News

Shokin replaces Yarema as top prosecutor

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New leader orders restructuring of Procurator General’s Office

KYIV – Ukraine’s top law enforcement officer, Procurator General Vitaliy Yarema, submitted his resignation on February 9 amid mounting criticism of his failure to prosecute any officials in the administration of President Viktor Yanukovych for alleged economic crimes, violence against the historic Euro-Maidan protest and separatism in the Donbas region. “It’s very good that we achieved the resignation of the procurator general, who showed no results,” Self-Reliance National Deputy Yegor Sobolev told the February 10 parliamentary session during which Mr. Yarema’s resignation was approved. “That’s the first time in Ukrainian history that a procurator general left who suited the president, suited the majority of political forces but didn’t suit society.”

Mr. Yarema resigned ahead of a February 17 report in the Wall Street Journal that stated the European Union will soon begin to drop sanctions against members of Mr. Yanukovych’s entourage – starting with four out of 22 targeted – for lack of evidence provided by the Ukrainian government to back up corruption allegations. “I stated several months ago that, in the event that EU sanctions are removed from the Yanukovych entourage through the fault of the procurator general, Vitaliy Yarema should be held politically responsible and resign,” wrote National Deputy Serhiy Leshchenko on his Facebook page the same day as the resignation. “It’s almost certain that sanctions will be removed from some of them in early March, a year after they were imposed.

News

Second ceasefire deal signed at Minsk summit

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KYIV – A second attempt at a ceasefire in Ukraine’s east was brokered on February 12 in Minsk by the heads of state of France, Germany, Russia and Ukraine after Western leaders warned it was the last chance to avoid an escalation in violence in the Donbas war, particularly with the U.S. leadership considering providing lethal arms.

The ceasefire agreement – signed by the representatives of the Ukrainian and Russian governments, the “separatist” forces and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (collectively known as the Trilateral Contact Group) – consists of 13 points, including a establishing a ceasefire as of midnight February 15, removing all foreign armies from Ukrainian territory and withdrawing heavy weaponry from what is in effect a newly created buffer zone. Western and Ukrainians leaders hailed the new agreement as a critical step towards de-escalating the war, which reached its peak the weekend of January 30-February 1 in a battle for control of the Donetsk regional railroad hub of Debaltseve. Several days earlier, terrorists shot rockets into residential sections of Mariupol, a key port city, killing 31 and wounding more than 100. “It’s not a complex solution and of course not a breakthrough, but Minsk 2 can be a step that can remove us from the spiral of military escalation towards a political impulse after weeks of violence,” said German Foreign Affairs Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier. At the same time, much skepticism surrounded its prospects – even in the short term – particularly since many of the agreement’s points were repeated from the first agreement, which was never upheld by the Russian-backed forces.

Travel/Adventure

Bukovel, the affordable jewel of the Carpathians

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BUKOVEL, Ukraine – It’s amazing that I’ve lived in Ukraine for 10 years and had yet to visit Bukovel, what I would call the jewel of the Carpathians, until the weekend of January 16-18. I think I was intimidated. As Ukraine’s most-hyped ski resort, I imagined unaffordable hotels anad ski lifts to diamond-level slopes, dominated by the ski-bum kids of Donetsk oligarchs as their bored Barbie doll wives strolled to the various spas in fur coats. How wrong I was! Bukovel in Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast is not Aspen, Colo., or St.

News

Russia escalates war, dispatches new forces

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KYIV – The war in Donbas escalated in recent weeks as Ukrainian forces suffered defeat at the ruined Donetsk airport. They regrouped and two weeks later thwarted Russian forces in what was described as the fiercest battle yet at the Donetsk regional railroad hub of Debaltseve on February 1 and subsequent days. Evidence has surfaced of the Russian government’s direct role in the war’s recent escalation. Soldiers who survived the Donetsk airport attack said it was the work of professional Russian soldiers. Ukrainian fighters also described an influx of Russian military hardware and soldiers in the regional center of Donetsk.

