Nigerian Pastor Finds New Flock In Ukraine

KIEV, Ukraine -- Inside one of Ukraine's biggest sports halls a band pumps out deafening music surrounded by pom pom-waving dancers in shiny blue outfits.

Sunday Adelaja
Thousands of people are on their feet enthusiastically singing and clapping along, as if at a pop concert.

A Pentecostal church called the Embassy of God is sweeping across the country.

It claims to have 25,000 members in the capital alone.

For many people here a church service that has a feel-good factor is something new.

"First of all I liked the music and I liked the girl who was singing on the stage. Maybe that's why I went back again. Then I understood that there's a God and he loves us," says maths teacher Roman Bazhok, who has been a member of the church for two years.

Political devotees

One of the main reasons the Embassy of God attracts so many people is down to its charismatic leader Sunday Adelaja.

He left Nigeria to escape witchcraft and to study in the Soviet Union.

After the collapse of communism Pastor Sunday, as he is known, started his own church with just handful a of fellow African students in the capital.

Now politicians and even Kiev's mayor Leonid Chernovetsky are regulars.

Wearing a striking green suit, Mr Adelaja charms the audience with tales about the temptations he has turned down.

Speaking in accented Russian he tells the youthful congregation they should abstain not just from sex but also kissing before marriage.

Then looking close to tears, with his hands in the air, he says a prayer.

Today he is preaching to more than 10,000 people at the same place in Kiev that was used to host the Eurovision Song Contest last year.

The Embassy of God hires this venue once a month.

Normally services are held at a dilapidated hall in an industrial part of the capital and at other churches throughout the country.

Uncertain response

Pastor Sunday says he has faced a lot of hostility in Ukraine.

"Can you imagine a black man coming from Africa, in this society; here you are lucky if you are white because if you are black you will feel the difference," claims Mr Adelaja.

"Here there are not too many black people. Even the Orthodox priests say to me go and play basketball, go and play soccer but don't try to teach us how to live."

Church leader Sunday Adelaja with Kiev mayor Leonid Chernovetsky
Critics are wary of the church's links with politicians like Kiev's mayor

The Orthodox Church is still the main religion in Ukraine despite the Embassy of God growing in popularity.

Golden-domed churches dominate the skyline of Kiev.

Inside St Michael's Cathedral priests in purple and red robes conduct an early morning service led by Father Superior Yevstratiy Zorya.

Ancient icons glow in the candle-light as women wearing headscarves kneel on the cold stone floor.

Nothing like the Embassy of God has ever been seen before in Ukraine.

Some critics are suspicious of this evangelical movement and its close relationship with powerful politicians.

'No brainwashing'

The Orthodox Church feels threatened. It says Embassy of God is a cult.

"The followers become like zombies - they are fully devoted to the leader of the organisation, ready to fulfil any of his desires," says Father Superior Yevstratiy Zorya, spokesman for the Orthodox Church in Kiev.

"It also has an impact on political life, because these people help to campaign for the politicians loyal to their church."

The Embassy of God says there is no brainwashing. Instead it targets people who feel rejected by society.

It runs a homeless shelter in the capital which helps prostitutes, drug addicts and members of the mafia like Alexander Skrypin.

"Before my encounter with God I was quite a rich person, but it didn't save me from being drunk in the gutter and living in brothels. After coming to Embassy of God I know that my life is for living," says Alexander, a former bank robber.

Many people have become alienated following the end of the Soviet Union.

There is poverty, unemployment, and a state which is no longer able to care for everyone.

Perhaps the reason that this new church is so popular is that it offers a sense of community, something which has been in short supply for many Ukrainians.

Source: BBC News

Top Chinese Adviser Starts Official Visit To Ukraine

KIEV, Ukraine -- Top Chinese adviser Jia Qinglin arrived in Kiev Monday, beginning his official goodwill visit to Ukraine, the last leg of his four-nation Europe tour.

Chinese adviser Jia Qinglin
Jia Qinglin, chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), said upon his arrival that China and Ukraine have exchanged frequent high-level contacts, enhanced mutual understanding and increased mutual trust since the two countries established diplomatic relations in 1992.

During the past 14 years, cooperation between the two countries has been broadened with fruitful results in the areas of politics, economy, science, technology, education and culture, Jia said in a written statement released at the international airport in Kiev.

"During my visit to Ukraine, I will exchange views with Ukraine leaders over further development of bilateral relations and deepening of exchange and cooperation in various fields.

I believe that China and Ukraine friendly cooperation relations will reach a new level under joint efforts of the two sides," said the leader of CPPCC, China's top advisory body.

Ukraine is the last leg of Jia's Europe tour from Oct. 22 to Nov. 3, which has taken him to Britain, Lithuania and Estonia.

Source: Xinhua

Ukraine Shot Down On EU Entry Hopes

HELSINKI, Finland -- Ukraine president Viktor Yushchenko continued to hammer on enlargement as the EU-Ukraine meeting in Helsinki drew to a close on Friday (27 October) afternoon, but got zero political commitment in return.

Ukraine's President Viktor Yushchenko (L) and Finland's President Tarja Halonen (R) in Helsinki
The dioxin-scarred Orange Revolution veteran told press he was "occasionally worried about the intention to determine EU borders" adding "we hope these discussions will not result in the creation of some new Berlin Wall along the EU borders."

Ukrainians "need to see the European doors open" the president stated, warning that unless the new EU-Ukraine treaty for post-2007 relations contains explicit recognition of Kiev's accession hopes "the political chapter of the agreement will have no sense."

Mr Yushchenko assured Brussels there would be no rerun of last year's winter gas crisis and said he would co-sponsor new pipelines to bring Caspian oil and gas to Poland under the "Brody" project and to Austria under the "Nabucco" scheme.

"The integration of the Ukrainian energy system into the European energy network is a part of Ukraine's strategic ambition to join the European Union," he said, having previously suggested membership talks could start in 2008.

But European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso gave a blunt response to the president's call, saying "Ukraine is not ready, and we are not ready [for discussions on enlargement]," AP reports.

"Ukraine still has reforms to do...and today in the European Union, member states are not ready to assume new membership obligations," Mr Barroso stated, adding that his words are not a "negative signal" but a spur to work on the new pact.

ENHANCING RELATIONS

Official talks on the so-called "Enhanced Agreement" [EA] between the EU and Ukraine are tabled to start in early 2007, with a "deep free trade area" at the heart of the programme dependent on Ukraine's speedy entry into the WTO.

But the draft EA treaty contains nothing on enlargement so far, while Friday's summit conclusions foresee only a "development of stronger economic and trade relations" and "increasingly close co-operation" on foreign policy.

Politically speaking, the draft EA puts Ukraine on a par with other EU "neighbourhood" states such as Morocco or Azerbaijan at a time when Europe is suffering from post-2004 enlargement fatigue but engaging in ever-closer relations with Russia.

Meanwhile, external relations commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner told Reuters "it is a particularly difficult time for the process of democratic consolidation and the overall reform process in Ukraine."

EU VOICES STABILITY WORRIES

"Political stability will be one of the key priorities that president Yushchenko has to find," she added, in reference to the recent comeback of Russia-friendly, anti-NATO politician Viktor Yanukovych as Ukraine's PM.

Brussels is wary that Yushchenko-Yanukovych wrangling could slow down WTO entry and the creation of the EU free trade zone, or even damage sensitive projects such as the EU border monitoring mission for the breakaway Moldovan region of Transdniestria.

"The importance of the continued implementation of the joint declaration by Ukraine and Moldova on customs was highlighted," the summit conclusions said on the Transdniestria customs scheme, which is deeply disliked by Russia.

Friday's summit also saw the EU and Ukraine ink a deal on cheap EU visas from 2007 onward and Ukrainian phone operator, Ukrtelecom, sign a contract to buy 3G mobile phones from Finnish giant Nokia.

Source: EU Observer

Armed Group Tries To Seize Street Market In Eastern Ukraine - Police Arrest 90 Suspects

DNIPROPETROVSK, Ukraine -- An armed group clashed with police while trying to seize control of a public market in eastern Ukraine early Monday in what appeared to be an ownership dispute, regional police said.

Ozerka market in Dnipropetrovsk
Two police officers were injured, and some 90 people were arrested in an early morning attack on the Ozerka market in the eastern city of Dnipropetrovsk, the regional Interior Ministry department said in a statement.

The market, which is run by the state, was sold in a privatization deal in 2004 to a company called Regionoptservis, but the sale was later canceled due to alleged breaches, Ukraine's Unian news agency reported.

Police said that, around dawn Monday, a group of about 150 people arrived on buses to try to seize the market's headquarters, using small explosives and air-powered guns. Special police forces were called in.

Ten of the intruders were arrested at the market, and 80 others picked up later, police said.

An investigation into who was behind the attack was under way.

Ownership disputes in Ukriane sometimes lead to attacks in which armed groups are hired to seize control of a property or business.

Source: AP

Nokia Supports Ukrtelecom In Launching The First WCDMA 3G/HSDPA Network In Ukraine

ESPOO, Finland -- Nokia and Ukrainian fixed line and broadband operator, Ukrtelecom JSC, have signed a three-year frame agreement for the supply of 3G core and radio network as the operator is extending its services to the mobile domain.


Nokia 3G WCDMA Base Station
Nokia will support Ukrtelecom's Utel branch in opening the first WCDMA 3G/HSDPA network in Ukraine which will enable the operator to provide new end-user services, such as high speed data transfer for WAP, Internet access, video calls, and streaming for video and audio.

The network will be launched in the Kiev area, from where it can be rolled out to other parts of the country. The deal marks a new customer for Nokia.

Nokia will be the sole supplier of Utel's core and radio network covering the Kiev area. The contract includes Nokia's innovative 3G radio solutions, such as the modular, high capacity Nokia Flexi WCDMA Base Station, and the Nokia High Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA) software.

The network will be supported by the multivendor, multitechnology Nokia NetAct(TM) network and service management system. Nokia will integrate value-added services platforms and a billing solution in the network, and provide network planning, implementation and training services.

"We are proud to be the first to launch a WCDMA 3G/HSDPA network in Ukraine. Our new services will be launched first in the capital city, which means that they will be serving Ukrainian citizens, business life, as well as foreign visitors," says Stanislav Gursky, Director, Utel branch of Ukrtelecom. "Our cooperation with Nokia enables us to enhance our business, and their innovative solutions will help us provide a wide range of new end-user services with top performance."

"We are delighted to support Ukrtelecom in entering the mobile business, which will enable them to expand their service offering and bring them new revenue opportunities," says Mikko Elomaa, Country Manager, Networks, Nokia. "In addition to helping Ukrtelecom develop their business, this deal is significant also for Nokia, as it will strengthen our position as a key player in Ukraine and in the East European market."

In WCDMA 3G, Nokia has 63 customers to date. High performance Nokia HSPA is a simple software upgrade to Nokia WCDMA networks, thus enabling a fast, cost-effective rollout.

Nokia HSPA is made up of two key technologies, HSDPA (High Speed Downlink Packet Access) and HSUPA (High Speed Uplink Packet Access), enabling true mobile broadband with breakthrough data speeds of up to 14.4 Mbps in the downlink and up to 5.8 Mbps in the uplink.

Nokia HSDPA offers almost 10-times faster data services than current 3G networks, generating an enhanced service experience.

Nokia is a leader in the HSDPA market, with a large number of HSDPA contracts. Many network operators have already opened their HSDPA networks with the Nokia solution.

Source: Nokia Press Release

Ukraine’s West Attracts Electronics

UZHHOROD, Ukraine -- A major international electronics manufacturer has launched construction of an electronic components plant in western Ukraine in a move that looks to capitalize on Ukraine’s inexpensive labor, tax breaks and the huge consumer market located next door in the EU.


The move could be a step toward turning Ukraine into a leading regional hub for the supply of electronics products, on par with Asian electronics manufacturing giants, but some market experts say the Ukrainian authorities are still doing too little to provide foreign electronics producers with enough incentives to enter the country.

United States based Jabil Circuit, a global designer and manufacturer of electronics components for diverse industries, announced Oct. 2 that it had launched the construction of a 26,000-square-meter electronic components plant in the western Ukrainian city of Uzhgorod.

The facility, which Jabil Circuit said will employ up to 1,500 highly qualified Ukrainian specialists, is to be located in the Transcarpathian Special Economic Zone (SEZ), which enjoys tax and custom duty breaks meant to stimulate economic growth and business development in the region.

The new plant will represent a significant addition to the company’s existing production capacities in Uzhgorod, where it already employs 940 workers at two facilities. Jabil Circuit has been renting these two facilities since December 2003.

Jabil Circuit plans to put its new plant into operation by the spring of 2007.

“Our intention is to first develop a high-tech park in Ukraine in order to build a fully integrated design and manufacturing solution line for our worldwide customers in the automotive, consumer and telecommunications industries,” Philippe Costemale, general director of Jabil Circuit Ukraine Ltd., told the Post Oct. 17.

Costemale said that Ukraine’s skilled, cheap labor force, the short export distance to the rest of Europe and the availability of raw materials, could easily allow Ukraine to develop as a large electronics supply base, and potentially turn the country into a leader on the world electronics manufacturing market.

“But the clock is ticking, and this will not happen if appropriate legislation is not put into place to facilitate investment,” he said.

According to Costemale, the new leaders in the electronics manufacturing industry, such as India, Malaysia and Brazil, “are developing appropriate investment conditions to successfully attract high-tech investors that manufacture for export, and they combine that attractiveness with having a huge domestic market.”

He said that many global high-tech industry leaders have visited Ukraine in the last several years to consider investment in the country.

But “most of them have been discouraged by the lack of responsiveness from the Ukrainian authorities to provide the appropriate customs regimes and tax incentives similar to those existing in Central European countries.”

According to Costemale, frustrated by not receiving a simplified customs regime from the Ukrainian authorities, a lot of investors who were considering manufacturing electronic components for export in Ukraine froze their projects in the country or reoriented them to Romania, Bulgaria or Russia.

He said that most other global electronic products manufacturers operate in the U.S., Europe and Asia.

Singapore-based Flextronics International Ltd. is Jabil’s only other competing foreign electronics manufacturer in Ukraine, according to Costemale.

Petro Reminets, the general director of an electronics plant that Flextronics is putting up in the same SEZ where Jabil is building, agrees that Jabil is his company’s only competitor.

Flextronics started building its electronics plant in the west Ukrainian town of Mukachevo in 2004, but construction works were frozen due to the government’s temporary cancellation of the special economics zone only to be restarted several months later.

According to Reminets, the facility will launch operations before the end of 2006, employing more than 2000 specialists.

He told the Post on Oct. 23 that the new Flextronics plant will produce components for such international companies such as Philips, Epson, Nokia and others, adding that all of its production will be exported to Europe.

Volodymyr Prykhodko, the general director of the Transcarpathian Regional Investment Agency, which promotes investment projects in the region’s SEZ, said that Jabil Ukraine has exported “hundreds of millions of dollars” worth of its products from Ukraine to the EU.

He said that Jabil Ukraine has already invested $29.5 million in Ukraine for construction of its new plant in Uzhgorod and plans to invest a total of $45 million to build a second plant that will employ an additional 2,500 people.

“This is a solid and transparent investment,” Prykhodko told the Post.

Jabil representatives, however, refused to provide the Post with exact sales figures, citing commercial confidentiality.

Like Costemale, Prykhodko said that Ukraine is capable of becoming a production leader in the market of electronic components.

He said that Jabil Ukraine currently imports inexpensive input components from abroad and exports very expensive output to the EU.

“Very expensive products are being manufactured by Jabil on the territory of Ukraine,” said Prykhodko.

He also said that the high educational qualifications of the indigenous labor force and proximity to European markets could give Ukraine an advantage over other, more distant regions where electronics are produced on a massive scale.

Citing “China, for example, which is very distant from the European market,” he said.

“For instance, roughly 90 percent of a mobile phone’s body is produced by Jabil in Ukraine, after which it takes only two days to deliver the goods to Finland, the Netherlands or anywhere else in Europe for final assembly as the most popular brands, like Nokia, Siemens, and so on.”

According to Prykhodko, it is unfortunate that the Ukrainian government has no policy to stimulate the domestic electronics market or the development of Ukrainian electronics brands.

Costemale said that for manufacturers that export 100 percent of their products, VAT and customs duties should be suspended for a minimum of 180 days for the temporary import of electronic components that are used for the production of the finished or semi-finished products made in Ukraine.

He also said that imports of manufacturing equipment should be fully exempt from customs duties, “because high tech requires constant investments.”

Customs duties for electronics exports, currently at 0.2 percent of a product’s value (the same as for imports), should also be canceled, he said.

According to Costemale, as of now Jabil is not enjoying any of the above benefits, except for the right on VAT suspension for 90 days, which is granted to all the businesses operating in SEZs, as per a Cabinet resolution of 2005.

However, Costemale said, even the VAT suspension now enjoyed by Jabil involves a great deal of red tape, and every export operation demands approval from the tax authorities, banks and other bodies. “We can put up with this while we are exporting our products on a relatively small scale. But when we start exporting on a large scale, such bureaucracy will be impossible for us to deal with,” said Costemale.

“Two world leaders in electronics manufacturing, Flextronics and Jabil Circuit, have decided to invest in new capabilities in Ukraine,” said Costemale. “Their success can send a very positive signal to the international investment community.”

Jabil provides electronics design, manufacturing and product management services to global electronics companies such as Phillips, Nokia, Hewlett-Packard, IBM and others, and operates production facilities in 20 countries, employing a workforce of around 65,000.

Source: Kyiv Post

Ukraine's Geopolitical Predicament: While Longing For Place In United Europe It Cannot Ignore Russia's Concerns

WASHINGTON, DC -- This week’s events confirmed that Ukraine is being pulled in two directions as it faces a strategic dilemma. On the one hand, Kyiv is pushing for associated membership with the European Union and a free-trade deal with the rich bloc.


Viktor Yanukovich (L) and Mikhail Fradkov (R)
On the other hand, the country’s heavy dependence on Russia for energy compels Kyiv to accommodate Moscow’s interests. Needless to say, the Kremlin looks askance at Ukraine’s European aspirations.

Today, October 27, Ukraine’s President Viktor Yushchenko is taking part in the annual Ukraine-EU summit in Helsinki, Finland, as the Finns currently hold the bloc’s rotating presidency.

According to well-informed sources in the Ukrainian delegation, one of Kyiv’s main expectations from the summit is the beginning of negotiations on a new framework agreement on cooperation between Ukraine and the EU. Another key issue will be talks on the creation of a free-trade zone between Ukraine and the EU.

The Ukrainians hope that the new pact will include the prospect of eventual membership. For its part, Brussels remains noncommittal, reflecting what has come to be known as “enlargement fatigue.”

Following its expansion to 10 new countries in 2004, the bloc is about to take in Romania and Bulgaria and is engaged in negotiations with Croatia and Turkey. So far, the EU has been reluctant to grant Ukraine a “membership prospectus” and instead included it in its “neighborhood policy” along with Belarus, the South Caucasus countries, Israel, and several Arab nations around the Mediterranean Sea.

Kyiv is deeply dissatisfied with what it perceives as Europe’s cold-shouldering and insists that it has the right to be treated differently than the other European “neighbors.”

Prior to Yushchenko’s meetings with EU leaders in Helsinki, Ukraine’s envoy to Brussels was quite explicit about the EU’s perceived snubbing of Kyiv. “Ukraine accepts the European Neighborhood Policy but we do not welcome it,” said Roman Shpek, head of the Ukrainian mission at the EU, on October 25. “Our country is in Europe. We are not a neighbor to Europe,” he explained, adding, “For us, it is not pleasant to be in the same basket as Morocco, Libya, or Israel.”

Integration with United Europe is a priority for Ukraine, asserted Shpek. He also remarked that Ukraine might in the future apply for an association agreement with the EU.

In Brussels, Ambassador Shpek was a guest of the EU-Ukraine Business Council (EUUBC) debate on the current state of economic relations between the two sides. During the meeting, the EUUBC unveiled a special report addressed to the parties of the Helsinki meeting.

The blueprint calls on the EU and the Ukrainian government to focus their efforts on several key issues. The report suggests that the Ukrainians should concentrate on achieving better market access to the EU for its producers. Kyiv should also aim at improving legal certainty and property rights in Ukraine.

The report stresses the need for the EU and Ukraine to jointly promote and implement energy efficiency projects. Most importantly, the report urges the Ukrainian government to speed up the negotiations on the accession to the World Trade Organization and commence negotiations on a free-trade agreement.

Commenting on the delayed WTO negotiations, Ukrainian officials confirm Kyiv’s commitment to finish the talks in January 2007 at the latest. But this likely is easier said than done -- not least because of the Russian factor.

On October 24, speaking at a news conference in Kyiv after talks with his Ukrainian counterpart, Viktor Yanukovych, Russia’s Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov said that Ukraine should respect Russia’s position on issues like cooperation with NATO, the EU, and the WTO. “I would say quite openly that we need to synchronize the negotiation process of our countries on WTO,” Fradkov said. He also raised concerns about the pro-Western ambitions of President Yushchenko.

Fradkov’s remarks came immediately after Ukraine cut a relatively beneficial deal on gas supplies for 2007 with Russia. Under the terms of the agreement, Ukraine will get at least 55 billion cubic meters of natural gas at no more than $130 per 1,000 cubic meters.

Kyiv appears to have willingly agreed to a 36% increase in gas price, knowing full well that it is still a good bargain: the Yanukovych government had already figured the $130 price into Ukraine’s 2007 budget.

However, the gas deal seems to come with certain strings attached, as it will likely require Ukrainian concessions that would increase the Kremlin’s influence over its Slavic neighbor.

Fradkov’s suggestion that the two countries have to synchronize their accession to the WTO is the case in point: such a move would slow or stall Ukraine’s entry and the start of a free-trade deal with the EU.

Moscow’s game is based on the two principal considerations. First, Russia fears that if Ukraine enters the WTO first, it could conceivably seek to influence the terms of Russia’s entry. Second, if Ukraine does get such leverage over Russia, the importance of Moscow’s energy leverage vis-à-vis Ukraine will likely diminish.

Source: Eurasia Daily Monitor

Luxury Kyiv Apartment Block Increasing Both Floors And Prices

KYIV, Ukraine -- The prices for real estate in the Ukrainian capital have been climbing steeply for the last couple of years, but in the case of one residential project in the center of town, they are going up faster than floors can be added to the building.


Capitol Center
The Capitol building, which is being constructed on the city’s main Khreshchatyk Street, was touted as Kyiv’s most expensive block of flats in the October issue of the Ukrainian real estate magazine Building.

And although only seven of Capitol’s planned 11 floors have been completed, developers say that all the luxury apartments have been sold and that a total of 15 floors are likely to be eventually built to meet continuing demand.

The project is being developed by 21st Century Investments, a Kyiv-based real estate investment company, which is best known for launching the Kvadrat brand of shopping centers.

21st Century’s board of directors is headed by Lev Partskhaladze, a former member of the Kyiv City Council, whose European Capital party lost its bid for the mayor’s seat in the last elections.

According to Vyacheslav Ushakov, who is managing the Capitol building project for 21st Century, apartments began selling at around $4,000 per square meter (sq. m.) in late 2003, when the Kyiv City Council allocated the 2,800 sq. m. prestigious land plot.

Now, he said, flat prices have more than doubled, exceeding the $10,000 mark. Ushakov predicts that by late March of 2007, when Capitol is scheduled for completion, the price per sq. m. will reach nearly $13,000.

The developer said that an average apartment in Capitol is around 200 sq. m., which puts the current price of a flat well into the seven-digit domain. Ushakov noted, however, that none of the 40 tenants who bought apartments in the posh residential complex have paid the whole sum upfront.

Instead, these “affluent individuals representing various groups of society, both businessmen and officials,” opted for a financing scheme that allows them to pay up within a year.

“This is definitely not the case of years-long housing loans. The clients are expected to be adequately secure financially.”

According to Ushakov, the 11-floor project’s initial projected expenditures was Hr 38 million (around $7.4 million), but this figure has increased due to rising construction and material costs.

He said he now expects a 70 percent profit margin.

Ushakov said city regulations for downtown residential construction require developers to give up 12 percent of their apartments to the city for distribution among the “socially vulnerable.” However, this will not be the case for Capitol’s $2 million apartments.

According to Ushakov, 21st Century has an arrangement by which the city will be given apartments in less expensive buildings built by the real estate investment company.

Ushakov denied that any members of the Kyiv City Council who were involved in allocating the land for Capitol’s construction back in 2003 will be tenants in the new building.

He said the luxury block of flats will be like a clubhouse, a closed community with hotel-like reception service to prevent trespassing.

In addition, the complex also will boast its own swimming pool, fitness center and spa – open to the public, but accessible through a separate entrance.

But the addition of more floors in the building might work against the Capitol’s clubhouse image, according to Serhiy Ovchinikov, deputy board chairman of Kyiv-based NEST, a real estate development company, which is currently developing three residential projects in the capital.

“Judging by European standards, a club-type building should have no more than seven floors.”

Ovchinikov said that a developer working on a club-type project must additionally ensure that the proper resident atmosphere is created, by carefully screening buyers and tenants to make sure they will be comfortable living next to each other.

Ushakov said that some of his tenants “might know each other” but, he acknowledged, his company never went so far as screening future residents. “The entire building is already sold out,” he said.

Source: Kyiv Post

EU Says Ukraine Not Ready To Join

HELSINKI, Finland -- The European Union has told Ukraine it is not ready to join the bloc.

Jose Manuel Barroso
EU Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said more reforms were required before accession talks could begin.

Ukraine's president Viktor Yushchenko met EU leaders in Finland, trying to push the case for membership talks to start by 2008.

He assured EU leaders of energy supplies over the winter, following last year's brief cut in natural gas flows after a price row with Moscow.

Mr Yushchenko has sought closer ties with the West since coming to power in the Orange Revolution of 2004.

But a BBC correspondent in Ukraine says the EU is concerned that reforms are being slowed by political divisions.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych is a fierce rival of the president and favours ties with Russia over those with the EU.

Closer ties

The EU has repeatedly told Ukraine that membership is not up for consideration at the moment.

"Ukraine is not ready and we are not ready," Mr Barroso said after meeting President Yushchenko.

"Ukraine still has reforms to do... and today in the European Union we are not ready, our member states are not ready, to assume new membership obligations," he said.

Instead, EU leaders are offering the prospect of closer political and economic ties, with Mr Barroso saying a free-trade area with Ukraine was the first aim.

The two parties signed an agreement that should make it easier to issue short-stay visas to Ukrainian citizens travelling to the EU.

Another agreement was signed establishing procedures for repatriating illegal immigrants to Ukraine.

Energy security

President Yushchenko gave EU leaders renewed assurances over security of energy supplies.

Mr Barroso welcomed the agreement reached earlier this week between Russia and Ukraine on the prices of natural gas.

"We don't anticipate any problems, at least for this year," he said.

Much of Europe's gas comes from Russia and is piped across Ukraine.

In January gas supplies to Ukraine were briefly cut off in a price dispute - a move which affected a number of European countries.

Source: BBC News

U.N. Official Urges Ukraine To Strengthen Efforts To Combat Children Trafficking

KIEV, Ukraine -- A visiting United Nations official on Friday urged Ukraine to strengthen efforts to combat child trafficking, which he said remained a major problem for the ex-Soviet nation.

