Number of national deputies to be 300
The Verkhovna Rada on February 4 approved a bill in one of two readings that would amend the Constitution of Ukraine and reduce the number of lawmakers in the chamber from 450 to 300. A slim majority of 236 lawmakers voted for President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s draft law that would amend two articles of the Constitution. The other change would enshrine a purely proportional electoral system and eliminate single-seat constituencies. Single-mandate districts currently make up half of the Rada’s 450 seats and have often been used as a way for oligarchs, sports stars and celebrities to get elected. The language of the legislation still could be changed before a final second reading, but in its current form the bill stipulates that citizens who’ve lived at least five years in the country and fluently speak the Ukrainian language qualify for a parliamentary seat. A constitutional majority of 300 votes is needed for the bill to pass in its final reading. The Constitutional Court on December 17 ruled that the legislation is in conformity with two articles of the Constitution but with reservations. Opposition lawmakers have criticized the bill because it removes a provision that stipulates holding elections “on the basis of universal, equal and direct suffrage by secret ballot,” which may lead to opportunities for legitimizing any form of election other than those currently specified in the Constitution. (RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service)
34 percent say they belong to OCU
Thirty-four percent of Ukrainians identify with the newly created independent Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU), a poll found conducted by the Kyiv-based Razumkov Center think tank and published on February 3. About 14 percent of the public called themselves faithful to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church – Moscow Patriarchate (UOC-MP), the survey on the confessional and church affiliation of Ukrainian citizens said. An additional 8.2 percent said they belong to the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church. More than a quarter of respondents, or 27.6 percent, said they were Orthodox Christians but don’t affiliate with a particular branch of church. In January, Metropolitan Epifaniy, the head of the OCU, said some 600 parishes in Ukraine aligned with the Moscow Patriarchate had in one year switched over to the newly formed Church. The UOC-MP doesn’t recognize and opposes the OCU, which was granted independence in January 2019 by the Patriarchate of Constantinople in Istanbul. The OCU now registers 7,000 parishes, 77 monasteries and 47 dioceses, or ecclesiastical districts. The OCU has been recognized by the Greek Orthodox Church and the Patriarchate of Alexandria. The UOC-MP boasts 12,300 registered church communities, a figure that religious experts say is inflated and which in actuality numbers between 9,000 and 10,000 parishes. The survey was conducted on January 17-21 with a sample size of 2,000 respondents aged 18 and over who were questioned in all the regions of Ukraine except for occupied Crimea and areas of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions that the government doesn’t control. (RFE/RL)
Two Ukraine-related Grammys
The “Poetry of Places” album by Ukrainian pianist Nadia Shpachenko won the Grammy Award for Best Classical Compendium. The album features premieres of solo and collaborative works (performed with pianist Joanne Pearce Martin, and percussionists Nick Terry and Cory Hills) inspired by diverse buildings. Ms. Shpachenko enjoys bringing into the world things that are outside the box – powerful pieces that often possess unusual sonic qualities or instrumentation. Her concert highlights include recitals at Concertgebouw, Carnegie Hall, Disney Hall, on the Piano Spheres and Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Green Umbrella and Chamber Music Series, and with numerous orchestras in Europe and the Americas. An enthusiastic promoter of contemporary music, she premiered more than 70 works by Elliott Carter, Paul Chihara, George Crumb, Daniel Felsenfeld, Tom Flaherty, Annie Gosfield, Vera Ivanova, Leon Kirchner, Amy Beth Kirsten, Hannah Lash, James Matheson, Missy Mazzoli, Harold Meltzer, Isaac Schankler, Adam Schoenberg, Lewis Spratlan, Gernot Wolfgang, Iannis Xenakis, Peter Yates, Jack Van Zandt, and many others. Ms. Shpachenko is a Steinway Artist and professor of music at Cal Poly Pomona University and Claremont Graduate University. In other Grammy-related news, Hildur Guonadottir, composer of the soundtrack for the HBO miniseries “Chernobyl,” about the 1986 nuclear accident in Ukraine, won a Grammy for Best Score Soundtrack for Visual Media. Ms. Guonadottir is an Icelandic musician and composer. She has gained international recognitions for her scores for television and film. Her score for “Joker” recently won the Golden Globe for Best Original Score. (Ukrinform, Wikipedia)
