NEWSBRIEFS

Workers' party endorses Yanukovych

KYIV - The All-Ukraine Party of Working People during its June 19 congress in Kyiv decided to endorse Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych's candidacy in the October presidential ballot, Interfax reported. The congress was attended by 79 delegates from Ukraine's 23 regions, Kyiv, Sevastopol, and Crimea. Delegates appealed to all political parties, trade unions and organizations to create a broad coalition in support of Mr. Yanukovych. The second session of the party congress will be held on July 10, during which it is expected to adopt a decision on creating such a coalition. The All-Ukraine Party of Working People boasts some 28,000 members. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Opposition leader calls for single candidate

KYIV - Our Ukraine head Viktor Yushchenko on June 21 called on the opposition to put forward a single candidate in the October presidential election, Interfax reported, citing the party's press service. Mr. Yushchenko noted that Our Ukraine, the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc and the Socialist Party are currently holding talks on fielding such a candidate. He also stressed that Our Ukraine's stance on the need for constitutional reforms remains unchanged, and that reforms should be implemented after a new Parliament is elected. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Rada increases funding for defense

KYIV - The Verkhovna Rada has increased funding to the Defense Ministry by 286 million hrv ($537,000), Interfax reported on June 19. Funding to the ministry allocated from the state budget will now total 4.4 billion hrv. Parliament on June 17 passed amendments to the 2004 state budget increasing estimated revenues and spending. The additional defense funding is to be used to provide for routine expenditures and for Ukraine's involvement in international peacekeeping missions. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Rada revises 2004 budget upward

KYIV - The Verkhovna Rada on June 17 passed a bill increasing the 2004 budget revenues by $4.5 billion hrv ($845 million U.S.) and spending by 7.9 billion hrv, Interfax reported. The budget-revenue revision was primarily connected with the government's recent sale of the Kryvorizhstal steel maker. The 2004 budget adopted in November projected revenues at 60.7 billion hrv and spending of 64.2 billion hrv. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Bill on 'hidden' revenues rejected

KYIV - The Verkhovna Rada on June 17 rejected a bill by the opposition Our Ukraine bloc on the "redistribution of hidden revenues" in the 2004 budget law, Interfax reported. The bill proposed increasing the minimum monthly wage to 240 hrv ($45) and recalculating all budget indicators linked to the minimum-wage level. This bill was supported by 122 lawmakers, while 226 votes were necessary for approval. Our Ukraine believes that the estimated revenues in the 2004 budget were underestimated and that Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych's Cabinet is concealing 10 billion hrv ($1.9 billion) in budget revenues and 5 billion hrv of pension-fund revenues. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Kuchma signs new military doctrine

KYIV - President Leonid Kuchma has signed a decree detailing Ukraine's military doctrine, Ukrainian news agencies reported on June 17. The current doctrine replaces the old one adopted in 1993. Under the new doctrine, Ukraine sees NATO as the basis of the European security system and pledges to pursue Euro-Atlantic integration in order to join the Atlantic alliance eventually. The document states that Ukraine currently does not consider any specific state a military threat. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Presidential election schedule published

KYIV - Ukraine's Central Election Commission has made public its resolution of June 7 on the schedule of this year's presidential-election campaign, Ukrainian news agencies reported on June 17. The detailed schedule is available at the commission's official website (http://www.cvk.ukrpack.net). The election campaign will officially start on July 3. Prospective presidential candidates should be nominated no later than July 27 and documents for their registration filed with the commission no later than August 1. The commission is to conclude the registration of candidates on August 6. Foreign observers of the election should register with the commission no later than October 25. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Brunei sultan visits Ukraine

KYIV - Sultan and Prime Minister of Brunei Hajji Hassanal Bolkiah Muizzaddin Waddaulah arrived in Ukraine on June 17 for a four-day official visit, Ukrainian media reported. Following a meeting of the Brunei official with President Leonid Kuchma on June 18, the two sides signed accords on mutual protection of investment and cooperation in tourism. President Kuchma visited Brunei in March. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Privatization seen as patriotic deed

