NEWSBRIEFS (07/01/01)

NEWSBRIEFS

Most Ukrainians approve of pope's visit

KYIV - The results of a poll released on June 23 by Ukraine's Oleksander Razumkov Center of Economic and Political Studies revealed that 53.2 percent of respondents approve of Pope John Paul II's visit to Ukraine, while 4.4 percent said they want to listen to the pope during a mass, Interfax reported on June 23. Of those polled, 31.1 percent said they are indifferent to the pontiff's visit, 6.8 percent said they disapprove of the visit, and 0.4 percent announced that they intend to participate in protest actions against the visit. The poll was held from April 20 to May 3 among 2,000 adult Ukrainians. (RFE/RL Newsline)

PM urges EU to avoid new divisions

KYIV - Ukrainian Prime Minister Anatolii Kinakh on June 26 urged the European Union to avoid creating new economic barriers when it spreads into ex-communist Central and Eastern Europe, Reuters reported. "EU enlargement should not create artificial problems as regards economic integration toward the east and movement of people. I suggest that we should simplify visa regimes, that we look for better solutions so that integration does not suffer because of EU enlargement," Mr. Kinakh told journalists after talks with senior EU officials in Luxembourg. He also said the EU will provide Ukraine with funds to create a modern infrastructure along its eastern borders, including the training of customs and border troop officers. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Border agreement faces opposition

PALANCA, Moldova - Residents of the southern Moldovan village are opposed to a provision in a border treaty with Ukraine that would split their village and have staged demonstrations against it, the DPA news service reported on June 26, citing Interfax. Under an agreement reached by the two countries, Moldova is to give Ukraine a short stretch of the Izmail-Odesa highway that passes through Moldovan territory in exchange for 500 square meters of swampland that would give Moldova access to the Danube River, where it intends to build an oil terminal. The villagers, most of whose dwellings lie in northern Palanca, say this would split their village and leave them without fields. Their spokesman said that if the treaty is approved "Ukrainian border troops will send us and our cows to the Moldovan Parliament to find grass." The two countries' Parliaments are to debate the treaty on July 28. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Kuchma names vice PM for economy

KYIV - President Leonid Kuchma on June 25 filled the last vacant post in Prime Minister Anatolii Kinakh's Cabinet, naming Economy Minister Vasyl Rohovyi as vice prime minister in charge of economic policy, Interfax reported. Mr. Rohovyi told journalists after the nomination that he is not going to work as both minister and vice prime minister. Presidential Chief of Staff Volodymyr Lytvyn said he does not rule out that Mr. Rohovyi will perform both functions in the government. (RFE/RL Newsline)

From Hitler's prisons to Stalin's camps

MOSCOW - Aleksandr Yakovlev, the head of the Russian presidential commission for the rehabilitation of the politically repressed, said on June 22 that Russia should build a special memorial to those 1.5 million Soviet soldiers who were captured by the Germans and then were sent immediately to the gulag upon their return home, Interfax reported. Mr. Yakovlev called the transfer from one set of prisons to another "one of the cruelest crimes of the Stalinist regime." (RFE/RL Newsline)

Patriarch Aleksei heads to Belarus

MIENSK - As part of his continuing campaign against the visit to Ukraine by Pope John Paul II, Russian Orthodox Patriarch Aleksei II is in Belarus, not so much to mark the anniversary of Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union as to try to diminish attention being given to the pope's visit to Ukraine, polit.ru commented on June 23. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Anniversary of Nazi attack marked

BREST, Belarus - At the Brest Fortress on the Belarusian-Polish border on June 24, Belarusian President Alyaksandr Lukashenka and Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Aleksei II commemorated the 60th anniversary of Nazi Germany's attack on the Soviet Union, ITAR-TASS reported. "Soldiers of the Great Patriotic War continued the Russian spiritual tradition," Patriarch Aleksei said, calling on all the peoples who won the Great Patriotic War to unite. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Gorbachev says pope will visit Russia

MOSCOW - Former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev told ITAR-TASS on June 24 that he has always believed that some day the pope will visit Russia. Mr. Gorbachev added that talks between the Russian Orthodox Church and the Vatican are taking place but are proceeding very slowly. As to when such a visit might take place, Mr. Gorbachev said that the question should be addressed to President Vladimir Putin, who would have to issue any invitation. (RFE/RL Newsline)

