Ukrainian deputy notes moves by Moscow (02/04/01)

Ukrainian deputy notes moves by Moscow

by Yaro Bihun
Special to The Ukrainian Weekly

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration's determination to develop a U.S. missile defense shield may well be one of the major reasons behind Moscow's push to bring Ukraine back into its old Soviet-style fold. Mykhailo Ratushnyi, a leading member of the Rukh (Kostenko) Party and the reformist majority coalition in the Verkhovna Rada, said that Russia cannot counter this U.S. strategic move without Ukraine's rocket-production capability.

"As I see it, Russia is alarmed by the new U.S. administration's determination to renew the development of an anti-ballistic missile system. In this context, Russia is interested in strengthening its strategic missile forces, and it cannot do this without Ukrainian booster rockets," he said in an interview with The Ukrainian Weekly on January 24.

Mr. Ratushnyi and fellow Rukh colleague and Verkhovna Rada National Deputy Ivan Bilas were in Washington during the inauguration of the new U.S. president and had discussions with potential officials of the incoming administration. They also shared their views with a larger group of representatives of various government departments and agencies and non-governmental organizations during an open forum at the International Republican Institute here on January 23.

In his interview, Mr. Ratushnyi said the military cooperation agreements signed during a January 18-19 visit to Ukraine by Russia's Defense Minister Igor Sergeev underscore the fact that Russia and "certain forces in Ukraine" are intensifying their efforts to bring Ukraine and Russia together again. And Russia is especially interested in getting control of Ukraine's military-industrial complex, he said.

Ukraine's President Leonid Kuchma, before coming to Kyiv initially as prime minister and then as president, used to head PivdenMash in Dnipropetrovsk, the Soviet Union's leading rocket-production facility. These new military cooperation agreements, in Mr. Ratushnyi's view, are "part of the Putin administration's policy of intensifying pressure on Ukraine to increase its military and economic integration with Russia and Belarus" and "a retreat from the path to cooperation with NATO."

"I think that it's a bad omen for the West as well as for the patriotic forces in Ukraine," he added.

Mr. Ratushnyi cautioned that even though "one should not see this as a done deal," since such agreements require ratification by the Verkhovna Rada - which he expects will not be an easy process - "experience has shown that the executive branch frequently brings international agreements into force without waiting for the Parliament to ratify them first."

During their appearance at the International Republican Institute, the two Rukh deputies also strongly suggested that the current scandal dealing with accusations of presidential complicity in the disappearance and possible murder of journalist Heorhii Gongadze may also have Moscow policy connections. As Mr. Ratushnyi pointed out, there have been calls in leading Western newspapers - notably an opinion piece by economist Anders Aslund in the Washington Post on December 27, 2000 - for Western governments to treat President Kuchma as a pariah if he does not come clean in the Gongadze case.

"And when one adds to this the criminal indictment of Vice Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, whose party, with 35 votes, is the largest faction in the majority coalition in Parliament, this could bring about the disintegration of that majority, the undoing of last year's accomplishments and the collapse of the Yuschenko government," Mr. Ratushnyi said.

Gen. Bilas called the Kuchma-Gongadze affair an "artificial and conspiratorial scandal" engineered by a parliamentary faction that calls itself "Rebirth of the Soviet Union."

Mr. Ratushnyi said his party has always been for a complete and transparent investigation of the murder of Mr. Gongadze. "And I can assure you that we will do our utmost, regardless of who is ultimately responsible, to get to the bottom of this matter," he said. He added, however, "We are politicians, and we should understand that the strategic partnership between Ukraine and Georgia as an alternative to [Russian President Vladimir] Putin's CIS was undermined by the murder of Mr. Gongadze, whose father is a member of the Georgian Parliament."

Mr. Ratushnyi also raised the question of why corruption allegations about Ms. Tymoshenko's business dealings, which were known back in 1993-1994, were officially brought forward only now, in 2001, when her party is the keystone in the parliamentary majority.

"If we are politicians, then we cannot allow our emotions to replace geopolitical considerations," he stressed. Mr. Ratushnyi said that during their meetings in Washington the two national deputies found President Bush's security and economic affairs team well-versed on issues relating to Ukraine and the region.

He added that he did not anticipate any "Chicken Kiev" speeches from this administration. (Mr. Ratushnyi was referring to former President George Bush's address in Kyiv in August 1991 just before Ukraine's independence, in which he called on Ukrainian leaders to remain within the USSR and not strive for independence.)

"We will continue maintaining our position, and ask for only one thing and we are confident about this - that the Bush administration reaffirm its position about Ukraine continuing to develop within Europe as an independent state and that no one will drag us back into some renewed unions," Mr. Ratushnyi said.

At the outset of the meeting at IRI, Mr. Bilas, who heads the Ukrainian Kozatstvo (Kozak movement), gave IRI President Lorne Cramer the group's "universal" (declaration) and asked that he present it to President Bush in their behalf. In the declaration, the group greets the new president and underscores the shared Ukrainian and American goals of freedom, independence and democracy.

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