candidate and right to not have this gentlemen foisted on them through rigged elections, the role of Yanukovych as mouthpiece of reform is unexpected, to say the least.

So what are these “political reforms” in the shape of constitutional amendments that the world was delighted to mention in passing, as an appendage to electoral reforms, last December (just as certain politicians had hoped)?

The following gives the key points of concern. More detail can be found on the websites of KHPG and Maidan International – cf. the references below.

Reduced powers of the President.

Under the so-called “reform” a number of the powers which the Constitution assigns to the President of Ukraine would be given to the Cabinet of Ministers.

There is a bitter irony in the fact that it was the very presidential candidate for whose rightful election so many people were prepared to risk their jobs, education, and perhaps, since it is a miraculous achievement that the Revolution was bloodless, their lives, should have been forced to accept such amendments.

More importantly, there is a serious constitutional flaw here, since these changes were introduced between two rounds of voting in Presidential elections. Those who voted for Yushchenko (or Yanukovych) voted for a President with certain, constitutionally fixed, powers. These powers must not be taken away from him during a presidential term

Muddled powers of the President and of the Cabinet of Ministers

Firstly, if the “reforms” come into effect, some of the members of the Cabinet of Ministers will be appointed by and answerable to the President, while others will be chosen by and answer to the Verkhovna Rada and Prime Minister.

One can assume that they will at least remember who they’re accountable to, but if one considers that ultimately they are all answerable to the people, this cannot be considered an auspicious situation. The division of roles within one branch of power will inevitably lead to competition and likely conflict between President and Prime Minister which, given the unfortunate spectacle seen by all in September this year, should be treated with the seriousness it deserves.

While a considerable number of the powers presently vested in the President, have been passed to the Verkhovna Rada, the President’s ability to dissolve the latter has increased three times. Surely a recipe for either disaster or for pretty embellishments and icing to a cake whose ingredients remain entirely unchanged (and still just as unhealthy).

For a country with a young democracy, there are significant advantages to having a President with a real, not decorative, role. There can be situations where a decision is needed swiftly. One should not underestimate the vast scope for corrupting individual members of the Verkhovna Rada, as well as the likely stalemates caused by brutal power struggles between different factions. Nobody is suggesting that the President of Ukraine must be above such venal weakness (and only a person who had slept through the past 14 years of Ukraine’s history could!), however there are mechanisms available for impeaching a President. Surely it would make more sense to strengthen these mechanisms, than to make power, and with it, responsibility for decisions taken, more diffuse?

Increased role of party factions in the Verkhovna Rada

Two changes are of major concern here. The constitutional amendments both formalize a system of proportional representation which has never received sufficient consideration, and set out grounds and mechanisms for removing State Deputies from office. Justification for removing them would be, among other things, bucking the party line, that is, going against a party / bloc’s stand or leaving the ranks of that specific party or bloc.

One can argue that individuals are more easily corrupted than entire parties. This, again, is a matter of debate. What is less in dispute is the desirability, indeed, urgent need in a democratic state for people’s representatives who are primarily in office to represent their constituents’ interests. This can hardly be expected from Deputies who know that their job, and the considerable benefits which come with it, will be at stake if they don’t follow the party position. This also provides the leaders of these parties with an unacceptable degree of power, and a virtual carte blanche to use this power with impunity.

Post-Soviet or not so very post …

The President will require the consent of the government to appoint or change the Prosecutor General. More disturbingly, the latter has again been given, albeit reduced, powers of surveillance. In post-Soviet Ukraine this restoration of powers so abused in Soviet times evokes understandable suspicion.

How do you reform the Rule of Law?

The “political reforms”, in as much as they affect the Constitution are, quite simply, unconstitutional. The Main Law of the Nation – the Constitution - is quite clear as to how fundamental amendments (and the changes thus far mentioned are hardly cosmetic) must be introduced. Major changes must be approved by national referendum. It is also unambiguous as to when changes should not be made, that being at times of unrest, state of emergency etc. Whether or not the requisite papers were signed and the UN informed as to the imposition of a state of emergency, would anyone seriously wish to suggest that the situation in December 2004 was an auspicious moment for making significant changes to any fundamental laws?

It should also be noted that the draft law introduced on the back of electoral changes in December differed significantly enough from that which had passed through its previous reading in the Verkhovna Rada to require reconsideration by the Constitutional Court.

If anyone thinks this is a mere quibble, they should consider the importance that the Rule of Law has been given in the strongest and oldest democracies of the world and give some thought to the legacy Ukraine – and its neighbours – inherited, and the subsequent need to safeguard their young and fragile democracy.

The millions who defended their right to choose their President from October to December 2004 were upholding the principles of the Rule of Law and the fundamental basis of democracy. They voted for a Guarantor of their Constitution, and are now calling on the President they elected to stand firm and to fulfil this role. Nobody is suggesting that changes are not required, but they should be discussed correctly and not form part of a deal where the future of the country and its right to democratic elections is being held to ransom.

We call on all of those people throughout the world whose moral support was crucial in those months where the Ukrainian people defended – and won – their right to be heard, their right to live in a democratic nation where the voice of the people must be heeded, to support us now. This shameful behind-the-scenes pseudo-reform is not what we fought for and is not acceptable in a democratic state.

Source: Maidan

Spitting on the Memory of Independence Square

KIEV, Ukraine -- The heroes of the Orange Revolution are competing as if to determine who can spit more on the soul of Independence Square.

Yulia Tymoshenko (L) and Vladimir Putin - A love affair?
It seemed as if after President Viktor Yushchenko extended his hand to Viktor Yanukovych, the leaders of the revolution had nothing left with which to shock their supporters. But Yulia Tymoshenko didn’t hesitate to strike back, outdoing everyone with her “consistency” when, out of nowhere, she confessed her love for Vladimir Putin.

“You have a wonderful leader, one worthy of your country, and I think your country can be proud of its president,” she announced in an interview with radio station Ekho Moskvy on Sept. 24. It’s unlikely that such a phrase can be chalked up to banal political correctness. When one doesn’t want to speak poorly of someone, one doesn’t call him wonderful. Especially if that “wonderful leader” is famous for turning his country into an authoritarian state, for creating a one-party political system, and for having destroyed in the process the remaining outlets of an independent media. His administration has been notable, furthermore, for its violation of human rights and its interference with the functioning of foreign governments, as during the presidential elections in Ukraine. Naturally, Russian citizens should be proud of all this.

Could Tymoshenko – that same woman who, during the Orange Revolution, promised that the spirit of freedom would travel from Ukraine to Russia – have forgotten about this? The same Tymoshenko who a year ago claimed that Putin and former President Leonid Kuchma were preparing a “terrorist act” to spirit her to Russia and hand her over to a military prosecutor? Now the fiery revolutionary from Independence Square, who used to head parliament’s most nationalist fraction, might at any moment head to Russia to agitate for the “worthy” Putin, if he gets around the constitution and wins a third term.

Tymoshenko’s enthusiasm after her recent visit to the Russian capital was so obvious and direct that analysts immediately suspected her of having received Putin’s quiet support. And the leader of Batkyvshchina, of course, is interested in such cooperation, especially ahead of parliamentary elections. First, after the loud split with Yushchenko, she needs a new political partner. The Kremlin controls practically all the central Russian television stations so beloved in eastern Ukraine and Crimea. If these stations, which until now have been slandering the Orange Revolution and Yushchenko and Tymoshenko, suddenly exchange anger for kindness, it will be the second sign of the Kremlin’s cooperation with the “Orange Princess.”

The first sign was the lightning reaction of the Russian military prosecutor, who in one day cancelled Tymoshenko’s arrest warrant and called off the international search.

Some think that the idea of an alliance between Tymoshenko and Putin is absurd. In reality, they have more in common than might be evident at first glance. Recall their takes on reprivatization and the inviolability of private property, their way of separating acceptable oligarchs from unacceptable ones, and, finally, their unconstrained will to absolute power. When Putin became president, he, like Tymoshenko, was considered a democrat and even a reformer. In fact, nobody knew what kind of ideology he was preaching. And to this day we still don’t know Tymoshenko’s deep convictions.

