[Ohio UZO News] Ukraine: here we go again: AP; EDM;

[Deychak, Orest]

I will refrain from commentary, although I'm sorely tempted...

Associated Press

Ukraine's president dissolves parliament, calls early elections,
bringing nation more turmoil 

By MARIA DANILOVA 

Associated Press Writer

8 October 2008

15:21

 

KIEV, Ukraine (AP) - Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko dissolved
Parliament Wednesday and called an early election, dashing hopes for the
revival of a pro-Western coalition and throwing this politically
volatile ex-Soviet nation into further turmoil.

The vote will be the third parliamentary election in as many years and
deal a severe blow to an economy already battered by the global
financial crisis. The date of the election was not announced.

The decision culminates a fierce battle between Yushchenko and Prime
Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, his estranged former partner in the Orange
Revolution that shook this former Soviet republic loose from the grip of
Russian influence and launched often chaotic democracy for its 46
million people. Both are seen as likely rivals in the 2010 presidential
vote.

Opinion polls show that Yushchenko's party is likely to lose parliament
seats in the new vote. Tymoshenko, who has fought to revive their
coalition and retain power, says the president's only motivation for
dissolving the Verkhovna Rada is removing her from her job.

Speaking in a televised address to the nation aired late Wednesday,
Yushchenko accused Tymoshenko of ignoring national interests for the
sake of acquiring power.

"I am deeply convinced that the democratic coalition was ruined by one
thing -- the ambition of one person, the hunger for power ... and the
dominance of personal interests over national ones," Yushchenko said.

The address had apparently been recorded in advance, as Yushchenko was
in Italy on an official visit.

The announcement was likely to spark protests from Tymoshenko. She has
said calling an election before late November -- when the legislature
would have worked a full year -- would be unconstitutional and has vowed
to challenge such a decision. Her party members have threatened mass
protests.

Tymoshenko has also suggested holding early presidential elections
alongside parliamentary ones, hinting that she would run.

Yushchenko defended his move as the only way to preserve the country's
democracy and national interests.

"They wanted to turn us back and then, as now, I am defending our
future," Yushchenko said. "The vote will be democratic and lawful."

Yushchenko pulled out of the nine-month-old coalition with Tymoshenko
last month, after she sided with the opposition to adopt a series of law
that trim his powers. Yushchenko has also accused Tymoshenko of selling
out to Russia.

Yushchenko has harshly criticized Russia for its August war in Georgia
and assailed Tymoshenko for her reluctance to condemn Moscow's action.
Tymoshenko says she opposed the war, but calls for balanced ties with
Russia.

Eurasia Daily Monitor

October 7, 2008 -- Volume 5, Issue 192

YUSHCHENKO FATIGUE IN WASHINGTON?

Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko's working visit to Washington in
late September left many observers wondering what, if anything, the
visit had accomplished. The apparent purpose of the trip was to seek
greater security assurances for Ukraine from the United States and gauge
the level of support in Washington for Ukraine's bid for a NATO
Membership Action Plan (MAP) in December. Few in Washington, however,
believe that Ukraine will be granted a MAP in December, even with U.S.
support, and that European opposition to Ukraine in NATO will prevail.

Yushchenko's meeting with U.S. President George W. Bush on September 29
revealed that Washington was slowly distancing itself from the Ukrainian
president. Prior to the meeting with Yushchenko, Bush met with the
President of Lithuania Valdas Adamkus and praised him lavishly: "I'm
honored to welcome my friend, the President of Lithuania, here to the
Oval. Welcome back, Mr. President. I've come to admire your courage,
your straightforwardness, and the job you've done for your country." The
photograph on the White House website showed the two men standing
together with Adamkus holding Bush's elbow (www.whitehouse.gov,
September 29).