United Nations logo
"I remain concerned at the low rate of prosecution and sentencing of traffickers, authors of child pornography and other crimes against children," said Juan Miguel Petit, a U.N. official in charge of the world body's efforts to stop child prostitution, child pornography and other crimes against children.

Petit said that the government should strengthen its efforts to combat the problems. Its recommendations included creating a separate juvenile justice system, naming a special ombudsman on children's rights and setting up a national commission to protect children rights.

Ukraine remains a primary source for men, women and children trafficked to Europe, the Middle East and Russia for sexual exploitation and forced labor, according to international experts.

Low salaries and high unemployment force thousands of Ukrainians to seek employment abroad, increasing their vulnerability to exploitation, they say.

The International Organization for Migration says it has provided assistance to about 3,000 Ukrainians who were victims of trafficking since 2000, but estimates that that number is only a small portion of the victims. Petit said that 10 percent of these victims were children.

He also said that statistics on human trafficking in Ukraine — and elsewhere — belie the true scope of the problem. "It is a huge figure, but it's just the tip of the iceberg," said Petit.

Yuriy Pavlenko, head of a state agency in charge of combating human trafficking said that 103 criminal probes into alleged children trafficking were opened since 2003.

Source: AP

Ottawa’s Gone Cool On Visas For Ukrainians – MP

OTTAWA, Canada -- A Canadian member of parliament from the Liberal Party has accused the new Conservative government in Ottawa of turning a cold shoulder to visitors and immigrants from Ukraine through its visa policy at the embassy in Kyiv.

Borys Wrzesnewskyj, a Canadian member of parliament from the Liberal Party, accuses his country’s new Conservative government of aggressively slashing visas for Ukrainians at the Canadian Embassy in Kyiv.
Borys Wrzesnewskyj, who claims to be the only lawmaker with Ukrainian roots serving in Canada’s House of Commons, says that Canadian Conservatives, who took over the government earlier this year, have been placing a strain on bonds between his country’s significant Ukrainian Diaspora and their kith and kin in the mother country.

Staff cuts last summer at the Canadian Embassy in Kyiv, as well as an alleged drop in the number of visitor and permanent residency visas issued by the embassy to Ukrainians, reflects a negative attitude toward Ukrainians on the part of new Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, according to Wrzesnewskyj.

There are more than 1 million ethnic Ukrainians living in Canada, which has a population of over 32 million.

In an Oct. 5 statement, Wrzesnewskyj said that Canada’s Conservative government was responsible for numerous visa rejections and delays at the Canadian Embassy in Kyiv.

“This summer I was receiving increasing numbers of calls and e-mails from frustrated constituents and Canadians across the country, who were unable to get their relatives and friends to come to Canada for family visits, weddings, christenings and, regrettably, even funerals,” Wrzesnewskyj said in the statement.

“It turns out that this is a consequence of aggressive cuts to the staff at Canada’s Embassy in Ukraine by Stephen Harper’s Conservative government. In July and September 2006, three positions, or 30 percent of the immigration section in Kyiv, have been eliminated, leaving a skeletal staff of seven.”

“The cutting of three immigration officers further demonstrates Immigration Minister Solberg’s attitude when it comes to potential immigration from Ukraine,” he said.

Embassy of Canada Political and Economic Program Officer Inna Tsarkova said that the recent personnel changes were no reason for panic, and characterized them as standard and well-considered moves.

“The changes are made based on well-established trends, not on short-term shifts, and are verified with current-year data,” Tsarkova told the Post Oct. 18.

“In this year’s [personnel] exercise, staff was reduced at 13 visa offices [around the world], and increased at 13 others, and all visa offices being trimmed will retain a sufficient number of staff to provide their current level of service in all priority categories,” she added.

“In the immigration section of the Canadian Embassy in Kyiv, this review and adjustment resulted in the elimination of one immigration officer position and two clerical/support positions – a registry supervisor and a cashier.”

Tsarkova said it was too early following the staff cuts to say whether they have resulted in a tangible decrease in the number of Canadian visas issued to Ukrainians.

Bohdan Klid, the assistant director at the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies in Edmonton, Canada, said he believes that “service at the immigration section in Ukraine could have been improved” and that “it’s logical to conclude that the time to process applications will now be delayed with fewer staff at the immigration section.”

Klid told the Post Oct. 17, “The Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, currently Monty Solberg, is the person from the [Canadian] government and the governing Conservative Party who is ultimately responsible for policy.”

According to data provided by the Canadian Embassy in Kyiv, each year the embassy receives between 6,000 and 7,000 temporary resident (visitor) visa applications and more than 900 applications for permanent residence in Canada. It issues over 5,000 temporary resident visas and 700 permanent resident visas to applicants from Ukraine.

Over the last five years, the number of temporary resident visa applications has increased, while the number of permanent residence applications has decreased, the Canadian Embassy said.

During Canada’s Jan. 23, 2006 early federal election, the Conservative Party won 40.3 percent of seats, or 124 out of 308, up from 99 seats in 2004. The liberals, headed by now former Prime Minister Paul Martin, went from 135 to 103 seats – a 23.7 percent drop from what they had in the last parliament.

Source: Kyiv Post

EU, Ukraine Reach Visa, Immigration Pacts

BRUSSELS, Belgium -- The European Union and Kiev have reached agreements on visas and readmitting illegal immigrants, which is to be initialled at an EU-Ukraine summit today in Helsinki, the European Commission said yesterday.


“I am very pleased that the agreements on visa and readmission have been agreed,” said European Commission chief Jose Manuel Barroso in a statement.

“This means that Ukrainians will now be able to travel more freely and easily while maintaining the efforts to clamp down on illegal migration,” he added.

Under the agreement on visas, procedures for issuing short-stay visas to Ukrainian citizens are to be eased.

The readmission agreement sets out clear obligations and procedures for both EU and Ukrainian authorities about when and how to take back people who are illegally residing on their territories.

The two agreements, which are to be initialled today by EU External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner and Ukraine Foreign Minister Boris Tarasyuk, have to be approved by the European Parliament and the 25 EU member states to go into effect, which generally takes about a year.

Source: AFP

Ukraine Strives For Closer Ties To Europe At Summit With European Union

HELSINKI, Finland -- Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko will seek to bolster ties with European Union leaders on Friday, hoping to improve his country's prospects of eventual EU membership.

Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko meets Finland's President Tarja Halonen (R) in Helsinki. Yushchenko is in Finland to participate in the EU-Ukraine meeting on Friday.
"One of the strategic goals is to get a European perspective in our foreign policy," Yushchenko said on the eve of the meeting, after talks with Finnish President Tarja Halonen.

The annual EU-Ukraine summit, being held in current EU president Finland, is expected to launch negotiations on a new economic and political cooperation agreement. The two parties also will sign agreements on cross-border cooperation to ease visa requirements and the readmission of illegal immigrants.

Yushchenko said Ukraine was on the "final stretch" of talks to join NATO and was making progress on membership of the World Trade Organization. He hoped the Helsinki meeting would open the way for EU membership talks to begin, possibly in 2008.

"In these talks my aim is to make progress so that we could start some kind of accession negotiations in 2008 which would eventually lead to Ukraine's membership in the European Union," Yushchenko said at a news conference with Halonen.

But the EU has been more cautious, shying away from setting any date for staring such talks.

After admitting 10 new countries in 2004, and preparing to absorb Romania and Bulgaria on Jan. 1, there has been a growing wariness in the bloc about further expansion.

European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso has urged Ukraine for reforms.

"The reform of the judiciary, the fight against corruption and improving the business climate are highest priorities, together with the finalization of Ukraine's WTO accession," Barroso said in Brussels. "This is not only crucial for Ukraine, but will also strengthen EU-Ukraine relations."

Halonen was even more blunt.

"We all know Ukraine will still have a lot to do in the future," she said. "Concerning the reforms, it's not how to please somebody else, but it's the issue of how Ukraine can become capable in international relations, in globalization and in bilateral relations."

So far, the EU has refused to grant Ukraine a "membership perspective," including the former Soviet republic in its "neighborhood policy" along with Belarus, Israel, the south Caucasus countries and several Arab nations around the Mediterranean Sea.

Governments from the 25 EU nations are currently mulling a proposal from the Commission to deepen relations with Ukraine by setting up a free trade zone, strengthening diplomatic ties and boosting collaboration in areas such as energy, justice, nuclear safety, and environment protection.

In Helsinki, the two parties are expected to sign agreements to make it easier for Ukrainians to travel, work and study in the EU and to increase cooperation in customs and border control, including easing the return to Ukraine of illegal immigrants arriving into the bloc from that country.

Source: AP

Ukraine: No Plan To Extend Russian Black Sea Port Lease

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine's defense minister Thursday rejected Russian President Vladimir Putin's proposal to consider extending the Russian military's lease on a Black Sea port.

Russian Marines on the Black Sea in Sevastopol
Defense Minister Anatoliy Hrytsenko said Ukraine would uphold the 1997 agreement that allows the Russian navy to remain in the port of Sevastopol until 2017.

But when that expires, Ukraine would expect Russia's Black Sea Fleet to leave, Hrytsenko told reporters in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv, according to his office.

"I am convinced that there shouldn't be and won't be any permanent foreign military base on Ukrainian territory - whether it be members of NATO, members of the Tashkent agreement or the Commonwealth of Independent States collective security agreement," Hrytsenko said, referring to the Western military alliance and alliances between ex-Soviet states.

During a televised call-in session on Wednesday, Putin said Russia would be interested in discussing the extension of the lease of Russia's Black Sea Fleet.

Russia pays Ukraine an annual rent of $93 million to base its fleet in Sevastopol. The presence of the Russian troops on Ukrainian territory has sparked anger among Ukrainian nationalists, and given rise to a number of disputes between Ukraine and Russia over who has ownership of lighthouses and other property in the region.

Analysts had suggested that in exchange for promising Ukraine a below-market rate for gas imports for several years, Ukraine might agree to extend the port's lease to the Russian navy. Hrytsenko, however, insisted no such talks were under way.

"If someone is carrying out such talks, they are behind-the-scenes, secret, and ultimately, illegal," Hrytsenko said.

Hrytsenko is an appointee of Ukraine's pro-Western President Viktor Yushchenko, who shares power with the more Russian-leaning Premier Viktor Yanukovych.

Source: AP

Yushchenko To Putin: 'Ukraine Can Defend Itself Without Russia'

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine President Viktor Yushchenko on Thursday sharply criticised his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin for suggesting the Kremlin's Black Sea fleet could help regional security by protecting Ukraine from exterior threats.


Viktor Yushchenko (L) and Vladimir Putin (R)
'Ukraine is a sovereign nation and has sufficient military forces to take care of itself ... and is in no need of assistance from any other foreign nation,' Yushchenko said in Helsinki.

Yushchenko's remarks were the Ukrainian president's first public response to Tuesday comments by Putin arguing Russian naval and land forces stationed in Ukraine's Crimea province contributed to regional stability, and could if necessary defend Ukraine from outside attack.

Ukraine's Defence Minister Anatoly Hrytsenko was even more direct in his criticism of Putin's declaration, telling reporters in Kiev: 'I cannot imagine a situation where Ukraine would ask another country for help in preventing interference in our internal affairs.'

'There are no changes in plans for the (Russian) fleet to remain in Crimea after its lease runs out,' he said.

Putin's remarks came during a three-hour television call-in programme on Russian state television. The Russian leader had been responding to a question from a citizen of the Ukrainian port city Sevastopol, where Russia's Black Sea fleet is based.

'We are prepared ... to provide assistance to our neighbour and brotherly republic Ukraine, to protect her, in case someone were to have the idea of interfering in her internal affairs,' Putin said during the televised question-and-answer session.

Putin qualified his remarks by saying he believed Ukraine should resolve its internal matters on its own.

His comments nevertheless sparked an almost immediate firestorm of rhetoric by Ukrainian commentators across the political spectrum, as one of the few things Ukraine's widely-divided ruling clans agree on is that they prefer to run the former Soviet republic without Russia's help.

The term 'brotherly republic' is a politically-loaded term in both Russia and Ukraine, implying effective subordination of Kiev to Moscow's control.

The expression 'protection from foreign interference in internal affairs' is if anything even more inflammatory, as the phrase was the standard justification given by the Soviet Union to invade its smaller neighbours.

Relations between Russia and Ukraine have been thorny since Ukraine's 2004 Orange Revolution, which shifted the country's foreign policy orientation from Russia towards Europe.

Increasing Russian assertiveness in the international arena in recent years has exacerbated the conflict.

A treaty between Russia and Ukraine allows Russia to base its Black Sea fleet in the port Sevastopol until 2017.

Source: Deutsche Presse-Agentur

Russia Bristles At Ukrainian Officials Push For Declaring Soviet-Era Famine As Genocide

MOSCOW, Russia -- Russia's Foreign Ministry on Wednesday bristled at Ukrainian officials' push for declaring a Soviet-era famine that killed up to 10 million people as genocide, saying it was part of Communist repressions that also affected other ethnic groups in the former Soviet Union.

Kiev memorial to famine victims
Up to 10 million Ukrainians died in the 1932-33 Great Famine, which was provoked by Soviet dictator Josef Stalin as part of his campaign to force peasants to join collective farms. Ukrainian officials have called for an official recognition of the famine as genocide.

The Russian Foreign Ministry on Wednesday criticized Ukrainian authorities for what it called a "unilateral interpretation" of the famine. "It was wrong to apply the notion exclusively to Ukraine, because it deals with a sad page in our common history," the ministry said in a statement.

Countries including the United States, Canada, Austria, Hungary and Lithuania have recognized the famine as genocide, but the issue remains highly charged in Ukraine, since declaring the famine as genocide would amount to an indictment of Soviet policies - something that Communists, Socialists and many pro-Russian politicians are loathe to do.

Source: AP

Ukraine Says EU Must Respect Its Membership Ambitions

BRUSSELS, Belgium -- The EU must offer Ukraine the prospect of full membership than to exile it from the European mainstream along with nations in North Africa and the Middle East, the country's envoy to Brussels said Wednesday.


"We are not neighbors of Europe, we are part of Europe," said ambassador Roman Shpek, head of the Ukrainian mission at the EU. "For us, it is not pleasant to be in the same basket as Morocco, Libya or Israel," he said ahead of Friday's EU-Ukraine summit.

Shpek also rejected suggestions that a gas deal signed with Russia on Tuesday would give Moscow a say on Ukraine's aspirations to join the World Trade Organization in the coming months.

"Next year Ukraine will become a full member of the WTO," Shpek told reporters. "Russians they have their own agenda and for us it's not the issue to compete with Russia."

Ukraine's President Viktor Yushchenko will meet European Union leaders in Helsinki, Finland, for the annual EU-Ukraine summit. The talks are expected to launch negotiations on a new economic and political cooperation agreement.

The Ukrainians hope that will include the prospect of eventual membership. The EU is noncommittal, reflecting growing wariness about expanding the bloc which admitted 10 new countries in 2004, is about to take in Romania and Bulgaria and is engaged in negotiations with Croatia and Turkey.

Shpek insisted under the treaty which underpins the Union, the EU must keep its doors open to European nations that share its values of democracy, human rights and free market economy.

"You cannot change values," Shpek said. "European politicians should recognize that Ukraine has the same rights as all European states."

So far, the EU has refused to grant Ukraine a "membership perspective," including the former Soviet republic in its "neighborhood policy" along with Belarus, Israel, the south Caucasus countries and several Arab nations around the Mediterranean Sea.

Governments from the 25 EU nations are currently mulling a proposal from the European Commission to open negotiations on a new cooperation agreement to deepen relations with Ukraine by setting up a free trade zone, strengthening diplomatic ties and boosting collaboration in areas such as energy, justice, nuclear safety, and environment protection.

Meanwhile, the two sides are expected to sign agreements on the margin of Friday's summit to make it easier for Ukrainians to travel, work and study in the EU and to increase cooperation in customs and border control, Shpek said at a meeting hosted by the EU Ukraine Business Council.

The private business group said the summit should adopt five priorities for boosting economic ties: open EU markets to Ukrainian goods; fight corruption and tighten protection of property rights in Ukraine; advance private-public partnerships in energy, transport and telecoms; hasten Ukraine's WTO membership plans; and promote energy efficiency.

"We would like to see an enhanced agreement for Ukraine that recognizes the reality that Ukraine is a European market that offers outstanding business potential," said James Wilson, the council's director.

Source: AP

IBM Sets Up Subsidiary In Ukraine

MOSCOW. Russia -- IBM has set up a subsidiary in Ukraine called IBM Ukraine.


The presence of a world leader on the IT market in Ukraine will have a positive influence on the development of the Ukrainian IT market on the whole and will help expand the sector of supply and services to the company's business partners, Brendon Riley, IBM general director in Central and Eastern Europe, said at a Tuesday press conference.

The establishment of an IBM subsidiary based on the company's representation, that has worked in Ukraine since 2004, will help IBM offer the entire range of its services in Ukraine, said Ihor Pastushenko, general director of IBM Ukraine.

IBM is planning to implement projects in business consulting, such as designing strategies, personal management, installing integrated informational systems, and developing the network of local designers and business partners that offer solutions based on IBM programs.

Around 2,000 Ukrainian companies are currently IBM clients, Pastushenko said.

Source: Interfax

Ukraine's Ex-PM Urges Our Ukraine To Join Opposition

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine's ex-Prime Minister Yuliya Tymoshenko said Tuesday her opposition party is looking forward to cooperating with the pro-presidential alliance Our Ukraine as soon as it finally opts for the opposition.

Yuliya Tymoshenko
Our Ukraine, a member of the anti-crisis parliamentary coalition, officially announced last Tuesday that it is switching to the opposition over major differences with the pro-Russian Party of Regions. But the party said it has still to decide on an opposition format.

"The Yuliya Tymoshenko Bloc is prepared to cooperate within the opposition with the pro-presidential bloc Our Ukraine," Tymoshenko said, regretting that the party has not decided whether it will remain in power or join the opposition.

Tymoshenko and her eponymous bloc went into opposition in late September after its first post-election coalition with Our Ukraine and the Socialist Party collapsed, giving way to a new alliance with the Party of Regions and burying her hopes for a new premiership.

Four ministers from Our Ukraine tendered their resignations Thursday, in line with the party decision to go into opposition and possibly form a shadow Cabinet.

But Our Ukraine seems to be experiencing a serious internal crisis as it adjourned its congress for three weeks to amend its strategy and undertake drastic reform in response to President Viktor Yushchenko's fierce criticism of inactivity over the weekend.

Efforts at forming a grand coalition by President Yushchenko's six-party bloc and Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych's Party of Regions and its allies, the Socialist and Communist parties, have stalled. After two months of talks, the political forces still disagree on a series of crucial issues, including Yushchenko's drive to join NATO.

"This Mexican soap opera has to end. We are keeping our door and hands open. They only have to decide," Tymoshenko said, appealing to the former "orange" allies.

Source: RIA Novosti

Ukraine: Worries About Nation's Future

KIEV, Ukraine -- In 1995 there were 52 million Ukrainians. A decade later there are less than 47 million Ukrainians left as this former Soviet republic has hemorrhaged the equivalent of the population of Denmark to emigration, alcoholism and low birth rates.

Alcoholism in Ukraine runs as high as 50% among the adult male population
“The figure itself is not catastrophic, but the tendencies are alarming”, said Ella Libanova, deputy director of Ukraine’s Institute of Demography and Social Research.

According to official statistics, the Ukrainian population has dropped by 678,039 people in the last two years. At 6o, male life expectancy is higher than in Russia but still well below that in neighboring countries that joined the European Union in 2004 such as Hungary and Poland.

“Thirty percent of 40-year-old men will die before they are 60 and there is no hope that the situation will change soon”, said Libanova.

Mass migration adds to the demographic crisis: according to some estimates between three and five million Ukrainians work abroad illegally -- those in the east of the country head for Russia, those in the west go to the European Union.

Emigrants like Olga Dufin, a 63-year-old nurse from Kiev who has been caring for patients in Italy for four years, have no intention of returning.

The 700 euros (870 dollars) that she makes each month in the northern Italian town of Forli make it possible for her to help her two sons, one of whom is unemployed, and to pay university fees for her daughter-in-law.

“Here in Forli, I meet Ukrainians aged between 20 and 40 everywhere”, she said by telephone. “The engineers work in construction, the doctors wash dishes. Some make 1,500 euros” -- almost 10 times the average wage in Ukraine.

“The most active and dynamic leave” -- especially those from the many small towns that in Soviet times built up around single mines or factories, according to sociologist Irina Bekeshkina.

“Ageing European countries, which need labor, will continue to soften their employment legislation and this flow will only increase”, said Libanova.

For Irina Pribitkova of Ukraine’s Institute of Sociology, the crux of the problem is a falling birthrate and a mortality rate that continues to rise despite calls from the government’s critics to reform the inefficient health system.

Between January and August this year, Ukraine saw 70 percent more deaths than births, with 511,338 deaths and 301,208 births.

Over 10 years the birth rate has fallen from 1.6 to 1.2 children per woman, while the natural replacement level would be 2.2, Libanova said.

“As in Europe, Ukrainians do not want to be baby machines and children have ceased to be economically necessary”, she commented.

“Women have emancipated themselves over the last 10 years, but discrimination means that they must work twice as much as their male colleagues to build a career. They can’t allow themselves to have children”, Pribitkova averred.

Source: Monday Morning

Kyiv Meeting Real Estate Scam Victims’ Grievances

KYIV, Ukraine -- Nearly nine months following the eruption of a major real estate scam in the nation’s capital, more than 1,000 apartment buyers who were bilked out of an estimated $100 million are still waiting for the Kyiv city authorities to follow through on pledges to organize the construction of compensatory housing.


Elite-Center scam cost investors $100 million
In a recent response to the apartment buyers’ continuing protests, the city administration has said that it has compiled a list of the scam victims and planned to hold a tender to attract private investors interested in financing the compensatory housing.

However, suspicion of licensing and regulatory officials, as well as concerns for the rights of Ukraine’s emerging middle class, remain.

Starting in 2004, prospective Ukrainian homeowners invested an average of $70,000 each into apartments to be built by Elite-Center, a private development company offering eight residential projects in Kyiv.

By the beginning of this year, it became clear that they had lost their down payments, together with any housing they were supposed to get. In late January, Elite-Center’s top executives fled the country after having funneled the funds they had received from buyers through various bank accounts.

Elite-Center, which advertised heavily throughout the capital, never actually existed as a legal entity, but worked through at least 14 other companies.

The paperwork documenting the eight projects formed a trail to the administration of then Kyiv Mayor Oleksandr Omelchenko, suggesting that top city officials were at best negligent, if not implicated in the real estate scam.

On Feb. 25, Omelchenko issued an order that designated Kyiv Investment Agency, a public utility company under the Kyiv City Administration, to take charge of attracting developers and builders to put up compensation housing for Elite-Center victims. Only one of the eight projects advertised by Elite-Center had actually been started, on the capital’s Otto Schmidt Street.

Omelchenko’s order said that construction of the housing projects was to be funded by new investments as well as money returned to Elite-Center buyers through court decisions.

On March 2, the Kyiv City Council allocated 19 plots of land for the construction of housing for the bilked apartment buyers.

On April 28, Kyiv’s Shevchenkivskiy district court held the first hearing in a case brought by victims of the Elite-Center scam, in which they accused the state financial services markets regulation commission of failing to exercise financial oversight of the investment agreements between the scam victims and Elite-Center.

On May 19, the court ruled that the commission’s inactivity was illegal, noting that there had been no proper control over the implementation of the investment agreements. The court ordered temporary administration of Elite-Center by the same state commission, with the aim of fulfilling the purchase agreements.

Earlier in May, Interior Minister Yuriy Lutsenko had announced that law enforcement agencies in CIS countries and the Baltic States were hot on the trail of the scam’s main suspect, the director of Elite-Center, who went under the name of Oleksandr Volkonsky.

Lutsenko said, however, that due to shortcomings in Ukraine’s court system, he was unable to seize several million hryvnias discovered in accounts thought to be linked to Volkonsky in a number of foreign banks.

Meanwhile, Volkonsky remains at large.

Some individuals affected by the scam have been living in hostel accommodations provided by the Kyiv City Administration starting in late June.

According to Anna Shmidt, a member of an initiative group of Elite-Center’s victims, some duped apartment buyers have been camping out in tents around Kyiv waiting for their turn to receive a room in a hostel. Like many of the other scam victims, Shmidt said that she had been living with friends after selling her apartment to invest in a flat in Elite-Center’s Otto Schmidt Street project.

Deceived buyers turned up the pressure on the city council in mid-August, when a group of them pitched a tent camp in front of the Kyiv City Administration building, demanding that municipal authorities guarantee the construction of the compensation housing.

During a press conference held on Aug. 16, Mayor Leonid Chernovetsky, elected in the general elections of March 26, told journalists that the demonstrators had been paid to try to force his hand.

“They were each paid Hr 100 for sitting there,” Chernovetsky said.

The Shevchenkivskiy district court refused to satisfy the city administration’s demand that the court ban the demonstrators from putting up their tents.

During a public hearing on Aug. 30, Chernovetsky said that due to a lack of support from the Interior Ministry, which had failed to provide the city with a list of the scam’s victims, citing investigative secrecy, the Elite-Center issue had been unreasonably drawn out.

Action finally taken

Now, nearly a year after the scam emerged, the municipal authorities have said they have finally launched their search for new developers and construction companies.

On Sept. 27, the city organized a meeting with Elite-Center apartment buyers to compile a victims list independently of the Interior Ministry.

“This is why we had to organize this meeting and invite buyers to bring their passports as well as the documents given to them by the Internal Affairs Ministry,” said Vitaly Zhurakhovskiy, the deputy head of the city administration.

According to a Sept. 28 statement by the municipal administration’s press service, the city’s victims list compiled at the Sept. 27 meeting totals 1,220 people.

Denis Bass, the deputy head of Kyiv City Administration and the head of the ad-hoc commission to provide housing for Elite-Center victims, was quoted as saying that preparations for holding the investment tender are in their final stage.

“Now we are close to the investment tender,” Bass said.

Ivan Nesin, an Elite-Center victim turned protester, said that selfish motives were behind Kyiv authorities allowing the situation surrounding the scam to drag on.

“I think they simply have their own interests in this and want to get more money using the situation. Otherwise, the problem would have been resolved long ago,” said Nesin, a pensioner who sold his house in Kryvy Rih to invest in an Elite-Center one-room apartment.

“My son-in-law was killed in a car accident and left my daughter a widow, as well as my grandson. I wanted to be closer to my daughter to help her raise her child,” he said.

Anna Levshunova is a dentist. She owned a one-room apartment in Kyiv’s historical Podil district, but because of dilapidated housing conditions where she lived, Levshunova decided to sell her flat and purchase a two-room apartment in an Elite-Center project on the city’s Left Bank.

“I wanted to improve my housing conditions because my son is growing up. Now I live with my child and my brother in his apartment,” she said.

“There are difficulties in the investigation. But it is the criminal part of the issue. The administrative part could be settled by a Kyiv Council resolution,” said Mykola Boychuk, a deputy in the Kyiv City Council with the opposition Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc.