In her political career she learned how to change partners and ideology with amazing facility. Being Yushchenko’s partner in the opposition, she was considered a zapadnik, a liberal and a free-marketer. The president himself believed that.

In a meeting with the editors of Korrespondent at the beginning of the year, Yushchenko said that the Ukrainian prime minister must be a proponent of a liberal ideology. But it seems the president was deceived, like everyone else. The destruction of the myth of the reformer/free marketer occurred in the first months of Tymoshenko’s premiership, when entrepreneurs discovered that nothing good could be expected of the new government. After her curtsies to Putin, it was clear that Tymoshenko’s pro-Western orientation was also an illusion.

While talking to Tymoshenko, the host of Ekho Moskvy, Matvei Ganapolskiy, noted that he was interviewing a “great storyteller, a person who creates her own worlds.” More and more Tymoshenko is gravitating toward mythology and not toward real geopolitics, economics, and ways out of crisis. This was clear even when Tymoshenko submitted her “wonderful” government program to parliament: its chapters carried headlines like “Faith,” “Fairness,” “Life” and “Harmony.”

When statistics testify to a drop in production, Tymoshenko accuses the statistics of black PR and says that life improved. Instead of answering assertions made against her government, she gives sentimental speeches about a bright future, trying to evoke the image of the mother-defender of Independence Square, defending her child to the death.

But that child has grown up a little bit; he’s entered a transition period. At this age he wants his parents to start talking to him like an adult, not babbling at him as if he’s a complete idiot.

Source: Kyiv Post

Moscow is Back in Fashion in Ukraine as Politicians Maneuver for Support

KIEV, Ukraine -- He's not Ukrainian, cannot vote or run for office here and is the leader of another state. But Russian President Vladimir Putin has nonetheless found his name attached to a small Ukrainian political party - the Party of Putin's Policies.


"Big Brother" is back in fashion in Ukraine
Moscow is back in fashion in Ukraine, with politicians from President Viktor Yushchenko to his ousted prime minister, Yulia Tymoshenko, turning their gaze eastward as they court the Kremlin's support ahead of the March parliamentary elections.

Analysts say wooing Moscow is such an ingrained habit here that even the pro-western rhetoric of last year's Orange Revolution failed to stamp it out. Last month, Yushchenko's new prime minister, Yuriy Yekhanurov, and Tymoshenko both dashed off to Moscow for competing talks with Russian officials.

"Like it or not, Ukrainians still have a tendency to look up to Russia ... the residual idea remains that Moscow is the center," said Ivan Lozowy, president of the Kyiv-based Institute of Statehood and Democracy.

Former lawmaker Sergei Kiyashko said his Slavic People's Patriotic Union Party renamed itself the Party of Putin's Policies to advertise its strong Russian bent.

"For us, it isn't just rhetoric," he said. "We wanted Ukrainians to understand there is a force out there that is serious about its orientation toward Russia."

Until recently, Russia's influence in Ukraine had been decidely on the wane.

During last year's heated presidential campaign, Putin traveled to Ukraine to stump for Viktor Yanukovych, sparking Western criticism and suffering an embarrassing defeat when Yanukovych's fraudulent victory was canceled. The Kremlin's political misstep proved to most Ukrainians that Moscow's days as a kingmaker were history.

Yushchenko's win initially shifted the focus westward as he set this nation of 47 million on a course for EU and NATO membership. Ukraine canceled visa requirements for EU nationals, and Yushchenko told Putin that Ukraine would now be looking out for its own interests.

But recent events show that Ukrainians seem unable to shake the habit of turning to Moscow for guidance.

Even Yushchenko chose Moscow as the destination for his first foreign trip as president. And dissatisfaction with the EU has grown recently because talks have failed to yield any big new initiatives for Ukraine.

"We have centuries of history with Russia. What if the West just doesn't understand us?" said Serhiy Antipov, 47, in the eastern, Russian-speaking city of Dnipropetrovsk, voicing a common worry.

A poll conducted last month by the Razumkov think tank found that 43.1 percent of Ukrainians think relations with Russia should be a priority - compared to 27.1 percent who believe the focus should be on the European Union. The poll of 2,011 Ukrainians had a margin of error of 2.3 percentage points.

The economies of Ukraine and Russia are closely intertwined. Russia supplies Ukraine with the cheap gas its metallurgical and chemical factories need. Nearly every strategic road, oil and gas pipeline from Russia to lucrative European markets runs through Ukraine, and Russia's navy still keeps its Black Sea fleet in the Ukrainian port of Sevastopol.

After the breakup of the Orange Revolution alliance last month, winning votes in the industrial, Russian-speaking east has become crucial for the members of the former coalition to offset the split in their shared western base.

"For many there is a need to be photographed with President Putin ... to set in motion those rumors that you had dinner," Yushchenko's chief-of-staff Oleh Rybachuk told the Kommersant newspaper while visiting Moscow.

Kyiv has sent conciliatory signals to Russia, describing Moscow as its "main partner," saying it would consult Moscow on its WTO bid and consider joining a fledgling common market led by Russia.

But analysts tend to see Yekhanurov's and Tymoshenko's visits more as political opportunism than as a change a change of heart toward Russia.

"These are both politicians who are relatively more pro-Ukrainian than anything we've seen in the last 14 years," Lozowy said. "Their wooing of Russia is tactical."

Source: AP

Former Ukrainian Police Officer Charged with Murder

KIEV, UKraine -- Former senior Ukrainian police officer, General Oleksiy Pukach, has been charged with masterminding the murder of the journalist Herohiy Gongadze, according to Chief Prosecutor Svyatoslav Piskun.

Piskun, now under the supervision of President Viktor Yushchenko, said on Sunday that Pukach directly planned the slaying of Gongadze.

Pukach is still at large for the time being and an international warrant has been issued for his arrest, the chief prosecutor said.

He added that further investigation is to be carried out to establish who else were behind the murder.

Gongadze, a journalist of the Ukrainska Pravda, known for his harsh criticism of high-level corruption in former president Leonid Kuchma's government, was kidnapped in 2000 and his decapitated body was found in a forest outside Kiev in November that year.

Piskun revealed that many high-ranking officials might have been involved in the case, and Kuchma would also be prosecuted if he is confirmed to have links with the murder.

Kuchma's government announced in May 2001 that Gongadze's case was over and the murder was committed by some gangsters. But opposition parties asked for further investigations, saying high-ranking officials were involved in the slaying.

On March 1, 2005, President Viktor Yushchenko announced that two police officers suspected of killing Gongadze had been arrested.

Source: Xinhua

Ousted Premier Eyes Comeback

KIEV, Ukraine -- Yulia Tymoshenko has made a career out of parlaying ordeals into opportunities. When the Soviet collapse saddled Ukraine with crippling fuel shortages, Tymoshenko plugged her energy distribution enterprise into the right political connections and became a millionaire.

Ex-PM Yulia Tymoshenko
Corruption allegations got her arrested and fired from a top government job in 2001, but she clawed her way back, rousing revolution out of a country yearning for change.

Now, a month after Ukrainian President and Orange Revolution confederate Viktor Yushchenko fired her from her coveted prime minister post, Tymoshenko is plotting another comeback.

"They think they can destroy my authority and credibility with the people, their trust in me," Tymoshenko said, curling a half-smile and narrowing her gaze. "The opposite will happen. In the March elections, the people will be on our side.

"I think I will become prime minister."

The fiery, telegenic Ukrainian has a knack for getting what she wants, and doing whatever it takes to get it. She was 30 when she set up her first moneymaker - making and selling pirated videos. By 36, her energy company, United Energy Systems of Ukraine, or UESU, had become an $11 billion enterprise.

Now at 44, she has reached the top tier of Ukrainian politics and is a media darling on both sides of the Atlantic. Forbes magazine recently ranked her the third-most powerful woman in the world, behind U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Chinese Vice Premier Wu Yi.

Her public appearances draw wild shouts of "Yulia!" from adoring Ukrainians. Her role as the inspirational force behind last year's Orange Revolution had made many Ukrainians forget her previous life as one of the country's oligarchs.

Recently, however, her popularity has taken a body blow with her firing from the prime minister post after just eight months, and the swirl of corruption allegations that accompanied Yushchenko's government house-cleaning Sept. 8.