IMF cites conditions on lending

KYIV - Following the visit of an International Monetary Fund mission to Kyiv on June 11-20, the bank issued a statement saying that the resumption of its loans to Ukraine is dependent on the country's further trade liberalization and observation of budget discipline, the Associated Press reported. According to Interfax, the IMF also is demanding that Ukrainian authorities reorganize or liquidate the loss-making Ukrayina Bank, the country's largest bank. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Rada OKs laws on budget and judiciary

KYIV - The Parliament on June 21 approved a Budget Code and an Entrepreneurial Code, the Eastern Economic Daily reported. Interfax reported that the same day the Parliament also passed a package of laws to regulate the functioning of the judicial branch after the so-called transitory provisions of the Constitution expire on June 28. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Rada: Ukraine not yet a democracy

KYIV - The Ukrainian legislature on June 20 held hearings devoted to the fifth anniversary of the adoption of the country's Constitution, Interfax reported. In a draft document including conclusions from the hearings, lawmakers said Ukraine has so far failed to fulfill the main constitutional tenet of becoming a democratic country ruled by law. The document also noted that human rights in Ukraine are violated on a massive scale. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Kuchma notes EU's "positive signal"

KYIV - President Leonid Kuchma on June 20 said the European Union had sent an "unambiguously positive signal" with regard to Kyiv for the first time in Ukraine's 10 years of independence, Interfax reported. Mr. Kuchma was commenting on his meeting with Swedish Prime Minister Goeran Persson in Kyiv, who told the Ukrainian leader that the recent EU summit in Goteborg decided to offer Ukraine broader political cooperation. President Kuchma added that he assured Mr. Persson of Ukraine's determination "to follow the path of European choice." (RFE/RL Newsline)

Nineteen charged for March riots

KYIV - The Security Service of Ukraine has concluded its investigation into the anti-presidential protest on March 9 and charged 19 people with the organization of and participation in mass disorders that led to many injuries among both protesters and police officers, Interfax reported on June 20. The 19 people, who are currently under arrest, face up to 12 years in prison if found guilty in court. Those arrested include Andrii Shkil, leader of the Ukrainian National Assembly-Ukrainian Self-Defense Organization. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Crimean lawmakers resort to fisticuffs

SYMFEROPOL - Crimean Prime Minister Serhiy Kunitsyn on 20 June refused to report to the legislature of the Crimean Autonomous Republic on the performance of his Cabinet, saying that he had delivered such a report earlier this year, Interfax and the Eastern Economist Daily reported. In response, 55 lawmakers in the 100-seat Crimean legislature endorsed an appeal to Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma to dismiss Mr. Kunitsyn. The voting was preceded and followed by turmoil and fist fights among Mr. Kunitsyn's opponents and supporters. The peninsula's Acting Vice Prime Minister Oleksander Riabkov and Acting Economy Minister Hennadii Hovoruschenko were injured while Mr. Kunitsyn, who remained seated during the fracas, left the session hall unscathed. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Ukraine to repay debt with Eurobonds?

MOSCOW - Aleksandr Lebedev, head of the National Reserve Bank of Russia, said on June 18 that Ukraine could pay its gas debt to Russia via a Eurobond float with a 10-year maturity period and 7 percent return, Interfax reported. Mr. Lebedev made this comment after a meeting with Ukrainian Prime Minister Anatolii Kinakh in Kyiv. "We would act as underwriters and would buy this debt, while the Russian budget would receive money, not state bonds with an ephemeral possibility of converting them into property," Mr. Lebedev noted. He said Mr. Kinakh reacted well to this proposal, adding that they had agreed to set up a working group to discuss the possible Eurobond issue. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Odesa has two Chinese publications

ODESA - Interfax-Ukraine on June 6 ran the following report in Ukrainian: "A second publication in the Chinese language has appeared in Odesa. [Odesa's] Chinese community started to issue a newspaper called Land of China with a circulation of 2,000 copies. According to what Interfax-Ukraine was told by Editor-in-Chief Dmytro Chan, the inauguration of the second newspaper was prompted by the need to draw Odesa residents toward China's culture, traditions and customs. Despite the fact that the Chinese community in Odesa is not numerous and amounts to no more than 300 people - that is, there are six newspaper copies for each Chinese - both publications are distributed free of charge in Chinese restaurants, at outdoor vendor markets, and at the so-called Chinese Market. The new newspaper, according to kiosk keepers, sells pretty well [even] among Odesa residents who are absolutely unfamiliar with the Chinese language." (RFE/RL Poland, Belarus and Ukraine Report)

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