EDITORIAL: Gore in Ukraine (08/02/98)

EDITORIAL

Gore in Ukraine

U.S. Vice-President Al Gore traveled to Ukraine on July 22-23 to reaffirm and expand strategic relations between the two countries. The vice-president spent the first day co-chairing the Kuchma-Gore Commission plenary session with Ukraine's President Leonid Kuchma. On the second day the ecologically minded vice-president flew to Chornobyl in a NATO helicopter to observe first-hand the situation at the site of the world's worst nuclear disaster.

Mr. Gore came to Ukraine to discuss numerous issues of concern to both the U.S. and Ukraine, but it seems that he came also to give himself a foreign policy face, one he needs to nurture if he wishes to seek the U.S. presidency in the year 2000.

His speech at the Chornobyl Museum in Kyiv after his on-site visit to the nuclear facility was labeled by U.S. Information Service representatives as a "major foreign policy address." It turned out to be more of a sermon sprinkled with biblical quotes on Mr. Gore's foreign policy vision of a world "connected" by high technology and interwoven economies. The speech held few, if any, new policy declarations either in terms of the world or Ukraine.

Nonetheless, it focused attention on the continuing diaster that is Chornobyl. And, it included a reference to the Great Famine of 1932-1933, which, he said, is an example of the "cruelty of communism."

President Kuchma, who is seeking re-election in late 1999, also used the Gore visit to pursue his own political interests, which are closely tied to the interests of Ukraine. Mr. Kuchma realizes that to get re-elected he needs to get the economy on its feet. Today Ukraine stands at the brink of economic and financial disaster, which can perhaps be averted, if only temporarily, by a multi-billion-dollar loan from the International Monetary Fund.

If Ukraine doesn't receive the Extended Fund Facility, as the loan is called, which it has been discussing with the international financial organization for several months now, inflation is sure to be re-ignited as Ukraine's financial structure collapses under the weight of outstanding international loans and Ukrainian treasury notes it will not be able to repay.

Thus, Mr. Kuchma used the Gore visit to put pressure on the IMF to approve the EFF by having the vice-president extol the positive steps that the Kuchma administration has taken in recent weeks to re-invigorate economic reform and put Ukraine's financial house in order.

So what are we to make of all this? Not much really. It is common practice for politicians to seek political support and political opportunity wherever they can find it. If Mr. Gore needed Ukraine as a stage on which to display his foreign policy acumen, so be it. If it takes a U.S. vice-president expressing support for the policies of a Ukrainian president to get Ukraine the financial aid that it cannot do without at this point in its history, that's OK, too. The EFF that Ukraine awaits will come with strict economic reform requirements to which the country will have to adhere. For Ukraine that is needed discipline.

Although discussion during the Kuchma-Gore Commission sessions also revolved around concrete issues such as economic cooperation in space, energy and agriculture, and resulted in the signing of three agreements, including one on textile trade, this all could have been done in committee meetings, without the presence of Vice-President Gore or President Kuchma. However, by chairing the plenary session, the two leaders achieved significant results. Mr. Gore's visit to Chornobyl and the resulting declaration by President Kuchma that there is agreement on a second donors' conference to raise more money for the rebuilding of the concrete sarcophagus that encases the damaged fourth reactor at Chornobyl - this time from private organizations and benefactors - will certainly help Ukraine.

What is most important, however, is that by virtue of their meeting the two leaders have drawn the U.S. and Ukraine closer in their "strategic relationship." The Gore trip shows that U.S.-Ukrainian relations are on track and continuing to expand.

Although some politicians in Ukraine, with their eyes still cast towards Moscow, may look askance at this, we as Ukrainian Americans ought to feel quite positive about Vice-President Gore's visit to Ukraine. For us, a strong relationship Ukraine and the United States cannot be a bad thing. In this case, politics makes good bedfellows.