Tymoshenko is confident she can win back Ukrainians' trust. But as she prepares for parliamentary elections in March that will shape Ukraine's future government, a larger question looms:

Can Tymoshenko, Yushchenko and what remains of the splintered Orange Revolution camp resurrect public confidence in a movement that has lost so much credibility since the Independence Square demonstrations last winter?

"The damage was huge," Tymoshenko said, "especially the damage to people's souls - the people who stood on Independence Square for the sake of the revolution. ... This is a big tragedy."

An endless stream of politicians and power brokers heading into her party headquarters on Kiev's Lesya Ukrainka Boulevard on a recent afternoon suggests her campaign to climb back into power is in full swing. Her sense of image-building is as strong as ever - she still wears her long, brown hair in a braided ring that crowns her head, the same Ukrainian peasant girl look she strove for during last year's demonstrations.

Visitors ushered into an anteroom to await appointments are greeted by a large poster showing Tymoshenko handing out roses to a police cordon during the Orange Revolution. The poster's caption reads "Beauty will save the world."

"Our team will fight for the possibility to form the government. We perceive these positions not as a goal, but as an instrument to realize the ideals of the Orange Revolution," Tymoshenko said during a recent interview at her office. "I don't want people's trust in government to die."

Tymoshenko grew up in Dnipropetrovsk, an industrial city of 1.1 million and the hometown of several other political heavyweights, including former Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev and Leonid Kuchma, the authoritarian ruler Yushchenko replaced.

The daughter of Lyudmyla, a dispatcher, Tymoshenko was raised by her mother in a khrushchovka, the nondescript tenement housing Nikita Khrushchev built across the Soviet Union during the 1950s.

After graduating from a city university, she began work as an economist. Then in 1990 she received from her father-in-law two videocassette recorders that she set up in her living room to produce pirated videos, according to Matthew Brzezinski's 2001 book, "Casino Moscow," which devotes a chapter to Tymoshenko.

Later, Tymoshenko, her father-in-law and her husband, Oleksandr, discovered a far more lucrative niche.

In the early and mid-1990s, Ukraine's economy was mired in an energy crisis, largely because the Soviet-era fuel distribution network it had with Russian suppliers disappeared with the country's independence in 1991.When longtime Tymoshenko family ally Pavlo Lazarenko became deputy prime minister - and later prime minister - in the mid-1990s, he ensured that Tymoshenko's UESU cornered nearly a third of Ukraine's gas imports market.

As a result, UESU eventually assumed control of 20 percent of Ukraine's gross domestic product, Brzezinski wrote.

"She was Lazarenko's protege, and she benefited from this," said Oleg Ivantsov, deputy chief editor of Kiev's Dyen newspaper.

Kuchma forced Lazarenko out of office in 1997. Three years later, Lazarenko was charged in the United States with money laundering and transportation of stolen property - an indictment that named Tymoshenko and UESU as being involved with Lazarenko in allegedly laundering millions of dollars in the mid-1990s.

U.S. authorities never charged Tymoshenko. In June 2004, a federal jury in California convicted Lazarenko of money laundering and extortion charges. He is slated to be sentenced later this year.

Before Lazarenko's firing, Tymoshenko had turned her attention to politics. She won election to parliament in 1996, and in 1999 teamed with Yushchenko for the first time, becoming his deputy prime minister for fuel and energy while he was Ukraine's prime minister.

Neither Tymoshenko nor Yushchenko lasted long in their jobs. Tymoshenko angered her energy sector rivals, introducing reforms that forced them to collectively pay $2 billion in taxes. Kuchma, who was president at the time, fired Tymoshenko in January 2001. A month later police arrested her on charges of fraud and money laundering. She spent 42 days in jail awaiting trial; later that year the charges were dropped.

Yushchenko's 16-month stint as prime minister ended when parliament fired him in April 2001. He went on to form Our Ukraine, a party that garnered the largest share of the vote in the 2002 parliamentary elections. Tymoshenko took her politics to the streets, organizing rallies that called for Kuchma to step down. A Sept. 16, 2002, demonstration drew tens of thousands of Ukrainians to the capital; tens of thousands more rallied in other Ukraine cities that day.

Never entirely at ease with each other, Tymoshenko and Yushchenko decided to band together for Yushchenko's presidential bid last year. And when it became clear authorities within Kuchma's regime had rigged the election to ensure that Kuchma's handpicked successor, Viktor Yanukovych won, Yushchenko and Tymoshenko rallied Ukrainians to Kiev's Independence Square in protest.

On stage in front of tens of thousands of demonstrators, Yushchenko was the authoritative voice of reason - Tymoshenko was the impassioned general revving up the troops for battle. When she ordered Ukrainians to form human blockades around key government buildings, thousands complied.

"She has natural charisma that makes it possible for people to believe her easily," said Mikhail Pogrebinsky, director of the Kiev Center for Political Research and Conflict Studies.

Five weeks of protests in frigid weather culminated in Yushchenko's victory in a repeat runoff election Dec. 26. Yushchenko selected Tymoshenko as his prime minister Jan. 24, repaying her for her role in the revolution. Within weeks, fissures in the Yushchenko-Tymoshenko team appeared.

Tymoshenko wanted wholesale revisions of privatizations of state-owned enterprises during the Kuchma era. Yushchenko urged a measured approach, calming Ukraine's investment community with assurances that only about a dozen privatizations would be scrutinized.

The trigger for Tymoshenko's firing appeared to revolve around her push to return to the state a metals plant Kuchma's son-in-law, oligarch Viktor Pinchuk, had obtained in a 2003 privatization widely regarded as rigged. Pinchuk accused Tymoshenko of targeting his plant solely to ensure it was eventually controlled by his rivals, a charge Yushchenko believed had merit.

Tymoshenko denied the allegation and accused Yushchenko's circle of advisers of trying to resurrect an image of Tymoshenko the oligarch - cunning, ruthless, power-hungry.

"I haven't been doing business for years, and all of Ukraine knows this," Tymoshenko said. "The campaign against me is based on the notion that 10 years ago I was very powerful. In a span of five years, I created the most powerful company in post-Soviet space. The memory of that exists, of course."

The scandal has scarred the image of the Orange Revolution and its principals. A poll last month by the Kiev-based think tank Razumkov Center found that less than a quarter of Ukrainians support either Yushchenko or Tymoshenko.

Nevertheless, some analysts say Tymoshenko has the political wherewithal to win enough votes in the parliament elections. A constitutional change that becomes effective in January makes those elections crucial; the amendment shifts key authority from the president to parliament, including the power to select a prime minister.

Tymoshenko is confident she can muster the votes to become prime minister again. Yushchenko would still be president, though, raising the prospect of further stalemate and chaos as the postrevolution government totters into its second year.

"The question is about compromise, and her ability to put up with being in the role of Person No. 2," Pogrebinsky, of the Center for Political Research and Conflict Studies, said. "She has always been Person No. 1 - she has always looked at herself this way."

Source: Chicago Tribune

Criminal Case Instigated Against Ukrainian Ex-President Kuchma

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s office has instigated criminal proceedings against former Ukraine’s president Leonid Kuchma and members of his administration.

Ex-President Leonid Kuchma (L)
The case is connected with the investigation of the opposition journalist Georgy Gongadze’s murder in 2000. The prosecutor’s statement quoted by ITAR-TASS news agency said that the case was instigated “in connection with the illegal dismissal of the Ukraine’s Prosecutor General Svyatoslav Piskun on October 29, 2003 which severely hindered the investigation of the journalist’s murder.”

Kuchma’s aides are charged with exceeding their authorities.

Piskun was appointed Prosecutor General in 2002 and dismissed a year later being accused of excessive politization in his office and causing damage to the “authority of the prosecution and the state in the whole.” On December 10, 2004, soon after the change of power in Ukraine, Piskun was returned to office.

He repeatedly connected his dismissal with the investigation of Gongadze’s murder.

Source: MosNews

Berezovovsky Foundation to Sponsor Ukrainian Journalist Murder Investigation

LONDON, England -- Civil Liberties Foundation of exiled Russian tycoon Boris Berezovsky has announced it will pay $1 million dollars to a person that will help solve the murder of a Ukrainian journalist Georgy Gongadze.