Erdogan denounces Crimea’s annexation
On a visit to Kyiv, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan reiterated Turkey’s support for Ukraine’s territorial integrity, emphasizing that Ankara doesn’t recognize Russia’s “illegitimate” takeover of Crimea. Mr. Erdogan was speaking at a news conference in the Ukrainian capital on February 3 following talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. The Turkish leader said his country will help build housing for nearly 500 families of Crimean Tatars who have relocated to other parts of Ukraine following the annexation of the Black Sea peninsula in March 2014. Rights groups and Western governments have denounced what they describe as a campaign of repression by the Russian-imposed authorities against Crimean Tatars – a Turkic ethnic group – and others who have spoken out against Moscow’s military seizure and occupation of Crimea. Mr. Erdogan, who has been strengthening ties with Russia in recent years, has adamantly opposed Russia’s moves in Crimea, particularly speaking up for the rights of the Crimean Tatars. Speaking alongside Mr. Erdogan, Mr. Zelenskyy said Kyiv counted on Ankara to help win the release of dozens of Ukrainians, particularly Crimean Tatars, being “illegally” held behind bars in Russia or Crimea. Mr. Zelenskyy also said a military-financial cooperation agreement was signed that foresees Ankara giving Kyiv $36 million to purchase military and dual-purpose goods from Turkey. Both sides also discussed possible natural-gas supplies to Ukraine via Turkey from the Caspian Sea. The two leaders, who last met in Ankara in August, also chaired the eighth meeting of the High-Level Strategic Council. The sides signed a number of intergovernmental documents, including a memorandum of understanding regarding negotiations on a free-trade area agreement, according to the Presidential Office of Ukraine. (RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service)
Zelenskyy: Iran’s compensation too little
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in televised remarks that Iran offered $80,000 per victim after it shot down a Ukrainian passenger jet on January 8, but that Ukraine did not accept the offer because “it was too little.” Mr. Zelenskyy added in comments made on Ukrainian 1+1 television that “of course, human life is not measured by money, but we will push for more” compensation for families of the victims. Air-defense forces of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) shot down Ukrainian Airlines Flight 752 shortly after takeoff in Tehran, killing all 176 people on board. Iran said the downing was an accident, and in mid-January said it would send the black-box flight recorders to Kyiv for analysis. However, Mr. Zelenskyy said that Ukraine had yet to receive the recorders, and that Tehran had instead suggested that Ukrainian specialists fly to Iran on February 3 to examine the black boxes. “I’m afraid that the Iranians might attract our specialists and then say, ‘Let’s decipher [the recorders] on the spot,’ and then say, ‘Why do you need the black boxes now?’ ” Mr. Zelenskyy said. “No, we want to take these boxes [to Ukraine],” he added. (RFE/RL, based on reporting by TASS and Reuters)
Tehran stops sharing evidence with Kyiv
An Iranian official says his country will stop sharing with Kyiv evidence from the crash of a Ukrainian airliner shot down near Tehran last month after audio from the investigation showing the authorities were aware immediately that a missile may have downed the plane was leaked by Ukrainian media. The semiofficial Mehr news agency quoted Hassan Rezaifar, the director in charge of accident investigations at Iran’s Civil Aviation Organization, as saying on February 3 the move was linked to the audio leak from a day earlier. “The technical investigation team of the Ukrainian airline crash, in a strange move, published the secret audio file of the communications of a pilot of a plane that was flying at the same time as the Ukrainian plane,” Mr. Rezaifar said, according to Mehr. “This action by the Ukrainians led to us not sharing any more evidence with them,” he added. A transcript of the recording contains a conversation in Persian between an air-traffic controller and a pilot who was reportedly flying a Fokker 100 jet for Iran’s Aseman Airlines. In the conversation, as the small plane flew from Iran’s southern city of Shiraz to Tehran, the pilot insists he saw what he believed was a missile and then an explosion in the area where the plane went down. The UIA Boeing 737-800 crashed several minutes after taking off from Tehran’s primary international airport on January 8, killing all 176 people aboard. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy acknowledged on February 2 that the recording, first aired by the Ukrainian television channel 1+1, is authentic. Mr. Zelenskyy said on February 3 that he had canceled a trip by Ukrainian investigators to Tehran to participate in the decoding of the plane’s black boxes and called on Tehran to bring them to Kyiv. (RFE/RL’s Radio Farda, with reporting by Mehr, UNIAN, and Reuters)