He added that instead of holding public hearings on the Elite-Center issue, the city of Kyiv should try to reach some kind of compromise with every family victimized by the scam.

“I think the Kyiv city government has all the resources to do this,” Boychuk said. “This can involve [Kyiv] regional administrations and institutions that deal with social issues to work with the victims and finding a mechanism to solve the problem instead of trying to keep away from it.”

Boychuk said that the Elite-Center issue could have been resolved already and that Chernovetsky must take complete responsibility for resolving it, as he said he would.

Vladyslav Kaskiv, a leading politician in the PORA People’s Party, and a former adviser to President Viktor Yushchenko, also suffered a loss as a result of the scam, investing in the purchase of a three-room apartment in Elite-Center’s Otto Shmidt Street project. However, Kaskiv said he hasn’t taken an active part in the housing buyer protests, indicating that this could compromise his position as a political activist.

“Of course, I did not lose everything I had … But my situation is rather inconvenient. If I became too involved in the issue, it could have been understood as an abuse of my position,” Kaskiv said.

“On the other hand, of course, I have a rational wish to get my money back or receive an apartment. But I think I don’t have the moral right to interfere,” he said.

Kaskiv said he believes the fact that such a scam took place shows that the construction sector’s regulatory system is not working properly. According to Kaskiv, the construction market in Kyiv has already been formed, and many people have their interests vested in it, especially politicians and officials.

“If the system collapses, their interests would be damaged first,” he said.

Meanwhile, some Elite-Center buyers are trying to receive compensation without the city’s help.

On Aug. 30, Kyiv’s Holosiyivskiy district court ruled in favor of two Elite-Center buyers against Blagovest Pechersky, one of Ukraine’s largest real estate agencies, freezing Blagovest’s banking accounts. Blagovest acted as a broker between Elite-Center and the two buyers, who demanded Hr 600,000 [$120,000] in compensation from Blagovest in the case.

“Apparently, as a leader of the real estate market, the defendant should have had enough information about the market and market players,” reads a statement from Ilyashev&Partners, the law firm that represented the Elite-Center buyers in the case.

According to Ihor Khasin, an attorney with Ilyashev&Partners, if the court’s decision is not appealed, or the Court of Appeals confirms the Holosiyivskiy court’s decision, the buyers will be compensated Hr 492,000 [$100,000] in monetary damages and Hr 100,000 [$20,000] in moral damages.

Source: Kyiv Post

The Evil Of A Murder In Russia

MOSCOW, Russia -- Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaia was murdered shortly after she entered her apartment building in central Moscow on Oct. 7. The building's security system was in working order, and she pushed the right buttons to open the door.

Anna Politkovskaia
The assassin was waiting inside. His slim figure was caught on security video.

Politkovskaia's murder was one of many. On Oct. 16, Anatoly Voronin, financial director of Russia's leading news agency ITAR-TASS, was found knifed to death in his apartment.

On Sept. 13, Andrei Kozlov, deputy director of Russia's Central Bank, was killed while exiting a sports event.

Politkovskaia has been called "the conscience of Russian journalism" by the deputy editor of Novaia Gazeta, the daily newspaper for which she wrote.

She was the only Russian intellectual seriously engaged in exposing to the world the unspeakable doings of the Russian security forces in Chechnya: routine kidnapping and torture of men, women and children whose mutilated bodies have occasionally been found by relatives.

She was universally trusted, and her mediation might have prevented hundreds of casualties during the various hostage takings in Russia. But she was not allowed to mediate.

In 2004, rushing to Beslan to avert the crisis, she was mysteriously poisoned (as President of Ukraine Viktor Yushchenko had been at the start of the Orange Revolution). She was probably the most fearless and noble journalist alive in the world. Her book, A Small Corner of Hell: Dispatches from Chechnya, was published in English in 2003.

Respected Russian political commentator Evgeniia Albats drew a parallel between Politkovskaia's murder and the murder of communist leader Sergei Kirov in 1934. That murder unleashed Stalin's well-known purge of the Communist Party, which culminated in the show trials of Politburo members and other party leaders.

It is significant that Politkovskaia's murder generated no more than a tone of subdued indignation in the American and European media. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung and Le Monde gave it a few sideshow articles that promptly disappeared from their homepages.

The Moscow online gazeta.ru removed mentions of Politkovskaia the day after her funeral. Our own media reported President Bush's subdued call for the murder's investigation, answered by President Putin's chilling assertion that an "objective" investigation would be forthcoming.

As a Russia scholar, I am not all that interested in who Putlin's police might eventually display as Politkovskaia's murderer. Whether the real murderer or someone who merely confessed to the murder, such a person will carry a lesser moral guilt than those who planned and organized the deed.

The same applies to the ongoing Chechnya atrocities that have long disappeared from the front pages of world newspapers, and with Politkovskaia's passing may disappear for good from the world's memory.

What is of interest is who stands behind the hired killer. The fact that the murder took place on Putin's birthday invites speculation about Putin's admirers in Russia (and they are many): "the strong hand," which has become proverbial in Russia and which has been desired by quite a few Russians, has again made its appearance.

And the second question: Why so little indignation and attention spent on Polit-kovskaia in Russia and abroad? Whence the restrained tone in which the Western media and politicians condemned the murder?

Let me offer a scenario. In the post-Soviet and terrorist-ridden world, the superpowers seem to be looking backward to the 19th century, when great empires ruled the world and the rest of humanity acquiesced after countless failed uprisings.

After the First World War there came an era of democracy, brutally broken by the rise of Nazism. After the Second World War, apart from the communist menace that made first world countries uncomfortable (not to speak of the hardships of Eastern and Central Europe under Soviet military domination), democracy surged forward, with more and more rights gained by more and more minorities in the noncommunist world.

The 20th century gave suffrage to women. It gave American blacks a taste of real equality, and it liberated many Asian and South American countries from dictatorial regimes.

After the fall of communism, Eastern and Central Europe gained an opportunity, in Boris Yeltsin's words, to "grab as much freedom as they were able to swallow." All of them did except, as Mikhail Khodor-kovsky's imprisonment and Politkovskaia's murder have illustrated, the Russian Federation.

The fact that Russians took the path of make-believe democracy says a great deal about the Russian political culture. It may also be an indication of Russian political brilliance exemplified by President Vladimir Putin. Putin's evil brilliance consists in understanding that powerful nations once again are poised to rule the world.

The Russo-German alliance on energy defies the spirit of the European Union whose founders envisaged a united European front on major political and economic problems. Now Russia wants Germany to be its energy distributor and watchdog in the EU.

This puts the EU out of whack, as countries such as Poland and the Baltic republics are left out of the planned gas pipeline to be built at the bottom of the Baltic Sea. Have the world leaders forgotten that it is crucial to the stability of Europe to guarantee stability and liberty in non-Germanic Central Europe?

The answer is yes. Winston Churchill's infamous division of the world into "giants" and "pygmies" seems to be falling in place again. The increasingly nationalistic world powers seem once again to be betting on their strength in controlling smaller nations.

International treaties and agreements are still being signed and are ostensibly honored, but unilateral actions by the great powers have become more and more frequent. The United Nations has been sidelined on too many occasions, its resolutions ignored by the strong nations and enforced only when the strong want to see them enforced.

The North Korean crisis illustrates this. The United Nations is powerless to change the course of that country. The United States has to lean on China to effect pressure on Kim Jong Il.

As Robert Kaplan recently noted, China would welcome a satellite state on the Korean peninsula, but that would not be in the interest of Russia, which has a history of strong ties with North Korea in the communist period, and is viewing the country as a potential pipeline route for its oil and gas.

Neither China nor Russia wants the rest of the world to have a say in North Korean developments. They signed off on the U.N.-imposed sanctions, but insisted that military action not be included.

Are we going back to the 19th century, when the white empires brutalized white minorities within their own borders while treating the nonwhite rest of the world as a back yard to be used as they saw fit?

To be sure, the great powers today are not the same as 150 years ago. The rise of China, the assertive voices of some of the mid-size powers such as Brazil, South Korea and Japan change the picture somewhat.

But the trend seems to be backward rather than forward. It is this trend that accounts for the relatively scant attention paid to Polit-kovskaia's murder. Like 19th century revolutionaries, she was an inconvenience to be crushed.

The great powers do not blame the Russian government, because they are getting ready — or indeed have been more than ready — to engage in liberty-reducing actions within their own borders.

They therefore studiously avoid blaming Russia for its brutality, for Russia is poised to join the concert of nations from which its own excesses dislodged it in the early postcommunist era.

Politkovskaia's murder may signal a return to the undemocratic past when the rich and the powerful openly used their might against the rest of the world.

Source: Houston Chronicle

Kids From The Ukraine Meet Potential Parents In Utah

SALT LAKE CITY, USA -- A life changing experience for a group of Utah families and children from the Ukraine.

Elizabeth Garrett was adopted from Ukraine by a Utah family
Looking to make a difference in a country with 60,000 homeless children the “Save A Child Foundation,” focuses on placing children ages 6 through 15 into homes.

24 children from the Ukraine have just arrived here at the Salt Lake City International Airport, it has been a long trip.

They were delayed by two days and while they are excited to meet their host families, this is still a pretty scary experience for some of them.

“Welcome kids...I’m excited, you will have a good experience, I love you,” says Elizabeth Garrett in Russian. Elizabeth was adopted out of the Ukraine and felt at one time much like these children do.

The Save A Child Foundation has paired up children with host families with the hopes that many will be adopted.

“We were exposed to the need over there,” says Vern Garrett from the Save A Child Foundation.

The Garrett family, who has adopted two girls and plan to adopt a third from the Ukraine, created this opportunity for the children.

“Our host families are our diamonds,” says Vern. “Without them we can’t do this.”

Some are already thinking adoption.

“We are very open to that,” says Jenae Price one of the host families. She has a family of all boys who are excited for a sister.

“Because sisters help you a lot and they aren’t messy,” says 10-year-old Tyler Price from one of the host families.

“I’m very excited,” says Elizabeth. “I don’t know them, but I’m just shaking!”

“I’ll take such good care of you!” says one potential parent.

“That’s her in the green!” says another excitedly.

“They’re so precious,” says another hopeful mother.

‘The birth of their child’ are words used to describe the feeling here.

Though most of them will face a language barrier it doesn’t matter. To simply say “family” is nothing compared to feeling it.

Elizabeth Garrett describes how it felt when she first met her parents, “It was very exciting. I was happy to have parents because it was my whole life’s dream, to have parents.”

The children will stay with the families for a couple of weeks. Then, due to legalities, they’ll have to go back to the Ukraine. But the families will then have the option to pursue adoption of the kids they met today.

The same group hosted families last year and more than 90 percent of the children were adopted after the visit.

Source: WCBS KUTV

U.S. Alters Its Spelling Of Ukraine City

WASHINGTON, DC -- The Ukrainian capital of Kiev is now Kyiv, as far as the U.S. government is concerned. And the State Department says the spelling change has nothing to do with American hopes of wooing the one-time Soviet republic more into the Western orbit.


About half of Ukraine's 47 million people are Russian speakers, and Kiev is the Russian spelling.

Ukraine's Western-leaning President Viktor Yushchenko, elected on the wave of the 2004 Orange Revolution's mass protests against election fraud, has sought to take his nation out of Russia's influence and join NATO and the European Union.

"I don't think this decision has anything reflective in it," State Department spokesman Tom Casey said Thursday.

The department announced the change in a memorandum Oct. 3, instructing officials to use the Kyiv spelling in all communications regarding Ukraine.

When a reporter asked about the change Thursday, Casey said there is a U.S. Board of Geographic Names with representatives from several government departments, including the State Department, that establishes uniform geographic name usage for the federal government.

The Associated Press continues to spell the name of the capital Kiev.

Source: AP

Ukraine's President Criticizes Party's Decision To Move Into Opposition

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine's President Viktor Yushchenko on Saturday criticized his party's decision to move into opposition and urged it to resume talks with the ruling parliamentary coalition led by his Orange Revolution foe.


President Viktor Yushchenko
As the leader of Our Ukraine party, Yushchenko won the 2004 presidential campaign amid the Orange Revolution protests against election fraud.

But Yushchenko's team broke up quickly amid political infighting, which helped the party of Yushchenko's Kremlin-backed election rival, Viktor Yanukovych, win the most votes in parliamentary elections and get the prime minister's job.

After months of negotiations, no agreement was reached for Yushchenko's Our Ukraine to join the governing parliamentary coalition led by Yanukovych's Party of Regions, and Our Ukraine said earlier this month it was moving into the opposition.

But Yushchenko, who is the party's honorary chairman, said moving to the opposition was not the best strategy for Our Ukraine and urged the bloc to continue coalition talks with the Party of Regions.

"I am not sure that... the opposition is the Our Ukraine's best answer," he said, adding the focus should be on "consolidation and mutual understanding with various political forces, including the Party of Regions."

Yushchenko added that if his party fails to "find new understanding (with Yanukovych's party)" it will "undoubtedly move into the opposition."

He also said that Our Ukraine had been weakened by personal ambitions and urged it to reshuffle its leadership.

"Our Ukraine as a political organization endures a serious internal crisis," Yushchenko said Saturday at the party's congress, saying the party has been plagued by a"mistaken policy, blindness through ambition... which led to intrigues, adventurous activities."

"I don't want the (party members) to pursue their personal interests," said Yushchenko, urging the party to change its leaders and statute "dramatically."

Roman Bezsmertny, who currently leads the bloc, said that he would give up his leadership and "suggest a new candidacy" next Wednesday during the party's council session. He did not elaborate.

Source: AP

Clear The Streets

KIEV, Ukraine -- Anyone who’s been to Kyiv can attest to its pedestrian-friendly, tree-lined streets, which conveniently traverse the center of town, making a car largely unnecessary.

Traffic jam on main street Khreschatyk on a typical day
This is nice for tourists as well as inhabitants of the Ukrainian capital.

Within the last half dozen years, however, pedestrians have been crowded out by the increasing number of automobiles and construction sites.

Many find this irritating, but it is also a sign of development and a bustling economy. So be it!

But when motorists flaunt the law, driving and parking on the limited sidewalk space still available to those without cars, something has to be done.

The City Council recently took a decision to partly alleviate the situation, by allowing city evacuators to haul away the vehicles of those who think they can park them where they want.

Good for the Council! Unfortunately, on Oct. 12, Kyiv’s Shevchenko District Court canceled the Council’s decision.

If the courts don’t stand up for the rights of the authorities to enforce the law on such a local, albeit fairly clear-cut issue, what is the message for bigger offenders?

Source: Kyiv Post

Ukraine's Mobile Customer Base Exceeds 40 Million

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine ended September with 40.4 million mobile subscribers, up from 38.8 million in August and 37.2 million in July, according to figures from market researcher Advanced Communications & Media.


Mobile penetration in the country went up to 84.9 percent, from 81.6 percent in August.

Kyivstar had 17.7 million subscribers at the end of September and a market share of 43.8 percent, up from 17.2 million customers and a market share of 44.3 percent in August.

UMC (MTS) ended the month with 16.4 million subscribers, up from 15.9 million in the previous month.

The company saw its market share drop slightly to 40.5 percent, from 41 percent in August.

Astelit (operating under the life:) brand) had 5.1 million subscribers, up from 4.7 million in the previous month, and the company's market share reached 12.7 percent from 12 percent in August.

VimpelCom (URS) saw its customer base go up to 938,647, from 785,598 customers in the previous month.

VimpelCom had a market share of 2.3 percent, up from 2 percent in August.

Source: Telecom

Ukraine's Krasnianska Wins Beam Gold

AARHUS, Denmark -- Ukraine's Iryna Krasnianska surprised the favourites with her deft flips to grab gold on the balance beam at the world gymnastics championships on Saturday.

Ukraine's Iryna Krasnianska shows her gold medal for the balance beam at the 39th Artistic Gymnastics World Championships in Aarhus, Denmark
She had to wait 10 minutes, as the crowd grew impatient, for her score of 15.575 points, surpassing Romanian Sandra Izbasa by 0.075 points and Canadian Elyse Hopfner-Hibbs by 0.100 points.

Top qualifier Zhang Nan from China competed despite suffering a scary training injury that required a trip to hospital on Friday.

She tied for fourth with Russia's Anna Pavlova.

All-round champion Vanessa Ferrari of Italy fell during her routine and finished sixth.

American Nastia Liukin could not defend the title she won last year in Melbourne after hurting her ankle earlier this month.

Source: Guardian Unlimited

Implications Of Our Ukraine’s Withdrawal From The Government

BOSTON, MA -- On 19 October, Viktor Yushchenko’s People’s Union-Our Ukraine (PUOU) party announced that all of its ministers within the government had resigned and that the party’s political bloc had moved into opposition (with 79 parliamentary seats).

Our Ukraine party logo
This included Justice Minister Roman Zvarych, who was appointed on the personal quota of President Yushchenko, but is a founding member of PUOU: Interior Minister Yuriy Lutsenko, appointed on the Socialist Party quota, but now supporting President Yushchenko, also reportedly submitted his resignation.

Foreign Minister Borys Tarasyuk, representing the People’s Movement of Ukraine, which is a member of the Our Ukraine parliamentary bloc, did not resign, nor did Defense Minister Anatoliy Hrytsenko, who is not a member of any political party, but a strong Yushchenko ally.

What are the implications of this action? What might it suggest about Ukraine’s future domestic and foreign policy course? What are the ramifications for Ukraine’s nascent political opposition?

President Viktor Yushchenko now has only two representatives – Tarasyuk and Hrytsenko – in the cabinet of ministers, which has primary control over domestic policy and some control over foreign policy.

On the surface, therefore, it appears that Yushchenko may lose important leverage within the cabinet. However, Our Ukraine’s ministers had been unable to work effectively within Yanukovich’s cabinet and were often left watching as policies in opposition to Yushchenko’s positions were enacted. This is particularly true of Foreign Minister Tarasyuk, who has been unable to protect his portfolio.

A move to opposition may allow these former ministers more effectively to criticize the government and to provide clear alternatives. Their influence outside the government may be far greater than it was within it.

Yushchenko’s remaining allies in the government will have difficulty influencing government policy in any measurable way.

Already in the past month, Foreign Minister Tarasyuk was left at home both during Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich’s first visit to Brussels and during all of his visits to Russia as prime minister.

During the visit to Brussels, Yanukovich backtracked on Ukraine’s stated goal of speedy entry into NATO – a primary goal of Tarasyuk’s and Yushchenko’s foreign policy. The Foreign Minister also has been unable to push the government to move forward quickly on reforms which are necessary to enter the WTO.

Now, with his allies out of the cabinet, the situation likely will become even more difficult for him.

The Defense Minister is in a more advantageous position. Hrytsenko is a strong leader and effective manager and has been able to continue Western-style military reforms.

He has vigorously attacked the notorious corruption within the ministry and forged important alliances by doing so. However, recent personal attacks on him from the ruling coalition partner Communist Party suggest that the core governing coalition is not content to ignore him.

Although he is in this position to remain a relatively effective force for reform, the best position is not necessarily secure.

Concerns regarding the effectiveness of the “Declaration of National Unity” were well-founded.

On 2 August 2006, Yushchenko, Yanukovich and the leaders of the Communist Party, Socialist Party and Our Ukraine Bloc, signed the “Declaration of National Unity.” This five-page document was said to provide the foundation for all future policy decisions in the country.

“The basics of the definition of Ukraine's domestic and foreign policy, of its continuity, have been completed,” Yushchenko said at the time. “I am convinced that in Ukraine's political practice, at any rate among the signatories, there will be no more … discussions and misinterpretations.”

Those discussions, of course, had been based on the fact that Yanukovich leaned toward a Russo-centric foreign policy while Yushchenko was committed to a West-leaning policy.

Following the signing of the declaration (called a “Universal” in Ukraine), and buoyed by his apparent belief that all questions of Ukrainian’s future policy direction had been answered, Yushchenko nominated Yanukovich to become the country’s new prime minister.

When questioned by the media about differences that seemed to exist between the two men – particularly about the country’s general foreign policy and its specific goal of joining NATO – Yushchenko said that foreign policy would remain entirely his right, and asserted: "I am pursuing the policy toward [NATO] integration without adding anything else to it."

However, on 17 October, Our Ukraine’s leadership suggested that under the Yanukovich government, "Ukraine's process of integration into the WTO is being wrecked, the program of Ukraine's accession to the EU has been basically stopped and there has been a fundamental block on Ukraine's entry into NATO.”

It is true that Yanukovich and his coalition have halted preparations for NATO entry, slowed preparation for the WTO and paid little attention to EU reforms – all in opposition to Yushchenko’s wishes. But, given Yanukovich’s previous anti-NATO rhetoric and his consistent caution towards the WTO and the EU, this should not be a surprise.

In fact, the “Declaration of National Unity” provides no timetable for NATO and EU preparation – Yanukovich had refused to sign it if these were included. And, although the document states that the Yanukovich government and parliamentary majority will enact reforms “necessary for entering the World Trade Organization by the end of 2006,” the coalition partner Communist Party has always refused to endorse this particular article of the agreement, immediately calling it into question.

The ability of the new opposition to influence policy is questionable, as the country’s two opposition blocs will have difficulty creating an effective mechanism to promote their agendas.

Our Ukraine’s leadership historically has been uncomfortable in opposition-oriented alliances. Through the final years of the Kuchma administration, Our Ukraine often had difficulty deciding whether or not to join anti-Kuchma protests.

Yushchenko himself, as late as 11 October suggested that he did not want Our Ukraine to move to opposition. Within the bloc, there are also a number of important members who have business connections to business interests within Yanukovich’s Party of Regions, and these members previously have blocked attempts to move into opposition.

Furthermore, Our Ukraine’s members lead the governments in at least 75 regional and local councils, placing them technically in opposition to the federal government, but leaving them financially dependent upon it. This suggests that the bloc’s leaders will hesitate to confront the authorities.

In contrast, the Bloc of Yulia Tymoshenko (BYUT), which controls 122 seats in the parliament, moved into “radical opposition” on 3 August, soon after Yanukovich was nominated.

Former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko then attempted to create an inter-faction opposition, but Our Ukraine balked at joining. BYUT will not hesitate to confront the government whenever necessary, which sometimes places it in conflict with the more moderate Our Ukraine.

Our Ukraine leader Roman Bezsmertny has hesitated to work in opposition with Tymoshenko. “Our Ukraine does not conduct any negotiations,” Bezsmertny said on 17 October. “If Yuliya Volodymyrivna [Tymoshenko] makes relevant proposals, we are ready to renew a dialogue,” he added. However he underscored that they will not approach her and suggested that there should be only one opposition bloc.

The two opposition forces likely will have difficulty working together to create an effective mechanism for representing their interests and the interests of Yushchenko.

Source: Institute for the Study of Conflict, Ideology and Policy

Fresh Political Row Erupts In Ukraine

KIEV, Ukraine -- Just two years after Ukraine’s Orange Revolution, President Viktor Yushchenko is facing a political crisis, with four of his government allies resigning yesterday and public support for him down to single digits.

Viktor Yushchenko
The resignation of four cabinet ministers from Yushchenko’s own party came a day after he made a surprise appearance at a film premiere in Kiev with Hollywood director Steven Spielberg — and many in the audience seemed hardly to notice.

Any president might be overshadowed by a star of Spielberg’s stature, but Yushchenko is not just any president: he is the onetime national hero who rode a wave of mass protests to power in the 2004 Orange Revolution.

Two years on, his support in the opinion polls has tumbled to 9.5 per cent. “In his first months as president in 2005 he had 46.7 per cent total support,” sociologist Andrei Bychenko from the Razumov polling centre said.

“This fall is very serious. From the time he became prime minister (in 1999), his level of total support has never fallen below 20 percent.”

“Yushchenko’s support has reached the level of Leonid Kuchma,” Ukraine’s widely unpopular former president, Bychenko said.

The latest sign of trouble for Yushchenko was the announcement by his Our Ukraine party that four of its members — the ministers of justice, health, family and culture — had resigned their cabinet posts.

Ukraine’s interior minister, an ally of Yushchenko’s, said yesterday he had also submitted his resignation to the president, but was staying on at Yushchenko’s request.

The stir provoked an expression of concern from visiting EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana, who said yesterday he hoped Ukraine’s political landscape would be “clearer and more comprehensible” by the next EU-Ukraine summit, Interfax reported.

The parliament has yet to approve the first four resignations, and two other key presidential allies, Defence Minister Anatoly Gritsenko and Foreign Minister Boris Tarasyuk, have thus far retained their jobs in government.

But the president is feeling the heat.

His main political problem is his conflict with Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych — his former Orange Revolution adversary who advocates closer ties with Russia and has resisted Yushchenko’s plans for integration with western Europe.

The departure of the four Our Ukraine ministers would further chill the “cold war” between the president and Yanukovych’s government, political analyst Vladimir Fesenko was quoted by Interfax Ukraine news agency as saying.

In a bid to revive his fortunes, the president has announced a shake-up in his secretariat and last week embarked on a nationwide tour designed, the media said, to reconnect with voters and test the loyalties of regional authorities.

But while the president and the prime minister are wrestling over the approach Ukraine should take towards Nato, the World Trade Organisation and the European Union, most Ukrainian citizens are thinking with their wallets, Bychenko noted.

Ukraine’s economic success when Yushchenko was prime minister led people to expect a wave of prosperity once he became president, the sociologist said. “On the contrary, they see him as having done practically nothing in the economic sphere — the sphere seen as his strong point.”

However low public support has fallen for the man who was cheered by crowds of hundreds of thousands just two years ago, it may not have hit rock bottom yet.

Source: AFP

Ukraine's Interior Minister To Keep Post Despite Resignations

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine's interior minister said Thursday he will continue serving in his post, despite a decision by the pro-Presidential Our Ukraine bloc to go into opposition against the Russian-leaning prime minister's government.


Yuriy Lutsenko
Yuriy Lutzenko was one of five Cabinet ministers that handed in their resignations in protest against Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych's failure to follow through on Western-leaning President Viktor Yushchenko's key policy areas agreed in August, in particular joining NATO and the WTO.

As well as Lutzenko, resignation letters were filed Thursday with the country's parliament by Justice Minister Roman Zvarych; Minister on Family, Youth, and Sports Affairs Yuriy Pavlenko; Healthcare Minister Yuriy Polyachenko; and Culture Minister Ihor Likhovoi. Parliament must accept the resignations for them to take effect.

But the interior minister, who has held the post since February 2005, said President Yushchenko has changed his decision on his resignation.

"I do not intend to leave the ministry to possible followers of non-democratic agendas," he said.

Anatoliy Hrytsenko and Borys Tarasyuk, the defense and foreign ministers respectively, will also keep their posts, on the condition that they not join governing coalition.

Our Ukraine's move signals an end to efforts at forming a grand coalition of Yushchenko's six-party bloc with Yanukovych's pro-Russian Party of Regions and its allies, the Socialist and Communist parties.

Source: RIA Novosti

Ukraine: Pro-Presidential Bloc Goes Into Opposition Amid Executive Standoff

PRAGUE, Czech Republic -- Our Ukraine has announced that it is switching to the opposition and pulling its ministers out of the government.

