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Poroshenko cites achievements, discusses failures in war with Putin

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KYIV – Assessing his first year in office, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko offered an uncharacteristically sober view in which he acknowledged disappointments with the government. He also stressed achievements, such as thwarting Russia’s attempts to split Ukraine. The evaluations and political plans came in a June 4 address to the Verkhovna Rada and a June 5 press conference, both nearly a year after he was inaugurated president on June 7, 2014. “I am often asked whether I’m satisfied with the work of the government. No.

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Another Yanukovych insider, Serhii Kliuyev, flees abroad

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KYIV – It’s been more than a year since former President Viktor Yanukovych fled Ukraine, and no one from his entourage has been arrested by the Ukrainian government, let alone prosecuted, for the murders during the Euro-Maidan protest. Never mind the billions alleged to have been pilfered in corruption schemes. [Former Finance Minister Yurii Kobolov was arrested by Spanish police but has yet to be extradited to Ukraine. The government has seized his property in Ukraine.]

The latest Yanukovych insider to elude arrest was Serhii Kliuyev, who is widely believed to have fled the country within days after Ukraine’s Parliament voted on June 3 to strip him of his political immunity. By June 10, he was declared missing by Anton Gerashchenko, an advisor to the internal affairs minister, who confirmed a week later in Parliament that he fled to Russia through the occupied territories of Donbas.

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Verkhovna Rada dismisses Nalyvaichenko from SBU

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KYIV – Ukraine’s Parliament voted on June 18 to approve President Petro Poroshenko’s request to dismiss Valentyn Nalyvaichenko as head of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), the country’s leading national security body. While the president argued that Mr. Nalyvaichenko had failed to fulfill his responsibilities, Mr. Poroshenko’s critics argued that the dismissal was revenge for Mr. Nalyvaichenko’s unapproved attempts to eliminate the president’s allies – alleged to be corrupt – from both the SBU and the Procurator General’s Office. The conflict over Mr. Nalyvaichenko was the biggest since the coalition government emerged in November 2014 and threatens its future stability. The president will likely appoint someone loyal to him to replace Mr. Nalyvaichenko in order to strengthen his hierarchy of power, observers said. “The new SBU head will be very loyal to Poroshenko.

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Yatsenyuk makes Ukraine’s case in a series of appearances in DC

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WASHINGTON – As President Barack Obama and the other G-7 leaders on June 8 were concluding their summit meeting discussions with a focus on how best to resolve the crisis of Russia’s intrusion into Ukraine, the prime minister of Ukraine, Arseniy Yatsenyuk, arrived in Washington for three days of talks about that crisis and other important issues facing Ukraine and the West, with U.S. government officials, congressional leaders, the International Monetary Fund and influential American organizations. The prime minister’s tight schedule included a surprise White House meeting with Vice-President Joe Biden, who had just returned from his son’s funeral in Delaware. In all, as Mr. Yatsenyuk told journalists following his IMF meeting just before departing back to Ukraine June 10, he and Finance Minister Natalie Jaresko had some 30 meetings over the span of two days. “And the level of support expressed by the U.S. vice-president, the speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, the secretaries of the Treasury and Commerce – in other words, the American establishment – was unprecedented,” he said. On Capitol Hill, Mr. Yatsenyuk met with House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and other members of the Senate Ukraine Caucus, co-chaired by Rob Portman (R-Ohio), who then called for providing Ukraine with additional U.S. aid.

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Poroshenko appoints Saakashvili to lead Odesa

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KYIV – In an unexpected move, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko appointed former Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili as head of the Odesa Oblast State Administration to lead the president’s initiatives in the region, as well as oversee the spending of funds earmarked by the central Kyiv budget. Though he was placed under arrest in his native Georgia, Mr. Saakashvili is among the most popular post-Soviet politicians in Ukraine and the West after leading reforms that turned Georgia into a competitive economy. He has a long history in Ukraine, having studied alongside Mr. Poroshenko in Kyiv and learned the Ukrainian language. A key supporter of the maidans in Kyiv, Mr. Saakashvili spent recent months criticizing the Ukrainian government for failing to quickly carry out needed reforms. In appointing Mr. Saakashvili, Mr. Poroshenko is forcing him to either show what he can do or back down from the criticism, observers said. “Saakashvili simply couldn’t be an outside observer of Ukraine’s reforms process, or just a top advisor at that.

US

UCCA celebrates 75th anniversary

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WASHINGTON – The Ukrainian Congress Committee of America (UCCA) celebrated the 75th anniversary of its founding with a reception on May 20 at the Senate Visitor’s Center at the U.S. Capitol, where U.S. and Ukrainian government representatives joined with a large group of representatives of Ukrainian American organizations and the Ukrainian Catholic and Orthodox Churches to mark the occasion. As they praised and thanked the UCCA for the positive work it has done since its founding in 1940 for the benefit of its community, Ukraine and the United States, much of the focus of remarks by speakers, including five members of the U.S. Congress, was also on what the United States and other Western countries are and should be doing to help Ukraine during its current crisis with Russia. The first congressman to address the gathering, Rep. Michael Turner (R-Ohio), who chairs the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Tactical Air and Land Forces, put it this way: “I appreciate you being here. I appreciate your strong voice for Ukraine, and I appreciate also the opportunity to stand with you in support of a country, that like all countries, deserves territorial integrity, freedom and the ability for self-determination.”