The meeting with Yushchenko was depicted in far less intimate trappings
with Bush limiting his remarks to praise for Ukraine's democratic
turnaround. "I welcome you here to the Oval Office. I admire your
steadfast support for democratic values and principles. A lot of
Americans have watched with amazement how your country became a
democracy. We strongly support your democracy. We look forward to
working with you to strengthen that democracy." The photo on the White
House website avoided any hints of closeness between the two presidents
and showed them sitting in the Oval Office (www.whitehouse.gov,
September 29).

In remarks made during the brief press conference afterward, Bush, who
has been an active proponent of Ukrainian membership in NATO,
acknowledged that they had discussed NATO but avoided any statement in
support of Ukraine's ambitions to join the alliance.

Washington, according to sources in the administration, is experiencing
fatigue with Yushchenko, but not with Ukraine per se, they stress. The
president of Ukraine is widely perceived to be an inept leader, and
Washington is hedging its bets on who will become the next president of
Ukraine.

The perception of Yushchenko as an ineffective president was reinforced
during his meeting with the United States-Ukraine Business Council on
September 29. Speaking for nearly one hour, which left little time for
questions, Yushchenko dwelt for some time on the political crisis in
Kyiv, blamed the Ukrainian parliament of trying to destabilize the
country, and accused the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc, the Party of the
Regions, and the Communists of being in a "partnership with Moscow." He
also described the Black Sea region as an "area of instability," a
description that raised some consternation among the representatives of
American companies who attended the meeting. One participant noted that
this was not the way to encourage potential investors to do business in
Ukraine.

In his welcoming remarks, President of the United States-Ukraine
Business Council Morgan Williams stressed that for business to continue
moving forward in Ukraine, "a stable political and governmental
environment is needed. The government also needs to view business as a
partner and friend and pass the many reforms needed to bring about a
much stronger, pro-business environment in Ukraine." Apparently
Yushchenko did not take these words to heart and proceeded to paint
Ukraine as being less than stable.

Will "Yushchenko fatigue" spread to the EU? On October 6 the Ukrainian
president is scheduled to visit the U.K., where he will meet with
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Foreign Secretary David Miliband
and take part in a working lunch with European Bank for Reconstruction
and Development President Thomas Mirow (UNIAN news agency, September
29). From there he will proceed to Italy for October 7 and 8.

How European leaders, who have been more reserved toward Yushchenko than
Washington, will welcome him remains to be seen. Much hinges on the
forthcoming trip of Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko to Moscow to discuss
gas supplies for Ukraine in 2009 with Russian Prime Minister Vladimir
Putin. It is doubtful, however, that the critical issue of the gas price
for Ukraine will be decided, given that the Central Asian suppliers have
yet to announce the price they will charge Gazprom for their gas.

If it is true, as some analysts in Kyiv believe, that Yushchenko set
unrealistic goals for Tymoshenko in her negotiations with Moscow in
order to discredit her afterward, the Europeans will be more spooked
than usual about the possibility of another gas disruption in winter.
Even the most remote possibility that Ukrainian internal political
differences will affect European gas supplies could well condemn
Yushchenko to becoming a political nonentity in the eyes of already
skeptical Europeans.

--Roman Kupchinsky

 

Window on Eurasia: Belarusians, Russians Aren't Cousins Let Alone
Brothers, New Book Says

 

Paul Goble

 

            Vienna, October 8 - Even as Russian Prime Minister Vladimir
Putin and Belarusian President Alyaksandr Lukashenka promote between
their two governments, a new book argues that "Russians and Belarusians
are in no way brothers. Indeed, they are not even cousins" and adds that
they have had very different histories and will experience very
different fates. 

            The book, "The History of Imperial Relations" Belarusians
and Russians," was written by Anatoly Taras and published in 150 copies
by the Posokh Book Club in Smolensk. But its content is reaching a far
larger audience through an interview Taras has given to the Internet
newspaper "Salidarnasts"
(gazetaby.com/index.php?sn_nid=16646&sn_cat=35).