KYIV - State Property Fund head Mykhailo Chechetov said on Fifth Channel Television on June 16 that he is proud that a Ukrainian bidder won the tender for the Ukrainian steel maker Kryvorizhstal. Kryvorizhstal was purchased by a consortium led by two Ukrainian oligarchs, Viktor Pinchuk and Rynat Akhmetov, for some $800 million, despite the fact that foreign bidders offered from $1.2 billion to $1.5 billion for the 93 percent stake that was put up for sale. "I believe that the patriotism of any official is demonstrated by his deeds, not by the language he uses," Mr. Chechetov said, switching between Russian and Ukrainian. "[I] could speak Ukrainian but give the company to the Americans or Russians. ... But I still speak Russian, and I have left the crown jewel of Ukrainian steel-making to the national investor." One unsuccessful bidder, the LNM and U.S. Steel group, which offered $1.5 billion for the stake and another $1.2 billion in an investment program, has reportedly appealed to the Ukrainian government to review the Kryvorizhstal tender. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Prosecutor cites progress in Gongadze case

KYIV - Procurator General Hennadii Vasyliev told journalists in Kyiv on June 10 that investigators have made progress in their probe of the murder of Internet journalist Heorhii Gongadze, Interfax reported. Mr. Vasyliev said his office questioned Ukrainian businessman Volodymyr Tsvil, who is now living in Munich. Mr. Tsvil, who claims to know some details connected with the clandestine recordings made by presidential bodyguard Mykola Melnychenko in President Leonid Kuchma's office, told Deutsche Welle last month that Yevhen Marchuk and Volodymyr Radchenko, former chiefs of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), and current SBU head Ihor Smeshko knew that Mr. Melnychenko was secretly taping the president. The Melnychenko tapes link high-ranking Ukrainian officials, including Mr. Kuchma, Verkhovna Rada Chairman Volodymyr Lytvyn, and former Internal Affairs Minister Yurii Kravchenko, to Gongadze's murder. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Sailors sentenced in Iraq return home

KYIV - Mykola Mazurenko and Ivan Soschenko, who were sentenced in Iraq in October to seven years in prison each for smuggling, are returning to Ukraine, Interfax reported on June 17, quoting Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesman Markian Lubkivskyi. Messrs. Mazurenko and Soschenko were among the crew of the Panamanian-flagged vessel Navstar-1 that was detained last year off the Iraqi coast with an illegal load of oil. After the sentence was handed down to them, the two sailors were incarcerated in the notorious Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad. Mr. Lubkivskyi said a Ukrainian court will review their case and in the event it confirms the Iraqi verdict, the two will serve their terms in a Ukrainian prison. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Kuchma: I won't run for third term

KYIV - President Leonid Kuchma said at a news conference in Kyiv on June 9 that he has no intention of running for a third presidential term, Interfax reported. "I have already made this statement before and I will not change my mind," Mr. Kuchma said. The president speculated that if he were to decide to run for another term, Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych "would at once become the happiest person in Ukraine" because "he would be relieved of this burden." Mr. Kuchma said he is sure he could win for the third time if he chose to run. In December 2003, the Constitutional Court ruled that Mr. Kuchma may seek the presidency in 2004 despite a two-term limit in the Constitution that went into effect in 1996, during Mr. Kuchma's first term as president. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Lytvyn elected to lead Agrarians

KYIV - The congress of the Agrarian Party of Ukraine in Kyiv on June 9 renamed the organization the Popular Agrarian Party of Ukraine and elected Verkhovna Rada Chairman Volodymyr Lytvyn as its leader, Interfax reported. Mr. Lytvyn called on party colleagues to form an "anti-clannish front" in Ukraine in order to counteract attempts to create a state ruled by "oligarchs and party-clannish formations" and plagued by "total corruption." PAPU will decide at a congress in July whom it will support in the presidential election scheduled for October 31. PAPU, which was founded as the Agrarian Party of Ukraine in 1996, has 15 deputies in the Verkhovna Rada and is a member of the pro-government coalition. The party claims to have 465,000 members. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Defense minister calls for reform

KYIV - Defense Minister Yevhen Marchuk, writing in the Den newspaper on June 3, said that he is in favor of "radical reform" in the Ukrainian armed forces. Mr. Marchuk wrote that, in terms of the numerical strength of its army, Ukraine comes 13th in the world, while, in terms of military budget expenditures, the country is in 126th place. He said Ukraine spends $2,600 per serviceman annually, while this figure amounts to $8,460 in Romania, $34,600 in Hungary, and $91,000 in France. The minister revealed that during Ukraine's 12 years of independence the armed forces have not bought a single domestically produced tank or a single airplane or helicopter. The Ukrainian armed forces currently have some 355,000 servicemen. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Yanukovych's former convictions revealed

