NEWSBRIEFS (02/18/96)

NEWSBRIEFS

Ukraine, IMF make progress on credit

KYIV - The International Monetary Fund agreed to allow Ukraine a larger budget deficit in talks on disbursing a delayed credit, Prime Minister Yevhen Marchuk was quoted as saying on February 14. Interfax-Ukraine said Mr. Marchuk told reporters on the eve of a parliamentary budget debate that the proposed deficit could be expanded from 6 percent to between 6.2 and 6.4 percent. IMF officials said the two sides had moved closer to an agreement during talks in Kyiv this week on the delayed fourth tranche of a $1.5 billion stand-by loan. "We've reached essential agreement on the memorandum (on economic policies)," said IMF resident representative Alex Sundakov. (Reuters)

Gunmen kill five in the Crimea

KYIV - Masked men burst into a bar in the Crimea and sprayed automatic weapons fire at party-goers, killing five people in what militia said on February 10 was the latest in a long series of contract murders. Crimea militia authority Mykhailo Korniyenko told local journalists seven people were wounded in the attack in the Symferopil bar Mirage. Three people were seriously injured. The two assailants ran off. "Never have we had so many people killed in a settling of accounts between rival mafia clans," the Crimea's chief prosecutor, Valentyn Kuptsov, said. According to militia, the two brothers who ran the bar believed the attack was directed at them, not the customers who were attending a birthday party. One brother was slightly hurt, the other escaped injury. Among the dead was a Yemeni medical student who also ran a bar. Investigators from the Interior Ministry of Ukraine have flown to the peninsula to oversee an operation to search for and arrest suspected criminals. Some 75 contract murders were recorded last year in the Crimea. Statistics show half of Ukraine's serious crimes are committed there and in the heavily industrialized Donetske and Dnipropetrovske oblasts. (Reuters)

Roundtable pushes energy sector reforms

WASHINGTON - The over-all success of economic reforms in Ukraine depends first of all on comprehensive reforms of the energy sector, concluded the participants of a roundtable discussion at the World Bank held on February 14 here. The conclave was held as part of Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Roman Shpek's working visit to the U.S. Representatives of the World Bank commented positively on the recent presidential decree "On Structural Reform in the Coal Industry," saying Ukraine has made a serious effort to establish competition in the energy sector and to allow unregulated retail sales of energy products. Partial privatization of the power generation industry is slated to begin in the near future. Participants in the discussion exchanged views on the critical financial state of the coal energy and power generation industries, noting especially the possibility of shortages of enterprise capital upon introduction of a free market for energy. It was emphasized that international financial institutions should tailor their support of energy sector restructuring bearing in mind the tempo and requirements of economic reforms in general. (Press Office, Embassy of Ukraine)

Snowstorm cripples eastern Ukraine

KYIV - Thousands of rescuers and a fleet of helicopters freed more than 1,500 people who were trapped in cars and buses by a weekend snowstorm in eastern Ukraine, officials said February 12. Nearly 1,000 vehicles were stuck in up to six feet of snow on impassable roads, some for up to two days. The hardest-hit area was about 240 miles southeast of Kyiv and between Dnipropetrovske and Zaporizh-zhia. Helicopters were used to drop hot food to the stranded and lift some to safety. Militia, firefighters and soldiers worked on the rescue operation, said Viktor Korniyuk, spokesman for the State Auto Inspection. Temperatures have averaged 3 degrees Fahrenheit for weeks in the capital and have kept much of the rest of Ukraine frozen since December, in what is the longest such cold spell in more than half a century. Fierce snowstorms over the weekend caused electrical outages across the Crimea, a southern resort region that rarely sees significant snowfall. Some 39,000 people were working today to clear snow in southeastern Ukraine, Interfax reported. Traffic authorities urged people to stay home until the roads are cleared. In Kyiv, ambulance officials said they see dozens of people every day with storm-related injuries, mostly from falling on ice covering the city's hilly streets. (Reuters)

Russia cuts Ukraine out of power grid

KYIV - Russia has removed Ukraine from their joint electricity grid after noting a surge in demand that the grid could not handle, ITAR-TASS and Reuters reported on February 13. Russian Energy Ministry spokeswoman Oksana Liven said it was unlikely that Ukraine will be reconnected anytime soon. The cut-off forced a number of factories to close. Meanwhile, the Ukrainian government is considering temporarily closing major industrial sites to prevent the collapse of the entire system. many plants have already closed. The cut-off comes amid severe weather and a coal miners' strike which, though seemingly winding down in scope, has sharply worsened the situation in Ukraine. The extent of the energy crisis is most evident in such industrial powerhouses as Dnipropetrovske, where power supplies have been cut by some 40 percent, the port city of Mykolayiv, where only two factories remain open, and Lviv, where the country's only bus assembly plant has shut down until spring due to an inability to heat its premises. The power cut-off by the Russian government is the second consecutive one in a three-month period. The recent crisis has even led Ukraine's environment minister, Yuriy Kostenko, to warn the West that closure of the Chornobyl nuclear plant, site of the world's worst nuclear accident on April 26, 1986, is in danger if financial assistance by G-7 countries is not consolidated and delivered in a timely manner. A memorandum signed by G-7 states and Ukraine in December 1995, envisions $2.3 billion of loans to Ukraine for the plant's closure. (Reuters)

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