Collage of Boris Berezovsky (L) and Georgy Gongadze (R)
The announcement came a day after the Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko called on the international community to assist in search for the mastermind behind the murder.

“We ask witnesses, who have significant information concerning the case, to give evidence to the investigation, and we are ready to pay them observing their confidentiality as soon as officials inform us,” the Foundation head Alexander Goldfarb told journalists after meeting a team of the Prosecutor General’s office investigators.

“The move is being made in compliance with a successive Foundation policy to assist democracy development in ex-Soviet countries, including Ukraine,” he stressed.

Goldfarb also stressed that the promise to solve Gongadze’s murder was one of the most important ones, given by President Yushchenko to citizens of Ukraine during Orange Revolution last year.

The opposition journalist Georgy Gongadze was kidnapped on Sept. 16, 2000. The following month his headless body was found in a forest near Kiev. Shortly afterwards members of the opposition — in particular socialist leader Alexander Moroz — presented a tape that allegedly had the voice of President Leonid Kuchma giving orders for the journalist to be killed.

Boris Berezovsky seems to be very interested in Ukraine currently. In September he claimed that it was he who had sponsored Orange Revolution. A team of Ukrainian MPs was sent to London, where he now lives, to ask him numerous questions. They left Berezovsky satisfied and said he confirmed his controversial announcement. But later Berezovsky himself dismissed their words.

Source: MosNews

Food Poisoning Affects 330 Kids in Ukraine

KIEV, Ukraine -- More than 330 school children in western Ukraine were hospitalized with food poisoning, including four who were in critical condition, an emergency official said Saturday.

Khmelnitsky, Ukraine
The first 299 children, aged between 2 and 6, became ill on Friday, possibly from food prepared at seven kindergartens in the Khmelnitsky region. An additional 33 were hospitalized later Saturday, he said.

Health Ministry official Tetiana Yurchenko said a preliminary investigation showed that the source of infection as a dysentery bacteria in kefir, a popular drink made of fermented milk.

"It's up to the investigation to establish how the dysentery bacteria got in the kefir," she said.

The Defense Ministry sent military medics and was setting up 60 beds in two military hospitals to help treat the children.

Last year, poor hygiene at state-run dairies caused an outbreak of food poisoning among more than 800 children in the country's three regions, including the capital, Kiev.

Source: AP

Revisiting Chernobyl: Wildlife, Radiation Thrive

CHERNOBYL, Ukraine -- Passing through the first checkpoint, marked by a couple of low-slung buildings and a red-and-white pole across an otherwise desolate road, is an anticlimactic affair: A police officer sidles up, scans an official letter of invitation and glances into the back of the van before waving it on into the Chernobyl exclusion zone. It's a lovely fall morning.

Ghost Town of Chernobyl
Two visitors ride past some of the zone's 74 abandoned villages, derelict little homesteads overgrown with weeds. Many of their owners now live in high-rise apartment buildings between here and the capital, Kiev, about 60 miles to the southeast.

The driver maintains a modest speed. Too many animals tend to toddle out of the birch and pine trees now, he says. The flight of humans after one of the Chernobyl nuclear-power plant's four reactors blew up in April 1986 was a boon for wildlife.

There are wolves, elk, deer, boar and bison here. Bird-watchers have spotted white-tailed eagles, fish hawks, owls, black storks and the rare green crane. Fish are bountiful, and there's even aquatic life in the former cooling ponds.

Nature is bountiful, but this is still a spooky place.

Little mounds covered with radioactive signs indicate where contaminated rubble was dumped into hastily dug trenches and covered with soil. Hunting and fishing are banned within a 19-mile radius extending in all directions from the ruined reactor and reaching into neighboring Belarus.

The town of Chernobyl, several miles from the plant, once had 10,000 residents and now is home to some of the 9,000 people who work in the zone decommissioning the nuclear-power plant and servicing the forests and dams. If it's not exactly bustling, there are at least signs of human life — offices, a functioning store, a bar and laundry hanging outside windows.

The statue of Vladimir Lenin, outside the Chernobyl administration building, was painted orange late last year, the color adopted by supporters of a popular revolt that ushered in a new government in Kiev. Now it's back to gray.

At the Chernobyl Information Center, the visitors pick up their guide, Yuri Tatarchuk, 32, who works 15 days on, 15 days off, shepherding reporters, scientists and, increasingly, tourists around the exclusion zone's sights.

Extreme tourism, it's been called, a term Tatarchuk dismisses. "We prefer to think of this as educational," he said. Officials in the zone expect close to 1,000 tourists this year. A one-day excursion from Kiev cost two visitors $220, including lunch.

At the information center, they step onto something that looks like a person-size scale and press their hands against two steel pads. A green light flashes: so far, clean.

Next stop is Reactor No. 4, now encased in an ugly concrete sarcophagus that was hastily thrown up after the accident and needs to be replaced before the end of the decade lest it collapse. There are plans to encase the casing in a metal tomb.

The building abuts another reactor, No. 3, which was shut down in 2000. There are two other decommissioned reactors and two reactors that were never completed. Snaking through the vast complex is a wide cooling channel leading to an 8 ½-square-mile cooling lake.

The destroyed reactor can be observed at a distance of about 300 yards through the bay windows of a building that serves as an information center. But for security reasons, no photos are allowed from this vantage point. There are 180 tons of nuclear fuel, now in a lava state, resting inside the sarcophagus.

More than 200,000 emergency workers, known as liquidators, picked through the radioactive debris in the months and years after the explosion. Soviet exhortations still adorn some walls: "The Power of Friendship between the Peoples of the USSR is Stronger than the Atom," one reads.

Lunch, back in the town of Chernobyl, is out of a time capsule, a picture of Soviet prim. Today's fare is tomato salad, borscht, meat and mashed potatoes, washed down with mineral water. Workers pay little attention to the American, Canadian and Japanese guests, who make tepid jokes about mutant vegetables.

Next up is the city of Pripyat, now completely abandoned and located beyond another checkpoint.

Built in the 1970s, a couple of miles from the plant, Pripyat was a young model city when it died. Lenin Avenue's pedestrian zone is now a tangle of overgrown greenery, and branches brush the side of the van as it passes down the street. Moss covers the sidewalks. The apartments themselves were stripped long ago; they stand empty, their windows bereft of glass.

The avenue opens up onto a large square and around it stand the silent Palace of Culture, a sports complex, the Hotel Polissa, the Communist Party's local headquarters and a department store. Nearby is the amusement park with a ghostly Ferris wheel that was never used; it was supposed to start operating on May Day 1986, Tatarchuk says.

Pripyat's 45,000 former residents are now scattered around the world.

Hot spots with elevated radiation levels still dot the city and the wider zone. A trip to a huge vehicle graveyard where 2,000 radioactive cars, trucks and machines are parked is declined.

On the way back, the van stops at Evhenia Rubanova's house, a sweet little cottage on a tree-lined street in Chernobyl. Rubanova, 76, is among 358 mostly elderly settlers who have returned to their homes in the zone and are quietly tolerated by the authorities.

"We were given an apartment, but this is my place," Rubanova said, standing by the carefully tended flowers in her fenced yard. "What's an apartment? Chernobyl is a beautiful place, and this is where I want to be."

Rubanova, who returned in 1989, professes to have no fears about radiation. "If I was going to die, I'd be dead," she said, and then recommended with a hint of mischievous glee the local mushrooms, which are heavily radiated.

"They're delicious," she said. "Just boil them and then fry them and they're fine."

As the van passes the checkpoint to exit the zone, the visitors are required to step through another radiation-detection device. The green light flashes. Kiev beckons.

Source: Washington Post

NATO Demands That Ukraine Turns Itself Into Strong Democracy

BRUSSELS, Belgium -- NATO demanded on Friday that Ukraine stop talking about its hopes of joining the alliance and the European Union and try to turn itself into a strong democracy.


NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer
NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer quoted by Reuters told reporters after talks in Brussels with the new Ukrainian PM Yuri Yekhanurov, that “the key message this morning was ’Actions speak louder than words’.”

On Thursday, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso urged Ukraine “not to talk all the time about (EU) membership but to achieve concrete results.”