WTO delivers mixed ruling in rail feud
The World Trade Organization (WTO) on February 4 ruled largely in favor of Ukraine in a dispute with Russia over railway equipment exports – one of several rows between the two rival neighbors in their broader geopolitical spat. The ruling stems from an appeal by Ukraine to the WTO’s appeals panel, often seen as the supreme court of world trade, regarding Russia imposing a virtual ban on imports of Ukrainian railway carriages and equipment in 2013. Russia had annulled export certificates for a number of Ukrainian companies, including at the country’s Kryukivskyi carriage maker based in the Poltava region. Kyiv initiated litigation in 2015, a year after Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula and started backing militants in eastern Ukraine. Exports to Russia by the affected group of Ukrainian companies had shrunk from $1.7 billion in 2013 to $51 million in January-July 2015. Kyiv in July 2018 argued Russia was in violation of international trade agreements and was systemically blocking imports. However, “Ukraine failed to demonstrate that Russia systemically prevented the importation of Ukrainian railway products into Russia,” the WTO said in its key findings and conclusions. Still, the WTO’s appellate body agreed with Ukraine that Russia discriminated against it by blocking market access for Ukrainian manufacturers in comparison with Russian and European ones. (RFE/RL, with reporting by Interfax and Reuters)
Two more soldiers killed in Donbas
Two Ukrainian military personnel were killed and four wounded on February 1-2 in the Donbas conflict zone where Russian-backed separatists control portions of the country’s two easternmost regions. A female combat medic was killed on February 1 near the frontline town of Novotoshkivske in the Luhansk region, the military headquarters said in a daily war update. Sgt. Klavdia Sytnyk, 33, came under fire while delivering medical supplies to a combat post and sustained fatal shrapnel wounds to her chest. The native of the Kharkiv region worked as a civilian paramedic before enlisting in the military in February 2017, according to her combat unit. Another service member was killed on February 2 as Ukrainian forces faced 15 attacks over a 24-hour period, almost twice the number recorded the previous day, the military said. More than 110 Ukrainian service members were killed in 2019. The conflict between Ukrainian government forces and Russian-backed separatists that started in April 2014 has killed more than 13,000 people. (RFE/RL, based on reporting by UNIAN, Interfax, Hromadske and Censor)
RFE/RL correspondent’s car set on fire
The car of an RFE/RL Ukrainian Service correspondent in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv was set on fire overnight on January 29-30 – an arson attack which Deputy Internal Affairs Minister Anton Herashchenko said could have been ordered by someone. Halyna Tereshchuk, who has been working for RFE/RL since 2000, said she suspected the attack was linked to her professional activities. “We think the crime was ordered, that somebody hired someone to conduct it,” Mr. Herashchenko said to RFE/RL, adding that the police were doing “everything to find both the perpetrators and those who ordered the attack.” The National Police department in Lviv said earlier in the day that a probe had been launched into the “deliberate destruction of the journalist’s property.” The Ukrainian unit of rights group Freedom House condemned the torching of not only Ms. Tereshchuk’s vehicle, but on the same day, the car of Andriy Lukin – an activist in Zaporizhia. “We are outraged by the fires… and call on law enforcement agencies to investigate these incidents effectively,” Freedom House Ukraine said on Facebook. The group stated that “arson or other methods of destruction of vehicles and property are becoming increasingly used as a means to pressure active people in Ukraine.” It noted that there were 11 cases last year of property belonging to activists being destroyed and “in almost all cases, the perpetrators were not found and punished.” (RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service)