Roman Bezsmertny
Our Ukraine leader Roman Bezsmertnyy said in the Verkhovna Rada on October 17 that his bloc's decision to go into opposition was caused by its disagreement with policies pursued by the ruling coalition of the Party of Regions, the Socialist Party, and the Communist Party, which is often referred to as an "anticrisis coalition."

"In the past two months we witnessed a break in Ukraine's domestic and foreign course that was supported by the Ukrainian people during the election of President Viktor Yushchenko. Integration with the World Trade Organization is being ruined, programs of cooperation between Ukraine and the EU have actually been halted," Bezsmertnyy said.

Bezsmertnyy called on opposition parties, both within and outside the Verkhovna Rada, to set up a "confederation" to support the pro-European course championed by President Yushchenko.

"Regarding our proposals in today's situation, we call on opposition forces in parliament and outside parliament to form a European Ukraine [opposition alliance] as a confederation, to work out an action plan that would be aimed at creating an alternative to the actions of the anticrisis coalition and the current government," Bezsmertnyy said.

Bezsmertnyy did not say a single word about Our Ukraine's relations with the BYuT, its former ally in the 2004 Orange Revolution. Both blocs split in September 2005 because of their failure to run a coalition government.And they suffered an even worse failure while trying to form a new coalition after the March 2006 parliamentary elections.

The BYuT announced the creation of an "interfactional" opposition association in the Verkhovna Rada last month and made former Prime Minister Yuliya Tymoshenko its leader. So far Tymoshenko has managed to attract only two defectors from the Socialist Party to this opposition alliance.

Meanwhile, BYuT lawmaker Anatoliy Semynoha told RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service that he and his colleagues will readily welcome Our Ukraine lawmakers among their ranks.

"Our position is comprehensible. We formed an interfactional opposition union, which has been joined by some Socialists. We are inviting our Ukraine as well. I think that it is necessary for them to join [this union] and start working today without inventing a bicycle [anew]," Semynoha said.

However, judging by Bezsmertnyy's announcement on October 17, Our Ukraine is set to reformat the configuration of opposition groups in Ukraine according to its own taste rather than join the Tymoshenko-led group.

Our Ukraine lawmaker Vyacheslav Koval told RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service that his party has not yet made a final decision on how to proceed in the opposition.

"There has been no decision on whether to create a confederation or not. But perhaps [such a confederation] is a way for attracting parties outside parliament and creating a powerful opposition. However, this needs to be discussed," Koval said.

But the chances that Our Ukraine might get together with the Yuliya Tymoshenko Bloc once again, let alone recognize Tymoshenko's leading role in the opposition, are very slim.

Where do these opposition maneuvers leave President Yushchenko?

Yushchenko said on October 18 that the five ministers delegated to Yanukovych'a cabinet by Our Ukraine should step down in order to be consistent with the position of their bloc. They reportedly submitted their resignations to the Verkhovna Rada on October 19.

If Prime Minister Yanukovych replaces these ministers with people from his party, President Yushchenko will lose a considerable leverage tool in the government. In such a case there will be only two pro-Yushchenko ministers in the cabinet -- Foreign Minister Borys Tarasyuk and Defense Minister Anatoliy Hrytsenko, who were appointed directly by the president.

But Yanukovych may decide against such a solution. There have already been proposals from the Party of Regions to give Yushchenko the right to fill these five ministerial posts with "non-party professionals."

This seems to be a coldly calculated gesture of goodwill toward the president whose powers have been significantly trimmed in favor of the legislature and the prime minister by a constitutional reform enforced in January.

The anticrisis coalition falls 60 votes short of the 300 votes required to override presidential veto over legislation. Therefore, by giving Yushchenko the right to nominate more ministers to the cabinet, Yanukovych may want the president to share responsibility for the cabinet's decisions, even despite the withdrawal of the pro-presidential Our Ukraine from it.

In other respects, however, the failure of the Orange Revolution camp to form a ruling coalition after the March 2006 legislative elections could spell big trouble for President Yushchenko. Prime Minister Yanukovych is firmly set to take away as much prerogatives from the president as constitutional loopholes will allow him.

Yanukovych has recently refused to implement several presidential decrees, arguing that they were not cosigned by him, as stipulated by the constitution.

Yanukovych is also questioning in the Constitutional Court Yushchenko's right to appoint regional governors without coordination with the government.

In addition, pro-Yanukovych regional councilors reportedly passed no-confidence motions in more than 70 oblast or district administration heads. Yanukovych is demanding their dismissal, arguing that under the constitution a no-confidence vote supported by two-thirds of lawmakers is sufficient to oblige the president to sack the head of a district or oblast administration.

Thus, having taken a firm grip on the central government, Yanukovych now appears to be determined to dismantle the network of presidential loyalists in the provinces.

May such a turn of events push Our Ukraine and the BYuT toward reassessing their stance toward each other? BYuT lawmaker Semynoha believes that it may.

"Regarding the opposition and its future, I am convinced that there is no other scenario for Our Ukraine than actually joining the united opposition in the Verkhovna Rada and jointly building democracy in our state," Semynoha said. "If they fail to do it today, they will do it later. Time, voters, and necessity in our situation will simply force them to do it."

But Ukrainian voters will have the chance to discipline their politicians no earlier than in 2009 and 2011, when the country will hold presidential and parliamentary votes, respectively.

Therefore, in the short term, Ukraine will most likely witness confrontation not only between the government and the opposition represented by the BYuT and Our Ukraine, but also between the opposition blocs themselves.

Source: Radio Free Europe

Ukrainian Film To Counter Holocaust Deniers - Spielberg

KIEV, Ukraine -- A documentary film based on the accounts of Holocaust survivors in Ukraine can help undermine activists who try to deny the attempt to eliminate European Jewry, U.S. filmmaker Steven Spielberg said on Wednesday.

Filmmaker Steven Speilberg (R) speaks as Ukrainian industrialist Viktor Pinchuk listens at a news conference in Kiev, October 18, 2006.
Spielberg, whose grandparents came from Ukraine, co-produced "Spell Your Name" and was attending its premiere after visiting Babiy Yar, the site outside Kiev city centre where the Nazis slaughtered more than 33,000 Jews in two days in September 1941.

"In order to create an undeniability about the Holocaust, these survivors, 52,000 of them, need to be shown to students all over the world," Spielberg told a news conference.

"Tolerance is born of education. Everything comes from what we learn. It all depends on who our teachers are...All hatred starts with fear. And we have experienced a century of fear and I fear we are going into another century of heightened fear."

The film, co-produced with Ukrainian industrialist Viktor Pinchuk, brings together poignant accounts from Jews who survived and Ukrainians who sheltered them.

Yuri Pinchuk relates how he last saw his mother in a ghetto after she had helped negotiate his safe passage out. Polina Belskaya describes emerging from a mass grave.

Irina Maksimova winces at the memory of a German soldier removing a crying infant from a truck, smashing its head and hurling the corpse back into the vehicle. She then tells how her family took in and concealed 16 Jews.

Director Sergei Bukovsky intersperses the accounts with images of life in towns and villages through the seasons.

HOMECOMING

Spielberg, making his first trip to an ex-Soviet state, said his background made him feel very much at home in Ukraine.

"This is not a foreign culture to me at all. This is a very familiar culture. I got off the aeroplane today and said 'I'm home!'" he said.

"I was brought up in a home where grandparents only spoke Russian and Yiddish...I kind of felt I had a piece of Ukraine in my own home, especially around dinner time."

Spielberg said showing the film would build understanding of the Holocaust in Ukraine, where Soviet versions of history downplayed its scale. He explored the subject of the Holocaust in his acclaimed "Schindler's List".

He said he had been moved by his visit to Babiy Yar, one of the first sites of mass wartime killings, where the Nazis ordered Kiev's Jews to gather 10 days after seizing the city.

No monument stood at the site until the 1970s and it was not until the end of Soviet rule that a monument to Jewish victims was erected. Gypsies, partisans and other victims were later shot there, with the total number believed to exceed 100,000.

"I had mixed feelings to be quite honest because the epicentre of Babiy Yar is a train station...," he said.

"I had a very tough time picturing what that place looked like 60 years ago and why it had changed so much. I was then able to see some pictures in books...get my bearings and my geography and go to the monuments."

Source: Reuters

Ukraine Needs A Strong Opposition

KIEV, Ukraine -- The recent announcement by President Viktor Yushchenko’s Our Ukraine party to go into opposition to the Viktor Yanukovych government does not come as a surprise.

Our Ukraine faction leader Roman Bezsmertny
The real surprise came a few weeks earlier, when the president called on Yanukovych to form a coalition government comprising Yanukovych’s Party of Regions, the Socialists, the Communists and Our Ukraine. Now, Our Ukraine is rejecting participation in this coalition.

In reality, the coalition is untenable. It has no ideological base, no common policies and no cohesion. Yesterday’s enemies artificially forced a relationship designed to satisfy immediate political necessities. Our Ukraine wanted to regain some power — get appointed to head ministries – after forfeiting a viable Orange coalition.

Regions was anxious to neutralize the opposition. To cover up major political fault lines, the parties signed the National Unity Universal document. To her credit, BYuT faction leader Yulia Tymoshenko refused to join the coalition and formed an opposition to the government, never signing the document.

Now it appears the deal with the devil, as the Ukrainians call it, is in jeopardy. Last week, Our Ukraine faction leader Roman Bezsmertny, announced that Our Ukraine is joining the opposition and pulling ministers from the government.

What sparked it off was the prime minister’s negative stance on NATO in Brussels, though Our Ukraine accuses Yanukovych of wider disregard for the Universal.

No surprises here. Once the Universal had served its purpose and once he was firmly in power, Yanukovych was less bound to its principles, such as European integration, fast tracking to the WTO, and, of course, joining NATO. Such principles never were part of his party’s political ideology to begin with.

Moreover, it appears the Universal is not enforceable by law, not worth the paper it’s written on. In reality, the prime minister’s position is secure as long as he controls the majority in the Rada, Ukraine’s parliament, or until the people have had enough of this deceit and demand a new election.

It looks like Our Ukraine has been outmaneuvered. No surprises here either. It has a history of political ineptness. Consider the following: its forerunner, and still an influential component, Rukh, championed the independence movement in 1991. Over 90 percent of the population supported them. Since then, it has split into several parties, Our Ukraine being one of them.

This eternal squabbling cost them the political control of Ukraine. Then, reunited in the 2004 presidential election and re-branded as Orange forces, they again rallied tremendous popular support. They surprised and earned respect from most of Ukraine, even the world, with this success. Now two years later, with the people given political capital squandered by its leaders, parliamentary power has been handed over to Russia’s preferred man - Viktor Yanukovych.

The reinvention of Our Ukraine as the opposition may be its political salvation. It has lost much support among the people and will no doubt lose more if it continues to associate with the Regions.

Ideologically, Our Ukraine is a much better fit with BYuT than with Regions. It might distinguish itself once again by joining forces with Tymoshenko to raise Ukraine to a new level of democratic evolution: a two party system; one in power and one in opposition.

Democracy, as defined by ancient Greece, and still true today, is a society in which citizens take turns in being rulers and the ruled. Rulers are those who win control of parliament in a fair election; the opposition are those who lose but want to win and rule next.

There were times in Ukraine’s history when criticism of the government - the main role of the opposition - was considered treason, punishable by prison or worse. This was the reality in the USSR, a one party dictatorship with no opposition. It was death for some 30 million who dared to criticize the Soviet authorities! A pathological paranoia leading to loathing and scorn still clings to many politicians with a Communist background, against opposition to their “correct” way.

Such people are clearly identifiable. They hurl invectives at those not inclined to support them, be they coalitions or simply individuals with other political views. Fascist nationalists and emotional national crisis generators come to mind, as do the appalling animal name-calling by Mr. Yanukovych of the Orange supporters who protested the falsified presidential elections in 2004.

These are yesterday’s people who do not understand the indispensable value of an opposition and the need for Ukraine to go forward in its political evolution.

What does a legitimate opposition do? It debates and criticizes, asks embarrassing questions and makes statements to the press about the government’s questionable dealings.

When the public good is at stake, the opposition has the right and duty to oppose the government’s policies and actions. By doing so, it is trying to convince the electorate to give it power to govern in the next election because it, the opposition, can and will do a better job.

In democracies, the evolution from a multi-party to a two- or three- party system clarifies the role of the opposition. It is the party whose elected members do not support the government and who offer themselves to the voters, not just as individual candidates, but as an organized and alternative government.

This is exactly what Yulia Tymoshenko did when she declared that BYuT would not join the Regions but sit in parliament as the opposition. If Ukraine is to continue its transformation into a modern state, it is imperative that it move in this direction. Our Ukraine’s decision to join the opposition is a good step forward.

Ukraine needs what every democracy needs - a strong, forceful opposition, ideologically united to fight policy battles on important issues with the government on behalf of the citizens.

To win the next election Ukraine’s opposition, like those throughout the world, needs a winning strategy. To begin, here are some key steps:

1) Decide that it is an “Orange opposition,” understanding that the greater the integration and movement towards a single party, the greater its chances of galvanizing the electorate’s support.

2) Distance oneself from losers, former political lights that have disgraced themselves. The people do not forget.

3) Seek models of how other oppositions do it — the Poles, the Brits, the Americans. Use what fits. Learn quickly.

4) Establish a shadow cabinet using the best people for the job, sharing positions among the various factions to strengthen cohesion.

5) Provide solid debate on issues facing Ukraine - energy and the Russia factor; foreign affairs; the despicable social inadequacies. Use the media as much as possible.

6) Be fearless in criticizing the government in parliament, the media, in meetings with the electorate, but be fair. Remember, their turn to criticize will come when they are in the opposition.

Source: Kyiv Post

Ukraine Illegally Sells 40 Tanks To Georgia — Report

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine has been illegally selling arms to Georgia amid escalating tensions between the South Caucasus republic and Russia, Ukraine’s Communist party leader quoted by RIA Novosti said Tuesday.


“Ukraine has already delivered 40 tanks to Georgia,” Petro Symonenko said.

Symonenko said Kiev is facing the risk of having sanctions imposed on it by the international community for illegally supplying arms to warring sides.

However Ukraine’s Defense Minister Anatoliy Hrytsenko asked Symonenko to fulfil his deputy’s duties instead of “going into hysterics”.

“Ukraine, in particular [state arms trader] Ukrspetseksport, indeed sold 16 tanks to Georgia last year. This is open information. It is clear to everyone. The UN has never questioned Ukraine about this.

By doing so, we have fulfilled our duties and breached not a single law. The Communists should calm down. They should better take care of passing the state budget for 2007 rather than making noise in the media,” he told Ukrainian Inter TV channel.

Georgian President Saakashvili has pledged to restore Tbilisi’s control over the self-proclaimed republics of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. His defense minister has also said Georgian troops will celebrate New Year’s day in the capital of South Ossetia, Tskhinvali.

On October 13, the UN Security Council unanimously approved a Russian-sponsored draft resolution on Georgia urging the ex-Soviet country to refrain from provocative actions in Abkhazia, and calling for an extension of the Russian peacekeeping mission in the region until April 15, 2007.

Russia retains a peacekeeping presence in South Ossetia and Abkhazia, which gained de facto independence following bloody conflicts after the breakup of the Soviet Union. Georgia’s leadership, which is currently embroiled in a spying row with Russia, accuses the Kremlin of supporting the breakaway regions’ drive for full independence.

Georgia’s relations with Russia went sour after President Mikheil Saakashvili came to power on the back of the “Rose Revolution” in 2003.

Both the government and parliament have sought to remove Russian peacekeepers from conflict zones with two self-proclaimed republics, and to force the withdrawal of Russian troops from two Soviet-era bases that are due to close in 2008.

Relations were further strained in September of this year after NATO ministers, meeting on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, endorsed the so-called Intensified Dialogue with Georgia.

Russia’s Foreign Ministry denounced the decision, saying closer ties between the alliance and the ex-Soviet nation could “seriously affect the political, military and economic interests of Russia and undermine the fragile status quo in the Caucasus.”

The arrest in Georgia of four Russian army officers on espionage charges a week later sent relations to a new low, prompting Moscow to suspend transportation and postal links with its Caucasus neighbor and to expel hundreds of Georgian migrants, regardless of Georgia releasing the officers, RIA Novosti adds.

Source: MosNews

Home Of Witness In Ukraine Journalist Murder Case Hit By Break-In

KIEV, Ukraine -- The home of a key witness in a high-profile Ukrainian journalist killing was broken into for unknown reasons, a lawyer involved in the case said on Monday.


Murdered Internet editor Georgy Gongadze
The Kiev apartment of Liudmila Frolova, a former co-worker of murdered Internet editor Georgy Gongadze, was ransacked in a possible robbery, said attorney Valentina Telichenko.

Gongadze's headless corpse was unearthed in a forest outside the Ukrainian capital in October 1999.

Frolova was a witness to death threats against Gongadze. According to some accounts the threats came from senior government officials.

The break-in according Telichenko was an attempt to destroy evidence of a government link to Gongadze's killers.

Gongadze before his death had been one of the few Ukrainian journalists to criticise the government of then-President Leonid Kuchma, who at the time controlled the country's media almost totally.

Frolova according to her account had in her possession phone records proving the threats against Gongadze had been made, and giving clues as to who had made them.

Scandal over the Kuchma government's lack of will to search for Gongadze's killers led to Ukraine's international isolation.

Ukraine's current President, reformer Viktor Yushchenko, has called bringing Gongadze's killers to justice "a matter of honor."

A criminal trial of two of three suspects in Gongadze's killing began in June. The missing suspect and alleged mastermind behind the murder, a former senior police officer, is thought to have fled the country.

Source: DPA German Press Agency

French President May Visit Ukraine In 2007

KIEV, Ukraine -- France’s President Jacque Chirac may schedule his visit to Ukraine before the spring of 2007, French Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Ambassador in Ukraine Jean-Paul Veziant reports.


“Before the spring of the next year the President’s Administration will find an opportunity to arrange Mr Chirac’s visit to Ukraine,” said Mr Veziant in his interview to Den daily out on Tuesday.

Touching upon relations of Ukraine with France and Germany regarding the possible accession to the EU or NATO, French Ambassador Veziant mentioned that “there are no obstacles” made by these two countries on Ukraine’s path to the Euro-Atlantic integration.

He also outlined the necessity of consensus among Ukrainians regarding the NATO membership.

Earlier, Chirac’s scheduled visit to Ukraine was postponed due to the state of French President’s health.

Source: ForUm

Mittal Sues Over Valuation Of 4.8 Billion Dollar Ukraine Steel Mill

KIEV, Ukraine -- Mittal Steel sued the Ukrainian government Monday, alleging a 4.8 billion dollar steel mill recently acquired by the international metals giant had been overvalued.


Mittal Steel Chairman Lakshmi Mittal
Mittal Steel Krivy Rih, the Ukrainian company operated by Netherlands-headquartered Mittal, filed the suit against the former Soviet republic's State Property Fund (SPF), the government agency responsible for privatizing state-owned businesses.

Mittal on 24 October 2005 purchased Ukraine's largest steel mill, Krivorizhstal, for 4.8 billion dollars in open bidding.

It was the largest privatization in Ukraine's history and, owing to its size, at a fell swoop doubled the total value of foreign direct investment in the country.

The Ukrainian government agent the SPF concealed some 6.6 million dollars of debt owed by the Krivoi Rih-headquarted steel works at the time of the Mittal purchase, and so acted in bad faith, the suit charged.

The legal framework of the record turnover of the factory to Mittal "also suffers from numerous procedural shortcomings," the suit alleged.

The SPF issued a statement saying the transfer had been proper in all its details, and that the Ukrainian government expected Mittal to live up to its obligations.

Mittal has failed to give SPF lawyers access to date proving Krivorizhstal was overvalued, the SPF statement charged.

Mittal's operation the Krivorizhstal mill since October 2005 has been less than smooth, with workers threatening strikes because of Mittal's purported failure to raise salaries, and plant management alleging Mittal has not invested in the plant as much as it promised to when buying the plant.

Mittal officials have denied the allegations, saying the steel company is committed to the Ukrainian market and has met all commitments to shareholders and plant personnel.

Ukraine has one of the poorest records in attracting foreign investment of any East European country. The main barriers are a Ukrainian government bureaucracy unfriendly to business, and widespread corruption.

Breach of faith suits are a common legal tool in Ukrainian business disputes concerning privatizations. Typically, the company sues in order the change the terms of a turnover of state property to private industry.

Source: DPA German Press Agency

Our Ukraine Bloc To Formally Move Into Opposition Tuesday

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine's pro-presidential parliamentary bloc Our Ukraine will officially announce that it is switching to the opposition October 17, the parliamentary faction leader said Monday.


Our Ukraine "Yes" flags
Relations between the bloc and the Russian-leaning government of Viktor Yanukovych, which came to power in August, have worsened as the government has dragged its feet on the president's key pro-Western policy goals. The bloc vowed October 5 to form a radical opposition, and called on its ministers to quit the Cabinet.

"The decision by the party's political council and the Our Ukraine bloc has already been made," Roman Bezsmertniy said. "We now have to make a decision on the fate of five ministers who are in the Cabinet as part of Our Ukraine's quota."

He said a final decision concerning the ministers will be made by President Viktor Yushchenko.

He also said Our Ukraine is not conducting any negotiations with an anti-crisis coalition in parliament, comprising the Party of Regions, the Socialist Party and the Communist Party, or with the Yulia Tymoshenko bloc.

Our Ukraine said Thursday it intends to form a shadow government.

After two months of negotiations, President Viktor Yushchenko's bloc failed to reach an agreement with Yanukovych's party on forming a governing coalition, and the sides continue to disagree over the national unity agreement proposed by the president, particularly on Yushchenko's drive to join NATO.

The Our Ukraine bloc was part of the 'Orange' coalition, which emerged after the inconclusive March parliamentary elections, along with the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc, which won 129 seats, and the Socialists.

The alliance collapsed when the Socialists defected to join the Party of Regions, led by President Viktor Yushchenko's former rival in the 2004 election and the current prime minister, Viktor Yanukovych, and the Communist Party, to form an 'anti-crisis' coalition.

But Ukraine's Prime Minister Yanukovych said Tuesday he has agreed with President Yushchenko to continue working on a broad parliamentary coalition.

President Yushchenko then urged political leaders "to return to a constructive dialogue" and resume talks on building a broad coalition.

Source: RIA Novosti

Laughter The Best Remedy

KIEV, Ukraine -- The exhilaration from defeating France at Hampden in the Euro 2008 qualifier was still coursing through the veins of Tartan Army members as they pressed kilts, dusted down the Glengarries and headed to Kiev.


A Scotland soccer fan stands in Independence Square in Kiev, Ukraine
It was the first time Scotland had played in Ukraine, so the denizens of their capital city had never seen anything like it.

Ukranians were certainly bemused by our regalia but there were smiles all round as the Tartan Army congregated on Independence Square.

It was the scene of a peaceful demonstration less than two years ago, dubbed the 'Orange Revolution', which resulted in the democratically elected President, Viktor Yushchenko, belatedly being sworn into office.

Unfortunately, on Tuesday evening, the night before the game, a group of around 30-40 youths elected to alter the ambience by charging the Scots who had hitherto been playing football with the locals and sampling the brewery products.

I had left the square by this time but was informed by members of the Tartan Army that four or five of the lads had been hospitalised by thugs determined to fight rather than frolic.

Fortunately, the Scots defused the situation by not reacting aggressively, understanding that it was the actions of a handful of unenlightened people.

The game in the Olympic Stadium was a disappointment, with Scotland losing 2-0

However, Ukraine were better than us on the night and deserved the points.

After play ended, we were left inside the ground for over an hour, supposedly waiting for the Ukrainians to disperse.

It later dawned on me that the hoards of Ukrainian police and army were more worried about protecting us than in preventing us from causing trouble.

However, as we were escorted away from the ground into the city, hundreds of Ukrainians waited on the streets to clap, shake hands and be photographed with us.

Once the police had left, a few Ukrainians insisted on us sharing the obligatory - in this part of the world - vodkas.

Five of Kiev's citizens took us to their favourite bar, and for a few hours, myself and a friend enjoyed wonderful hospitality and swapped tales on the game's great atmosphere.

They were humourous, friendly and generous companions. This is a big part of travelling with Scotland: meeting people and having a good laugh.

Sadly, it was not the only thing we were to take on the chin.

Returning to our hotel in the wee hours of the morning, my friend and I were jumped from behind by five thugs, intent on giving us a very different welcome.

We both received kicks and punches to the face and body, and were forced to defend ourselves in a bid to escape the cordon that had enveloped us.

The attack probably only lasted two or three minutes but it seemed an awful lot longer before the police arrived on the scene, checked our documents and sent us in the direction of our hotel.

Broken metatarsals

It was an uncomfortable flight the following day. I arrived at the Western Royal Infirmary in the small hours of Friday to have several parts of my body x-rayed.

The doctors and nurses delivered some mixed news: the discolouration and swelling at the back of my head, cheek bones and ribs were all just bruising, but metatarsals in my left hand were broken.

The next time I will stay in larger groups of Tartan Army members, but these things can happen anywhere, including Scotland.

The vast majority of Ukrainians were hospitable. There are good and bad people in every nation and I won't be allowing a small handful of mindless idiots to deter me from following my nation's football team in the rest of the qualifiers.

Apart from the flogging, it was an enjoyable experience.

A friend has already suggested ordering me a T-shirt emblazoned with the words 'I got a kicking in Kiev'.

Laughter is the best remedy.

Source: BBC News

Tanning With Tycoons In A Black Sea Playground

YALTA, Ukraine -- In his story The Lady With the Dog, Anton Chekhov, a resident of Yalta, remarked on two peculiarities of the crowd along the seaside in that great Crimean resort town: “the elderly ladies were dressed like young ones, and there were great numbers of generals.”

Picturesque Yalta
Generals aren't much in evidence in this Black Sea city today, but balmy old Yalta is once again, after the long interruption of the Soviet era, a place where the East European moneyed classes go to unwind.

It is, in fact, an open-air museum of New Russian and Ukrainian folkways. Bull-necked tycoons suck on Cohibas, their sparkly girlfriends teetering on dangerous-looking heels. The occasional Bentley rolls through the pedestrian throng near Primorskiy Park.

Casinos buzz and ping everywhere amid the city's pine-bowered alleyways. Much — if not everything — goes in this seaside boomtown, stuck at what used to be the Russian empire's, and is now Ukraine's, saggy bottom, looking across the Black Sea toward the Orient.

Glitz, however, is only one side of this city of about 80,000 people, and a superficial one — in Crimea, as elsewhere in the former Soviet Union, it wears off fast. Walk back several blocks from the Yalta seaside and the handsome old city is often in decay.

Then too, Crimea is mostly a poor, troubled place even by Ukrainian standards. Beyond its south coast, and even along it, it's an arena in which the ethnic Russians who make up the peninsula's vast majority and the indigenous Muslim Tatars now returning after being deported en masse by Stalin peer at each other warily.

This spring saw Tatar protests against Russian mistreatment, pro-Russian protests against NATO, and mutterings in the Russian Duma that Moscow might even reincorporate the peninsula, essentially taking it from Ukraine. (Crimea became Ukrainian in 1954, when Nikita S. Khrushchev, as a “gift,” transferred administrative control of it to the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. Russian, not its close cousin Ukrainian, remains Crimea's main language.)