News

Europeans keep Russia sanctions amid growing terrorist attacks

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KYIV – European leaders decided this week to pursue extending existing sanctions against Russian politicians and enterprises, and to consider a new round after the deadliest attack on civilians in Ukraine thus far that occurred in the city of Mariupol on January 24. The European Union’s Foreign Ministers Council voted on January 29 to recommend extending Crimea-related sanctions until September and imposing new economic sanctions. The day before, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) voted to extend sanctions restricting Russian activity in the organization until the end of April. The measures were welcomed by Ukraine’s Foreign Affairs Ministry and its PACE delegation, which fiercely lobbied for them amid intense Russian efforts to lift them. Yet, the Europeans have begun to reveal doubts about their sanctions approach, which so far has only restrained, not deterred, Russia’s military aggression and terrorism in Ukraine.

News

Russians launch biggest offensive in Donbas since September ceasefire

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KYIV – Pro-Russian rebels in the Donbas, backed by the Russian military, on January 13 launched their biggest military campaign against Ukrainian forces since the September 5 Minsk ceasefire protocols, staging hundreds of attacks in a fierce attempt to take control of the territory of the ruined Donetsk airport. Besides the military offensive, terrorist attacks were launched throughout Ukraine. Besides the January 13 Volnovakha attack that killed 13 civilians and injured 17, a January 19 explosion near a Kharkiv courthouse injured 14, four of them seriously, and a bridge was blown up the next day in the Zaporizhia region as a cargo train crossed it. The rebels also launched an offensive to destroy the Avdiyivka coke plant in the Donetsk region, a key source of coking coal used for heating furnaces. The Russian government intended its military-terror campaign to boost its negotiating position with the Europeans and Ukrainians in talks to resolve the Donbas war, said Volodymyr Fesenko, the director of the Penta Center for Applied Political Research in Kyiv.

Columnists

At long last, historical justice

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Reading Ukrainian history, one would easily begin to have doubts. Yet 2014 seems to be the year that Ukraine’s karma began to turn for the better. Several salient examples come to mind. The collapse of the Soviet Union left behind many who could not adapt to the new realities. Among those disturbed individuals is Natalia Maksymets, a councilwoman in the Luhansk City Council and chief editor of the Communist Party’s oblast newspaper, Soviet Luhanshchyna.

News

Yanukovych, Azarov declared wanted by Interpol

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KYIV – It took almost a year but Interpol, the International Criminal Police Organization, has finally issued wanted person alerts for former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, former Prime Minister Mykola Azarov, and two of their associates on charges of embezzlement and misappropriation. They are being pursued by the Ukrainian government, which submitted an alert request as early as March 2014 for Mr. Yanukovych for abuse of power and murder charges. Yet Interpol revealed in its January 12 statement that it didn’t respond because the request wasn’t compliant with its rules and regulations. Procurator General Vitalii Yarema claims he filed the alert requests for the current charges months earlier, but Interpol hesitated because of the suspicion that they were politically motivated. All the key Yanukovych administration officials fled abroad, mostly to
the Russian Federation.

News

Verkhovna Rada approves 2015 budget, but further amendments are certain

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KYIV – Ukraine’s Parliament, voting on the last weekend of 2014, approved several dozen bills amending the tax and budget codes in order to accommodate the 2015 central state budget, which was revamped since its presentation the prior week and approved early Monday morning, December 29. The nation’s fiscal plan was unprecedented in its reforms, such as keeping high royalty payments on firms that extract natural gas, mostly controlled by the nation’s biggest oligarchs, and sharply cutting state subsidies to the coal industry, which were largely pocketed by Donbas oligarchs. “I was happy to have fulfilled the promise that I gave during elections, which was to eliminate in the Verkhovna Rada the legalized corrupt schemes that steal billions from the country,” National Deputy Tetiana Chornovol, a prominent anti-corruption activist, wrote on her Ukrayinska Pravda blog after the voting. “For the first time, the oligarchs suffered a loss. For the first time, the government truly entered into their pockets, even those who continue to manipulate politicians,” she noted.

Cabinet of Ministers

Financial concerns increase after 2015 budget is presented

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KYIV – The Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine led by Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk on December 23 presented to Parliament its 2015 central budget, which decides who will carry the economic burden as the country attempts to preserve its statehood in what is promised to be the most turbulent year since independence. The 2015 budget will also determine whether the government will qualify to receive the next IMF tranche of $2.8 billion expected in early February, as estimated by Ukraine’s top economists. The tranche is the Ukrainian government’s only hope for survival as its international reserves have dwindled to $7 billion – an 11-year low. Meanwhile, it has $11 billion in foreign debt obligations. Parliament voted to approve a calendar that would require a vote on the budget on December 30, with three sessions and two committee hearings before then.