NEWSBRIEFS (04/27/97)

NEWSBRIEFS

Kyiv, West agree on Chornobyl measures

KYIV - Carol Kessler, head of the Western delegation to talks in Kyiv on the closure of the Chornobyl nuclear power plant, said Ukraine and Western countries have agreed on a plan to reduce the threat from the radioactive ruins of the facility. Ms. Kessler told journalists that the April 22 meeting was "very successful" and that agreement was reached on a plan to ensure the safety of the deteriorating concrete sarcophagus entombing the reactor and the removal of the remaining nuclear fuel inside. She also said that both Ukraine and the G-7 are "very positive" about fulfilling a 1995 agreement to close Chornobyl by 2000. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Stabilization work to begin at Chornobyl

KYIV - An international team of experts is to start work on stabilizing the sarcophagus surrounding the reactor destroyed in the 1986 explosion, the plant's deputy director told Interfax on April 17. Following the explosion, which triggered the world's worst-ever civilian nuclear accident, emergency teams quickly erected a cement sarcophagus to prevent further leaking of radioactivity into the environment. The official said the reactor still contains some 200 tons of highly radioactive material and that cracks in the sarcophagus are causing concern about whether the structure would withstand a strong earthquake. An official at the Ukrainian Emergencies Ministry told Agence France Presse on April 18 that a nuclear waste treatment facility will be built to handle radioactive waste from an exclusion zone around the plant and from within the reactor. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Chornobyl cited for rise in U.S. leukemias

LONDON - Fallout from the 1986 accident at Ukraine's Chornobyl nuclear power plant may have caused a 30 percent increase in leukemia cases among U.S. children born soon after, according to Joseph Mangano of the Radiation and Public Health Project in New York. The researcher said he found evidence of the increase in cancer registries for 12 U.S. states and cities. "The leukemia rate among children aged under 1 year born in 1986-1987 (62 cases) was 30 percent higher than among other children born during the decade," he wrote in a letter to the British Medical Journal. There have been no reports of more cases of childhood leukemia in countries closest to the site such as Belarus, Finland and Sweden. But there has been a clear rise in incidence of thyroid cancer in children. Mr. Mangano said his findings support a Greek study that found extra cases of childhood leukemia. "Studies of health effects in children since the accident at Chernobyl continue to yield new findings," Mr. Mangano wrote. "Although any increases in leukemia are likely to fall short of the sharp rises in thyroid cancer, possibly because elements like cesium were released in smaller quantities than iodine, more precise analysis should be pursued." Mr. Mangano said his study covered 50 million people - a much larger sample than used in any European studies - and thus could be more reliable. (Reuters)

Yeltsin due in Kyiv in June

KYIV - Russia's prime minister is to arrive in Ukraine on May 28 to pave the way for President Boris Yeltsin to visit Kyiv in June to sign a broad political agreement. "The document has no name yet, but it will be an all-embracing political agreement," a spokesman for President Leonid Kuchma said. President Yeltsin has canceled six trips to Kyiv to sign a friendship treaty with Ukraine's president since Ukraine broke free of Moscow's rule in 1991. The spokesman said the Russian president's arrival would depend on the results of Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin's visit on May 28-29 but added: "Yeltsin has promised to come in early June." (Reuters)

International status for Sevastopol?

MOSCOW - The Federation Council has asked President Boris Yeltsin to consider whether the Crimean port city of Sevastopol, where the Black Sea Fleet is based, might be governed jointly by Russia and Ukraine, Russian news agencies reported on April 17. The upper house of the Russian Parliament also asked the president to insist that Ukraine recognize there are problems surrounding the legal status of Sevastopol. Last December the Federation Council passed a resolution claiming Sevastopol as Russian territory, prompting protests from Kyiv. The Russian Foreign Affairs Ministry rejected the resolution, saying Moscow recognized that "Sevastopol and all of Crimea belong to Ukraine." (RFE/RL Newsline)

Talks on Black Sea Fleet continue

MOSCOW - Another round of Ukrainian-Russian negotiations over the division of the Black Sea Fleet opened in Moscow on April 22. The Ukrainian delegation is headed by Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Konstantyn Hryschenko and the Russian delegation by his counterpart, Boris Pastukhov. Mr. Hryschenko told journalists there were no major breakthroughs at the outset of the talks. Mr. Pastukhov confirmed Russian President Boris Yeltsin's statement last month that Russia will no longer make the signing of a friendship and cooperation treaty with Ukraine conditional on agreements on the Black Sea Fleet division and the status of Sevastopol. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Ukraine to unilaterally delimit border

KYIV - Ukraine has begun unilaterally delimiting the Ukrainian-Russian border, Interfax reported on April 21. Leonid Osavoliuk, a member of the Ukrainian State Committee for the Protection of the State Border, said Moscow has rejected Ukraine's proposals for when border talks can begin. He argued Russia's consent is not needed to begin delimitation because the current border between Ukraine and Russia will be used. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Ukraine, Uzbekistan discuss Tatars

KYIV - Meeting in Kyiv on April 18, Uzbek Prime Minister Utkir Sultanov and his Ukrainian counterpart, Pavlo Lazarenko, failed to reach an agreement on the return of Crimean Tatars deported to Central Asia by Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin during World War II. Refat Chubarov, leader of the 250,000-strong Crimean Tatar community, told Reuters after the meeting that some "difficulties" remained on how to finance the Tatars' return. Uzbekistan wants only those who were actually deported to be given deportee status, while Crimean Tatars and Ukraine insist that all their relatives and descendants be included. Under Stalin, some 190,000 Crimean Tatars accused of collaborating with the Nazis were deported to Central Asia. While many have since returned to Ukraine, there is still a sizable Tatar population in Central Asia. Mr. Sultanov's visit marked the first session of the Ukrainian-Uzbek Commission for Comprehensive Cooperation. Mr. Lazarenko said he wants to expand Kyiv's ties with the Transcaucasus and Central Asia, especially Azerbaijan, Georgia, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. He added that Ukraine wants to develop transit links through the regions and pursue agreements on energy supplies. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Yeltsin upbeat on Russia-NATO charter

MOSCOW - Following his meeting with German Chancellor Helmut Kohl in Baden-Baden, President Boris Yeltsin told journalists on April 17 that Russia will sign a charter with NATO leaders in Paris on May 27. The announcement came as a surprise since only a few hours earlier presidential spokesman Sergei Yastrzhembskii had said it was premature to suggest the charter would be signed next month. Mr. Kohl said Russia and NATO have agreed on 90 percent of the first four articles of the charter. However, he noted that the two sides still have considerable differences over the last article, which deals with the military facilities of new NATO members. Russia insists that NATO promise not to build military infrastructure in new member-states. (RFE/RL Newsline)

Odesa park home to Lenin statues

ODESA - Dozens of statues and busts of Lenin now standing in an Odesa park form a unique museum for the many monuments to the founder of the USSR that were pulled down in Ukraine after the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union. They now stand in a 500-yard lane in the Lenin-Komsomol Park. Odesa Mayor Eduard Gurvits said he sees the park as an innovative solution to the ideological dilemma facing hundreds of former Soviet cities: What to do with all those Lenins? In planning the display last year, Mayor Gurvits called it "a memorial to history - so that it will never be repeated." (Associated Press)

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