ANALYSIS: Reining in the Security Service of Ukraine (03/13/05)

ANALYSIS

Reining in the Security Service of Ukraine

by Roman Kupchinsky
RFE/RL Belarus and Ukraine Report

The Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) is being overhauled by its new civilian head, Oleksander Turchynov, a close political ally of newly elected Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko.

Mr. Turchynov said in an interview published in the February 19 edition of the Dzerkalo Tyzhnia weekly that the SBU is presently involved in investigating Volodymyr Satsiuk, the first deputy of his predecessor, Col. Gen. Ihor Smeshko, on a number of charges - among them financial irregularities and possible involvement in the poisoning of Viktor Yushchenko. Many in Ukraine have alleged that the SBU, an all-powerful government within a government, was used by former President Leonid Kuchma to listen in on opposition leaders' phone conversations and conduct special operations to physically harm his enemies and blacken their reputations.

Mr. Satsiuk, a former KGB officer, also had a seat in Parliament as a member of the Social Democratic Party - United faction. He was said to have been appointed deputy head of the SBU at the insistence of Viktor Medvedchuk, the head of the Kuchma administration.

In the interview, Mr. Turchynov said: "I do not want to comment on an ongoing investigation, but I can tell you that there is evidence of serious [financial] wrongdoings. As to other, more serious matters, we shall have answers to these in a very short time."

On February 17 Interfax reported that Mr. Turchynov announced that the SBU had initiated a criminal investigation of the former SBU leadership into alleged wiretapping of the telephone conversations of Ms. Tymoshenko and Mr. Yushchenko during the election campaign.

Mr. Turchynov did not say who used the information gathered by these wiretaps or whether they included Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB), presidential candidate Viktor Yanukovych, President Kuchma, or others who might have benefited from having access to such conversations.

On February 19, Interfax reported that Mr. Turchynov announced that the SBU had begun an investigation into the possibility that many SBU officers and Ukrainian diplomats had been "recruited by foreign countries." And, while Mr. Turchynov did not specify which "foreign countries" might have been involved, he did dwell at length on the fact that, according to bilateral agreements with Russia, both sides had agreed not to engage in such activities against each other.

Mr. Turchynov also narrowed down the field of potential culprits by saying that "The SBU is not only capable, it is charged with stopping all illegal activities of any special service, including those which represent states that are members of regional groupings."

The current investigations might shed some light on events that took place during the Orange Revolution in Kyiv in November-December 2004.

The New York Times on January 17 published a report based on conversations with SBU officers and with Mr. Smeshko. The report presented the SBU and its former head in a more positive light. The article claimed that, during the revolution, Mr. Smeshko and some of his closest SBU colleagues saved demonstrators from an imminent attack by armed Internal Affairs Ministry troops.

However, a number of SBU officers in Kyiv told RFE/RL that the article in The New York Times was one-sided, presented Mr. Smeshko in "too good a light," and failed to take into account all the other illegal activities that the SBU was allegedly involved in helping the pro-government Mr. Yanukovych campaign. One senior SBU officer interviewed by RFE/RL speculated that the article in the The New York Times was "an attempt by the Americans to keep Mr. Smeshko in power."

This explanation stems from a fierce internal struggle that has raged within the SBU since Mr. Smeshko's appointment in September 2003. Mr. Smeshko, the former head of the Ukrainian military intelligence service (GRU), had served as Ukraine's first military attaché in Washington in 1992-1996. Some of the SBU officers interviewed claimed that Mr. Smeshko had been recruited to work for the U.S. government at that time. Mr. Smeshko has not responded to these charges.

Other SBU officers interviewed by RFE/RL rejected these views as "disinformation" and part of a "conspiracy theory." They insist that Mr. Smeshko was resented for his connection to the GRU, a traditional rival of the former KGB. These officers claim that Mr. Smeshko merely saw the writing on the wall and switched loyalties to the Mr. Yushchenko camp in order to preserve his position in the SBU.

How much success Mr. Turchynov will have in cleaning up the Security Service of Ukraine is difficult to predict given the Byzantine nature of the organization. Yet, if Mr. Turchynov fails, the consequences could be far-reaching as Ukraine attempts to break definitively from its communist and corrupt past.

Roman Kupchinsky, a Prague-based analyst, is a contributor to RFE/RL.

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