These tensions contribute to the ambience of go-for-broke frontier vitality that reigns here. Enjoy yourself, because at any time, history suggests, the game could be up.

The Western visitors to this gorgeous place — with a climate like the Mediterranean's — need not concern themselves with any of that, of course. But on the other hand, almost everything to be seen once you get away from Yalta's pebbly beaches is so steeped in either Russianness or Tatarness that you can unintentionally acquire a fine education in Crimea's bifurcated, and rich, cultural reality.

A good place to examine Crimea's Tatar roots is Bakchisaray, an ancient town in the sun-drenched mountains northwest of Yalta that makes a good day trip from the resort.

It's from this dusty mountain place that the Tatar khans — under the patronage of their Ottoman overlords in Istanbul — ruled the peninsula for centuries before Catherine the Great conquered Crimea for her empire.

In Bakchisaray, the main attraction is the Khan's Palace, a graceful welter of courtyards, a minaret and a fountain immortalized in Pushkin's poem The Fountain of Bakchisaray. You can get Tatar food in the town's cafes: roasted meats, the meat- or cheese-filled flaky-crust dumplings known as chebureki, and lagman, a noodle-rich mutton stew.

You'll also find Tatar Crimea atop Ai Petri, the baroque-towered peak that looms monstrously just west of Yalta. Step off the cable car that ascends the three kilometres from the hamlet of Alupka to the peak, and you're on a windswept plateau from which views spread along the mountainous coast and across the Black Sea. You're also, unexpectedly, among the Tatars, who have built a tourist-serving encampment on the plateau that's as charming as it is unexpected.

In town for the Yalta Conference in 1945, Churchill pronounced the coastline — then a scorched battleground — the “Riviera of Hades.” There's nothing infernal here, but there remains a certain ghostliness lent by the lingering artifacts of lost Russian empires.

There are the disintegrating hulks of the brutalist sanatoriums the Soviets built, for example, and the Lenin statues that still stand in Yalta and Crimea's other towns.

Then there is the rich residue of the region's czarist past. In Alupka, a pleasant morning's ferry ride from the Yalta docks, you can, before boarding the Ai Petri cable car nearby, visit the spectacular half-Moorish, half-Scottish palace of Crimea's 19th-century governor-general Mikhail S. Vorontsov.

More poignant, however, is the Livadia Palace, an easy walk (or gypsy cab or bus ride) to the west of Yalta. Inside the palace, once you get past the exhibition devoted to the Yalta Conference, which was held in the building, you're in the private quarters of the royal family, which barely managed to complete the palace, in 1911, before they were overthrown.

Yalta's tourist infrastructure has made a lot of progress, but it's still underdeveloped. (Those who like the Wild East raffishness of the place, of course, say “thank God” to that.)

The middle ground in Yalta between apartment rentals (and Soviet sanatoriums that may or may not have running water) and expensive hotels doesn't really exist yet in Ukraine. Foreigners tend to stay at the Oreanda Hotel, the refurbished pre-revolutionary facility that bestrides the seaside like an overpriced colossus, but it's too expensive for what it offers.

An alternative is the Primorskiy Park Hotel, a five-minute walk into the park through groves of acacia and roses. Perched over the water, the place has a deco-ish vibe about it, as though it was airlifted in from Miami Beach. There's on-site bowling, for some reason, and a magnificent bath and spa complex.

Restaurants in Ukraine elicit howls of disgust from Western ex-pats: By North American large-city standards, there exists no first-rate restaurant in this entire France-sized country.

A likeness of one is at the Oreanda, especially if you seat yourself on the terrace overlooking the merry evening promenade. Another option is Nobu, a sushi place across the path from the Oreanda.

Your best bet, however, to follow the local credo: go cheap. Most of the dozens of outdoor and terrace cafes littered everywhere along the waterfront are satisfying places to eat: you get simple Tatar or Russo-Ukrainian dishes and lots of inexpensive local beer.

Look for the umbrella-covered tables, and don't be too choosy. These places are all more or less the same. And located as they are along the teeming docks or amid the mazy streets of the town, they put you close to the rough-edged charms of this resort, at the bottom frontier of a whole other world.

Source: Globe and Mail

Georgia Re-Orients Mail Route To Ukraine

TBILISI, Georgia -- Georgia is re-orienting its mail routes to Ukraine after Russia suspended mail links with its former Soviet ally, the Novosti Georgia agency said Saturday, referring to Georgia Post Office Co.


Authorities in Georgia arrested four Russian officers on spying charges in September, but released them later to defuse what was becoming a mounting crisis. An enraged Moscow responded by suspending all transportation and mail links with Georgia.

"After Russia suspended mail links with Georgia, the country's postal services have experienced a blockade as 80% of the mail exchange was transited via Moscow," Ezik Intskirveli said. "We have got in touch with Ukraine's national postal operator and asked it for help."

He said Ukraine had responded promptly and currently handled the largest portion of Georgia's mail exchanges, while Georgia was also holding talks with Turkish, French and German airlines.

Intskirveli added that the Georgia Post Office had urged the Universal Postal Union to respond to Russia's violation of the international mail links convention.

Source: RIA Novosti

Ukraine WW2 Nationalist Veterans Seek Recognition

KIEV, Ukraine -- Fighters from a Ukrainian World War Two guerrilla movement and their backers gathered on Saturday to demand official recognition as war combatants despite resistance from pro-Russian groups and Red Army veterans.

A woman gives flowers to a veteran of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), which fought both Nazis and Soviet forces in World War Two, as they attend a service in Kiev's St Sofia Cathedral October 14, 2006.
Riot police halted several hundred leftists who had intended to march down Kiev's main street to confront veterans marking the 64th anniversary of the founding of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), which fought both Nazi invaders and Soviet forces.

Minor scuffles erupted, but there was no repeat of the running street battles that marked commemorations a year ago.

A handful of elderly UPA fighters, surrounded by 3,000 sympathizers, filed through the city center holding aloft a giant blue and yellow national flag and massing by 11th century St Sofia Cathedral, one of Orthodoxy's most sacred shrines.

"Glory to the nation!" marchers shouted, recalling UPA's wartime slogan. Comrades echoed back: "Death to our Enemies!"

Unhealed wartime wounds expose gaps pitting Ukraine's nationalist west, more prone to seek inspiration in the West, against the Russian-speaking east, more sympathetic to Moscow.

Nationalists want authorities to grant the dwindling number of UPA fighters status as war combatants with veterans' pensions. Leftists denounce any such notion as an affront to the memory of more than 27 million Soviet war dead.

"We don't expect this government or president to solve this issue," said UPA veteran Teodor Yachun, 79, medals gleaming on his green uniform. "We see no light at the end of the tunnel, only darkness."

President Viktor Yushchenko, brought to power with the help of nationalists in the 2004 "Orange Revolution," is cautious on recognition. Veterans are wary of his calls for reconciliation, citing postwar Germany and Spain following its civil war.

"How can you possibly reconcile a victim with his hangman?" Yachun said.

Nationalists repressed when Moscow seized western Ukraine from Poland in 1939 under the Nazi-Soviet pact joined the UPA en masse under Nazi occupation to try to win an independent state.

At its peak in 1943, UPA had 100,000 men in its ranks. The very mention of UPA and its leader Stepan Bandera was virtually a post-war criminal offence as its fighters continued to resist Soviet rule well into the 1950s.

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 many Russians and Ukrainians still refer to as the Great Patriotic War.

Source: Reuters

Radical Communists Clash With Ukraine Police In Mass Demonstrations

KIEV, Ukraine -- Hundreds of radical communists clashed with police during mass demonstrations in Kiev on Saturday marking Ukraine’s divisive World War Two history.


Socialists and supporters of Red Army veterans rally against calls by Ukrainian partisans to receive official recognition as World War II veterans in front of a line of riot police blocking the main street downtown Kiev, Ukraine, Saturday, Oct. 14, 2006.
An estimated 200 members of the extreme-left Progressive Socialist Party of Ukraine (PSPU) attempted to break through police cordons separating them from Ukraine nationalist marchers.

Ukrainian rightists and nationalists in annual street marches on October 14 commemorate partisans that fought in World War Two.

The demonstrations are always tense, as some Ukrainian partisans fought against the Soviet Union’s Red Army.

Fists, clubs, and riot shields were used in the brawl. PSPU activists and police were roughly evenly matched in the 10-minute melee, until a paramilitary police unit fired an ‘unspecified gas’ into the crowd, dispersing the combatants.

One civilian participant in the battle was treated by an emergency medical team for minor injuries.

An estimated 5,000 former partisans, their supporters, and a small minority of partisan opponents had gathered in the centre of the Ukrainian capital Kiev by mid-morning.

Police presence was heavy with more than 4,000 uniformed law enforcers on hand. The marchers were generally peaceful, although pro- and anti-partisan demonstrators repeatedly insulted each other verbally, across police cordons.

Ukrainian nationalists operating in the country’s densely forested western and northern provinces formally founded the Ukrainian Revolutionary Army (UPA) on October 14, 1942.

UPA partisans fought primarily against German troops occupying Ukraine at the time, but also against Soviet forces, and against ethnic Ukrainian and Polish partisans.

All sides targeted civilians and an estimated 100,000 people died in three years of intense fighting and ethnic cleansing.

After World War Two ended some UPA fighters continued limited operations against the Soviet regime until as late as 1953.

Some Ukrainians consider the UPA the country’s first true patriots. Other Ukrainians consider the UPA as bandits and Bandera as a traitor to the Soviet state.

Source: Deutsche Presse-Agentur

Ukraine Must Join NATO To Ensure Security - Defense Minister

KIEV, Ukraine -- Joining NATO is a key precondition for Ukraine's sovereignty and national security, the ex-Soviet country's defense minister said Friday.


Defense Minister Hrystenko
Membership in the Western security alliance remains a hotly disputed issue among Ukraine's leadership, with the Western-leaning president pushing for accession, and the recently appointed pro-Russian government resisting the idea.

The Defense Ministry's press service said Anatoliy Hrystenko considers NATO accession "one of the main preconditions for the national security and sovereignty of the state," along with the "transparent, diversified, stable provision to Ukraine of energy resources, in particular natural gas."

Ukraine remains heavily reliant on gas supplies from and via neighboring Russia, and is currently in tense negotiations with Moscow over prices for 2007.

The issue became a key bilateral sticking point this year, following a price row in January, during which Russian energy giant Gazprom briefly cut off deliveries to Ukraine.

Hrystenko, speaking at a conference in the country's capital devoted to the NATO issue, said that as things stand, there is no reliability in the country's gas supply.

"The agreements that have been reached do not meet Ukraine's interests," the minister said.

"If we can resolve these two issues, Ukraine will be a stable, independent state, both domestically and externally," he said.

The drive for NATO membership was one of the key policy issues agreed to by lawmakers in August, through the national unity pact proposed by President Viktor Yushchenko.

However, Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych, who draws his support mainly from the Russian-speaking southern and eastern parts of Ukraine, said at a Ukraine-NATO commission meeting in Brussels in September that NATO accession remains deeply unpopular among the population, and that the country is yet not ready to push for membership.

The head of Our Ukraine's central executive committee, Igor Zhdanov, said Friday that the pro-presidential bloc intends to launch a large-scale 'information campaign' promoting NATO membership.

The bloc intends to convince Ukrainians that NATO membership is "first and foremost, a European standard-of-living issue, and not one of participation in military activities," Zhdanov's press service said.

"The foreign policy direction of the state became especially significant following Prime Minister Yanukovych's visit to Brussels, where he forgot about his signature on the national unity agreement."

"Our Ukraine will fulfill its promises to President Yushchenko, and will not allow the premier to realign the country's foreign policy direction," Zhdanov said.

Relations between the bloc and the Yanukovych's government, which came to power in August after months of political wrangling, continue to worsen amid disputes over the president's key pro-Western policy goals.

The bloc vowed on October 5 to form a radical opposition, and called on its ministers to quit the Cabinet.

Source: RIA Novosti

Our Ukraine Flounders For Political Bedfellows

KIEV, Ukraine -- Not only does President Viktor Yushchenko appear incapable of mending the various rifts that increasingly divide his country, but he can’t seem to muster the leadership to hold his Our Ukraine party together.


Volodymyr Horbulin (L), outgoing head of Ukraine's National Security Council, greets his successor Vitaly Haiduk, as President Viktor Yushchenko's head of staff Viktor Balokga watches
The parliament and government have been challenging the president’s authority for months; now, a revolt may be brewing among the ranks of his political followers.

On Oct. 10, Our Ukraine MP Davyd Zhvaniya confirmed that the bloc does not intend to return to coalition talks with the pro-Russian parliamentary majority led by Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych.

Our Ukraine leader Roman Bezsmertniy had proclaimed as much as a week earlier, on Oct. 4. Zhvaniya reiterated Bezsmertniy’s threats that Our Ukraine would go into opposition, adding that the party would recall the four ministerial posts that it holds in Yanukovych’s cabinet.

The four posts are Culture Minister Ihor Likhoviy, Health Minister Yuriy Polyachenko, Sports Minister Yuriy Pavlenko and Justice Minister Roman Zvarych. Upping the stakes even further, Our Ukraine additionally appealed to recall two other ministers - foreign and defense – whose jobs are constitutionally guaranteed by the president, rather than the premier.

Both Foreign Minister Boris Tarasyuk and Defense Minister Anatoliy Hrytsenko said, however, that they would remain in their posts, citing their constitutional duty as the reason.

For his part, faced with growing dissent in his own backyard, Yushchenko has continued to echo the calls for national unity voiced by Yanukovych’s Donetsk-based Regions party and its leftist allies: the Socialists and Communists.

The Socialists had stood side by side with Yushchenko during the mass popular protests of the country’s Orange Revolution, which took him to power and left his opponent Yanukovych humiliated.

But last summer, Yanukovych formed a majority with the Socialists and Communists, who have been relentless in chipping away at the president’s powers.

In the meantime, the flagship party of the country’s reform movement, Our Ukraine, has wallowed in limbo, neither fully in power or the opposition – represented by the parliament’s fifth faction, the Bloc of Yulia Tymoshenko, who had also once been Yushchenko’s ally.

The 80-member strong Our Ukraine faction is finding itself torn between efforts to drag it back into talks while still not having a clear opposition strategy or partners, thereby providing more instability on the domestic political scene.

The crux of the issue is the so-called Universal document, which Yanukovych signed in August in return for Our Ukraine’s support for his candidacy for the premiership.

The Regions now say the Universal provides the basis for more talks, while Our Ukraine sees it as a statement of joint policy – one that the Regions and its allies continually flaunt.

If the two parties are estranged by disagreement, one wouldn’t be able to tell by listening to their leaders.

Premier Yanukovych said after a meeting Oct. 9 with Yushchenko that talks on creating a broad alliance would go forward. Yanukovych noted the two had agreed “to work on creating a coalition.”

Yanukovych qualified this by saying that “for this we have, first and foremost, the political will of the president and the prime minister. And we believe that our overall aim is to stabilize the political situation. We do not have any other way.”

Speaking on Oct. 11 at the opening of a cabinet session, Yanukovych insisted that he expected Our Ukraine to join the coalition. Alluding to the Universal, he added that “yesterday, I spoke with the president.

An understanding exists that the political will of the head of state and head of cabinet are directed at maintaining stability, which is also a guarantor of economic stability … and that is why we will look for ways to resolve issues as we agreed in August.” According to Yanukovych, “there will be a final decision soon.”

All the while, Yushchenko has been reshuffling his inner team, stocking it with tougher politicians capable of standing up to the strong-arm tactics of the parliamentary majority.

On Oct. 9, Yushchenko appointed wealthy Ukrainian industrialist Vitaliy Hayduk secretary of the National Security and Defense Council. Hayduk’s appointment follows in the wake of another influential supporter from “Orange Donetsk,” Oleksandr Chaliy, who was made a deputy head of the presidential secretariat.

The question remains whether the president plans to fight this battle alone, or with the help of his party.

Speaking to the Post on Oct. 10, Our Ukraine press secretary Tetyana Mokridi confirmed that the faction is in opposition: “On Oct. 4, Our Ukraine said it was going into opposition because the Universal is not being implemented. This decision was taken by the faction, all the parties belonging to the bloc and the council of Our Ukraine … We are talking about systemic opposition.

We proposed to initiate a confederation called European Ukraine, which would unite democratic forces both in parliament and outside it. We are saying that the confederation can be based upon the parties that existed in 2001.”

Mokridi was also critical of the stance of the Regions: “The Party of Regions is not implementing the Universal, is fighting for some presidential powers and, at the same time, says the door for talks remains open. Our Ukraine does not adhere to such a position. Our Ukraine has a clear stance – the Universal should be implemented in its entirety.”

Political analyst Svitlana Kononchuk told the Post that, in her view, indecision is prevalent in Our Ukraine. She described Our Ukraine’s predicament as awkward: “It will be difficult for them to join the opposition BYuT camp. The step to go into opposition is justified in terms of promises made by it to the electorate during the recent election campaign.

However, unable to find a place which would be a platform for the party’s future development, it is neither in government nor opposition. It lost power, and in the eyes of the electorate it is lost too. If it is a responsible party, it should not be to-ing and fro-ing, as it needs to decide on its place in politics and role in Ukraine.”

Asked about the near-term future of Our Ukraine, analyst Mykhaylo Pogrebinskiy said that Our Ukraine will “most likely exist as a faction, but there will be two or three groups and they will vote in different ways.

One part will vote with the Regions, and Yushchenko will appeal to another part, but I cannot yet see a new political project being put forward by Our Ukraine.”

Senior BYuT deputy Andriy Shkil agreed broadly with Pogrebinskiy.

Asked about Our Ukraine’s plans, he said “there will be no fully-fledged move by Our Ukraine into opposition. Part of it will go into opposition and part will go with the coalition. A majority of Our Ukraine MPs, around 45, will go into opposition.

BYuT proposed a way out - the creation of an intra-factional association. The remaining MPs [35] will go with the Regions. There can be no confederation idea like European Ukraine, as Our Ukraine is either in the coalition or in opposition.”

Source: Kyiv Post

Ukrainians Fight Over New Face For Ancient Lviv

LVIV, Ukraine -- The city of Lviv, a jewel of architectural beauty, is marking its 750th anniversary with a makeover of its main square, but the elaborate project has enraged historians and civic activists.

Tourists and local residents relax on a sunny afternoon in Rynok Square in central Lviv.
The local council is eager to end decades of decay and attract tourists from throughout Europe to the cobbled streets and intriguing alleyways of a city that over the past century has been run by Austrians, Poles, Soviets and now Ukrainians.

But the restoration has provoked intense debate about whether post-Soviet Ukraine is capable of preserving its artistic treasures for future generations.

Lviv's town center is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage site and Rynok Square, already reconstructed several times after wars or fires, has always been its focal point.

Critics say the latest project has disfigured the square.

"Imagine taking an elderly woman and applying lipstick, mascara and rouge to turn her into a young girl," said Valery Potyuk, a sculptor who heads the Lviv branch of Ukraine's Cultural Fund.

"You cannot look at her because it is both unpleasant and unnatural. The art which pervaded Rynok Square has disappeared."

Students and journalists fought to block renovation of the area dominated by the town hall and flanked by more than 40 other buildings with fountains at each corner of the square.

Monks, craftsmen and jewelers frequented the square from the Middle Ages, with architectural styles ranging from the 13th to the 18th century.

Officials in the city of 850,000 defend the project.

"Not a single modern stone was used. Everything is from the appropriate era and done well. And people like it," said Vasyl Myskiv, head of the town council's construction department.

"We did the archaeological research and changed the entire infrastructure. That meant new gas and water pipes and tram lines and renewing fountains, street lamps and cobblestones."

Work crews ignored the protests and raced to complete plans for the festivities this month, when 150,000 guests -- including the presidents of Ukraine, Poland and Lithuania -- poured into Lviv for concerts, exhibitions and lavish receptions.

CHANGING BORDERS

The city, the heartland of Ukrainian national sentiment, is a vibrant example of the changes that swept over central Europe, often shifting national borders eastwards or westwards.

Lviv's twisting alleys, gothic and baroque buildings and sumptuous cafes resemble Vienna for a good reason -- as Lemberg it was an eastern outpost of Austria-Hungary until the empire's demise in 1918.

The influence of Poland -- which took over Lwow in 1918 -- is everywhere, with Catholic shrines, cemeteries and monuments alongside Orthodox and Armenian churches, and synagogues.

Suburban tower blocks are signs of the Soviet legacy from 1939 when the Kremlin grabbed back Lvov and western Ukraine as part of the Nazi-Soviet deal carving up eastern Europe.

Critics of the renovation say it was rushed and botched.

"Everything was done in a hurry. What was clear only to specialists at the start is now clear to everybody," said Oleg Matsekh, a cultural activist who spearheaded protests.

"We see cobbled streets coated with concrete. We see the installation of modern lamps on period houses. We see electric cables running over fountains. You can't call this renovation."

The city said the parlous state of facilities after countless years of neglect left it little choice and the hope is that tourist revenues can generate revenue for further renovation.

"Nobody did anything for over 100 years. Water pipes are very old. Electric cables were unchanged for 100 years. The reconstruction was vital," says Myskiv.

"Cobblestones could perhaps have lasted a few more years, but the sewer system was ruining the foundations of old buildings. We have accomplished a big job."

New projects to halt further decay are in the planning stages.

Renaissance palazzos and other buildings in Vienna's early 20th century Secession style are crumbling. Gothic cellars are submerged. Medieval wooden water pipes are in ruins. Frescoes are faded or hidden under fresh paint. Roofs have open cracks.

"Anywhere you go in the city center things are old -- old streets, old buildings," Myskiv said.

"As of now, more than 1,000 buildings are crying out for renovation. We cannot stop now if we want to hang on to them."

Source: Reuters

NGO Launches Pro-NATO Information Campaign

KIEV, Ukraine -- Responding to what it says has been a failure on the part of the government to provide comprehensive information about NATO, a Western-funded Ukrainian NGO has launched an educational campaign to enlighten public opinion and put the country firmly on track toward Alliance membership.


The initiative comes as Ukraine finds itself divided over its NATO membership prospects, with pro-Western President Viktor Yushchenko pushing the country toward the Alliance, and pro-Russian Premier Viktor Yanukovych pulling it back.

The Democratic Initiatives Fund (DIF) announced on Sept. 29 the launch of its ‘Ukraine Must be in NATO’ campaign, a six-month project that the Kyiv-based NGO said would provide the Ukrainian public with objective information about the Alliance through the dissemination of “yasnyks,” or news and educational materials.

DIF said that the aim of the campaign is to explain why Ukraine needs to become part of NATO, describing both the advantages and disadvantages of NATO membership for the country.

The Fund’s first “yasnyk,” dated Sept. 29, included a list of 21 pros and six cons regarding Ukraine’s integration into NATO.

Information launch

According to Oleksandr Paliy, DIF’s foreign program coordinator, Ukrainians know very little about the military bloc, which during Soviet times they had seen as a looming threat.

Paliy said the Fund felt compelled to embark on the public education campaign as a result of the “annoying inactivity of state representatives who support the idea of joining NATO, as opposed to their rival enemies, who are working much more effectively to discredit the idea.”

According to polls conducted by the Fund over the last couple of years, very few Ukrainians have a grasp of the extent of NATO’s military activities in the recent past, let alone being favorably disposed to their country’s membership of the Alliance.

A poll carried out by DIF in spring 2006 showed 64.4 percent of respondents as saying they opposed Ukraine joining NATO, compared with 50.4 polled a year earlier, and 30 percent in 2004. The margin of error was 2.2 percent.

Paliy said that the marked increase in opposition to NATO within Ukraine over the last two years can be explained by the use of the NATO issue in the country’s domestic political battles, and the absence of independent news resources on NATO in a political environment where NATO’s opponents wield greater resources to disseminate anti-Alliance information.

Another poll conducted in mid-September by the Sofia Center of Social Research, which included 2,010 respondents throughout Ukraine, showed that 60.2 percent of those polled were opposed to Ukraine joining NATO, compared with 21.5 percent who favored such a move.

In the same poll, 73.4 percent of respondents said that the issue of Ukraine’s membership of NATO should be raised as part of a nationwide referendum. The margin of error in the Sofia Center poll was 2.2 percent.

Like the DIF, the Sofia Center is also Kyiv-based but lists no telephone number or funding information on its website.

The Yushchenko administration has been reluctant to hold a referendum on joining NATO any time soon, as the Ukrainian public is still largely unaware of the issues and more than likely to shoot the initiative down.

Paliy said that Russian media organizations, with their largely anti-NATO views, have had a strong influence on public opinion in Ukraine.

According to Paliy, providing the public with objective information regarding NATO, including historical facts about the Alliance, and information on the social and economic changes that NATO members have undergone since joining the organization, “would be helpful in the country’s integration process.”

“Every week, for a period of six months, yasnyks will be sent to 40,000 emails of journalists, experts and prominent public figures, who can influence public opinion,” Paliy said, adding that DIF’s limited budget does not make it possible for the Fund to reach a broader audience.

DIF’s programs are largely funded by grants from the Renaissance Fund of U.S. philanthropist George Soros, the U.S.-based National Endowment for Democracy and the embassies of various Western countries, such as the Netherlands, Demark and Canada and the U.S.

Unlike its exit polls, which receive targeted Western funding, DIF said it received no specific sponsorship for the “yasnyks.”

Some other Ukrainian pollsters are less transparent than DIF about their sources of funding, leaving the objectivity of their results in question. This was also the case during the 2004 presidential elections, when a variety of polling agencies published widely conflicting results, most in support of then presidential candidate Viktor Yanukovych’s fraud-filled presidential bid. The ensuing Orange Revolution swept Viktor Yushchenko into power , who promised the nation that it would join Europe.

But “the Orange authorities have been absolutely incapable of coping with the task” of educating the public about NATO, Paliy said.

“Today’s [Yanukovych’s pro-Russian] government will try to put even more obstacles in the way of [Ukraine’s NATO] integration,” he added.

“Officials at the Defense Ministry and Foreign Ministry [who are responsible for NATO publicity] were busy with technical reforms and never had time to get to Ukraine’s national interests,” according to Paliy.

Paliy said that the only outlets left for information regarding NATO in Ukraine were the more liberal media, which appeared after the Orange Revolution, and “people who think in Ukrainian terms and the country’s interests.”

NATO about-face

Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych dashed hopes of joining NATO on Sept. 14 when he told NATO officials in Brussels that he was halting planned moves by Ukraine toward the Alliance, citing widespread public disapproval at home.

“I cannot hold to a state policy that is far from popular opinion,” Yanukovych explained several days later in remarks broadcast on television.

Yanukovych’s words angered President Viktor Yushchenko, who has made NATO membership a priority of his state policy. The Brussels statements also upset other top officials in Yanukovych’s cabinet, including Yushchenko-appointed Defense Minister Anatoliy Hrytsenko and Foreign Minister Borys Tarasyuk, who said that Yanukovych’s stance was at odds with Ukraine’s national interests.

According to the Constitution of Ukraine, President Yushchenko can exercise prerogatives in national defense and foreign policy, including the appointment and dismissal of the country’s defense and foreign ministers. But questions such as NATO membership require wider approval.

