"Ukraine is the heart of Europe," Yushchenko tells Washington audiences (04/17/05)

"Ukraine is the heart of Europe," Yushchenko tells Washington audiences

by Andrew Nynka

WASHINGTON - Speaking at several venues during a hectic three-day visit to the United States, Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko repeatedly requested stronger foreign investment in his country, appealed for help to integrate Ukraine into European institutions and affirmed that his country was now truly free and actively fighting corruption.

"For the past 14 years we were independent, but we were not free," Mr. Yushchenko said at a gathering hosted jointly by the International Republican Institute and the National Democratic Institute in Washington on April 6.

"Today I end my visit to the United States. I came to tell America one phrase," Mr. Yushchenko said while wearing his trademark orange necktie and pocket handkerchief. "From today Ukraine has gained its freedom."

Carrying his message throughout Chicago, Boston and Washington, Mr. Yushchenko spoke passionately about his country's place in Europe, at points drawing resounding applause and praise for the content of his speeches.

"Ukraine is not a neighbor of Europe," Mr. Yushchenko said emphatically, while staring directly into the crowd gathered at the IRI and NDI event. "Ukraine is the center of Europe. Ukraine is the heart of Europe. Tell me, please, how can Europe live without its heart?" he asked, pausing to let a wave of applause and whistles subside.

Mr. Yushchenko was introduced at the event by three political and diplomatic heavyweights, all of whom praised his work in Ukraine.

Noted former political dissident and writer Vaclav Havel, a former president of the Czech Republic, introduced Mr. Yushchenko to the IRI and NDI audience at Washington's prestigious Willard Hotel.

Sen. John McCain, an Arizona Republican and the IRI chairman, and Madeleine Albright, a distinguished American diplomat and the NDI chairwoman, both spoke of President Yushchenko as the backbone of Ukraine's democratic movement.

"The name Yushchenko is on the lips of opposition figures in Lebanon to Belarus to Kyrgyzstan," Sen. McCain said. "And they look to Ukraine for inspiration."

Speaking of the opposition leaders in those countries, Sen. McCain said, "I wish for them tonight that each country may be blessed enough to have a leader of the caliber, charisma and moral authority of Ukraine's Viktor Yushchenko."

The senator called it a "truly historic moment" to welcome the Ukrainian president to Washington and called Mr. Yushchenko's address before a joint meeting of the U.S. Congress two days earlier "magnificent."

Dr. Albright, a former secretary of state under U.S. President Bill Clinton, also praised Mr. Yushchenko's work in Ukraine.

"Tonight we celebrate a man, a movement and a milestone in democratic change," Dr. Albright said. "For years we have thought about Ukraine and have been forced to shake our heads, for democracy was not doing very well. It feels a lot better to clap our hands because the voice of freedom has been heard."

Echoing a message he relayed before a gathering of some 400 people at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in Washington on April 4, President Yushchenko heaped praise onto the international community during the IRI and NDI event for their support of Ukraine's opposition during the Orange Revolution.

"Let me be honest with you," Mr. Yushchenko said. "If we didn't have our international partners, I don't believe the regime would have sat down to negotiate with us. Because of you, because of the international election monitors, because of the International Republican Institute and the National Democratic Institute, we were able to achieve a fair and honest election in the third round."

During his trip to the United States Mr. Yushchenko called on the international community to take an even greater role in Ukraine. Speaking at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce headquarters, the Ukrainian president called on American businessmen to invest and work in Ukraine.

In his message, Mr. Yushchenko also announced an open invitation for an economic forum scheduled to take place in Ukraine in June, adding that "more than a thousand representatives of business communities from around the world will take part in this forum."

"I remain deeply convinced that in the near future Ukraine will become a modern economic powerhouse," Mr. Yushchenko said in the Chamber's ornate Hall of Flags.

In the past, Mr. Yushchenko said, businesses operating in Ukraine faced senseless administrative pressure, but he pledged that "from now on the administration guarantees that businesses will not be oppressed."

"The administration will be your partner," he told the crowd of mainly business professionals.

The Ukrainian president added that his administration had created a council of investors that would promote and defend business interests in the Ukrainian market, and he urged investment in Ukraine's gas, oil and electric industries, as well as in the country's technology and agro-industrial sectors.

Mr. Yushchenko told people at the Chamber, the largest non-profit business federation in the United States, that "Ukraine needs you," but sought to assure business leaders that Ukraine is trying to fight corruption and attract investments.

"I would like to clearly state that the rules of the game have changed in Ukraine, that the law is working in Ukraine," he said in Ukrainian. "From now on the Ukrainian state, the Ukrainian government is going to protect your interest."

But Mr. Yushchenko also asked that business leaders not contribute to corruption in Ukraine, which he called his country's No. 1 problem.

"Please, do not give any bribes in Ukraine to anybody," he said. He explained that by cutting bribes from investor's budgets, they would save enough money to become more profitable on their own.

During his trip to the United States - which included a working lunch with U.S. President George W. Bush and meetings with several Cabinet-level officials - Mr. Yushchenko echoed several goals he recently set for Ukraine. He wants Ukraine to achieve market economy status in the first half of 2005, and added that three weeks ago he asked the U.S. Commerce Department to grant Ukraine that status.

With U.S. recognition of Ukraine as a market economy, Mr. Yushchenko said he was looking to have Ukraine accepted into the World Trade Organization by November.

Additionally, Mr. Yushchenko said that within the past week he had signed a law that lifted visa requirements for people from European Union countries and the United States traveling to Ukraine. He pressed the EU and the United States to reciprocate by easing visa requirements for Ukrainian students studying in those countries, as well as journalists and representatives of cultural organizations. He also spoke of a plan to establish a free trade zone between EU countries and Ukraine.

In addition to his speeches at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and before a joint IRI and NDI event, Mr. Yushchenko addressed officials at the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, where he also lit candles in memory of victims of the Holocaust and Babyn Yar.

According to the Washington Post, Mr. Yushchenko lit two candles in the Hall of Remembrance. One candle was lit in memory of those killed at Auschwitz (Mr. Yushchenko's father was an Auschwitz survivor), while a second candle was lit in memory of Ukrainians executed at Babyn Yar. Arthur Berger, a museum official, told the Washington Post that 100,000 civilians were killed at the ravine near Kyiv, including more than 30,000 Jews.

While visiting the museum on April 6, Mr. Yushchenko met with representatives of U.S. Jewish organizations and later noted "the similarity of the dramatic and tragic destinies of the Ukrainian and Jewish peoples," the Ukrinform press service reported.

The Ukrainian president also took the opportunity to advocate that a similar museum be built in Ukraine. "There are a lot of people who know these events not from books and photos, but went through them personally," Mr. Yushchenko told museum officials, according to Ukrinform. He also asked the Holocaust Museum officials for their technical assistance in helping to build a Ukrainian museum dedicated to the Holocaust and the Ukrainian Famine Genocide of 1932-1933.

At the tail end of his trip to the United States, Mr. Yushchenko also laid a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknowns in Arlington National Cemetery, and met with the Sikorsky brothers, the sons of Ukrainian helicopter inventor Ihor Sikorsky.

It was previously reported that, while traveling in the United States, Mr. Yushchenko planned to meet Mykola Melnychenko, the one-time member of former President Leonid Kuchma's security detail who fled to the West after revealing that he had digital recordings apparently implicating Mr. Kuchma in the murder of a Ukrainian journalist. Mr. Yushchenko's press service told The Weekly that this meeting did not occur, but did not clarify why it did not happen.

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