U.N. panel condemns abuses in Crimea
UNITED NATIONS – A United Nations panel has condemned human rights abuses in Crimea and pressed Russia to allow U.N. monitors to visit the Ukrainian territory it annexed in 2014. The U.N. General Assembly’s human rights committee, in its first action on Crimea, adopted a resolution drafted by Ukraine and backed by the United States, France and Britain by a vote of 73 to 23 on November 15, with 76 abstentions. The resolution next month goes for a vote before the full assembly of 193 members, which is expected to approve it. Russia lobbied hard against the resolution, dismissing it as “politically motivated” and “one-sided.” The people of Crimea “chose to vote in a historic referendum to reunite with Russia,” said Russian Foreign Affairs Ministry official Anatoly Viktorov. “It completely ignores the negative impact that the actions of Ukrainian authorities have had on the residents of Crimea,” who have the same rights and privileges as other Russian citizens, he said. Among the countries that backed Russia in opposing the resolution were China, Iran, India, Syria, South Africa, Kazakhstan, Serbia and North Korea. Many Latin American and African countries abstained from the vote. The resolution condemned abuses and discrimination in Crimea, which Russia seized in February 2014. Moscow’s annexation was not recognized by the U.N., and the resolution calls it a “temporary occupation.” Ukraine’s Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergiy Kyslytsya said the human rights situation has worsened in Crimea with “extrajudicial killings, intimidation, arbitrary detentions, torture” and repression of free speech. Rights groups have raised alarm over the plight of Crimea’s Muslim Tatars, who have been repressed for their opposition to Russian rule of the territory. The resolution urges Russia to reverse its decision to shut down the Crimean Tatars’ governing body, the Mejlis, and to allow cultural and religious institutions to reopen. It calls on Russia to “take all necessary measures to bring an immediate end to all abuses against residents of Crimea” and to cooperate with U.N. rights staff seeking to monitor the situation on the Black Sea peninsula. A U.N. monitoring mission on human rights set up in Ukraine in 2014 has not been allowed into Crimea. “Russia wants to make sure only one voice is heard in Crimea – Russia’s,” said U.S. Deputy Ambassador to the U.N. Sarah Mendelson. “States should not have to fear that a neighbor, however powerful, will seize their territory.” (RFE/RL, with reporting by AP and AFP)
Hague prosecutor on Ukraine conflict
WASHINGTON – The lead prosecutor for the International Criminal Court (ICC) has for the first time said the simmering conflict in Ukraine should be considered an international armed conflict between Russia and Ukraine. As a practical matter, the determination by Fatou Bensouda, issued on November 14, will change nothing on the ground in eastern Ukraine, where fighting between Russia-backed separatists and Ukrainian government forces has increased and decreased since April 2014 and continues despite ceasefire deals. Nor will it change Russia’s annexation of the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea, which has been rejected by the vast majority of United Nations member states. Moreover, Russia is not a member of The Hague-based court, whose mandate includes prosecution of war crimes and related crimes. Ukraine is also not a member, though it has accepted the court’s jurisdiction on a limited basis. But the finding, included in a report released November 14 by Ms. Bensouda’s office, adds legal heft to arguments in Ukraine, and much of the West, that Russia is to blame for instigating the war. “According to information received, the situation in the Crimea and Sevastopol is equivalent to the international armed conflict between Ukraine and the Russian Federation,” the report said. “This international armed conflict started not later than February 26, when the Russian Federation employed members of its armed forces to gain control over parts of the territory of Ukraine without the consent of the government of Ukraine.” The report labels the situation in Crimea an occupation by Russian forces and highlights the plight of Crimean Tatars, who have faced persecution, kidnappings, and killings on the peninsula for their opposition to the Russian annexation. It also concludes that shelling by both sides in eastern Ukraine and Ukraine’s detention of Russian military personnel there “points to direct military engagement between Russian armed forces and Ukrainian government forces that would suggest the existence of an international armed conflict.” The finding that the fighting constitutes an international armed conflict could also trigger more legal scrutiny for how prisoners of war are treated, as well as heightened protections for civilians affected by the fighting. The report was released as part of an annual accounting of the preliminary investigations that ICC investigators have conducted in 2016. Under the court’s rules, if the prosecutor concludes there is enough evidence to merit a full investigation, he or she must then seek court authorization. (Mike Eckel of RFE/RL)