            In it, the Belarusian author argues that the Belarusians are
very different than "their Eastern neighbors historically, culturally
and even genetically and that it is completely incorrect to speak about
the Russians, Belarusians and Ukrainians as if they were "fraternal
peoples." There are not but rather "three absolutely different ethnic
communities."

            "The Russians," Taras says, "are a people who were formed on
the basis of Finno-Ugric and Turkic peoples. And the Russian language
... is an artificial tongue ... [which] arose on the basis of Finnish
words (the word Moskva translates from Finnish as 'black water') and
Turkic ones (for example, Karamzin, Sumarovokov and Kutuzov are Tatar
family names." 

            "Look at that Putin," the Belarusian author says,
"externally, that is anthropologically he is 100 percent a Finn!"

            The Belarusians in contrast, he continues, are Balts who
mixed with Slavs and migrated as a result of pressure by German tribes
from the banks of the Elbe," while "the Ukrainians are descendents of
Iranian-language Sarmathian tribes who were subjected to the influences
of the southern Slavs."

            But these anthropological and linguistic differences
continue in the separate histories of the three countries, Taras argues.
"The entire history of the Moscow state is the history of uninterrupted
expansion, 800 years of constant aggression." Regimes have changed
periodically, "but the essence {of its policies] have not!"

            Belarus and Ukraine have had very different histories, in
large measure because they have been subjected to the imperial policies
of Russia, he says.

            Asked why he had published the book in Smolensk, a city
within the boundaries of the Russian Federation, rather than in Minsk,
the Belarusian author said that he had not been able to interest "a
single commercial publishing house" in the Belarusian capital but hoped
that its publication in a limited print run would spark someone's
interest.

            More to the point, he said, Smolensk is not a Russian city
as the interviewer's question implied. "From times immemorial, Smolensk
is a Belarusian land, where there live Belarusians whom the Moscow
powers that be consider Russian even though far from all contemporary
Smolensk residents would agree.  This is our [Belarusian] land."

            And asked why he had chosen to publish his book in Russian
rather than Belarusian, Taras replied that "those citizens of Belarus
whom one can include among the nationally conscious in principle do not
need what is in this book.  They to a greater or lesser degree know
everything that is in it."

            This book, Taras continued, "is for others," both inside
Belarus and in all "14 countries of the former Union" for whom "the
problem of imperial relations continues to be relevant to this day." And
it would be a good thing, he concluded, if some in the Russian
Federation would become "acquainted" with it as well. 

But he said that trying to argue with Russians who think differently on
these issues "is something totally hopeless" because "they are simply
blinded by the consciousness of what they believe is their own
greatness, however illusory" that is in the eyes of anyone else.  And he
added that this problem is greater now in the wake of Russia's attack on
Georgia.

"Thanks to the situation in South Ossetia and Abkhazia," Taras said, "a
powerful wave of national patriotism, or more precisely chauvinism, has
arisen in Russia." He noted that an acquaintance of his had recently
been told by a Russian militiaman: You Belarusians "always were our
slaves, and that's how you will remain!"

            And another acquaintance told him that a Moscow publisher
had said that Belarusians and all the other non-Russians should "kiss"
the hand of Russians "for all that we have done for them" and that in
the future "we will put them in their place, and things will be for them
just as they are for Georgia now."

            But if Russia is able to throw its weight around now, Taras
said, it won't be much longer. And he predicted that as a result of
"social cataclysms," Russia would break into a group of small
principalities in about ten years. Over the same period, Belarus will
become more European as it overcomes the Belarusian variant of "Homo
Sovieticus."

            As a result, the Belarusian author said, he is quite
pessimistic about the future of Russia and the Russians but moderately
optimistic about that of Belarus and the Belarusians.

            Obviously not all Belarusians share the views of Taras, but
his words are a useful, even timely reminder that many Belarusians do
not share the attitudes of Lukashenka's regime or dismiss their country
and its culture, as many in both Moscow and the West do as byproducts of
Russian history that are fated to be "reabsorbed."

 

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