Yekhanurov promised to professionalize the Ukrainian army and vowed to work on public opinion. Polls show as little as one quarter of Ukrainians want to join NATO. “We shall build on the achievements of the old government and I hope we shall achieve more positive results,” Yekhanurov said. Polls show as little as one quarter of Ukrainians want to join NATO.

The new Ukrainian prime minister was appointed in September after the reformist Yulia Tymoshenko had been sacked.

De Hoop Scheffer, from his part, refused to forecast in public when Kiev might be offered an invitation.

Source: MosNews

Journalist Beaten and Warned to Halt Investigation

NEW YORK, NY -- The Committee to Protect Journalists today condemned an attack on a Ukrainian television reporter by an unidentified assailant who warned her to stop investigating the political party headed by former Prime Minister Yulia Timoshenko.


Reporter Natalya Vlasova of 34 Kanal, a television station in the eastern industrial city of Dnepropetrovsk, was attacked on Tuesday in a downtown street, and repeatedly hit in the head and chest, her editor Ruslan Uralov told CPJ. She is in hospital with concussion and bruising.

The attacker did not rob Vlasova but warned her to stop "poking her nose" into the affairs of the Batkivshchina (Fatherland) Party, Uralov said.

The local press reported that Vlasova had received anonymous threatening telephone phone calls for 10 days before the attack. She reported the threats to the police the day before she was beaten. The caller threatened to harm Vlasova, her parents, and six-year-old daughter if she did not stop looking into the business dealings of Batkivshchina, the media said. Vlasova was investigating the local Dnepropetrovsk branch of the party, they said.

Uralov, who is editor-in-chief of 34 Kanal's news department, said the station had not assigned Vlasova to such an investigation but she may have been carrying it out on her own initiative. The Dnepropetrovsk police opened a criminal case into the attack on Wednesday. CPJ is monitoring the investigation.

President Viktor Yushchenko, who was swept to power after the so-called Orange Revolution last year, dismissed Timoshenko and other ministers in September after months of power struggles and allegations of corruption inside his government.

Source: CPJ News

No Immunity!

KIEV, Ukraine -- It should go without saying that in a decent society, no one should be above the law. Ukraine has made progress in becoming that sort of society, but every once in a while it offers up an incident that reminds us that, after all, the Soviet era with its savage injustices wasn’t so long ago.


Interior Minister Yuriy Lutsenko is going to resign if the law, signed by president Yushchenko, restoring criminal and administrative immunity for local councils’ deputies comes into effect
Take the business this week concerning parliament’s granting of blanket immunity from prosecution to members of Ukraine’s regional and city legislatures. The Rada in its collective wisdom apparently wanted to make sure that provincial lawmakers should be able to break the law in this country, and get away with it.

It’s as crudely simple as that. As the bill envisions it, the guy who sits on the regional council in, say, Dnipropetrovsk or Lviv will now be able to steal, cheat, and even murder in complete freedom from the threat of prosecution, for as long as he occupies office. Yes, his fellow deputies could vote to lift his immunity, but it will be a cold day in hell before they vote against their own interests like that. Shamefully, President Viktor Yushchenko signed the bill late on Oct. 5.

Rumor has it that this reprehensible bill is the Yushchenko team’s sop to Viktor Yanukovych and his Regions of Ukraine party, who favor an extension of immunity. Yanukovych, of course, was Yushchenko’s partner in getting Prime Minister Yuriy Yekhanurov approved by the Rada recently, and now Yanukovych is said to be calling in the markers on behalf of his cronies in the provinces.

It’s bad enough that Rada deputies themselves are immune from prosecution. It creates a culture of cynicism, in which a mandarin caste of unaccountable rulers lords it over an inferior populace. It also turns the Rada into more of a sewer of corruption than it has to be, since some members acquire seats only to avoid going to jail. Immunity actually offers crooks an incentive to join parliament. Now the Ukrainian people are supposed to accept it as this system is expanded to the local level?

We’re aware of the arguments in favor of immunity. Chief among them is that, without it, nothing would get done, as the country’s political forces would do little else but try to destroy each other with politically-motivated prosecutions. There’s some superficial sense to that argument, since Ukraine still lacks the strong civil culture that prevents such abuses in countries that don’t offer their ruling classes immunity. But even if you grant that Rada immunity is a good idea – which we’re not inclined to – there’s still no reason to extend the privileges to every old boy on every council in the Ukrainian hinterlands.

It’s an interesting counterpoint to this business that in the United States right now, powerful Republican congressman Tom Delay is being indicted on money-laundering charges that could put him in jail. The U.S. need not be an example to Ukraine in all things, but this country should learn from that older democracy in this instance: even an old ally of President George W. Bush isn’t above the due process of the law.

This is a bad bill, and Yushchenko deserves censure for signing it. It will leave even more of a bad taste in our mouths if it turns out that his support for it represented a quid pro quo for political favors received from Viktor Yanukovych. The whole affair is depressing, and nothing less than an outrage.

Source: Kyiv Post Editorial

Yushchenko is Asked to Renege Agreement With Yanukovych

STRASBOURG, France -- Hanne Severinsen - rapporteur of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) - hopes that, even after the Yushchenko-Yanukovych memorandum, amnesty will not be given to those involved in election falsification.

Hanne Severinsen
"We hope that the election amnesty agreement will not apply to those who were involved in electoral manipulations. Those involved should be handled through the court system," said Severinsen during the PACE hearing about Ukraine.

Severinsen also underlined her position that reforms should not stop "due to political struggles, and are not supposed to depend on which side holds the power at the moment."

Additionally, Severinsen noted lack of progress in the Gongadze investigation.

Renate Wohlwendg, another rapporteur of the PACE in Ukraine, criticized the General Prosecutor's Office (GPO).

"Right now, the Office is operating under an outdated Soviet example. The General Prosecutor's Office has not reached full operational competency," said Wohlwendg.

She added, "we call upon Ukraine to restructure the Office in a way that would prevent the General Prosecutor to take on the responsibilities of ombudsman."

Wohlwendg remarked that the political reform adopted in December of 2004 "leaves grounds for doubts."

She named two clauses in the amended Constitution with which the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe disagrees: i) the right of the GPO to maintain a general oversight of law enforcement, and ii) the prohibition for deputies to switch factions in the new Verkhovna Rada.

Finally, Wohlwendg expressed hope that the next Ukrainian Parliamentary elections will be free and democratic.

Co-rapporteurs Severinsen and Wohlwendg prepared the draft resolution for PACE which, aside from criticisms, includes accolades towards recent developments in Ukraine. The debates on this resolution took place in the Parliamentary Assembly during the first half of the day on Wednesday, October 5th, 2005.

Source: Ukrayinska Pravda

Yushchenko Appoints New Justice Minister to Improve Europe Connection

KIEV, Ukraine -- President Viktor Yushchenko appointed Serhiy Holovatiy, a prominent lawmaker and chairman of the legal committee at the Parliamentary Assembly of Council of Europe, as the justice minister on Thursday.

New Minister of Justice Serhiy Holovatiy
Holovatiy, who has already served on the post between 1995 and 1997, replaces Roman Zvarych following a government reshuffle on Sept. 8.

The appointment suggests Yushchenko is determined to accelerate the process of adjusting Ukraine’s legal norms and regulations closer to those of the European Union.

“Holovatiy is well known in the Council of Europe. He has a lot of connections there,” Volodymyr Fesenko, the head of Penta, a Kiev-based political consultancy, said.

Holovatiy is currently in Strasbourg joining a session of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. He is expected to be back in Ukraine by the end of the week.

Holovatiy was a member of the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc in Parliament until two weeks ago, when he had been expelled for backing Yuriy Yekhanurov, Yushchenko’s choice, as the prime minister. Tymoshenko, unhappy about her dismissal, worked hard to derail the appointment of the new prime minister.

Yushchenko dismissed Tymoshenko Sept. 8 amid a sharp political crisis that had been triggered by allegations of corruption within the government team.

Zvarych, who was born in the U.S. and later accepted the Ukrainian citizenship, was backed by Yushchenko persistently despite being involved in several scandals, including a controversy over his university background.

But Zvarych recently said he was proud working in the Tymoshenko government, which may have forced Yushchenko to replace him with a more loyal figure.