Hundreds protest Ukraine’s government
KYIV – Ukrainian authorities locked down the heart of the capital on November 15 as hundreds of demonstrators protested outside government buildings over poor economic conditions and rising prices for vital necessities such as natural gas and bread. Police vehicles and officers in riot gear blocked streets around Kyiv’s government quarter and stood guard with bomb-sniffing dogs in front of the presidential administration, the central bank, and Parliament, where crowds braved freezing cold to demand lower utility prices and higher pensions. Government officials claimed the protests marked the start of a Kremlin-orchestrated plan to “destabilize” Ukraine, which faces economic difficulties and a simmering war against Russia-backed separatists who hold parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts in the east. Organizers of the protest included leaders of the Opposition Bloc – created from the remnants of the defunct party of former President Viktor Yanukovych, who was driven from power by the Euro-Maidan protests and fled to Russia in 2014 – and former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko’s Batkivshchyna party. “Three years after the [Euro-Maidan], we can say that Ukraine’s clan system has been revived. Unfortunately, we again have a president who is an oligarch of the highest level,” Ms. Tymoshenko said of President Petro Poroshenko in a call to protest published on the party’s site on November 14. Oleksandr Tkachuk, chief of staff of Ukraine’s domestic SBU security service, said that security was particularly tight because the authorities fear that the protests marked the start of a Kremlin-managed plan to undermine the government by supporting former political allies of Yanukovych and encouraging early parliamentary elections. “We have previously stated that we have the information proving Russia’s attempts to hijack Ukrainian politics and internal affairs, exploit different grievances to provoke mass revolt and destroy the existing political system,” Mr. Tkachuk told RFE/RL. He was referring to a document leaked by Ukrainian hackers last month which they claim was taken from the e-mail of a senior aide to Russian President Vladimir Putin. The document’s authenticity has not been confirmed. “It does not necessarily mean that today’s demonstrations are completely organized by Russia’s puppets,” Tkachuk added. He provided no specific evidence of a Russian role in the protests. Many analysts believe Russia is continuing to seek to foment divisions and instability in Ukraine after forcibly seizing the Crimean Peninsula in March 2014 and backing the separatists in eastern Ukraine, where the conflict has killed more than 9,600 people since April 2014. But observers also say that Poroshenko’s government uses warnings about a Russian threat to deflect criticism over pressing problems such as corruption and economic troubles. (Christopher Miller of RFE/RL)
NATO wants dialogue with Russia
BRUSSELS – NATO wants dialogue with Russia, the chief of the alliance said ahead of talks with EU defense ministers in Brussels. “Russia is our biggest neighbor, Russia is there to stay,” Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said on November 15. “And especially when tensions run high and especially when we face many different security challenges, it is important to have dialogue.” But Mr. Stoltenberg insisted that NATO “will never respect or accept the violation of the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Ukraine.” Moscow’s relations with the West have plunged to levels of acrimony unseen since the end of the Cold War following Russia’s military seizure of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in March 2014 and an ensuing war between Kyiv’s forces and Russia-backed separatists. Mr. Stoltenberg also said he was sure that President-elect Donald Trump would meet all U.S. commitments to the alliance. “A strong NATO is important for Europe but it’s also important for the United States,” he said. Mr. Trump caused concern during his election campaign when he called NATO “obsolete” and said he would withhold U.S. support from alliance members unless they increased military spending and “fulfilled their obligations” to the United States. On November 14, President Barack Obama said he was sure Mr. Trump would stand by U.S. security commitments. (RFE/RL, based on reporting by Reuters and AFP)