Suspect in car’s torching is detained
Ukrainian police reported on February 6 that they had detained a man on suspicion of setting the car of RFE/RL correspondent Halyna Tereshchuk on fire in Lviv last month. According to “Schemes,” a television program produced by RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service and Ukrainian Public Television, the detainee is a citizen of Ukraine registered in the western Ukrainian city of Kamianets-Podilskyi. Earlier, Internal Affairs Minister Arsen Avakov had said on Twitter that the detainee is a Moldovan citizen. “We are working on finding out who prompted him do that. The safety of a journalist is a priority,” Mr. Avakov wrote on Twitter. Ms. Tereshchuk’s car was set on fire and completely destroyed on the night of January 29. (RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service)
More evidence needed in Sheremet case
Additional evidence is needed for the murder case of journalist Pavel Sheremet to go to trial, Ukrainian Prosecutor General Ruslan Ryaboshapka said on January 30. “The volume of compiled evidence isn’t enough,” he told the Interfax news agency in an interview. Mr. Ryaboshapka said that, in order to determine whether the suspects were guilty or innocent, “written instructions were prepared for the investigating prosecutors and the terms of the investigation were accordingly set.” Sheremet, a Belarusian-born Russian citizen who had made Kyiv his permanent home, was leaving his apartment to head to a broadcast studio where he hosted a morning radio program when an improvised explosive device planted under the vehicle he was driving exploded on July 20, 2016, killing him instantly. Sheremet’s killing underscored concerns of a climate of impunity for attacks on journalists and others who challenge the authorities, while the government has faced persistent criticism over a perceived lack of progress in solving the case. Investigators suspect three people of involvement in the murder, all of them with ties to the war taking place in two eastern regions of Ukraine. They are former special operations Sgt. Andriy Antonenko, army medic Yana Duhar, and pediatric surgeon and volunteer Yuliya Kuzmenko. Police have also named two persons of interest in the investigation – married couple Inna and Vladyslav Hryshchenko. William Taylor, the former U.S. charge d’affaires in Ukraine, has suggested Internal Affairs Minister Arsen Avakov isn’t certain that the people who were charged with the murder are guilty. Reporters Without Borders (RSF), a France-based media watchdog, has called the probe a “flawed three-and-a-half-year investigation.” In a statement on January 10, RSF raised concern about “inconsistencies in the evidence for the Ukrainian authorities’ claim to have solved [Sheremet’s] murder,” and urged them to “continue the investigation and to be more transparent as they do so.” This investigation “offers the opportunity to really begin combating impunity,” said Jeanne Cavelier, the head of the Paris-based media freedom watchdog’s Eastern Europe and Central Asia desk. “Not just the perpetrators but also the instigators should be identified and brought to trial,” Ms. Cavelier insisted. Sheremet’s mother, Lyudmila Sheremet, told RFE/RL in December that she does not know have an opinion on whether the suspects are guilty or not, but that she is afraid “that innocent people may be hurt” as officials try to show they’re making headway in the case. (RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service)
Kremlin: No role in naming DPR’s PM
The Kremlin has distanced itself from the naming of a Russian citizen as the separatist prime minister in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region. Commenting on media reports saying that Vladimir Pashkov, former deputy governor of Russia’s Irkutsk region, had become “the acting prime minister of the Donetsk people’s republic” (DPR), Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on February 6 that “there is nothing controversial” about the move. “Russia has absolutely nothing to do with that conflict. It is not an official person delegated officially [there]. In this case it is likely about the activities of a private person who acts as an ordinary citizen of the Russian Federation,” Mr. Peskov said. Some areas of Ukraine’s eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk, known as the Donbas, have been controlled since April 2014 by Russia-backed militants. Russia incited an insurgency in the region following its illegal annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea in March 2014, but has denied any involvement in the ongoing conflict, in which more than 13,000 people have been killed. (RFE/RL, based on reporting by UNIAN and TASS)