Source: Ukrainian Journal

Yushchenko's Son Pays $2,500 per Night for His Hotel in Turkey

KIEV, Ukraine -- Andrei Yushchenko, the elder son of the Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko, has got into a scrape again. In the dead of night on September 30th somebody set fire to Bentley owned by Valid Arfush, a publisher of the magazine Paparazzi.

Andrei Yushchenko with Friend on Turkish Holiday
There are rumors going around Kiev that the car has been destroyed in retaliation for the publication of candid photographs showing Andrei Yushchenko's luxury holiday break in Turkey.

Speaking to KP yesterday, the brothers Omar and Valid Arfush confirmed the rumors.

"There has been some confrontation between you and Andrei before, am I correct?"

"Yes, you are. In March this year we took a picture of the president' son buying an expensive article of jewelry in the center of Kiev. We printed the photograph. Some time later my brother Omar and his sweetheart were having dinner at a restaurant. Andrei Yushchenko approached my brother and threatened to make the reporter disappear if our magazine prints any other pictures of Andrei. Later the head of security service of the president and the government minister telephoned us. They asked us not to make a fuss over the situation in Europe because it might damage the image of Ukraine.

"So what did you do after that?"

"We flew to France because we feared for our lives.

"But you did print the picture of Andrei for the second time, didn't you?"

"To be honest with you, my brother and I were considering the possibility of shutting down the shop. Alternatively, we could have stayed away from Yushchenko. We arrived at the conclusion that it was impossible to disregard Andrei. He likes partying, he gets in the spotlight. And our readers are keen to know things related to the president's son.

"What did you come up with this time?"

"Andrei was on holiday in Turkey," says Valid. He brought along his numerous friends. His hotel bills ran up to $2,500 per night. Once he entered the restaurant, the owners shut it down for any other patrons."

"How could he learn about your plans to print the photographs about his Turkish holiday?"

"We published an announcement of the coming issue of Paparazzi in one of the Kiev newspapers. We got threats on the telephone shortly after that. Then I saw my car burning down on September 30th. Somebody smashed the window with a dumbbell and threw a can of gasoline inside. We moved to France again. But telephone threats keep coming in.

Source: Pravda

Yushchenko Makes Plea for Growth

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko urged his new government on Wednesday to create favorable conditions for business to kick-start slumping growth and bring back reluctant foreign investors.

Cabinet of Ministers Meeting
Chairing a meeting of the team assembled after last month's dismissal of former Orange Revolution ally Yulia Tymoshenko, he told ministers to concentrate on the economy and steer clear of politics ahead of March's parliamentary election.

"If we want to provide proper European wages and pensions we have to ensure economic growth," Yushchenko told the session.

"To ensure economic growth we must mobilize financial resources in the form of investment. And to mobilize them we need to have clear procedures for Ukrainian business."

Yushchenko said the ousted government, riven by months of infighting, had done little to improve the business climate. "Two-thirds of the measures which impeded business were in fact government orders," he said.

Foreign investment in the first quarter had totaled a paltry $300 million. "You cannot dupe the economy. Just what can one expect to do with $300 million in investment?"

Under Tymoshenko's stewardship, growth in the ex-Soviet state sank to its lowest rate in five years, with forecasts for 2005 scaled back to 4 percent from 6.5 percent and more.

Source: Moscow Times

EU to Sound Out Ukraine's New PM on Reforms After Government Shake-up

BRUSSELS, Belgium -- European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso meets with newly installed Ukrainian Prime Minister Yuriy Yekhanurov Oct. 6 and will sound him out on his government's commitments on economic and political reforms, officials said.

EC President Jose Manuel Barroso
Barroso "will want to know what the situation in the country is ... what is going on with the reform process," EU External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner told reporters Wednesday.

Last month, President Viktor Yushchenko fired the previous premier, Yulia Tymoshenko, an ambitious Orange Revolution ally.

He replaced her with Yekhanurov, an economist, who has challenged his new Cabinet to make boosting Ukraine's economic performance a priority.

Staying the course on reforms would be welcomed in Brussels, officials said, and may encourage the EU to grant Ukraine coveted market economy status ahead of a Dec. 1 EU-Ukraine summit in Kyiv.

Recognition as a market economy is largely symbolic. Yet it would give Ukraine added protection against possible charges of breaking global trade law on antidumping. Economic reforms may also qualify Ukraine for more financial and economic assistance from the European Union.

Ukraine has ambitions to join the bloc, but the EU has ruled that out. Instead, it wants to craft a program of close economic and political ties.

Source: AP

Ukraine Resumes Missile Tests

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine’s army was due to resume tests of surface-to-air missiles today, four years after the accidental downing of a commercial airliner during a military exercise.

S-200 Missile

Defence Minister Anatoly Gritsenko and other top-ranking commanders were to watch the test of the S-200 missile from the southern Crimean Peninsula.

The test was to be the first since October 2001, when a stray S-200 missile hit a passenger jet over the Black Sea, killing 78 people – mostly recent Russian immigrants to Israel.

Ukraine suspended live surface-to-air missiles tests following the disaster.

Ukraine’s impoverished and poorly trained army has been plagued by accidents, with more than 700 servicemen killed in mishaps over the past six years.

Source: Ireland OnLine

Russia Still Gets It Wrong On Ukraine

KIEV, Ukraine -- Russian leaders were delighted, even gleeful, when Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko was fired in early September. Their unabashed gloating confirms that Moscow still does not realize why its interference in the 2004 Ukrainian presidential elections failed so miserably. Instead, Russian officials have continued to look wistfully toward Ukraine.

Russia's Kremlin
Russian leaders believe that the ongoing political crisis could lead to Ukraine's disintegration or civil war between eastern and western Ukraine. If the country divides, Ukraine might return to Russia and end President Viktor Yushchenko's pro-Western foreign policy. These scenarios are decidedly wrong.

The 2004 presidential elections proved that Ukraine has changed since Leonid Kuchma was first elected president in July 1994. The 1994 vote followed a far deeper crisis, when hyperinflation and strikes by miners forced then president Leonid Kravchuk to call early presidential elections.

Throughout the 1990s the central issue of Ukrainian politics was statehood; that is, would Ukraine survive as an independent state. This issue was resolved in the 1999 presidential elections when Kuchma defeated the Ukrainian Communist Party leader.

The defeat of the main domestic threat to independence (the Communists) and the end to an external threat from Russia (after it recognized Ukraine's borders) changed the central issue of Ukrainian politics to what kind of state would be built. This would, in turn, directly influence Ukraine's integration either with the Commonwealth of Independent States (as a corrupt, oligarchic, authoritarian state) or with "Europe" (as a democratizing state).

During Kuchma's second term in office Regions of Ukraine (RU) replaced the Communists (KPU) as the leading pro-Russian party. Although both the KPU and RU are pro-Russian, they differ in that only Regions of Ukraine favors Ukrainian statehood. Thus the party shift was a positive development for Ukrainian stability.

Russia strongly backed then prime minister Viktor Yanukovych to succeed Kuchma in 2004. Yanukovych, however, denied that Russian President Vladimir Putin "came to visit me personally, it was not a strategy of my election campaign". After Yanukovych's defeat, the Unified Russia party signed a cooperation agreement with Regions of Ukraine.

The Ukrainian Communists have rapidly declined since the 1999 elections. Eastern Ukrainian voters have since shifted from the Communist Party, which now has only 11% support in this region, to Regions, which has 51.7%.

Russian political commentators earnestly – but wrongly – believe that the current government crisis will re-orient Ukraine eastwards. The selection of Yuriy Yekhanurov as prime minister and Anatoly Kinakh as secretary of the National Security and Defense Council (NRBO) are cited as "evidence" for this argument.

A political expert with the Moscow INDEM think tank believes that Ukraine's foreign "re-orientation" was inevitable. "Russia is the country from which money, and lots of it, comes to Ukraine. There is no way around this. Ukraine's economy depends heavily on Russia. All the talk about ‘turning West' was euphoric. The fact is Russia and Ukraine have long and close ties that neither can do without".

Russian political commentators have reached the wrong conclusions about Ukraine's crisis for three reasons.

