NEWSBRIEFS (06/15/97)

NEWSBRIEFS

Landslide wrecks apartment complex

DNIPROPETROVSK - A severe landslide destroyed a nine-story apartment complex on June 6, killing an 85 year-old resident, sending 3,500 persons to local hotels and dormitories and cutting off all water, electricity and gas for 16,000 residents of the Topol region, local media reported. A local school and garages where rendered useless as well. Minister for Emergency Situations Valerii Kalchenko and President Leonid Kuchma visited the site soon after the structure, built on the edge of a ravine, collapsed, assuring residents that the government would do all in its power to liquidate the consequences of the landslide. Plans have been announced to build concrete abutments in the area to prevent future landslides. Locals said that city authorities had known for years of soft clay soil and an underground river, which made the area unsuitable for residential construction, but had failed to remedy the situation. Criminal charges have been filed and an investigation is under way. The destruction of the 144-apartment complex is the latest in a series of similar disasters in Ukraine. In early June, an 80 meter wide sinkhole developed in Lviv Oblast, while last year a hospital in Chernivtsi was nearly swallowed whole by the ground. Zelenyi Svit environmental activists have voiced concern that safety at the Rivne nuclear power plant, built on ground prone to development of sinkholes, may be endangered. (Respublika)

Lukashenka pines for USSR

MIENSK - Belarusian President Alyaksandr Lukashenka on June 10 bemoaned the Soviet Union's collapse as a "tragedy" and declared his life's mission to put the empire's broken pieces back together. Speaking as his puppet parliament, the Council of the Republic of Belarus, voted unanimously to ratify a union treaty with the Russian Federation, Mr. Lukashenka said, "The main goal of my life is to bring back... ...what has been ruined. We have broken up the country, and, regrettably, it happened on our land," (a reference to the December 1991 Belaya Vezha Agreement creating the CIS, signed by Russian President Boris Yeltsin, and the former heads of state of Ukraine and Belarus, respectively, Leonid Kravchuk and Stanislau Shushkevich). The new union treaty, signed by Messrs. Lukashenka and Yeltsin in May, calls for creation of joint energy and transport systems and coordination of economic reforms and military policy, while leaving open the prospect of currency union between Belarus and Russia. Russia and Belarus have removed customs barriers and border controls but otherwise have done little toward real integration since forming a "community" in 1996. Both houses of Russia's Parliament have ratified the latest bilateral accord. Mr. Lukashenka, a former state farm director, has amassed virtually unlimited powers in his country, cracking down on dissent and last fall replacing the popularly elected parliament with the present, rubber-stamp Council of the Republic. He has also demonized opponents of his policies of Belarusian-Russian unification, chiefly Belarusian nationalists who see in his moves a complete erosion of independence and state sovereignty, as well as Russian economic liberals who, while supporting political integration, oppose the financial burden to Russia of absorbing Belarus' largely unreformed economy. (Associated Press)

Crimean Parliament against Sea Breeze

SYMFEROPOL - The Verkhovna Rada of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea approved a statement on June 4 condemning the Sea Breeze '97 naval exercises that Ukraine and NATO plan to hold off the peninsula's coast in August. Crimean deputies said the exercises "could ruin the fragile equilibrium in the CIS geopolitical space." The statement continued, "Crimea is being virtually transformed into a testing ground for executing NATO's plans." The statement also contained a protest against improving ties between Ukraine and NATO. (UNIAN, Eastern Economist)

Ukraine, Iran sign economic agreement

KYIV - The foreign ministers of Iran and Ukraine, Ali Akbar Veleyati and Hennadii Udovenko, signed an economic cooperation treaty on June 9 and pledged to strengthen bilateral ties. Mr. Velayati, who was on a three-day visit to Ukraine, told journalists that a top priority for both countries is the development of relations "in the sphere of oil, energy and gas." Iran wants to help Ukraine complete the Odesa Oil Terminal and a pipeline linking the terminal to an existing pipeline that transports oil to Europe. Mr. Velayati also visited the Antonov airplane factory, which recently unveiled a new turboprop passenger plane to be produced in Iran under Ukrainian license. Mr. Udovenko said Ukraine attaches "great importance" to its relations with Iran. He predicted that trade between the two countries, which currently totals $100 million annually, will rapidly increase. (RFE/RL Newsline)

'97 budget stuck in Parliament

KYIV - Verkhovna Rada Chairman Oleksander Moroz sharply criticized the Cabinet of Ministers' latest version of the 1997 state budget, further sinking hopes that Parliament will soon approve a spending plan for this year, local media reported on June 10. "This version of the draft budget does not conform with the Constitution and contains about 10 major contradictions with current legislation," said Mr. Moroz. He based his comments on a freshly completed review of the draft spending plan by the Verkhovna Rada Secretariat's analytical department. As the draft document now stands, "The Verkhovna Rada has no right to discuss it," said Mr. Moroz, adding that he had sent a letter in this vein to the Cabinet. According to the analytical department, the draft budget violates the draft law covering mandatory payments by enterprises to the Employment, Chornobyl and Pension Funds. Another major objection stems from Cabinet refusal to adopt Verkhovna Rada proposals concerning the allocation of additional funds for the creation of a higher official poverty line and for compensating citizens for personal savings wiped out by inflation in the early 1990s. (Eastern Economist)

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