Yanukovych has said the issue of NATO membership would have to be submitted to a referendum.

Meanwhile, just days after the premier’s watershed announcement in Brussels Sept. 14, the Ukrainian parliament, dominated by Yanukovych’s pro-Russian Regions party, adopted a non-binding resolution Sept. 19 supporting his move to hold off on Ukraine’s NATO membership.

Over the last few months, anti-NATO groups have held protests against joining the Alliance and signed petitions urging an end to official ties with it.

Cooperation between Ukraine and NATO began in 1994 with Ukraine’s participation in NATO’s Partnership for Peace project, which involved Ukrainian land and sea forces taking part in joint military exercises with NATO forces and contributing to the Alliance’s peacekeeping activities.

In 2002, President Leonid Kuchma signed the Ukraine-NATO Action Plan, which provided for the broadening of cooperation between the parties through 2005, and involved targeting improvements in Ukraine’s democratic, social, economic, military and defense standards, bringing them closer to those of NATO member countries.

Yanukovych’s predecessor, Prime Minister Yuriy Yekhanurov, who headed Yushchenko’s second pro-Western government, had indicated Ukraine would not enter NATO as long as public opposition continued. However, Yekhanurov’s government had still hoped NATO would offer Ukraine a membership action plan at the NATO summit scheduled for November in Riga, which would pave the way for the country’s eventual membership, possibly as early as 2008.

Mykhaylo Pogrebinskiy, the director of the Kyiv-based Center for Political and Conflict Studies, said that there was no better way to debate the NATO issue fairly and transparently than through television.

“The only way to deliver information is to arrange objective television programs, where experts would have equal opportunities to debate,” Pogrebinsky said.

“Experts, not politicians, should talk about NATO,” he added.

He said that at present the Ukrainian media do not provide sufficient coverage of the issue to make a fair debate about NATO, adding that campaigns regarding the Alliance could be useful for the public, depending on who was providing the information.

“Democratic Initiatives is too biased [in favor of NATO] to conduct a fair public debate about the necessity to enter this union, which is still more military than political,” he said.

According to Pogrebinskiy, the Fund will fail to inform the public that “entering NATO implies Ukraine’s support of U.S. global policy.”

“If Ukrainians understand that, they will decide whether Ukraine should enter NATO based on their attitude toward the USA,” he said.

Andriy Lysenko, a spokesman for Ukraine’s Defense Ministry, said the responsibility for running an information campaign supporting the president’s intentions to enter NATO should be placed on the entire government, and not just the defense and foreign ministries.

“The Economy Ministry should possibly talk about the influx of foreign investment. The justice minister should talk about guarantees of improvements in the legal sphere,” Lysenko said.

According to Lysenko, the Defense Ministry has a limited budget for NATO-related communications.

“In 2006, the ministry’s television production studio won a tender to shoot a film about NATO, but the film will be more oriented toward military people [as opposed to the public],” he said.

“The government’s communication powers are always weaker than those of certain interest groups, who can afford to arrange meetings and protests to deliver their messages,” Lysenko said.

He added that because the Defense Ministry has no additional money to launch an independent NATO information campaign, all such public initiatives should be widely supported.

Source: Kyiv Post

Kiev Steps Up Criticism Of Spat

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko's office on Wednesday criticized what it called "elements of xenophobia" in Russia's spat with Georgia.


Viktor Yushchenko (L) and Mikheil Saakashvili (R)
"Ukraine is very much concerned with all cases of human rights violations that are taking place today in connection with the situation around Georgia, including elements of xenophobia," said Oleksandr Chaly, Yushchenko's top foreign policy adviser.

The statement was the harshest yet by Ukraine, which has close ties with Georgia but has taken a very cautious approach to the dispute.

The Ukrainian government has come under fire from some politicians for not rushing to Georgia's defense. Chaly, however, defended Yushchenko's response.

He said "a whole number of visits" by senior Georgian and Ukrainian officials were being arranged, and that Yushchenko had been in telephone contact with his Georgian counterpart, President Mikheil Saakashvili.

Yushchenko had also offered to mediate, if asked.

Source: The Moscow Times

Ukraine 2-0 Scotland

KIEV, Ukraine -- Scotland's fantastic start to Euro 2008 qualifying came to a halt as they toppled to defeat in Kiev.

Ukraine's Andriy Shevchenko (L), and Scotland's Robbie Neilson challenge for the ball during their Euro 2008 qualifying soccer match in Kiev, Ukraine,
The Scots adopted a defensive approach but their stubborn resistance was broken on the hour by a close range shot from Olexander Kucher.

Kenny Miller hit the crossbar with a speculative effort and headed a wonderful chance wide on 80 minutes.

But Scotland lost Steven Pressley to a red card and Ukraine captain Andriy Shevchenko converted a late penalty.

The sending off and the penalty were harsh but Scotland can have no complaints about the result.

Ukraine enjoyed the lion's share of possession, with Scotland sitting in deep and inviting the home team to come at them.

Shevchenko looked lively early on and his run and shot was deflected wide by the lunging Pressley.

Scotland goalkeeper Craig Gordon had to gather a header from Maxim Kalynychenko and the same player headed over the crossbar soon after.

On a rare Scotland burst forward, Paul Hartley released Darren Fletcher down the right flank but, with Miller speeding in on goal, the midfielder's weak cut-back was easily intercepted.

The Scots were given a scare following a scramble from a 26th minute corner but Shevkenko could only poke the ball into Gordon's arms from close range.

Andriy Voronin gave the massed ranks of Scots defenders the slip five minutes before the interval but Gordon was able to beat away the forward's powerful strike. Two minutes after the break, Scotland enjoyed a huge slice of fortune when Shevkenko hit the woodwork.

David Weir was at full stretch to block the striker's first effort and, when the ball broke back to the Chelsea star, his shot rolled beyond Gordon but struck the post.

The yellow shirts of Ukraine continued to swarm forward and a blistering shot from Andriy Nesmachny was expertly headed to safety by Gary Caldwell.

But the home side took advantage of a lucky break to take the lead.

James McFadden appeared to have cleared a Shevchenko free-kick but the ball hit Vyacheslav Sviderski and the ball ran through to Kucher, who drilled a shot home through Caldwell's legs.

Gordon had his hands warmed by a swerving strike from Shevenko before Scotland went close to an unlikely equaliser.

Miller's dipping delivery from the right deceived goalkeeper Olexander Shovkovsky and bounced off the crossbar.

The Celtic striker then passed up a glorious chance with ten minutes remaining.

Full-back Robbie Neilson swung in a great cross and the unmarked Miller dipped in to header but skewed his effort wide from eight yards out.

Pressley was shown a straight red for a late challenge on Shevenko and the Ukraine skipper won a very soft penalty in the closing minutes.

Shevenko collapsed in the box while tussling with Neilson and then slotted the ball home from the spot.

Source: BBC Sport

Scottish Fans 'Attacked By Hooligans' In Kiev

KIEV, Ukraine -- Several Scotland supporters have been injured after being set upon by a gang of local hooligans in Ukraine.

Scottish fans pass through Kiev's Independence Square, where the violent scenes took place.
Fans said up to 300 local youths launched an "unprovoked" attack on members of the travelling Tartan Army in Kiev ahead of tonight's Euro 2008 qualifying match.

The Scottish Football Association said several Scots suffered broken bones and cuts following the disturbance in the city's Independence Square.

The exact number of supporters involved is unknown. Approximately 3,000 Scottish fans are in Kiev for tonight's match.

"The Scotland fans were absolutely magnificent, in that they did not react to the violence or provocation," said Derek Kirkwood, security adviser to the SFA. "They chose to walk away from the scene rather than get involved, and their behaviour was exemplary."

But the footballing authority has warned Scottish fans in the country to remain on their guard. "Following the incident, which was entirely unexpected, the SFA have advised fans to be careful in the city and to avoid any possible further provocation," read a statement.

A spokesman for the British Embassy in Kiev said he had heard about trouble in Independence Square, but did not know how many people were involved. He was not aware of anyone who needed hospital treatment.

Travelling fan Simon Johnston, a committee member of the Association of Tartan Army Clubs, was in Independence Square at the time of last night's trouble.

He said around 300 Scots were enjoying themselves in the square at about 9.30pm local time when they were suddenly targeted by a similar number of chanting locals.

"It was a big group of Ukrainians, about 300 of them," said Johnston. "They came out of nowhere from down a side street and all piled in. All the Scots scarpered, but a few guys, I think, got caught up. We heard there were ambulances there."

Strathclyde police have a senior officer in Ukraine, but he is not thought to have been in the area of last night's trouble.

Source: Guardian Unlimited

Thousands Attend Funeral Of Murdered Russian Journalist

MOSCOW, Russia -- Thousands have attended the funeral of slain journalist Anna Politkovskaya in Moscow, many fearing that with her they were also burying the last vestiges of media freedom in Russia.

Murdered journalist Anna Politkovskaya
The line of mourners spilled out of the ceremonial hall at the Troyekurovskoye cemetery, where Politkovskaya lay in an open, flower-strewn coffin with a traditional Orthodox white ribbon around her head, where the hit-man who killed her aimed his final bullet.

The ceremony was attended by the Norwegian, US and Swedish ambassadors and a Who's Who of Russian human rights activists.

Police estimated that at least 3,000 people attended in all. But there was no sign of any high-ranking government officials.

"This is the funeral of a whole era," said Irena Lesnevskaya, a former head of the Ren-TV station known for her independent line.

"It was an era of conscience, truth and freedom and 10 years ago no one could have dreamt it would be crushed a decade later," she said.

Ms Politkovskaya, 48, was gunned down in what police said was a professional hit as she stepped from the lift of her apartment building in Moscow on Saturday.

A star reporter at the bi-weekly Novaya Gazeta, she was virtually the last Russian journalist who dared investigate atrocities in Chechnya and openly criticise President Vladimir Putin.

"This is a tragedy for Russia. They executed our conscience," said Yasen Zasursky, dean of Moscow state university's journalism faculty.

Vyacheslav Izmailov, another reporter at Novaya Gazeta, fought back tears as he told mourners that the frail-looking grey-haired mother of two had been like a "soldier at war".

The murder - the 42nd killing of a journalist in Russia since the Soviet collapse in 1991 and the 12th apparent contract killing of a journalist since Putin came to power in 2000 - has sparked deep concern throughout Europe and the United States.

Messages of grief and anger over her death continued to flow in from journalists and human rights activists in Russia as well as from Europe and the United States.

The outpouring was in dramatic contrast to the near silence from Russian officials, with the Kremlin limiting itself to a brief promise on Monday that "all necessary measures" would be taken to solve the crime.

The government was represented at the funeral by the deputy culture minister, a Kremlin official told AFP.

Putin challenged

Ahead of the funeral, the Russian Union of Journalists challenged Mr Putin in an open letter.

"We would like to be sure that you, as the guarantor of our constitutional rights and freedom, will take the investigation of this monstrous crime under personal control," the letter said.

"We are convinced that our readers, viewers and listeners, and your government ... need full and open information about this crime and about the social-political situation that made it possible."

The family of Paul Klebnikov, a US journalist murdered in still unresolved circumstances in 2004, warned that the killing had worrying implications.

"As long as journalists are not able to freely carry out investigations, Russia cannot be considered a truly free country," Mr Klebnikov's brother Michael said in a statement.

As international condemnation of the killing continued, French President Jacques Chirac sent a letter to Ms Politkovskaya's children condemning her killing and saying that everything should be done "to ensure that justice is done and that the assassins are found and punished".

"The odious assassination of your mother, Anna Politkovskaya, has deeply moved me as it has moved all the French and all defenders of press freedom," Mr Chirac said.

Bulgarian national radio urged people to defend the freedom of the press by lighting candles in the Russian church in Sofia.

In Ukraine, several dozen protesters placed candles outside the Russian embassy in Kiev as well as its consulate in the western city of Lviv.

They carried photographs of Ms Politkovskaya and placards that read "Putin assassin" and "The Kremlin has killed freedom".

Russia's prosecutor general has taken personal control of the investigation, but the outspoken Novaya Gazeta says it is undertaking its own enquiry and also offering a reward of almost a million dollars for information.

On Tuesday, the mass-market daily Komsomolskaya Pravda reported that the assassin had at least three or four accomplices.

"They were all filmed by different cameras and look suspicious to the investigators," the newspaper said. "Four or five people were in this group: two men and two women."

The newspaper did not give the source of the information, but said that one of its own journalists had happened to be near the scene of the crime and was being questioned as a witness.

According to the daily, one man was waiting in the staircase to Ms Politkovskaya's apartment in case she took the stairs, not the lift.

When the doomed journalist entered her building, followed by the trigger man, a woman stood guard by the door to the street.

Two other accomplices waited in the get-away car, the newspaper reported.

Source: AFP

Anti-Soviet WWII Partisans In Ukraine Call For Recognition By Presidential Decree

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukrainians who fought as anti-Soviet partisans called Tuesday on President Viktor Yushchenko to recognize them as World War II veterans by decree, saying that their hopes of winning recognition in parliament had dimmed under the new governing coalition.

WWII partisans capture German soldiers
"As Communists are participants in the new coalition, recognition will be blocked," said lawmaker Oleksiy Ivchenko, who heads the Congress of Ukrainian Nationalists. "In any case we will struggle for it."

About 100,000 Ukrainians fought both the Nazis and the Soviets during the war in a bid to create an independent homeland. In the Soviet era, Ukrainian schoolchildren were taught that they were enemies of the people.

But with the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991 and the creation of an independent Ukraine, the partisans launched a new fight to change views — and win financial and moral recognition similar to what Red Army veterans have long enjoyed.

The issue has divided Ukraine, with the more nationalistic west supporting recognition, and the Russian-speaking east opposing it. The main opponents, however, have always been the Communists.

The Communist Party, which has seen its number of supporters decrease, got a major boost this summer when it joined the governing coalition headed by Premier Viktor Yanukovych, whose support base is in the more pro-Russian eastern Ukraine.

In August, Yushchenko tried to get the new coalition members to agree to recognize the partisans by including such a provision in a Memorandum of National Unity that he and Yanukovych both signed, but the provision was dropped.

Lawmaker Taras Chornovil, a Yanukovych ally, said he personally supports recognizing the partisans but that many political forces in Ukraine are not yet ready. He said parliament should hold a conference dedicated to the issue.

Supporters of giving the partisans recognition say that it can be done through a parliamentary bill or via a presidential decree. If parliament refuses to act, as many expect, "recognition by presidential decree will be the only one way out," said lawmaker Yevhen Hirnyk.

About 10,000 partisans are believed to still be alive, while there are 3.8 million World War II veterans still living.

Hostility toward the partisans runs deep in Ukraine because in the war's early years, the anti-Soviet partisans aligned themselves with the Nazis, seeing the invasion as a way to get rid of the Soviet regime. But after the Nazis rejected their calls for an independent Ukraine, the partisans started fighting against both the Nazis and the Soviets. The Red Army drove out the Nazis in 1944, and the partisans continued their struggle until 1951.

An estimated 7 million Ukrainians died in the fighting against the Nazis, and 2.4 million people were sent to Nazi concentration camps. Yushchenko's father was a Soviet Red Army soldier who spent four years in a Nazi camp.

Yushchenko has repeatedly urged Red Army veterans and anti-Soviet guerrillas to forgive each other for the sake of national unity, but his attempts have sparked protests by Communists and other pro-Russian parties.

"I feel sorry that for 15 years of its independence, Ukraine failed to recognize partisans which struggled for our independence, for our freedom," said 82-year-old former partisan Mikhaylo Zalenchuk.

Former partisans plan to mark the 64th anniversary of the creation of their army with a march in downtown Kiev on Sunday.

Source: AP

Shevchenko Ready To Return For Ukraine

LONDON, UK -- Andriy Shevchenko has returned to training with Ukraine and is expected to take his place in the starting line-up for tomorrow's Euro 2008 Group B qualifier against Scotland in Kiev.


The Chelsea striker missed his country's 2-0 defeat to Italy on Saturday with a virus, but he took part in a practice session with the rest of the squad last night and should make the Scotland game.

However, the Ukrainians will be without fellow striker Oleksiy Byelik, who has been withdrawn after injuring his leg during the match in Rome, while defender Oleh Romanchuk is also sidelined with a virus .

Anatoliy Tymoschuk, the midfielder, took a knock on Saturday, but he is likely to be fit, while Andriy Gusin, who missed the Italy game through injury, is back in training and should be available.

Volodymyr Yezerskyi is suspended after picking up his second yellow card in qualification in the clash with the Italians.

Lee McCulloch is well aware the Ukrainians pose a threat throughout the entire team - with or without the services of Shevchenko.

He said: "The manager has done his research and we have had a couple of meetings about them. We know they have quality right through their team. They were the first to qualify for the World Cup with six straight wins so they are obviously a fantastic team."

McCulloch is walking a disciplinary tightrope, along with James McFadden, after the pair were booked in the 1-0 win over France on Saturday. Christian Dailly has already been ruled out because of his second yellow of the campaign against the French and McCulloch knows Scotland need to avoid losing any more players.

He added: "We need to be disciplined and avoid getting any silly bookings. A couple of us were booked on Saturday and Christian will be a big loss to us, but we have a good enough squad with people coming in."

However, McCulloch, 28, insists he will not change his style, despite sitting on a yellow card. He said: "I do not think you can afford to think like that. Just as long as we are disciplined and play well, hopefully, we will at least get a point."

McCulloch insists no-one in the Scotland camp is getting carried away by their wins over the Faroe Islands, Lithuania and France so far. He warned: "We have had a good start, but there is still a long way to go. There are a lot of games and a lot of minutes to play."

Source: The Scotsman

Journalist Politkovskaya Gunned Down Near Home

MOSCOW, Russia -- Investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya, who chronicled military abuses against Chechen civilians and garnered accolades and awards from around the world, was killed in her apartment building Saturday in an apparent contract murder possibly tied to her reporting.


Anna Politkovskaya
Politkovskaya, 48, was found dead with a gunshot wound to the head in an elevator in her apartment building at 8/12 Lesnaya Ulitsa near Belorussky Station in central Moscow.

The killing of the Novaya Gazeta reporter outraged journalists and political leaders in Russia and was met with shock and sorrow in Western countries. As of Sunday evening, the Kremlin had made no comment.

On the day of her murder, Politkovskaya had planned to file a lengthy story on torture practices believed to be used by Chechen authorities, Novaya Gazeta editor Dmitry Muratov said.

Those accused in the story of practicing torture belong to security detachments loyal to Chechnya's pro-Moscow Prime Minister Ramzan Kadyrov, Muratov said. The detachments are known as kadyrovtsy.

Now the story may never be published. What's more, Muratov said, two photographs of the suspected torturers have disappeared.

Politkovskaya's body was discovered by a neighbor between 4:30 p.m. and 5 p.m.

Investigators found a pistol and four 9-millimeter bullet casings at the scene, First Deputy City Prosecutor Vyacheslav Rosinsky said in televised comments.

Politkovskaya was carrying grocery bags, apparently having just returned from a Ramstore supermarket, when she was gunned down.

Footage from a security camera in the apartment building foyer showed the presumed killer, a tall young man wearing dark clothing and a black baseball cap.

Prosecutor General Yury Chaika will personally oversee the investigation, his office announced Sunday.

Chaika's office said investigators were considering Politkovskaya's professional work as the primary motive for her murder.

Most of Politkovskaya's colleagues, friends and acquaintances interviewed believe the killing was ordered by those seeking revenge for her reporting on corruption or Chechnya.

"There can be no other reason," said Alexei Venediktov, editor of the Ekho Moskvy radio station and a friend of the journalist. "She had no other life apart from her profession."

Vitaly Yaroshevsky, a deputy editor at Novaya Gazeta, had no doubts why Politkovskaya had been killed. "There is no question this is politically motivated. I can't rule out that this was a murder ordered from above."

The editors are apparently not counting on authorities to bring the reporter's killer to justice: Muratov pledged that the paper would conduct its own investigation.

Billionaire State Duma deputy Alexander Lebedev, who bought 90 percent of Novaya Gazeta in June, has posted a reward of 25 million rubles, just under $1 million, for information leading to those responsible for Politkovskaya's death, Ekho Moskvy reported.

Yaroshevsky said investigators came to the newspaper offices at around 7 p.m Saturday. They searched Politkovskaya's office and confiscated books and the hard disk from her computer, he said. On Sunday, investigators appeared to have removed the base unit of her computer, Yaroshevsky said.

"We fully understand that the investigators need all this information, and we are cooperating," Yaroshevsky said.

On Sunday, Kadyrov, whom had repeatedly been criticized by Politkovskaya in her articles, and Chechen President Alu Alkhanov voiced shock at her killing.

Kadyrov said he had, at times, questioned Politkovskaya's objectivity but deplored her killing. He also cautioned against any speculation that a "Chechen trail" would lead to the guilty parties, Ekho Moskvy reported Sunday.

Venediktov speculated that the journalist may have been targeted by ultranationalists. Her name had been included on several lists of so-called enemies of the Russian people on ultranationalist web site.

And Venediktov said her killing might have been a demented birthday gift for President Vladimir Putin, who turned 54 on the day of Politkovskaya's death.

On Sunday, pro-Kremlin electronic media were awash in speculation that the killing had been ordered by anti-government forces seeking to replicate the rallies sparked by the killing of Ukrainian journalist Heorhiy Gongadze.

Gongadze had written several articles critical of Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma. He disappeared in September 2000. His decapitated body was discovered two months later outside Kiev.

The killing sparked demonstrations in Kiev from December 2000 through February 2001, helping to foment the opposition to Kuchma that led to the Orange Revolution of late 2004.

Politkovskaya's killing, explained Maxim Shevchenko, a commentator for Channel One state television, was "an attempt to provoke an Orange Revolution here," RIA-Novosti reported.

Former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev, a co-owner of Novaya Gazeta, said the killing might have been intended to cast a pall over Putin's Kremlin. Former Prime Minister Boris Nemtsov dismissed that suggestion.

"What pall? There have been so many palls cast on the current authorities and to no avail," Nemtsov said.

On Sunday, more than 500 demonstrators descended on Pushkin Square to protest Politkovskaya's killing. "The Kremlin has killed freedom of speech," one poster declared.

Four activists from the pro-Kremlin group Young Russia tried to disrupt the rally, which had been planned as a show of support for Georgians and turned into a protest against Politkovskaya's death.

The four, all men, unfurled a sign at the rally reading: "Politkovskaya is a Russian Gongadze. Orange Creatures, You Will Pay for Her Death." The men were quickly overwhelmed by demonstrators; their sign was torn to pieces.

The slaying is the highest-profile murder of a journalist in Russia since Paul Klebnikov was shot dead after leaving work in July 2004. Klebnikov, the American editor of the Russian edition of Forbes magazine, had spent years reporting on Russia's rich and powerful.

If history is any indicator, Politkovskaya's killer is unlikely to be brought to justice.

No one has ever been convicted of the high-profile slayings of Klebnikov or journalists Dmitry Kholodov, Vladislav Listyev and Larisa Yudina. The Russians were all killed in the 1990s.

Over the past 15 years, Russia has become the third-deadliest country in the world for journalists, after Iraq and Algeria, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. Since 1992, the group said, 42 journalists have been killed in Russia; the majority of the murders have never been solved.

Politkovskaya is survived by her son, Ilya, and daughter, Vera. Both are in their early 20s, Yaroshevsky said.

Politkovskaya's ex-husband, Alexander Politkovsky, one of the hosts of the perestroika-era cult television program "Vzglyad," said Saturday that his ex-wife had been a "principled, honest journalist."

"She was a person from another time," he said.

The funeral is set to be held Tuesday at 2:30 p.m., at the Troyekurovsky Cemetery.

Source: The Moscow Times

Crimea's Referendum On NATO Membership Illegal - Ukraine

KIEV, Ukraine -- The results of a referendum on NATO membership proposed by members of parliament in the largely Russian-speaking Crimea autonomy in Ukraine will not be recognized by the Ukrainian government, a government official said Monday.


Several Communist deputies of the Crimean parliament proposed in September a local referendum on Ukraine's bid to join NATO and prepared a draft resolution of Crimea's Supreme Council, citing events at the southern Ukrainian port of Feodosia, when pro- and anti-NATO demonstrators clashed during the summer over tensions about the presence of a U.S. naval ship docked at the port.

The representative office of the Ukrainian president in the Crimean autonomy said the decision to conduct the referendum would be beyond the scope of the Supreme Council's authority.

"According to Article 92 of the Ukrainian Constitution, the foreign policy of the state is determined solely by national laws," the office said in a statement.

Ukraine had been actively seeking NATO membership until a power-sharing agreement ended a political stalemate between pro-Western President Viktor Yushchenko and his Russia-leaning rival Viktor Yanukovych, who was appointed the new prime minister in August.

On September 14, Yanukovych said the country was shelving its bid to join NATO for the time being because of widespread opposition within society, and on September 21 he said in Brussels that the issue of Ukraine's accession to NATO will be decided by a national referendum.

Source: RIA Novosti

Ukraine's UMC Stops Providing NMT-450 Mobile Services

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine's second largest mobile operator Ukrainian Mobile Communications, or UMC, has ceased providing mobile services in the NMT-450 standard, the company said in a press release Monday.


The move follows the Ukrainian government's ruling on June 9 to classify the standard as outdated and to force operators to stop providing NMT-450 services in the country, UMC said.

Earlier this year the company obtained a CDMA-450 mobile license that allows offering mobile and high-speed data transfer services in the same frequency range as NMT-450.

UMC is currently holding a tender to buy CDMA-450 equipment and plans to start testing CDMA-450 services by the end of the year, UMC said.

The company earlier offered its NMT-450 subscribers to switch to the company's GSM services retaining their phone numbers.

Russia's largest mobile operator Mobile TeleSystems, or MTS, owns UMC. The Ukrainian company's network covers more than 87% of Ukraine's territory, which is inhabited by 93% of the country's population.

UMC's subscriber base totaled 15.5 million users as of July 31, or 16.3% up since January 1 and 52.6% up on the year, according to the company's earlier reports.

Source: Prime-Tass

Italy Beat Ukraine To Boost Qualifying Hopes

ROME, Italy -- Italy boosted their chances of qualifying for the 2008 European championships with a hard-fought 2-0 win against Ukraine.

Italian forward Luca Toni celebrates after scoring against Ukraine during their Euro2008 qualifying Group B football match at Rome's Olympic stadium.
The pressure was on the world champions after taking just one point from their first two Group B matches against Lithuania and France.

But they rose to the challenge with a precious victory over the stubborn Ukrainians who held out until the 70th minute at the Olympic stadium.

Massimo Oddo broke the deadlock from the penalty spot after Andrei Rusol had pulled back Luca Toni in the box.

And Toni netted himself in the 79th minute with a rising drive after being put through by substitute Antonio Di Natale.

Italy's win was far from easy though, and they were indebted to their keeper Gianluigi Buffon for a string of fine saves.

Victory for the Italians against the team they defeated in the World Cup quarter-finals tasted even sweeter following France's shock 1-0 defeat away to Scotland.

It was also Italy's first win under Roberto Donadoni since he replaced Marcello Lippi shortly after the World Cup.

