Ukraine and NATO meet at D.C. summit (05/02/99)

Ukraine and NATO meet at D.C. summit

by Yaro Bihun
Special to The Ukrainian Weekly

WASHINGTON - Ukraine and NATO held the first summit meeting of the commission that oversees the development of the "distinctive partnership" the two countries initiated two years ago.

The meeting between President Leonid Kuchma and NATO leaders took place on the second day of NATO's 50th Anniversary Summit in Washington April 23-25. In addition to evaluating the NATO-Ukraine relationship, the meeting also provided a forum for President Kuchma to present Ukraine's views on the Kosovo crisis and the peace initiative he and Foreign Affairs Minister Borys Tarasyuk began soon after the NATO bombings of Yugoslavia began.

Ukraine had the only "solo" meeting on the three-day NATO program, which also included a summit of the 19-member NATO organization, recently expanded to include the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland, a special session on the crisis in Kosovo, a summit meeting of Kosovo's neighboring states, and a summit of the more than 20 NATO "partner" countries, which include Ukraine and most of the countries of the former Soviet Union. Russia chose to boycott the Washington gathering in protest over NATO's bombing of Yugoslavia.

The Kosovo crisis intruded into the Ukraine-NATO session, as it did with most of the other NATO summit meetings.

On the morning of President Kuchma's arrival in Washington, April 23, the Wall Street Journal published an op-ed piece in which the Ukrainian president outlined his Kosovo peace plan.

Key points in the plan call for an immediate ceasefire, a U.N. peacekeeping force under the direction of a Security Council special envoy, immediate support for international relief efforts in the region and a peace conference to be held in a capital city of a neutral country. No major role is envisioned for NATO.

That same day, Ukraine's Verkhovna Rada passed a resolution condemning NATO's actions in Yugoslavia, calling on President Kuchma to express Ukraine's opposition in his meetings with NATO leaders, to present the governments future cooperation plans with NATO to the Verkhovna Rada for oversight, and to stop the destruction of Ukraine's strategic arsenal.

In his first public statement at the outset of the NATO Summit, President Kuchma told reporters that he would raise the Kosovo issue and that of his peace plan with NATO leaders.

"And our voice will be heard," he said. "This does not mean that the ultimate peace will be based on Ukraine's suggestions or [that] they would be given any priority," he added.

President Kuchma stated that Ukraine does not seek any glory or credit for its initiative. "What's important is that this process succeed as quickly as possible in the interest of peace and stability on the European continent," he said.

As for Ukraine's overall goal in attending the NATO Summit, President Kuchma said that this is the "watershed" year for determining Ukraine's future.

"There are two strategic options before us: in one, we move forward; in the other, we move backwards. And that is why I came here: to move forward. There is no road back for Ukraine," he stressed.

Foreign Affairs Minister Tarasyuk, who was part of the large Ukrainian delegation accompanying President Kuchma, said during a news conference at the National Press Club on April 23 that the leftists in the Verkhovna Rada are trying to stop Ukraine's integration into Euro-Atlantic structures and that the resolution they passed earlier that day was just another indication of this. Mr. Tarasyuk said he did not see any danger of this happening now, but things might change later in the year, depending on the outcome of the presidential elections.

Mr. Kuchma's peace plan did receive a hearing from NATO, but, judging from the declaration approved at the NATO-Ukraine Commission and remarks by NATO Secretary-General Javier Solana following the meeting, NATO's reception was lukewarm.

The joint declaration does not mention President Kuchma's peace plan, noting only that "we exchanged views" on the Kosovo crisis and that the NATO allies "acknowledged Ukraine's important contribution" to the NATO-led peacekeeping operations in Bosnia and the recently curtailed Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe verification mission in Kosovo.

At a news conference following the meeting, Mr. Solana welcomed the efforts of Ukraine, and other countries, on behalf of peace in Kosovo, but he made clear NATO's intent to hold fast to its five conditions for a peaceful resolution, to which - according to NATO's statement following its special meeting on Kosovo earlier in the day - "there can be no compromise."

Mr. Kuchma told the news conference that he was satisfied that Ukraine's position on the Kosovo crisis received a hearing.

Assessing the NATO-Ukraine summit in general, he said that it was "exceptionally important" that in the meeting's declaration the NATO leaders "reaffirmed their support for Ukraine's sovereignty and independence, territorial integrity, democratic development, economic prosperity and the principle of inviolability of frontiers, as key factors of stability and security in Central and Eastern Europe and in the continent as a whole."

