Yushchenko urges Washington to keep engaged in Ukraine (02/16/03)

Yushchenko urges Washington to keep engaged in Ukraine

by Yaro Bihun
Special to The Ukrainian Weekly

WASHINGTON - The former prime minister of Ukraine who now leads the Our Ukraine forces in the Verkhovna Rada, Viktor Yushchenko, spent three days here seeking U.S. support for strengthening democracy in Ukraine and keeping Washington engaged in his country despite the recently deteriorating official relationship.

"Only democracy can save Ukraine from the current crisis," he told a gathering at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace on February 7, the last day of his visit.

Without a true democracy and open and fair elections, Mr. Yushchenko said, the "regime of the clans," whose policies he blames for the current crisis, will remain in power, using its control of the mass media and repressive measures, as well as intimidation of political opponents to achieve that end.

Mr. Yushchenko began his meetings with senior administration officials on February 5 with Vice-President Richard Cheney and concluded them on February 7 with Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage.

His objective in these and other meetings here, as Mr. Yushchenko reiterated in his public remarks and statements to the press, was to report on the situation in Ukraine as he saw it, listen to the U.S. officials' assessment and try to help raise the bilateral relationship from the depths to which it sank over the past year.

One of the most serious unresolved bilateral issues between Washington and Kyiv in recent months was the allegation that President Leonid Kuchma approved the sale of the Kolchuha air-defense system to Iraq. That issue, however, was not discussed with U.S. officials, Mr. Yushchenko said. The Kolchuha problem, he explained, should more appropriately be discussed with Ukrainian government officials.

Joining Mr. Yushchenko at many of his meetings here were three deputies from Our Ukraine: Roman Bessmertny, Yevhen Chervonenko and Oleh Rybachuk.

Their tight schedule also included meetings with members of the U.S. Congress - Sens. John McCain, Charles Hagel and Carl Levin, and members of the Congressional Ukrainian Caucus - with former Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright; two former U.S. ambassadors to Ukraine, Steven Pifer, who now serves as deputy assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs, and his predecessor, William Green Miller; as well as with Zbigniew Brzezinski, who was national security advisor to President Jimmy Carter.

Despite the fact that the level of trust between the United States and Ukraine is at an all-time low and there is a lack of bilateral contact at the higher levels, Mr. Yushchenko told The Ukrainian Weekly, he found a great interest on the part of official Washington in helping get Ukraine back on track to building a viable democratic state.

Looking at the problem domestically, "Ukraine today is far from being a democracy," he said. "With every passing day it sinks deeper into corruption, freedom of expression is curtailed, the media cannot do its job without interference, there are problems with the shadow economy, and the like."

Externally, he added, "there is the serious loss of image and reputation, and the resulting international isolation."

Mr. Yushchenko suggested that, at present, U.S.-Ukrainian relations could be improved with the proactive help of the U.S. Congress and the Verkhovna Rada. "I am convinced that the problems can be resolved if we tackle their root causes rather than by reacting to results," he said.

Responding to questions on Ukrainian-Russian relations following his address at the Carnegie Institute breakfast meeting on February 7, one of which was posed by former U.S. Ambassador to Russia Jack Matlock, Mr. Yushchenko said that recent policies governing that relationship have been disappointing and destabilizing. These ties, he said, should be based on equal treatment of each other's interests.

As for the alarming increase of Russian investment in Ukraine, Mr. Yushchenko said that the problem was not so much the origin of the capital as the absence of transparency in the privatization process. "Western capital is not used to working in such an atmosphere," he said, "and certain political cliques take advantage of this."

The economic relationship between Ukraine and Russia has not been a healthy one in recent years, Mr. Yushchenko said. It is being driven by a "dynamic" that is not in the economic interest of either country, he said. There has been a downturn in trade and economic relations, and the trade and tax regimes have been pushing the two economies apart, he added.

On more than one occasion during his visit, Mr. Yushchenko expressed apprehension that the present administration - he never referred to President Leonid Kuchma by name in any of his criticism - may be planning some "surprises" next year in an attempt to retain power after the next presidential election.

One such attempt may have already been launched with the announcement of a governmental reform proposal to shift the governing power from the presidency to the Parliament. Our Ukraine and other political groups, he said, see this as an attempt to pass power from one branch of the government to another while retaining power in the same political hands.

Oleksander Yeliashkevych, a former Verkhovna Rada deputy seeking asylum in the United States because of a threat on his life for criticizing President Kuchma, chided Mr. Yushchenko for not once mentioning the president by name in his remarks. Also attending, but not participating in the discussion, at the Carnegie Institute breakfast was Mykola Melnychenko, President Kuchma's former security officer whose secret recordings of his conversations gave rise to many of the administration's problems, both domestically and abroad.

During his visit, Mr. Yushchenko also had the occasion to meet with another U.S. asylum seeker related to the so-called Kuchmagate tape scandal, the widow of the murdered journalist Heorhii Gongadze, Myroslava Gongadze, who now reports for Radio Liberty in Washington.

He arrived in Washington one day after the Bush administration announced major cutbacks in U.S. assistance for Ukraine and in its international broadcasting operations through the Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. The 2004 budget proposal would reduce VOA's daily Ukrainian programming schedule from two hours to one and would eliminate three staff positions.

Mr. Yushchenko characterized the broadcasting cutbacks as premature. "Cutting back programming of these radio stations at this time is a mistake," he said, explaining that they provide equal media access to all political players in the country, be they pro-government or in opposition to it.

The visiting Our Ukraine deputies were the guests of honor at two evening receptions. One was hosted by three organizations involved in democracy-building efforts in Ukraine - the National Endowment for Democracy, the National Democratic Institute and the International Republican Institute, which assisted in setting up the group's Washington visit schedule. The other, hosted by U.S. Court of Federal Claims Judge Bohdan Futey and his wife, was an opportunity for them to meet with representatives of the Ukrainian American community.

Halfway through the reception, Messrs. Yushchenko and Chervonenko left for New York to attend a concert by the popular Ukrainian singer and Our Ukraine National Deputy Oksana Bilozir. The other two deputies remained, and flew back to Kyiv the following morning.

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