DONETSK - Oleksander Kondratiev, head of the Court of Appeals in the Donetsk Oblast, on May 26 named the articles of the Criminal Code of the Ukrainian SSR under which current Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych was twice sentenced to prison terms in the past, Interfax and the Ukrainska Pravda website reported. In 1967 Mr. Yanukovych was sentenced to three years in a juvenile detention center under Article 141 pertaining to theft and robbery. In 1970 he was sentenced to two years in prison under Article 102 pertaining to "infliction of bodily injuries of medium seriousness." Mr. Kondratiev noted that the court files of Mr. Yanukovych's criminal cases have been destroyed in accordance with limits on the preservation of court files. Mr. Kondratiev confirmed that both of Mr. Yanukovych's convictions were annulled in 1978 as judicial errors. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Peacekeepers to leave Sierra Leone

KYIV - Petro Shuliak, commander of the land troops of the Ukrainian armed forces, told journalists on May 25 that the Ukrainian peacekeeping contingent of more than 500 soldiers in Sierra Leone will be withdrawn from that country by the end of this year, Interfax and UNIAN reported. Mr. Shuliak recalled that Ukrainian peacekeepers are also serving in Liberia (298 servicemen), Lebanon (185), Kosovo (315), and Iraq (1,610). He said the United Nations has so far paid Ukraine $223 million to cover its expenses on peacekeeping operations. Mr. Shuliak also announced that following this year's rotation of the Ukrainian contingent in Iraq its numerical strength will increase to 1,722 servicemen, ITAR-TASS reported. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Church is most trusted institution

KYIV - The Church is the most trusted institution in Ukraine, according to a survey conducted by the Center of Social and Political Research (SOCIS) on March 1-7. Last year, a similar survey also showed that the Church was the most trusted social institution, supported by 47 percent of Ukrainians. The results of the survey were announced during the roundtable discussion "The Social Opinion of the Ukrainian Population" held by the Democratic Initiatives foundation and the Institute of Sociology at the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine in Kyiv on March 26. According to the survey, among all social institutions, 36 percent of Ukrainians trust the Church, while Viktor Yushchenko, former reformist prime minister and present leader of the right-wing democratic coalition Our Ukraine, remains the most popular and trusted politician with 25 percent of Ukrainians supporting him. Forty-six percent of Ukrainians expressed their distrust of the Ukrainian Parliament and 41 percent their distrust of Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma. Thirty-nine percent do not trust the Ukrainian government, 27 percent do not trust regional administrations and 26 and 25 percent, respectively, do not trust the courts and prosecutors' offices. (Religious Information Service of Ukraine)

New apostolic nuncio appointed

VATICAN CITY- Pope John Paul II on April 22 appointed Archbishop Ivan Jurkovic, titular archbishop of Gorbavia, as apostolic nuncio in Ukraine. Before that, Archbishop Jurkovic served as apostolic nuncio in Belarus. Archbishop Jurkovic was born on June 10, 1952, in Kocevje, Slovenia, and was ordained a priest on June 29, 1977. He presented his doctoral thesis on canon law and in 1984 joined the diplomatic service of the Vatican. He has been on papal diplomatic missions in Korea, Colombia and the Russian Federation. On July 28, 2001, Archbishop Jurkovic was appointed apostolic nuncio in Belarus. He speaks Italian, Croatian, Spanish, German, French, English and Russian. (Religious Information Service of Ukraine)

Ukraine, Azerbaijan sign oil deal

KYIV - The governments of Ukraine and Azerbaijan on June 3 signed an accord on cooperation in the oil sector, UNIAN reported. The document was signed within the framework of an ongoing visit of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to Kyiv. Under the accord, Azerbaijan is reportedly obliged to sell a "sufficient amount" of oil to Ukraine "on a commercial, indiscriminate basis," in order to make it possible for Kyiv to fill the Odesa-Brody oil pipeline. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Crimean Armenians remember genocide