Italy's victory left them on four points, five adrift of leaders Scotland and two behind World Cup final opponents France.

Marco Materazzi returned for Italy after completing a two-match suspension following his spat with Zinedine Zidane in the World Cup final, while Vincenzo Iaquinta was a surprise choice in a three-man attack alongside Alessandro Del Piero and Toni.

The most notable absentee for Ukraine was their star striker Andrei Shevchenko. The Chelsea forward, who spent seven years in Italy with AC Milan, was struck by a virus.

Despite his absence, Ukraine started brightly with Anatoly Timoshchuk testing Buffon with a low drive 20 yards in the fourth minute.

Buffon was made to work harder two minutes later as Ukraine nearly snatched an early lead.

Andrei Vorobei crossed from the left to the back post and Oleg Gusev escaped his marker to fire an angled shot towards goal, which the Italy keeper palmed away.

Del Piero sent a half volley over the bar after linking up cleverly with Andrea Pirlo, before Toni came within inches of putting Italy ahead.

Oddo crossed from the right flank for the lanky Fiorentina marksman whose flicked header was fingertipped away by Alexander Shovkovsky.

Toni's dipping volley sailed narrowly over the bar as Italy ended the half on top.

A last ditch tackle by Sergei Nazarenko saved Ukraine when Iaquinta lined up a shot on goal shortly after the restart, before Timoshchuk stung Buffon's palms with a fierce drive.

Shovkovsky then denied Iaquinta with a one-handed reflex save, while at the other end Buffon did well to keep out substitute Maxi Kalinichenko's curling free-kick.

Italy finally made the breakthrough 20 minutes from time when Rusol tugged Toni's shirt as he reached for a cross and Oddo coolly converted the resulting penalty.

Toni's emphatic finish nine minutes later ensured no way back for Ukraine and put Italy's qualifying campaign back on track after a worrying start.

Source: AFP

Official: Ukraine Won't Buy Russian Gas

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine currently pays $95 (euro74) per 1,000 cubic meters of a mix of more expensive Russian gas and cheaper Turkmen imports which it receives through an intermediary company.


In order to avoid an anticipated major price hike from Russia next year, Ukraine has agreed to buy the needed 57.5 billion cubic meters of gas from Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan for the same price it is currently paying, said Dmytro Marunich, spokesman for Ukraine's state-owned gas company Naftogaz.

"There is no need to buy from anybody else," Marunich told The Associated Press.

Energy Minister Yuri Boyko on Friday stressed, however, that the decision will not disrupt deliveries of Russian gas to European consumers, Ukrainian media reported.

Some 80 percent of Russian gas exports to Europe go through Ukraine.

Ukraine has vowed that western European gas consumers will not suffer supply disruptions as they did in January during a price dispute between Ukraine and Russia, when Russia briefly turned off the gas taps.

Russia then accused Ukraine of siphoning off gas meant for Europe.

Russia's state-controlled natural gas monopoly, OAO Gazprom, has said it would keep the current price of natural gas for Ukraine unchanged until the end of the year, but pressure to increase the price has risen after Turkmenistan hiked the amount Russia pays for the gas it buys and then sells on to Ukraine.

Source: AP

Ukraine Government Deadlock Sidelined By Necklace Spat

KIEV, Ukraine -- Stylish Ukrainian politician Julia Timoshenko took off her necklace in the former Soviet republic's parliament on Friday, to prove a point during debate on whether or not to reduce MP benefits.


Julia Timoshenko near parliament
The gesture put the house, a regular scene of fisticuffs between MPs, into an uproar - but things settled down quickly. A government more concerned with political grandstanding, rather than reaching a working compromise, has been the norm in Ukraine for years.

Timoshenko, leader of the country's largest opposition party and renowned for appearing in public dressed only in the latest French fashions, had been responding to an accusation of hypocrisy by a pro-government speaker.

'Dear Julia Vladimorovna (Timoshenko), one pearl around your neck would be able to feed an average Ukrainian family for a year,' said Evhen Kushnarev, leader of the country's pro-oligarch Regions Ukraine party.

'So don't come to us with farcical claims you are trying to benefit the Ukrainian people,' he said, arguing that a bill introduced by Timoshenko's opposition party to reduce MP benefits merited no support.

Ukrainian MPs are among the least trusted members of Ukrainian society, thought to be less corrupt only than public health workers, customs agents, and traffic police in years of public opinion surveys. The cost of a premium place on a party's election list and a possible seat in parliament is reportedly in excess of five million dollars.

Kushnarev and Timoshenko are among the most notorious of Ukraine's MPs; he for having led a failed secession movement during the country's 2004 Orange Revolution, and she for amassing a fortune in government natural gas exports during the 1990s.

Timoshenko retaliated to Kushnarev's remarks by marching in clicking high heels up to the speaker's lectern, and handing Kushnarev her sparkling gold-and-pearl accessory.

The move violated parliamentary procedure rules, but followed a long-established precedent in the Ukrainian legislature that allows physical interruption of an opponent's speech, provided the interruption is imaginative enough.

Taken aback at the bauble, Kushnarev required several seconds to recover his wits before snapping that Timoshenko should 'donate the jewelry to the poor of the nation.'

Timoshenko riposted by protesting her finances were limited, her necklace made of plaster, and promised she would hand the offending item 'over to journalists so it can be fairly appraised.'

The bill narrowly failed, gathering only 215 of 226 votes needed to pass the 450-seat house.

The testy exchange came at the end of a week during which the country's Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich declared that his pro- Russia cabinet would make policy while the President of the country, reformer Viktor Yushchenko, should do little but watch.

'The president must learn where the real power in this country lies,' Yanukovich told the Interfax news agency.

Yanukovich is closely allied with the country's eastern industrial barons, supports closer Ukrainian relations with Russia, and opposes Ukrainian membership in NATO. Fighting corruption is not a priority.

Yushchenko supports economic and administrative reforms, early Ukrainian membership in the European Union and NATO, and a government campaign to fight corruption - especially the tight links between the industrial tycoons and government officials on the take.

Yushchenko in Thursday remarks to reporters made clear he not only had no intention of pulling pro-reform ministers out of Yanukovich's cabinet, but repeated threats to veto any legislation not aimed at economic reforms that was produced by the Yanukovich-controlled parliament.

Talks begun in June between Yushchenko's and Yanukovich's political parties on a possible grand coalition collapsed on Wednesday.

The failure not only left the country's parliament badly split, but the government as well, with roughly one-third of Yanukovich's ministers loyal to Yushchenko.

Millions of Ukrainians demonstrated in the streets two years ago to put Yushchenko into power after a fixed presidential election won by Yanukovich. Since then the country has failed to form a working government.

Source: Deutsche Presse-Agentur

Italy Needs A Win Against Shevchenko's Ukraine

ROME, Italy -- World champion Italy desperately needs a win when it faces Ukraine in European Championship qualifying Saturday.

Italy Football Team

Italy struggled in its opening two Euro 2008 qualifiers — a 1-1 draw with Lithuania and 3-1 loss to France — and has only one point in Group B. Scotland and France lead the group with six points each, followed by Ukraine and Georgia with three points apiece.

"I don't like saying we need to win at all costs, but we do have to get good results," said coach Roberto Donadoni, who is facing criticism three months after taking charge.

The Italian league hadn't begun when Italy opened qualifying last month.

"The difference now from a month ago is we're in top form and we have to win," midfielder Andrea Pirlo said. "We're not playing for Donadoni, we're playing for all of Italy."

Strikers Luca Toni and Alessandro Del Piero are back on Italy's team for the first time since the World Cup.

"I can't contemplate a European Championship without Italy," said Toni, who scored twice in a 3-0 win over Ukraine in the World Cup quarterfinals. "Ukraine brings back great memories. I hope to do well this time too."

This is the third meeting between Italy and Ukraine this year. They also played to a 0-0 draw in a pre-World Cup friendly.

"We know Italy is the favorite but Ukraine is a team that can create surprises," said Ukraine striker Shevchenko, who has a fever and may not play.

Shevchenko joined Chelsea at the end of last season after seven years with AC Milan. He's been in touch with several of his old Milan teammates this week and will face some of them Saturday.

"Italy gave me a lot and I'm not talking about Milan victories, but of friends and all that I learned," Shevchenko said.

Shevchenko has only scored two goals with Chelsea, the last on Aug. 23.

"There are highs and lows in life. I was tired too after the World Cup," he said.

Alessandro Nesta of Milan is back from injury but it appears Marco Materazzi may start alongside captain Fabio Cannavaro in Italy's defense.

Materazzi returns from a two-game suspension that followed Zinedine Zidane's head butt on him in the World Cup final.

"We can't behave like we're world champions. We have to play like it," Materazzi said.

Left-back Fabio Grosso is out with a right leg injury. Massimo Oddo is expected to move into the lineup at right-back with Gianluca Zambrotta shifted over to the left.

The expected midfield trio is Pirlo, Gennaro Gattuso and Daniele De Rossi.

Midfielder Simone Perrotta is suspended for one game. He could return when Italy plays its next qualifier in Georgia on Wednesday, although he is also recuperating from a left ankle injury.

Mauro Camoranesi and Del Piero could support center-forward Toni in attack in a 4-3-2-1 formation.

As for Ukraine, Shakhtar Donetsk's Anatoly Tymoshchyuk provides a strong presence in midfield.

"It's a well organized team with some good individual players, as they already showed at the World Cup," Gattuso said.

Italy is playing in Rome's Stadio Olimpico for the first time since February 2001, when the Azzurri were beaten 2-1 by Argentina.

Source: AP

Yanukovych Calls On Yushchenko To Pressure Party Over Move Into Opposition

KYIV, Ukraine -- Ukraine's prime minister and his allies on Thursday called on President Viktor Yushchenko to persuade his pro-Western bloc to reconsider its move into opposition, saying such a step would be bad for the country.

PM Viktor Yanukovych
In its announcement Wednesday, Yushchenko's Our Ukraine grouping also said it would ask to withdraw three ministers from the Cabinet.

Relations between the pro-Western Yushchenko and pro-Russian Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych have worsened as the government puts the brakes on Yushchenko's policy goals - most importantly the drive to secure NATO membership.

Yanukovych, whose support lies mainly in the Russian-speaking east and south, is trying to persuade Our Ukraine to enter into a formal coalition agreement and shore up his authority.

"I believe that we, together with the president, will have enough strength to cope with the emotions of some politicians," he told reporters.

The two politicians were bitter rivals in the 2004 presidential campaign when fraud triggered the Orange Revolution mass protests, propelling Yushchenko into power. Yanukovych rebounded less than two years later to win the March parliamentary elections and form a governing coalition.

They signed a unity pact in August that led to Yanukovych becoming prime minister; in return, some of Yushchenko's allies were given seats in Yanukovych's Cabinet.

Despite months of negotiations, however, Yushchenko's party failed to reach an agreement to join the governing coalition led by Yanukovych's Party of the Regions, and the two parties have bickered over the unity agreement.

Yanukovych's allies warned of political instability if the president's supporters leave the government.

"I cannot imagine that the presidential force can be in opposition to the governing coalition and what negative consequences it can bring for the country," said Yanukovych ally, lawmaker Yevhen Kushnaryov.

"I believe we have all grounds to find a compromise. Otherwise we will have a big confrontation," said another pro-Yanukovych lawmaker, Vasyl Tsushko.

But Our Ukraine members in parliament vowed the bloc would not join the governing coalition.

"We cannot be in two places at one time. So we can be only in the parliamentary opposition," said Our Ukraine legislator Vyacheslav Kyrylenko.

Source: AP

NATO Chief Reiterates Support For Ukraine's Accession Bid

BRUSSELS, Belgium -- The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) supported Ukraine's accession bid, said the military bloc's Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop schaffer on Thursday.

NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop schaffer
He expressed the organization's support during the fifth round of Informal High-Level NATO-Ukraine Consultations, saying the bloc's link with Ukraine was still high on NATO's agenda.

He pledged NATO's support for Ukraine's reform of defense and security, but said that the speed of the process would be up to the Ukrainian government.

The talks, hosted by Scheffer and attended by defense ministers from Ukraine and some NATO members, were held in Sintra, a town 20 km west from the Portuguese capital.

Ukrainian Defense Minister Anatoly Hrytsenko reiterated his country's NATO membership bid, saying it was a strategic and unchangeable decision having undergone long consideration.

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Boris Tarasiuk had said in April that Ukraine wished to receive the official invitation for its accession into NATO in 2008.

But Ukrainian Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych, who was in conflict with President Viktor Yushchenko over the issue, had earlier told NATO officials in Brussels that Ukraine was not ready for fast-track membership because of low public support and whether it would join NATO would be decided by a referendum.

Source: Xinhua

Yushchenko's Forces To Leave Ukraine Pro-Russian Government

KIEV, Ukraine -- The party led by Ukraine's pro-Western president, Viktor Yushchenko, announced it would fight in opposition to the new pro-Russian government, signalling a new round of political confrontation between the opposing camps of the 2004 "orange revolution."

Ukraine's President Viktor Yushchenko addresses journalists in Kiev October 5, 2006.
"The Our Ukraine party is going into opposition to the government and will propose to the president that he recall ministers who are members of this party," said party spokeswoman Tetiana Mokridi.

Roman Bezsmertny, head of the Our Ukraine bloc in parliament, confirmed the decision to oppose the government of Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych.

"The negotiation process is finished," said Bezsmertny, quoted by Interfax-Ukraine news agency.

"For better or worse, everyone involved in this process has made their choice. There is a governing coalition and there is Our Ukraine which is in opposition to this coalition," he said.

The announcement came after months of laborious coalition negotiations between the Yanukovych government and Yushchenko's party, which is still not formally a member of the governing coalition despite the fact that several of its members hold key portfolios.

Among the most prominent members of the Ukrainian government who are members of the Our Ukraine party is Foreign Minister Boris Tarasyuk, who has faced unusual challenges in representing policies from a leader -- Yanukovych -- that he fought to oust in the 2004 "orange revolution."

In addition to Tarasyuk, Defense Minister Anatoly Gritsenko and Interior Minister Yury Lutsenko were appointed directly by Yushchenko under a presidential prerogative contained in a previous power-sharing deal.

Our Ukraine members also hold the justice, health, family and culture portfolios.

Yanukovych's Region's Party won by far the most votes of any party in legislative elections last March and he today controls a coalition together with the Socialist Party and the Communist Party capable of governing independently of whether Our Ukraine supports them or not.

Yushchenko and Yanukovych were the two protagonists who squared off in the "orange revolution." That ended with Yushchenko winning a repeat presidential election that was held after Yanukovych's early victory was reversed on charges of widespread fraud.

Since his election as president, Yushchenko has tried to pursue a policy course focused on steering his country away from Russia's historical influence and toward integration with Western institutions like NATO and the European Union.

That goal however has been dogged by infighting among his key "orange revolution" supporters -- notably Yulia Tymoshenko, whom he sacked as prime minister a year ago -- by political opposition and by resistance from the country's large Russian-speaking population.

Yushchenko and Yanukovych finally came to a deal last summer under which the president agreed to make his erstwhile adversary his new prime minister provided Yanukovych agreed to stick to the pro-Western foreign policy line launched by Yushchenko two years ago.

On a visit to Brussels last month, Yanukovych announced that Ukraine was not prepared to accelerate moves toward joining the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and that a "pause" was necessary in the process.

That drew a sharp rebuke from Yushchenko, who said the declaration did not correspond to Ukraine's national interest and demanded that Yanukovych immediately "correct" his position on NATO.

In an interview with AFP in his Kiev office on September 19, Yanukovych made clear he had no intention of changing course on NATO despite the president's demand.

"This will not happen... No change is necessary," Yanukovych said.

Yanukovych criticized Yushchenko, saying "sometimes his wishes exceed his capabilities."

Source: AFP

Pro-Presidential Our Ukraine Moves Closer To Joining Opposition

KIEV, Ukraine -- Following months of fruitless negotiations with the pro-Russian majority in parliament, the president and his faction have finally begun to reassert themselves in the hope of preserving some of their former authority and image.

Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko
The chances of the pro-presidential Our Ukraine faction joining the coalition led by the Donetsk-based Regions party look slimmer than ever, following an Oct. 4 announcement by faction leader Roman Bezsmertny that negotiations have broken down.

“In the situation that has come about, where the Universal and signed memorandum aren’t being fulfilled, where criminal cases are opened against Our Ukraine ministers, we don’t see any possibility of continuing dialogue or talks,” Bezsmertny said after a meeting of faction heads.

The so-called Universal is a list of shared policy points that Regions agreed to in August as a condition to Our Ukraine backing Regions leader Viktor Yanukovych as premier.

Prosecutor-General Oleksandr Medvedko, closely associated with the Donetsk political clan, recently opened a case against Our Ukraine Sports Minister Yuriy Pavlenko for allegedly misusing funds when he and a group of officials attended the World Cup recently.

“Thus, it can be said that the negotiations process has effectively ended. I don’t know if this is good or bad, but all the participants in this process have made up their minds – there is a government led coalition and Our Ukraine, which is in opposition to the government coalition.”

An official statement by Our Ukraine is expected to follow Bezsmertny’s announcement, which will likely mean the resignation of Our Ukraine’s appointments to the Yanukovych government: Justice Minister Roman Zvarych, Sports Minister Yuriy Pavlenko, Health Minister Yury Polyachenko and Culture Minister Ihor Likhovy.

Two other Our Ukraine ministers – Defense and Foreign Affairs – are appointed by the president according to the Constitution and are subject to change only by him.

Following the March 26 general elections, many supporters of the Orange Revolution expected Our Ukraine to join a coalition with its former Orange comrades – the Socialists and the Bloc of Yulia Tymoshenko. Instead, the pro-presidential party has consistently signaled that it prefers a grand coalition with Regions, its enemy during the revolution, which already has a majority with the Communists and Socialists.

The only faction currently calling itself the opposition is BYuT, the bloc of Yushchenko’s fiery former ally Yulia Tymoshenko.

BYut has continually challenged Yushchenko and Our Ukraine to form an opposition, despite Tymoshenko being passed over for the premiership last summer.

BYuT is now consolidating its position as the focal point of the official opposition by saying it will hold a forum to include all opposition forces. According to BYuT, which includes a healthy collection of nationalists, the Regions-led coalition is beginning to show cracks. One crack is that the Communists have always been against Our Ukraine joining a grand coalition.

Following Bezsmertny’s Oct. 4 announcement, Communist leader Petro Symonenko said: “This gives only one impression – that Our Ukraine isn’t going to join the coalition or take responsibility for what is happening in the country.”

As the smallest faction in parliament, the Communists would lose their “golden share” status: The Regions and Socialists don’t have enough MPs without the Communists to form a majority.

On the other hand, BYuT has already reiterated its interest in forming a united opposition with the pro-presidential faction.

One of Tymoshenko’s main banners of opposition is the nation’s fear that Russia will again raise the price of the gas it sells to Ukraine, as happened earlier this year. On Oct. 2 Tymoshenko accused Ukrainian and Russian officials of misleading the public by telling them the price of gas would stay unchanged this year in a bid to win political capital.

Russia's state-controlled gas monopoly Gazprom said last week that it would maintain the price of natural gas for Ukraine at $95 per 1,000 cubic meters till Dec. 31. However, Tymoshenko was not impressed, and said "It is political deception ... the de facto gas price has already been raised," citing unidentified sources in the Russian energy industry.

Tymoshenko did not reveal what she thought the new price would be, but said Moscow had agreed to let Kyiv wait to pay the difference in 2007. She called the Russian move an attempt to build up support for Yanukovych, who is perceived as more pro-Kremlin than President Viktor Yushchenko.

In another sign that the president and his former Orange ally may yet find a common language, Tymoshenko welcomed news that the presidential secretariat has been staffed with new faces. Viktor Baloha, recently appointed by Yushchenko as his chief-of-staff, introduced his deputies on Sept. 26.

With Yanukovych challenging the president on domestic matters and trying to rewrite foreign policy on NATO, Yushchenko has responded by reinforcing his secretariat, which he sees as a counterweight to the Regions-dominated cabinet.

Two former ministers, Arseniy Yatsenyuk and Viktor Bodnar, economics and transport ministers, respectively, of the previous Orange government, have been rewarded with senior posts. Yatsenyuk will serve as Baloha’s first deputy.

The series of appointments comes as Yanukovych tries to grab more powers from the president. Yanukovych is now threatening the president’s traditional prerogative to hire and fire regional governors.

At a meeting of the cabinet also attended by governors on Sept. 28, Yanukovych said five governors, all of them from Our Ukraine, should be dismissed. He claimed the five have not done enough to tackle socioeconomic problems in their regions.

But the Regions may find it easier to take power than to wield it. The Donetsk-based political force is now trying to solve a potentially embarrassing political banana skin regarding the new moratorium on utility tariff hikes after a presidential veto was defeated last week by the majority in parliament.

The moratorium, which is valid only till the end of this year anyway, leaves the Regions party, which is packed with eastern industrialists, confused. Regions supported the moratorium, but its industrialists will be most hurt by having to shoulder gas subsidies to households.

Now, with the president asking for the law to be submitted for him to sign, the cabinet is beginning to back down. In an obvious about-face, the cabinet now wants to annul the bill.

On Sept. 29, the day after parliament defeated the veto, Deputy Prime Minister for Regional Policy Volodymyr Rybak announced a proposal to lift the moratorium on raising gas, heating and electricity prices for the public. Rybak said parliament could reconsider the issue, which would involve revoking the law.

Socialist speaker Oleksandr Moroz is also confused, and as the Post went to print, was refusing to pass the law for signing by the president, who now says he is ready to approve it. Taking advantage of the pro-Russian majority’s predicament, both Our Ukraine and BYuT insist that the moratorium bill be handed over for the president’s signature.

Before Bezsmertny’s Oct. 4 statements, Regions continued extending Our Ukraine the hand of cooperation while snatching at much of the president’s authority with the other hand. Senior Regions MP Yevhen Kushnaryov was confident that Our Ukraine would join the pro-Russian parliamentary majority during comments he made on Oct. 2.

Kushnaryov assured Our Ukraine that Regions and its leftist coalition partners would honor the so-called Universal, which among other things supports the Western integration course charted by Yushchenko.

Taras Kuzio, an adjunct professor at the Institute for European, Russian and Eurasian Studies at George Washington University, told the Post that “this is simply a no-win situation, as Our Ukraine is split 50-50 over joining the coalition [the preference of the business wing and Yushchenko], or the opposition [the preference of the national democratic wing].”

“I do not believe the Regions will evict the Communists, as with them they have a parliamentary majority. But, without them they do not,” Kuzio added.

“The Regions are angry at Yushchenko and Our Ukraine for betraying them during coalition negotiations in April-June. They were then ready to compromise and give Our Ukraine the prime minister’s post, but Yushchenko chose Orange over the grand coalition,” he said.

“If Our Ukraine joins any coalition with the Communists, it will be the end of Our Ukraine. Our Ukraine’s best option is to go into opposition.”

Political analyst Andriy Yermolaev agreed that Our Ukraine was split, but underlined that “Our Ukraine and Yushchenko will never agree to Yulia Tymoshenko leading a united opposition bloc,” adding that, nevertheless, “Yushchenko will have the last word in the decision on the coalition by Our Ukraine.”

Svitlana Kononchuk, a political specialist at the Ukrainian Center for Independent Political Research, told the Post that it is clear that differences exist between Our Ukraine and Regions.

The former now finds itself on the back foot, as the coalition formed at the start of July has already formed a cabinet, and “the creation of a broad coalition is unjustified from the point of view of the need for the creation of a government.” After all, a coalition already exists, Kononchuk said.

She also said that the main thing now is the 2007 state budget, as access to state funds is vital for the personal enrichment of businessmen of all political persuasion. If Our Ukraine is not part of the broad coalition then the interests of such businessmen will not be taken into consideration.
Asked about Our Ukraine joining the coalition, Kononchuk said that “if such a broad coalition involving Our Ukraine is formed, it will only be an artificial coalition.”

Source: Kyiv Post

Confident Russia Shrugs Off Bad PR From Georgia Row

MOSCOW, Russia -- Russia's economic sanctions against Georgia have once again left the Kremlin looking to many in the West like a bully.

Georgia's President Mikhail Saakashvili
Russia strongly disagrees but in any case is not too concerned: whatever the West might think, it will still rely on imports of Russian oil and gas.

"The attitude is that 'Alright, they (the West) might hate us and criticise us, but they will respect us too'," said Fyodor Lukyanov, editor of the journal Russia in Global Affairs.

Russia cut off air, rail and postal links to its ex-Soviet neighbour after Tbilisi arrested four Russian army officers on spying charges.

Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili let them fly home on Monday, but Moscow -- defying calls from the United States and the European Union to accept Georgia's olive branch -- pressed on with those sanctions and promised more.

The row with Georgia was almost a re-run of a dispute with Ukraine in January this year. In sub-zero termperatures, Moscow cut off gas exports to Kiev in a pricing dispute.

The West saw the cut-off as a sign the Kremlin was trying to blackmail its ex-Soviet neighbours. Russia was slow to put its side of the story and suffered a mauling in the Western media.

"The outcome of the Ukrainian saga demonstrated for Russia that yes, its image suffered," Lukyanov told Reuters. "But on the other hand, so what? What happened? Did someone say 'We will not buy Russian gas'? ... No they didn't."

At that time, Western criticism focused on whether Russia's behaviour was appropriate for a country that this year is chairing the Group of Eight rich democracies.

The Kremlin hired Western public relations advisers who helped ensure the issue did not overshadow the G8 summit hosted by Russian President Vladimir Putin in St Petersburg in July.

SCATHING EDITORIALS

The advisers' influence was on display on Tuesday when Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov put Russia's side in the row with Georgia at a specially arranged briefing for foreign journalists.

That appeared to be an attempt to seize back the public relations iniative from Saakashvili, whose attacks on the Kremlin, in fluent English, have been beamed around the world.

But editorials in Western newspapers have been scathing of Russia.

"It is time for Mr Putin to stop ... bullying and undermining the Georgian government," said Britain's Guardian daily. Other newspapers took a similar line.

Even a Russian newspaper which is usually deferential to the Kremlin questioned the wisdom of the sanctions.

"The Kremlin ... it seems, has lost," the Moskovsky Komsomolets daily said.

"Our bureaucrats' customary sluggishness has allowed President (Saakashvili) to not only brilliantly execute a provocation but also to come out of it looking like the wronged victim."

Overall though, the tough line on Georgia seemed to be playing well inside Russia. Many Russians already dislike Saakashvili for his outspoken attacks on the Kremlin, and polls show they like to see Russia assert itself abroad.

While it may not worry about damage to its image abroad, Russia does have a problem, foreign policy expert Lukyanov said.

If sanctions fail to chasten Saakashvili -- and many analysts say they will have the opposite effect -- the Kremlin will look bad. But it has no obvious way of rolling back the sanctions without losing face.

"In my view, Saakashvili has outmanoeuvred Russia," Lukyanov said.

Source: Reuters

Ex-Ukraine Leader Appeals U.S. Extortion Conviction

SAN FRANCISCO, USA -- Ukraine's former Prime Minister Pavlo Lazarenko has asked a U.S. appeals court to overturn his sentence of nine years in prison on extortion and money laundering charges, his lawyer said on Tuesday.