Pre-screening proposed for Schengen zone
BRUSSELS – The European Commission on November 16 will propose pre-screening for everyone who enters the EU’s Schengen zone from a third country, even if that country’s citizens normally enjoy visa-free travel. The pre-screening plan, unveiled on November 16, is similar to a system used in the United Swtates, which requires that people pay a fee and fill out a form providing details about themselves before being granted entry. The fee will be 5 euros and people’s profiles will remain in the system as long as their passports are valid. The commission expects 97 percent of those pre-screened to be allowed to enter without problems, with the response to the screening coming the same day as the request. Citizens of all countries granted visa-free status will have to apply when they travel to the EU. This includes most countries in the Western Balkans and Moldova, and eventually Ukraine and Georgia, which currently are in the process of getting visa-free status. EU counties outside the Schengen zone such as Bulgaria, Croatia, Ireland, Romania and the United Kingdom are exempt from the new system. EU member states and the European Parliament are expected to approve the proposal and have it up and running by 2020. (Reporting by RFE/RL’s Richard Jozwiak in Brussels)
U.S. puts six Crimeans on sanctions list
WASHINGTON – The United States has added six Crimean representatives newly elected to Russia’s Parliament to its sanctions blacklist for supporting Moscow’s illegal annexation of the Ukrainian territory in 2014. The six – Dmitry Belik, Andrei Kozenko, Konstantin Bakharev, Svetlana Savchenko, Ruslan Balbek and Pavel Shperov – were all elected on September 18 to represent the Black Sea peninsula and its naval port of Sevastopol. The elections were “illegitimate,” the U.S. Treasury said on November 14, adding that the sanctions announcement follows similar action against the six by the European Union. They were complicit in policies “that threaten the peace, security, stability, sovereignty, or territorial integrity of Ukraine,” the Treasury Department said. The move was part of “maintaining pressure on Russia until it respects the security and sovereignty of Ukraine,” said John Smith, acting director of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control. “Treasury will continue to sanction those individuals involved in Russia’s annexation of Crimea and its destabilizing activities in Ukraine,” he said. The sanctions bar Americans and U.S. corporations from doing business with the six. Any assets they have on U.S. territory are also frozen. (RFE/RL, with reporting by AFP)
Saakashvili announces new political force
KYIV – Mikheil Saakashvili, a onetime Georgian president who resurrected his political career in nearby Ukraine, has announced the launch of a new Ukrainian political party and called for early elections just days after resigning his governor’s post in Odesa. Speaking to reporters in the Ukrainian capital on November 11, Mr. Saakashvili repeated accusations that rampant profiteering and obstacles to reform are hurting Ukraine, which remains divided two years after Russia seized Crimea and Moscow-backed separatists began fighting against Kyiv’s authority. “We will create a new broad political power, a platform of new forces, and our goal is to change the present, existing, so-called political elite, who are actually profiteers and social misfits,” Mr. Saakashvili told a press conference. “Our goal is for early parliamentary elections to be carried out as quickly as possible,” he said. Mr. Saakashvili again lashed out at Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, a former schoolmate whom he had accused of sabotaging reform efforts in the Black Sea port region. Mr. Poroshenko accepted Mr. Saakashvili’s resignation earlier this week and suggested that the latter’s political ambitions in Ukraine were stoked by a thumping that Mr. Saakashvili’s former party received in Georgian elections last month. Mr. Saakashvili, who now has Ukrainian citizenship, dared Mr. Poroshenko at his press conference to kick him out of the country. Mr. Saakashvili – whose reforms in post-Communist Georgia following its so-called Rose Revolution in 2003 won widespread international praise – said his new party would fight for Ukrainian business but oppose the presence of business representatives in politics. He also said his party would refuse membership to anyone who has served in Parliament for more than one term, which could exclude many in the political elite at the time of Ukraine’s Euro-Maidan unrest in 2013-2014. (Christopher Miller of RFE/RL)