First, their reliance upon Regions of Ukraine as their domestic ally gives them a regional, rather than national, view of domestic developments inside Ukraine. The Donetsk region, where RU has its main base of support, is different from the remainder of eastern Ukraine, let alone other regions of Ukraine.

Second, neither Kinakh nor Yekhanurov will re-orientate Ukraine's foreign policy towards Russia and the CIS. Nevertheless, Russian media claimed that Yekhanurov's September 30 visit to Moscow was tantamount to a "surrender" to Russia.

The Russian newspaper Nezavisimaya gazeta wrongly concluded that Yushchenko was doing an about-face and returning to Russia. "This means de facto that the leaders of the ‘orange revolution' have abandoned their earlier ideals. The Yushchenko team has turned back to the principles and methods for conducting foreign policy that characterized the Kuchma regime." Another Russian newspaper, Kommersant, believes that the Yekhanurov government will be "pro-Russian" because it "is closely linked to Russian capital."

Yekhanurov's ascent does not indicate a policy shift. He has been an ally of Yushchenko's since the latter was prime minister in 1999-2001. Moreover, the president, not the prime minister, formulates foreign policy. Two-thirds of the ministers in the Yekhanurov government are holdovers from the Tymoshenko government, including pro-Western foreign and defense ministers.

Interviewed on ICTV, NRBO secretary Kinakh continued to outline Ukraine's interest in only taking part in step one of the CIS Single Economic Space; that is, a free-trade zone. Foreign Minister Borys Tarasyuk reiterated this view during his September visit to the United States. While Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan support steps two (customs union) and three (monetary union), Ukraine continues to oppose both.

Third, Russia continues to get it wrong about Ukraine because it still sees the region as "Little Russia." According to new a poll by the Moscow-based Levada Center, 71% of Russians favor a unified state with Ukraine. Only 24% are against.

At the same time, the Russian population is more realistic than the ruling elites. Only 18% believe a union with Ukraine is realistic, with another 35% thinking it could take place in the distant future. Whereas 48% believed that a union was likely with Belarus, only 15% thought this was the case with Ukraine.

Many analysts suggest that Moscow might apply pressure to Kyiv using the threat of higher energy imports. But energy-supply discussions ahead of winter are a perennial problem that even pro-Russian states, such as Belarus, find difficult when dealing with Moscow. The same is true of Ukraine.

The September political crisis in Ukraine and change in government will not alter Ukraine's declared foreign policy goals of Euro-Atlantic integration. The success of this goal will be decided by the outcome of the March 2006 parliamentary elections. If pro-reform forces are able to overcome their personal divisions and create a parliamentary majority for Yushchenko, the country will support Euro-Atlantic integration. For now, the U.S. administration supports Ukraine's movement from Intensified Dialogue on Membership to a Membership Action Plan for NATO. What parliament does from 2006 to 2011 remains to be seen.

Source: Eurasia Daily Monitor

Ukraine Head Promises Reform Move

KIEV, Ukraine -- Mr Yushchenko was swept to power during the Orange Revolution. Ukraine's President Viktor Yushchenko has pledged to implement a political reform that will devolve much of his powers to the prime minister and MPs.

In a national TV interview, Mr Yushchenko also said the country's new government would achieve economic stability "within two to three months".

Ukraine has seen a sharp decline in economic growth since Mr Yushchenko took power in January.

Last month, he sacked Yulia Tymoshenko as prime minister and her cabinet.

Ms Tymoshenko was a key figure alongside Mr Yushchenko in the so-called Orange Revolution that brought him to power after the disputed elections in December.

'Pragmatic Government'

"My position is simple and logical: political reform must take place," Mr Yushchenko said in the interview aired on Ukraine's four major TV channels.

"I gave my word that I would do nothing destructive to the constitutional initiative adopted by parliament, so none of Ukraine's 48 million citizens can say Yushchenko is defending his powers."

The president was referring to the constitutional changes approved late last year in a compromise move during the controversial presidential elections.

The changes are due to come into effect in January, ahead of key parliamentary elections in March.

He also described the new government of Yuri Yekhanurov as a "pragmatic" team that was "not burdened by political promises".

Forecasts for economic growth in 2005 have been recently scaled back to less than 5% from over 6.5% earlier in the year.

The president also said he would try to patch relations with ambitious Ms Tymoshenko, but admitted that it "should be a different relationship".

"If all Yulia Volodymyrivna (Tymoshenko) seeks is power and power alone, it is her choice. I am no partner for her in this," he said.

Mr Yushchenko had earlier said his decision to fire the entire cabinet was forced upon him by the absence of unity and bitter infighting in his former government team.

Ms Tymoshenko blames aides to the president for the "deeply unjust" move and has distanced herself from Mr Yushchenko.

Source: BBC News

Ukraine: Will the Orange Revolution Boost the IT Outsourcing Industry?

KIEV, Ukraine -- The impact of the choice for democracy Ukrainians made in late 2004 spreads far beyond politics. This article elaborates on how the Orange Revolution can help the Ukrainian IT outsourcing industry to gain momentum.

The victory of democratic presidential candidate Victor Yushchenko came as a result of the continuous nationwide protests of millions of Ukrainians, outraged with the forged results of the presidential elections. The voice of the IT industry was also heard among the voices of millions.

In early December 2004, more than one-hundred Ukrainian IT companies sent their representatives to the "Hi-Tech March" to show their support for the democratic presidential candidate. About 3,000 IT workers marched the streets of Ukrainian capital Kiev (Kyiv) wearing orange bands and waving orange flags. The participants of the march had not only the future of their country, but the fate of the rapidly growing IT outsourcing industry at stake.

Now Ukraine has a new, more appealing global image that contributes to turning the country into a new European business hot-spot. As Eastern Europe emerges as an outsourcing alternative to Asia, Ukraine now has all the chances to broaden its portion of the outsourcing pie. "This may be just a coincidence, but it is right in the first months of 2005 we signed several long-awaited contracts with strategic customers such as Philips and Siemens," says Kutsyy.

The country currently has over 300 outsourcing companies that export ITO services. Analytical company MarketVisio, together with Gartner, estimated ITO services from the Ukraine to reach $150 million in 2005, which represents 50 percent growth in comparison to the previous year.

The current industry size is far below its potential. Among the factors that have hampered its development in recent years are the legislation and business climate. Ian Marriot, Vice President and Research Director at Gartner, still calls for caution when dealing with the country, as "Ukraine has been divorced from the international business community for a continuous period of time."

Already, big foreign companies are rushing to explore Ukraine's pool of talent. Flextronics, a major global electronics manufacturing services provider, has placed around 1,500 of its 7,000-strong engineer force in the Ukraine.

The size of the labour pool, quality of education, and the labour cost base are all major criteria of offshore outsourcing decisions. Now Ukraine has high scores across all these dimensions. The country's population (47 million) is the sixth-largest in Europe, and its capital Kiev is a mere two-hour flight from major European cities such as London, Amsterdam, or Paris. To make the trip to Ukraine even simpler, its government has introduced a visa-free travel for the visitors from the EU, US, and several other countries. There is no wonder that this year the country expects to at least double its revenues from the incoming tourism.

Indeed, Ukraine has historically been strong in education and science; there are almost a thousand colleges and 600,000 students. The National Academy of Sciences, whilst reduced in the course of the 1990s "brain drain," employs almost 30,000 engineers and researchers. Today the Academy supports 170 scientific research institutes, including the internationally-renowned Glushkov Institute of Cybernetics, and eight techno-parks which address the challenges of innovation.

Since the Orange Revolution, the new government has demonstrated its intent to transform the country. Despite a Ukrainian economy heavily dependent on Russian oil and gas, Yushchenko is firm in his commitment to develop strong ties with the West. At the summit of NATO foreign ministers in Vilnius, Lithuania in April 2005, Ukraine was invited to begin an intensified dialogue on membership aiming to enter NATO in 2008-2009. It is also expected to enter the World Trade Organization by the end of 2005, and looks set for eventual membership in the EU.

On the opposite side of the news spectrum, the country's political and economic environment is far from stable. The fall out between President Yushchenko and his Prime Minister Julia Timoshenko led the President to dismiss the Cabinet in September, which posed a question mark over the political stability in the country in the face of parliamentary elections that will take place in spring 2006.