The declaration noted the following:

President Kuchma "reaffirmed his country's determination to continue its efforts to implement democratic political, economic and defense reforms as well as to pursue its goal of integration in European and transatlantic structures."
Mr. Kuchma affirmed that the accession to NATO of Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic is a "significant contribution to stability in Europe."
NATO allies reaffirmed their conviction that Ukraine "should continue to play an increasingly important role" toward improving security in Europe.
Both parties welcomed the progress in the implementation of our Distinctive Partnership and "look forward to the realization of its full potential" and expressed satisfaction with the development of a wide range of consultations and cooperation between NATO and Ukraine.
Both parties welcomed the appointment of two NATO "Liaison Officers" to Kyiv, who will facilitate Ukraine's work in the Partnership for Peace (PfP) program.
Both parties designated the Yavoriv Training Area as a training center.

In addition to participation in the NATO Summit, President Kuchma and the members of his delegation had many non-NATO meetings and events on their agenda.

The delegation from Ukraine included some 20 top government officials. Among them, in addition to Foreign Affairs Minister Tarasyuk, were National Security and Defense Council Secretary Volodymyr Horbulin, Defense Minister Oleksander Kuzmuk, former President Leonid Kravchuk and National Deputy Ivan Zaiets.

President Kuchma had separate meetings with a number of other visiting heads of state and government, and he participated in a summit meeting of the regional organization GUAM (Georgia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Moldova), which was expanded to include Uzbekistan, whose embassy hosted the event on April 24. He also met with the chief executives of some 10 major U.S. corporations, among them Boeing, Honeywell, Westinghouse Electric, United Technologies and Monsanto.

He had a meeting on April 23 with International Monetary Fund Managing Director Michel Camdessus. President Kuchma's economic team - Finance Minister Ihor Mytiukov, National Bank of Ukraine Chairman Viktor Yuschenko, and National Development Agency Chairman Roman Shpek - were in Washington a few days earlier for talks with IMF, World Bank and U.S. Department of Treasury officials.

The first meeting on President Kuchma's visit in Washington was at the U.S. Capitol with the Congressional Ukrainian Caucus, to which he came directly from Andrews Air Force Base, where his presidential plane arived on April 23 after a one-day stopover in New York.

Present at President Kuchma's meeting with the Congressional Ukrainian Caucus were caucus co-chairs Steve Horn (R-Calif.), Sander Levin (D-Mich.), Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio) and Curt Weldon (R-Pa), as well as Reps. Tom Lantos (D-Calif.), John Oberstar (D-Minn.) and Thomas Petri (R-Wis.)

Following this meeting, President Kuchma received the Distinguished Public Service Award from the International Management and Development Institute.

Presenting the award, Rep. Oberstar noted that it was "in recognition of his commitment to democracy and economic reform and his dedication to building an independent and modern Ukraine and his efforts on behalf of a peaceful Europe."

Among the former recipients of this award are former U.S. Presidents Ronald Reagan and George Bush, former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and former U.S. Secretaries of State Henry Kissinger and George Schultz.

Introducing President Kuchma at the award ceremony, Rep. Lantos said he wished that Russian Prime Minister Yevgenij Primakov would have chosen to come to Washington and that Russia would have "as forward-looking an approach to the current crisis in the Balkans as, clearly, Ukraine does."

Following the world presentation and a brief news conference, President Kuchma met with Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.).

Three Ukrainian American organizations - the Ukrainian-American Coordinating Council, the Washington office of the Ukrainian Congress Committee of America and The Washington Group - hosted a reception and dinner on April 23 for members of the Ukrainian delegation. Former President Kravchuk, UACC President Ihor Gawdiak, and Federal Claims Court Judge Bohdan Futey spoke at the gathering.

President Kuchma began his four-day U.S. visit on April 22 in New York City, where he had separate meetings with Romanian President Emil Constantinescu, Slovak Prime Minister Mikulas Dzurinda and U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan, and participated in the presentation of the East-West Institute's "Statesman of the Decade" award to Former German Chancellor Helmut Kohl. President Kuchma is among previous honorees of the East-West Institute, along with President Vaclav Havel of the Czech Republic and President Eduard Shevardnadze of Georgia.

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