Similar expressions of support were made by the four other U.S. representatives participating in the event: Bill Pascrell Jr. (D-N.J.), Paul D. Tonko (D-N.Y.), Brendan Boyle (D-Pa.) and Robin Kelly (D-Ill.). Rep. Kelly also mentioned and delighted many attending the reception by noting that she, too, has Ukrainian roots.

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Crimean Tatars of Ukraine mark 71st anniversary of deportations

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KYIV – Crimean Tatars in Ukraine marked the 71st anniversary of the mass deportation ordered by Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, which displaced around 200,000 people and cost tens of thousands of lives. Organizers held a special event, called “I Am A Crimean Tatar,” in Holosiyivskiy Park in Kyiv on May 18 to remember the deportation victims. The commemoration was organized by Crimean Tatar activists and the Institute for Civil Society and Democracy Development. Organizers said the gathering’s goal was twofold: to commemorate Crimean Tatars who died during the deportation to Central Asia that started on May 18, 1944, and to honor those who lost their lives during and after Crimea’s annexation by Russia in March 2014. Several tents were set up in the park for people to gather and take part in prayers and commemorations and hear the accounts of people who survived the Stalin-era deportation and have been forced over the past year to flee Crimea for other parts of Ukraine. Also on May 18, a special concert to mark the solemn anniversary was held in Kyiv’s National Opera House and a rally of mourning, called “Light a Flame in My Heart,” took place on Independence Square (the Maidan).

News

Chaly to become next ambassador to U.S., reports say

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KYIV – Valeriy Chaly, a foreign affairs expert and government adviser, is likely to become Ukraine’s next ambassador to the U.S., Kyiv experts and mass media are increasingly reporting. The confirmation will be made not earlier than the EU Eastern Partnership summit in Riga on May 21-22, but it may come as late as the summer, said Volodymyr Fesenko, the head of the Penta Center for Applied Political Research in Kyiv. The Ukrainian government sent a notice requesting the U.S.’s agreement in April and is waiting for a response, he said. The notice was sent as early as November, reported the Yevropeiska Pravda news site. (Ukraine’s Foreign Affairs Ministry could not confirm when the notice was sent in time for The Ukrainian Weekly’s deadline.)

The delay isn’t only from the U.S. side, he said.

Community

Sen. Menendez honored as champion of Ukraine

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WHIPPANY, N.J. – Hailed as “Ukraine’s dedicated advocate in the Senate” and a “champion for freedom and democracy,” Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) was honored here on Saturday, May 2, at what was billed as a rally in support of Ukraine. The New Jersey democrat, sponsor of the Ukrainian Freedom Support Act of 2014, received a plaque from the Ukrainian National Association (UNA) and the Friend of UNIS Award from the Ukrainian Congress Committee of America (UCCA). The UNA also presented the senator with a blue-and-yellow pysanka – the work of folk artist Stephanie Hryckowian. Organized by the UNA in conjunction with the UCCA, the midday event at the Ukrainian American Cultural Center of New Jersey featured a keynote address by Mr. Menendez, the state’s senior U.S. senator, who said his analysis of the situation in Ukraine is this: “There are many experts who would contend that the complexity of the geopolitics that led to the U.S.’s retreat from Europe created an opening for [Vladimir] Putin in Ukraine.” He added, “We all want a diplomatic solution, but I believe that this can only happen when Putin believes that the cost of continuing to ravage Ukraine is simply too high.”

The public meeting was opened and emceed by Yuriy Symczyk, the UNA’s fraternal coordinator, who noted: “Right now… there are Russian troops on Ukrainian soil. There is war in eastern Ukraine.

News

Victory Day commemoration geared to presenting a new Ukraine

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KYIV – Never will be it more apparent that Russia and Ukraine are going their separate ways than this year’s commemoration of the 70th anniversary of the defeat of Nazi Germany. Not only will the main commemorations be held on different days, but the Ukrainian state events will be stripped of any symbolism of Soviet communism for the first time. The government also decided to do away with the May 9 military parade on Kyiv’s central boulevard, the Khreshchatyk, once and for all. “This era has disappeared forever, at least in our country,” said Yurii Krykunov, a Kyiv City Council deputy who is among those responsible for organizing this year’s commemorations in Kyiv. “I think these commemorations will be two absolute contrasts, revealing that we are moving towards civilization and they [in Russia] are moving towards a dead end.”

Victory Day has been among the biggest holidays on the Ukrainian calendar ever since 1965, when it was established.