SYMFEROPOL - The Armenian community of southern Ukrainian Crimea on April 24-25 commemorated the victims of the genocide of the Ottoman Empire against Armenians in 1915, which took 1.5 million lives. Archbishop Gregory Buniatian, head of the Ukrainian eparchy of the Armenian Apostolic Church, conducted a memorial service in the Church of St. Akop in Symferopol, after which a wreath was laid at the memorial to the genocide victims, situated near the church. Oleh Gabrielian, head of the Crimean Armenian society, noted that April 24 has become a day of unity for the Armenian people. Crimea currently is home to 10,000 ethnic Armenians, part of whom are descendants of refugees from the former Ottoman Empire. (Religious Information Service of Ukraine)

Expert outlines his view of SES

KYIV - Mikhail Deliagin, the director of the Institute for Globalization Problems and one of the leaders of the Motherland bloc, told the Open Economy web portal on May 25 that Russia needs the Single Economic Space (SES) to buy out the "most valuable and profitable enterprises [functioning] in the economies of the former Soviet Union." He commented that "They should work for us, because these [post-Soviet] countries, including the Baltic states, have proved their incapability." He added: "It is the European Union that took responsibility for the Baltic states, and we bear responsibility for the rest. But to develop [these] territories we should gain control over them." The presidents of Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakstan pledged in Yalta on May 24 that they will proceed with the implementation of the treaty on the creation of the SES they signed in September. Mr. Deliagin also said he is skeptical about the pace of integration within the SES. "First they signed the agreement, almost a year afterward [they] ratified it, and only then they sit down to discuss what they have signed," he said. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Transport minister to head new party

KYIV - The Ukrainian Justice Ministry on June 15 registered the Revival Party (Partia Vidrodzhennia), Interfax reported. The new party is led by Transport Minister Heorhii Kirpa. Justice Minister Oleksander Lavrynovych told journalists that the Revival Party is the 97th party registered in Ukraine. Mr. Kirpa said the registration of his party was supported by nearly 28,000 signatures from all of Ukraine. (RFE/RL Newsline)

New bishop ordained for Sumy-Okhtyrka

KYIV - Patriarch Filaret, head of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Kyiv Patriarchate (UOC-KP), ordained Father Mykola Sribniak as bishop of Sumy and Okhtyrka in St. Volodymyr's Cathedral in Ukraine's capital, Kyiv, on June 6. A day before, Patriarch Filaret, together with Archbishop Dymytrii of Pereiaslav-Khmelnytskyi, and Bishops Oleksander of Bila Tserkva and Falvian of Kharkiv and Bohodukhiv, participated in an enthronement ceremony and named Father Mykola as Bishop Mefodii of Sumy and Okhtyrka. He was appointed bishop by the Synod of the UOC-KP on May 14. Bishop Mefodii of Sumy and Okhtyrka was born in 1957 in the village of Hrabivka, Kalush district, Ivanko-Frankivsk oblast. In 1995 he was ordained as deacon and later as priest. From 1996 to 2004 he worked as secretary of the Dnipropetrovsk and Kryvyi Rih Eparchy. In 1999 and 2004, Father Sribniak graduated from the Volyn Theological Seminary and the Lviv Spiritual Academy, respectively. (Religious Information Service of Ukraine)

Alternative to military service is available

KYIV - On June 7 the law "On Alternative (Non-Military) Service," adopted by the Verkhovna Rada a month earlier and signed by Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma, came into effect. According to this law, the term of alternative service will be 1.5 times longer than service in the Ukrainian military. The duration of alternative service for people who have not completed their higher education and specialists and masters is 27 and 18 months, respectively. Ukrainian citizens can complete their alternative service at enterprises of state and communal property or institutions of local governing, which will be identified by the Cabinet of Ministers. (Religious Information Service of Ukraine)

Family forum plans for future

LVIV - At the initiative of Cardinal Lubomyr Husar, head of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church (UGCC), the Ukrainian Catholic University in western Ukrainian Lviv hosted Forum on the Family 2004 on June 10-11. Coordinated by the Commission for Family Affairs of the Lviv Archeparchy of the UGCC, the forum gathered the clergy, administrators and laity of the Lviv Archeparchy to analyze decisions, proposals and decrees of the previous assemblies of the UGCC on family issues and the pastoral address on the family by Cardinal Husar. In addition, the forum presented current results of pastoral work on family problems and planned further activities for the next three years. "The family should become a sanctifying environment where people feel happy," said Cardinal Husar during the opening ceremony. (Religious Information Service of Ukraine)

Copyright © The Ukrainian Weekly, June 27, 2004, No. 26, Vol. LXXII

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