But even if the government succeeds in sustaining stability and economic reforms, there are other factors crucial for the establishment of the solid outsourcing expertise in the country. Marriot asserts, "Once the large captive operations are established in Ukraine, it will raise its profile. This will increase the skill level and allow people to move into the IT industry more easily. It would have a knock-on effect on existing providers. Ukraine needs to have a strong value proposition, the right focus on skills, and the right type of organisations and marketing."

The outsourcing industry is already raising its profile by organising the country's second Ukrainian Outsourcing Forum on the 29-30th of November, 2005. For entrepreneurs, reaping the benefits of the Orange Revolution is just a question of time.

Source: AlwaysOn

The Princess and the Heavy Metal Musician - a Real Love Story

KIEV, Ukraine -- An aspiring heavy metal musician from Yorkshire has married into the closest thing Ukraine has to a royal family, exchanging vows with glamorous former Prime Minister Julia Tymoshenko's daughter.

Yevgenia Tymoshenko (R), the daughter of dismissed Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, and her husband Sean Carr, a British rock musician, drink champagne after their wedding
Sean Carr, 36, who used to run a chain of shoe-repair shops in Leeds and Bradford, married Yevgenia Tymoshenko, 25, in a 16th-century hilltop monastery in Kiev.

His image and past have caused controversy in Ukraine.

The Tymoshenkos are a wealthy and powerful family. Julia Tymoshenko is known as the Goddess of the (Orange) Revolution because of the role she played in overturning the results of a rigged election in December last year.

She went on to become Prime Minister but lost her job last month when President Viktor Yushchenko sacked the Government over a corruption scandal.

Ms Tymoshenko has since vowed to stand against Yushchenko in elections next year and is tipped to win back her role.

Yevgenia has lived in Britain since the age of 14 and is in the process of completing her studies at the London School of Economics. She met her new husband in Egypt during a holiday last year.

Carr's background is rather different from his new wife's.

He sings in a band called the Death Valley Screamers and rides a Harley Davidson motorbike.

Carr also owns a rottweiler called Salem and sports a giant tattoo on his stomach of an alien "escaping".

His band plays in Kiev's local bars and its first CD release in Ukraine appears to be selling well.

He also has a young daughter by a former partner who said in a British tabloid newspaper that Carr regularly beat her up and in 2002 broke her teeth, upper jaw and collarbone.

Carr was found guilty of assault and was sentenced to two years' probation and ordered to take relationship and anger management counselling.

He and his new partner were initially reported to be planning a wedding at Ripley Castle in Yorkshire but to have changed their plans to avoid adverse publicity.

If Julia Tymoshenko has any doubts about her new son-in-law she has not expressed them publicly, saying only that Carr is a "kind, educated and inspired person" who makes Yevgenia, her daughter, very happy and appears to "adore" her.

The wedding ceremony went smoothly at the weekend. There was bagpipe music and Ukrainian folk songs. Carr and the Death Valley Screamers were due to perform at the reception afterwards.

Many of the 150 wedding guests sported colourful tattoos and piercings. The couple briefly posed for photographs but announced they had decided they would not take questions from journalists.

The duo have said they intend to settle in Ukraine and start a family.

Journalists were anxious to see whether Yushchenko would attend the wedding in order to ascertain the state of relations between him and Julia Tymoshenko, but he did not appear to have been invited.

Source: New Zealand Herald

Russia, Ukraine: "Orange Revolution a Source of Division"

MOSCOW, Russia -- “It is absolutely inadmissible that our two peoples... should be divided and the fissure is widening all the time because of this mess,” Putin said, answering a question about simplifying border crossings between Russia and Ukraine.

The questioner -- a Russian woman complaining about the difficulty in visiting her grandchildren in the Ukrainian city of Kharkov -- had referred to last year’s “orange revolution”, which toppled the veteran pro-Moscow government of President Leonid Kuchma, as the “orange mess”.

Putin said he was working with Ukrainian President Victor Yushchenko on simplifying the border crossing between the two countries.

Russia backed Yushchenko’s arch-rival Victor Yanukovich in last year’s presidential election, which sparked demonstrations that led to the ouster of Kuchma.

During his TV appearance Putin repeated assurances that he would step down at the end of his second term and promised Russians a share in the country’s booming oil wealth.

Addressing the controversial issue of whether he will comply with the constitution and leave the Kremlin in 2008, Putin said that “abrupt changes in legislation, to the constitution, would not be prudent. As for me, I’ll find my place in the ranks,” he said.

Fielding questions from 12 cities across the vast country live on national television, Putin also dismissed accusations that Russia has backtracked on democracy during his more than five years in the Kremlin, saying: “The danger of a return to a monopoly on power does not exist.

Source: Monday Morning

Bells, Bagpipes and a Wedding. . . Ukrainian Style

KIEV, Ukraine -- It was billed as the ultimate fairytale wedding — if a little on the unconventional side.


Yevgenia Tymoshenko (R), daughter of the former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko (C), stands with her husband British singer Sean Carr (L)
Sean Carr, a former cobbler and heavy metal musician from Leeds, married Yevgeniya Tymoshenko, the daughter of the former Prime Minister of Ukraine, yesterday in a private ceremony at the 11th-century Vydubitskiy Monastery.

In brilliant sunshine, the 36-year-old lead singer with the Death Valley Screamers — now big in Ukraine — emerged with his bride, a 25-year-old London School of Economics student, to the incongruous sound of bagpipes mingling with the monastery’s bells.

The 6ft 4in biker had tied his shoulder-length hair back for the occasion and wore a crumpled cravat and embroidered waistcoat. In one hand he held a top hat and in the other an icon.

Yevgeniya, in a lacy skirt and top, clutched a stuffed pink pig with her flowers.

Tattooed Yorkshiremen mingled with the 100 well-wishers who chanted “Happiness! Happiness!” as the couple briefly posed for photographs and sipped champagne. Mr Carr smashed his glass on the pavement. This would probably have got him an ASBO back in Leeds, but here it was received with rapturous applause from Yuliya Tymoshenko, his new mother-in-law, who made an estimated $6 billion in the energy business in the 1990s and then co-led the Orange Revolution last year.

The newlyweds were then whisked off in a white Soviet GAZ Chaika limousine to a lavish reception at Krystal Palace, one of the most exclusive new restaurants in Kiev.

But the fairytale scenes were overshadowed by allegations from Mr Carr’s ex-partner, Emma Carr, 37, that he flew into drunken rages and beat her so badly in front of their daughter, Charlotte, then 7, that she had to wear dentures. Plans for a wedding in Britain have been put on hold since the revelations.

Ms Carr — who never married Mr Carr but changed her name by deed poll — said at her home in Otley, West Yorkshire: “I fell for him, so I can understand what she sees in him. He comes across as charming, self-confident and very magnetic, but he’s a very different person to live with.”

The attack, in the early hours of Christmas Day, was the last in a series that led to Mr Carr being given two years’ probation for assault in 2003.

If Mrs Tymoshenko disapproves of her daughter’s choice, she has been careful not to show it in public. She said recently: “I know him as a kind, educated and inspired person who loves my daughter very much, which is the most important thing.”

Svetlana Loza, 65, a well-wisher outside the monastery, said she was aware of the allegations but, like many Ukrainians, had a more tolerant attitude to domestic violence.

“That was his old life. This is his new life,” she said. “Sure, maybe he hit her. It happens.”

Ms Carr said: “I wish her [Yevgeniya] all the best. But she’s a beautiful, young, very eligible girl and I think she could have done an awful lot better — she could have had a decent man.”

THE ODD COUPLE

Yevgeniya Tymoshenko, 25

- Heir to a reputed £6 billion gas fortune

- Her mother, Yuliya, was recently dismissed as Ukrainian Prime Minister but is expected to run for President

- A student at London School of Economics, she often accompanied her mother to rallies during the Orange Revolution last year

Sean Carr, 36

- A long-haired, heavy metal fan who fronts a band called Death Valley Screamers, now very popular in Ukraine

- His tattoos include a large alien emerging from his stomach

- Sentenced in 2003 to two years’ probation for assault and ordered to undergo anger management

Source: Times On Line