Pavlo Lazarenko
U.S. District Judge Martin Jenkins last month sentenced Lazarenko, only the second foreign leader to be convicted in the United States, and fined him $10 million.

On Friday the judge also ordered Lazarenko to forfeit more than $26 million plus interest from his bank accounts linked to the case.

"From the original 52 counts, we are down to 14," defense attorney Dennis Riordan told Reuters in explaining the appeal. "All of the (eight) money laundering counts are subject to attack."

Lazarenko became a multimillionaire while in the top echelons of government during the chaotic post-Soviet 1990s.

Now under house arrest in San Francisco pending the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals review of the case, he is the first foreign leader sentenced in a U.S. court since Panamanian leader Manuel Noriega in 1992.

A jury convicted Lazarenko, Ukraine's prime minister from 1996 to 1997, of 29 counts of extortion, laundering money through California banks, fraud, and transportation of stolen property.

Judge Jenkins later threw out 15 counts, finding that there was not enough evidence to sustain those convictions.

Source: Reuters

Yushchenko Offers Technological Aid To Peres

BERLIN, Germany -- At a meeting in Berlin Tuesday, Ukrainian president Victor Yushchenko offered Israeli Vice Premier Shimon Peres his cooperation in the development of missiles and satellites, in the shadow of his country’s past development of missiles for the former Soviet Union.

Israeli Vice Premier Shimon Peres
Peres in turn offered Yushchenko his cooperation in the nano-technology field and in investments in the “Peace Valley”. Yushchenko will head an economic committee that will visit Israel on November 7.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, about 200 nuclear soviet missiles could be found in the Ukraine. The missiles and nuclear heads were returned to Russia, except for 12-20 missiles which ‘disappeared’ and were apparently transferred secretly to Iran in an illegal deal.

These missiles were thought to have been used by Iran in the development of the country’s “Shihab” missiles.

Peres and Yushchenko met at Peres’ hotel and discussed the development of nano-technology in the struggle against world terror.

Yushchenko expressed interest in the idea of a possible collaboration on the subject.

Peres also offered the Ukraine to cooperate in the "Peace Valley," set to encompass the area between the Red Sea in the south and the Yarmuch River in the north.

The project is expected to include a channel that will connect the Red Sea and the Dead Sea, advanced industries areas and tourism projects in which three countries – Israel, Jordan and the Palestinians would cooperate.

Hundreds of millions of dollars are set to be invested in the huge initiative by international bodies. Former United States President Bill Clinton is currently contemplating the possibility of heading the project.

Peres told Yushchenko that the "Peace Valley" initiative is set to be launched next year, and added: "The development of peace will be carried out by economic means, after the diplomatic means have failed."

Yushchenko, on his part, expressed interest in contributing to the subject.

Source: YNet News

Tymoshenko Accuses Kiev, Moscow Of Misleading Public Over Gas Prices

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukrainian opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko on Monday accused Ukrainian and Russian officials of misleading the public by telling them the price of gas would stay unchanged this year in a bid to win political capital.


Russia's state-controlled natural gas monopoly, Gazprom, said last week that it would maintain the price of natural gas for Ukraine at $95 per 1,000 cubic meters through Dec. 31.

"It is a political deception .. the de facto gas price has already been increased," Tymoshenko told journalists, citing unidentified sources in the Russian energy industry.

Tymoshenko did not say what the new price was, but said Moscow had agreed to let Kyiv wait to pay the difference in 2007. She called the move an attempt to build up support for Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych, who is perceived as more pro-Russian than President Viktor Yushchenko.

Yanukovych took office in August, and securing a good gas deal for Ukraine has been one of his top tasks.

Ukraine saw a nearly twofold gas price increase in January after a bitter dispute with Moscow. The Russian company briefly turned off the taps to Ukraine at the height of winter, triggering supply problems in other European countries that receive Russian gas via Ukrainian pipelines.

As part of the deal that resolved last winter's fuel dispute, Ukraine agreed to receive a mix of more expensive Russian gas and cheaper Turkmen imports at a price of $95 per 1,000 cubic meters.

Pressure to increase the price rose last month after Turkmenistan hiked the amount Russia pays for the gas it buys and then sells on to Ukraine.

Source: AP

Sheva: Struggles Are Normal

LONDON, UK -- Andriy Shevchenko has shrugged off his slow start to life at Chelsea and insisted he is happy with his decision to swap AC Milan for the Premiership champions.


The striker has scored just one league goal in seven games since his £30million summer transfer from Milan.

He will lead out Ukraine against Italy at the Stadio Olimpico for their Euro 2008 qualifier on Saturday hoping to rediscover his goal touch in the country where he was a prolific scorer.

"Players go through difficult times and it happens to everyone," said Shevchenko, who turned 30 last week.

"But I feel young and full of energy."

The frontman is determined to make a success of his move to England.

He said: "I chose Chelsea and I will continue on this path.

Nothing can change my choice. Life goes beyond football.

"I feel more free here (London) than in Italy. The life of a footballer in London is more simple, football is a show that finishes once the game is over.

"I understand the foreigners who speak English and then (Frank) Lampard and (John) Terry help me out."

Much has been said about Shevchenko and Roman Abramovich's relationship, but the striker says he receives no special treatment from Chelsea's Russian owner.

"I am not Abramovich's golden boy," Shevchenko told Gazzetta dello Sport. "I am just a player and he is my president, he takes care of all his players."

Shevchenko is still idolised by the red-and-black half of Milan after scoring 173 goals in seven seasons.

He helped Milan to the Serie A title in 2004 and the Champions League the year before, and Carlo Ancelotti's men have struggled for goals without him so far this season.

But the former Dynamo Kiev man was happy to have avoided his old Milan team-mates in the Champions League group stages.

"Chelsea is a very strong team, who fight to win everything just like Milan," he added.

"The only thing that I wanted in the Champions League is to avoid meeting Milan. To have played against my former team-mates immediately after my move would have been a drama."

Source: PA Sport

EU-Ukraine Relations Hit Visa Bump

BRUSSELS, Belgium -- EU-Ukraine relations risk hitting a fresh bump over visas, with Kiev blaming delays in a new travel deal on anti-immigration politics in the west and Brussels saying the "technical" issues will soon be resolved.


Ukraine had expected to seal a visa facilitation package for post-January 2007 travel to the EU in Helsinki on 27 October, joining Russia in a scheme to avoid EU visa price hikes from €35 to €60 per person next year.

But France, Germany, Austria, Poland, Slovakia and Hungary are delaying agreement on the text due to a dispute on readmission of third country nationals - people from countries such as China or Pakistan who enter the EU via Ukraine.

"We have proposed the same workable formula for readmission as the one the EU already has with Russia and Russia has with Ukraine," a Ukrainian diplomat told EUobserver. "So we do not see how our formula could form a 'negative precedent' in the region."

He added that the talks are "fixable" when it comes to new member states, but that they are "political" in the three western powers, with Ukraine not getting proper EU recognition for its help on EU border and security policies in Moldova and the Western Balkans.

"We understand the immigration fears of the EU countries," the Ukraine contact stated. "But we need a proper balance of actions. We cannot be in a position of giving help where we are needed but getting nothing in return."

EU officials handling the talks rejected the Ukrainian analysis, however. "There will be a visa facilitation deal with Ukraine if not this month, then next month," one EU diplomat stated.

"It's absolutely not political. It's technical and there is plenty of good will from the EU side," he added. "Ukraine is not being treated as a second class neighbour next to Russia. If anything, Ukraine is getting privileged treatment."

Kiev's figures show the country "readmitted" 1,844 third-country nationals from the EU last year, compared to 1,211 in 2004, with the country calling for EU help to boost poor conditions in migrant squatter camps near the Polish and Slovak borders.

"Ironically, the costs per migrant in temporary residence centres in Ukraine sometimes exceed the daily income levels of the populace around them," the Ukrainian official indicated, with average wages in Ukraine at just €170 a month.

In early 2005, Ukrainian visas hit the German headlines after it emerged that a Berlin anti-red tape bill known as "Volmer's law" saw hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians enter the EU between 2001 and 2003, some with the help of criminal gangs.

Friends in high places

The EU's own visa politics is not as open as it could be, with one story doing the rounds in Brussels that a visa deal for Moldova was given impetus in September only after a dynamic Czech diplomat got a highly-placed job in the European Commission's justice wing.

"The dossier had been sitting there for months and nobody cared, then a few weeks after she came, Prague and commissioner Franco Frattini launched a new initiative and it began moving," an EU insider said, with Chisinau set to initial an agreement later this week.

The Ukraine visa hiccup comes after pro-Russian politician Viktor Yanukovych - who is tinged in Brussels with suspicions of corruption and poisoning relating to the 2004 Orange Revolution - came back to power as prime minister last month.

Mr Yanukovych has said Ukraine will stick to its post-revolutionary, pro-EU path but is keen to "pause" NATO-membership progress. The European Commission has responded by taking a "wait and see" approach with the new leader for now.

Source: EU Observer

The Case For An Opposition, Not Unity

KIEV, Ukraine -- The incredible happened in Ukraine several weeks ago. Viktor Yanukovych, the former fraudulent presidential candidate ousted by the Orange Revolution, became prime minister. Yesterday's criminals are today's political leaders, and the president is someone's puppet.

Yulia Tymoshenko
The people are duped. Democracy undermined. This hocus pocus was accompanied by noble talk. Poof! Parliament united under the Party of Regions is the right thing for Ukraine's national unity. Poof, poof!! It will avert a national crisis.

Don't believe it. This is smoke and mirrors in the best of the former USSR tradition. In democracies, unity in parliament is not a virtue. Parliament requires at least two strong players from opposing camps to raise national differences and debate issues. Major democracies are not monolithic.

They are united despite major geographic, linguistic, religious and other polarizations. They balance differently, with interests colliding regularly. Their conflicts are no different from those in Ukraine. The difference between successful democracies and Ukraine is the manner in which political issues get resolved.

Successful democracies resolve their issues in parliament. The post-March election scenario in Ukraine was played outside its rules. Indeed, the manner in which President Viktor Yushchenko called upon the current government to serve undermines parliament and is a dangerous step back towards dictatorship.

Let's recall what happened. The real winners of the March elections, the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc and the Orange coalition, which obtained a slight majority of seats, were stalled for four months from sitting in parliament by the president.

This was shocking and offensive to democrats around the world. To temper the negative reaction, his inaction was given a seductive, but false spin: the president is deliberating what is best for national unity.

Nonsense. The stalling was taking place because the voters made the "wrong" choice as far as the wealthy oligarchs were concerned.

The people wanted Yulia Tymoshenko to be their prime minister. The Party of Regions did not. Nor did it want to play according to democratic rules.

It would not take the rightful place of the minority and become the opposition in parliament. It refused to recognize that it had received only 32 percent of the votes. The president went along as if the elections did not matter.

He did not press the rules of democratic behaviour: parliament must be constituted by creating the government from those who have the majority; and the opposition from those who received fewer votes. The democratic process was bypassed for months.

Then it was too late. The powerful few, not the people, got their way. It was a step backwards in democracy.

The back-sliding continues. Ukraine's political leaders, including the president and his newly appointed prime minister, claim to want to resolve their differences – East/West, pro-Russia/pro-West.

This is to be done by creating a unified political force in parliament. Some members of the president's Our Ukraine now serve in the new cabinet, including the strange Roman Zvarych as justice minister.

The reconstitution of parliament along a single unified team is nothing less than a return to the one party system of the former USSR. It is bad news for Ukraine. Of course, the USSR's single Communist party kept the country united through terror and force. This unity cost Ukrainians four famines, with the biggest costing 10 million lives, plus, some seventy years of tyrannical unity where opposition was suppressed by death or the Gulag.

What is going on in Ukraine that after 15 years of millions upon millions of dollars heaped in training, re-educating, showing the Ukrainians how democracy works in the West, government exchanges, money spent on producing MA's in public administration, such political perversions are allowed to happen?

The events of the last four months underscore how meager the results and how shallow the changes are. Shallow in understanding what democracy is and how it works and shallow in the way its key players have evolved as democrats. And shameful.

It is scandalous that today's prime minister is yesterday's cheating contender for the presidency. That his entourage comprises men like Rinat Akhmetov, who has amassed enough billions to be in Fortune magazine, while many Ukrainians live in dire poverty. It is scandalous that President Yushchenko denied his people their choice for premier and succumbed to manipulations like the best of the world's puppet leaders.

Even more so, as now he is opining that revolutions like the Orange one are but myths and legends. The premier, in the meantime, boasts of having participated in it to build a just nation. It is scandalous that the West won the war against Communism, saw the Soviet empire crumble, supported Ukraine during its feisty Orange Revolution, only to allow this ally in global democracy building to slip so perilously close to the edge.

Even more scandalous: the West may have orchestrated this in order to have good business ties with the oligarchs.

Things might have been different. The best case scenario for democracy would have been for the president to have stood with his people rather than betray them. Seeing their vote disregarded, the people might have returned to the streets where they scored victory two years ago, to demand a re-election or his resignation.

The West might have become furious and called in its ambassadors to exert pressure. And told its consulting firms that it is more in America's interest to have a democratic Ukraine, than to have it perverted in the name of doing business for a fee. It did not happen.

Democracy has suffered a setback. The only bright spot now is Yulia Tymoshenko. She has declared that she will not join the Party of Regions et al to form a united front in parliament. She will lead the opposition and deal with the real national crisis: the unbridled intention of the oligarchs to control all aspects of life.

When Ukraine became independent in 1991, hope quickly turned to the realization that, in fact, little had changed. The Communist gang that had ruled Ukraine was still at the helm. It had wrapped itself in Ukraine's blue and yellow flag instead of the red one to amass great state wealth.

Yet some hard-fought gains were made - free elections and greater freedoms, especially in the media. Now, it is feared, they are being lost.

Restrictions have already begun. In the Rada, there were moves recently to undermine the political checks and balances system by further restricting presidential powers. Today, more than ever, Ukraine needs a strong opposition. Yulia Tymoshenko has a huge job ahead of her.

The West must wake up. It must rally behind democracy and help her do a good job as the watchdog of the people. All aid should be directed towards resuscitating democracy.

In turn, the public needs to monitor how she fights for their wellbeing and to help her. If she does well, they will reward her in the next election and punish the fraud tricksters.

Source: Yulia Tymoshenko Website

Putin Denounces Georgia's "State Terrorism"

MOSCOW, Russia -- The war of words between Russia and Georgia escalated sharply with President Vladimir Putin accusing the Georgian leadership of "state terrorism" and acting like Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin.

Russian President Vladimir Putin speaks during a Security Council meeting at the residence of Novo Ogaryovo outside Moscow.
And in a remark apparently aimed at the United States and the NATO alliance, Putin also warned of "foreign sponsors" that he suggested were encouraging Tbilisi to provoke Moscow.

The president's angry denouncement underlined a deepening crisis in bilateral relations following Georgia's arrest of four Russian soldiers on Wednesday on spying charges.

Speaking at an emergency meeting of Russia's security council held at his residence in the chic Moscow suburb of Novo Ogarevo, Putin said he considered the arrests "an act of state terrorism with the taking of hostages," according to a Kremlin statement.

Earlier Sunday, in remarks broadcast on Russian television, he likened Georgia's leadership to the executor of Stalin's murderous purges.

The spying arrests are "a sign of the succession of Lavrent Beria both inside the country and in the international arena," Putin said, referring to the Soviet secret police chief who oversaw the 1930s Stalinist purges that killed hundreds of thousands.

"In spite of the fact that Russia is consistently fulfilling all the agreements we have on removing our armed forces from (Georgia)... our military officers were snatched and thrown in jail," Putin said.

"These people think that in being under the protection of their foreign sponsors, they can feel comfortable and safe. Is that in fact the case?"

Putin also ordered his forces to resume their withdrawal from Georgia after -- an operation that had been been interrupted on Saturday due to safety concerns.

Russia evacuated virtually all its diplomatic staff from its embassy in Tbilisi over the weekend.

Putin's evocation of Beria, who was born in Georgia's Abkhazia region, echoed comments by numerous Russian politicians and commentators as relations with Tbilisi have declined in recent months.

Beria was head of the NKVD, the Stalin-era Soviet secret police force that later became the KGB, from 1938 to 1946.

Putin was himself head of the FSB, the successor organization to the KGB, before entering Russian politics in 1999.

Earlier Sunday, the head of the Russian military in the Caucasus said that Russia's regional forces, including in Georgia, were "at heightened military readiness."

"If any actions are taken against Russian troops, we are ready to take any action, including the use of deadly force," Major General Andrei Popov said in an interview on Ekho Moskvy radio.

Meanwhile, Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili Saakashvili told an audience in Georgia's Black Sea port of Batumi on Sunday not to fear the Russian military.

Speaking of planned Russian naval training in the area, Saakashvili said: "Our response will be the legal process, the supremacy of law, and a stable country that continues to live, develop and assert itself in the modern world," according to a transcript on the foreign ministry's web site.

Relations between Russia and Georgia have been on the decline since mass uprisings in 2003 known as the Rose Revolution brought the pro-Western Saakashvili to power.

Saakashvili has pushed his country toward NATO accession over protests from Moscow, which considers the Caucasus to be its traditional sphere of influence.

The two countries have also clashed over Georgia's breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, which Moscow supports and which Sakaashvili has vowed to restore control over.

Numerous international leaders called Saakashvili over the weekend to urge a diplomatic solution to the crisis, including Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko, Polish President President Lech Kaczynski, Lithuanian President Vladas Adamkus.

EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana also called the Georgian president Saturday and offered to facilitate contacts between the two sides.

Source: AFP

Yushchenko, Yanukovych Lock Horns Over Respective Powers

KIEV, Ukraine -- President Viktor Yushchenko is slowly coming to the realization that he has to co-exist with a disobedient prime minister that he cannot dismiss.

Viktor Yushchenko
This is a consequence of the constitutional reform that came into effect this year, curtailing presidential powers, and of the Yushchenko faction’s defeat by the Party of Regions (PRU) in the March parliamentary election. PRU head Viktor Yanukovych has been challenging Yushchenko on foreign and domestic matters alike, defying his instructions and orders ever since his appointment as prime minister last month.

Yushchenko has responded by beefing up his Secretariat, which he apparently sees as a counterweight to the PRU-dominated Cabinet of Ministers.

Yanukovych defied the pro-Western Yushchenko most spectacularly in Brussels on September 14, saying that Ukraine is not ready to implement a NATO Membership Action Plan. Yushchenko chided him, and Foreign Minister Borys Tarasyuk and Defense Minister Anatoliy Hrytsenko publicly expressed their disagreement with Yanukovych.

In response, Yanukovych recalled that foreign policy foundations are defined by parliament, not the president, according to the constitution. He also upbraided Tarasyuk and Hrytsenko -- who were both appointed to the cabinet under Yushchenko’s quota -- suggesting that they should discuss their differences with the prime minister before making their viewpoints public.

The extent of institutional rivalry between President Yushchenko and Prime Minister Yanukovych manifests itself especially vividly on home turf. Yanukovych has not forgotten his election promises to raise the status of the Russian language, which Yushchenko, who believes that Ukrainian must be the only official language, bitterly opposes.

Yushchenko, for his part, openly mistrusts Yanukovych on economic matters. On September 15, he accused Yanukovych of discriminating against exporters based in western and central Ukraine in value-added tax reimbursements, and he instructed the Prosecutor-General’s Office to check into this.

In painful blows for Yushchenko, the cabinet has returned several of his decrees. Yanukovych’s office said that Yushchenko had violated the constitution by ordering the decrees to be published before the cabinet had countersigned them.

The decrees themselves were probably of secondary importance, and Yanukovych’s team made no secret that they were returned to Yushchenko just to make him realize that the time when the cabinet obeyed all instructions from the president has gone.

Yushchenko’s Our Ukraine party took the hint. It issued a statement on September 21 saying that the cabinet’s actions were tantamount to a coup. According to Our Ukraine, the prime minister signs presidential decrees only to confirm that he is aware of them and is going to implement them, meaning that Yushchenko’s decrees are valid without Yanukovych’s signature.

Yanukovych openly defied this, telling the cabinet on September 25 that it is legally impossible to carry out presidential instructions if they are not signed by the appropriate cabinet minister and the prime minister.

Yushchenko is aware that it is very difficult to solve this and similar disputes in a situation where his rivals easily find contradictions and loopholes in flawed legislation. Yushchenko believes that it is necessary to amend the errors in the constitutional reform that was hastily adopted during the Orange Revolution of 2004, even if this amounts to reversing the changes.

This, however, is impossible right now, as the current majority in parliament does not share his views. Finally, the results of recent public opinion polls add insult to injury for Yushchenko, showing that popular trust in him is lower than in Yanukovych.

Yushchenko has apparently decided that the potential of his inner circle, which forms the core of his Secretariat -- formerly the presidential administration -- has been exhausted. Revolutionary romantics are out, and Yushchenko is hiring tough managers that will be able to professionally respond to challenges posed by Yanukovych.

On September 16, he replaced Oleh Rybachuk with Viktor Baloha as head of his Secretariat. Yushchenko trusts Baloha, a businessman and former governor of the Transcarpathian region, who was one of the leaders of the Orange Revolution. At the same time, Baloha knows the corridors of power from the inside, as he was part of the team of Viktor Medvedchuk -- the chief of former president Leonid Kuchma’s administration -- when Yanukovych was only rising to prominence.

Simultaneously, Yushchenko appointed former economics minister Arseny Yatsenyuk, former transport minister Viktor Bondar, and former deputy foreign minister Oleksandr Chaly as deputies to Baloha. Neither of the three has ever been a member of the Orange team, but they are considered top professionals in their fields, even though Yatsenyuk and Bondar are only in their early thirties.

Chaly, after his resignation from the government in 2004, became one of the top managers of the Industrial Union of Donbas -- Donetsk-based business rivals of Yanukovych’s key Donetsk-based ally, tycoon Renat Akhmetov. It is interesting that Chaly, unlike Foreign Minister Tarasyuk, is quite skeptical of NATO accession. On September 25, Yushchenko accepted the resignation of Iryna Herashchenko, his press secretary since 2001.

Source: Eurasia Daily Monitor

Babi Yar

KIEV, Ukraine -- It is wrenching to insert Babi Yar into any "good news" framework. Yet the fact is that the 65th anniversary of one of the first and bloodiest of World War II's Nazi massacres was commemorated last week as never before in a land which still bristles with anti-Semitism.

A man lays flowers at the monument to the victims of the Nazi massacre of Jews in Ukraine's capital Kiev.
After decades of neglect, indeed for most of the time of willful obscuration, the commemoration was no longer a private Jewish affair but one in which the Ukrainian head of state and dignitaries from the world over - including Israel's president- attended.

That perhaps can be seen as at least an incipiently hopeful sign in a world again given to Holocaust denial and delegitimization of Jewish self-determination.

Perhaps if anything demonstrates more poignantly the need for the Jews to take their fates into their own hands it is that incomprehensible slaughter on the eve of Yom Kippur, 1941.

Kiev's Jews were ordered to report for evacuation, with documents, valuables and even warm clothes and undergarments. The deception was perpetrated to the last, with small groupings led separately to the huge pit prepared in advance.

Driven through a narrow corridor of Nazi Einsatzgruppen executioners with the assistance of local collaborators, they were brutally beaten, commanded to undress and then machine-gunned. In a mere two days of bestiality 33,771 Jews were murdered - more than all the casualties Israel has suffered in all its decades of struggle to survive.

To this day only 10% of Babi Yar's victims have been identified. Worse yet, Ukraine is scarred by many hundreds - perhaps thousands - of mass graves of Jews. Most such sites remain unidentified and unmarked.

This August another mass grave - with the remains of some 2,000 Jews - was discovered near Lvov. Searches for mass graves are conducted privately and even at some risk, without cooperation from the Ukrainian population or authorities.

Babi Yar itself would have been just as forgotten were it not for Yevgeny Yevtushenko's 1961 epic poem. Yevtushenko shamed the Soviets into erecting a monument at the site, though it didn't mention Jews (a commemorative menorah was put up by Jewish groups in 1991).

Previously the Soviets dammed and flooded the ravine with mud and runoffs from nearby quarries. Other eastern European killing fields remain largely out of mind because nobody immortalized them in verse.

Last week's memorial - though well attended by Ukrainian higher-ups - wasn't a local initiative. It was the brainchild of Russian Jewish businessman Moshe Kantor, who was appalled that so few of Babi Yar's neighbors admit to knowing what happened there, that youths play football over the mass grave, nowadays also a picnic ground.

Indeed no major government-sponsored commemoration took place there in the 15 years of Ukrainian independence. Responding to accusations about Ukrainian callousness, President Viktor Yuschenko announced that the massacre site would be turned into "a state historical and cultural reserve, which would include a museum dedicated to the Jewish victims."

This wasn't an easy announcement in a country where it is still de rigueur to equate (if not justify) the Jewish bloodletting with the Stalin-instigated 1932-33 Ukrainian famine.

Anti-Semitism remains ever-virulent in Ukraine. The number of physical attacks on Jews is on the rise, as are anti-Semitic publications. If in 2001 160 anti-Jewish articles saw print, last year's figure rose to 660.

The Holocaust, tragically, put Ukraine and Eastern Europe on the sidelines of existential Jewish concerns. Today Nazism's torchbearers reside closer to home - among them Iran's Mahmoud Ahmedinejad who denies the Holocaust, while in the same breath calling for its extension, i.e. wiping Israel off the map. He seeks nuclear firepower to enable him to implement genocidal schemes.

Nevertheless, again the world seems bent on appeasement and apathetic to the danger. Worse yet - Russia, heir to the USSR, now supplies Iran with nuclear reactors.

This is perhaps the time to reflect on what Kantor said moved him to organize the memorial: "The world's thundering silence in Babi Yar's wake crucially emboldened Nazi Germany to push ahead with more atrocities and industrialize mass-murder. The Holocaust was fueled by indifference to Jews."

Source: The Jerusalem Post

Yanukovych Goes After Yushchenko

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukrainian Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych on Thursday demanded the sacking of five regional governors loyal to Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko in a move decried by the pro-Western leader's allies as an attack on his powers.

Yushchenko (L) will regret choosing Yanukovych (R) as Prime Minister

Yanukovych, appointed in August, has engaged in a power struggle with his long-standing rival Yushchenko for a dominant political role in Ukraine.

Constitutional changes, introduced at the height of the 2004 pro-Western Orange Revolution, made the prime minister nearly equal in power to the president.

In just two months, Yanukovych installed his allies to all key posts in financial, energy and economic sectors and poured cold water on Yushchenko's plans to win fast-track entry to NATO.

On Thursday, he took the battle for power to the regions.

A draft document, distributed at a government meeting, demanded the governors of the Poltava, Ternopil, Kharkiv, Kherson and Chernihiv regions -- all of them Yushchenko loyalists -- be sacked for "unsatisfactory solutions to problems that hamper social and economic development of the state."

Hiring and firing governors is the prerogative of the president.

"The political reasons behind such actions are obvious," Yushchenko's Our Ukraine party said. "We see such actions as another attempt of Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych to overtake the president's powers," it added.

Source: Reuters