FACES AND PLACES: Is Ukraine Europe's black hole? (04/29/01)

FACES AND PLACES

by Myron B. Kuropas

Is Ukraine Europe's black hole?

According to one press report published here in Chicago, Condeleeza Rice, President George W. Bush's national security adviser, recently called Ukraine "the black hole of Europe."

If true, it was a politically dumb statement to make for someone still associated with the "Chicken Kiev" fiasco of the first President George Bush. Realistically, however, she may have been right.

"No country today has a more sullied reputation than Ukraine's," writes Freedom House president Adrian Karatnycky in the May/June issue of Foreign Affairs. "After 10 years of independence, this former Soviet republic is rated as among the world's most corrupt nations by Transparency International." Sad. Very sad.

Viktor Yuschenko remains Ukraine's present hope for the future. President Leonid Kuchma doesn't like him, however. There are many reasons: the prime minister is popular among Ukrainians yearning for a better life; he is favored by the United States and the West; he is a trusted and effective leader; he appears incorruptible. And he doesn't suck up to the petty, vindictive, authoritarian mediocrity that is Mr. Kuchma.

The mollusk-minded Ukrainian Parliament doesn't like Mr. Yuschenko either. Too honest. He represents a grave danger to Ukraine's rapacious oligarchs and various pro-Russian parties loyal to President Kuchma. They mustered 283 deputies to pass a resolution critical of Mr. Yuschenko. The oligarchs are especially unhappy because the prime minister rebuffed their efforts to form a "coalition government" under their direct dominion. Leading the dump Yuschenko cabal were 112 Communist deputies and their fellow travelers in the Labor Ukraine Party (45 deputies), the Social Democratic Party (34 deputies) the Democratic Union faction (30 deputies) and Yabluko (14 deputies). Most hail from eastern Ukraine.

Although Ukraine's economy under Prime Minister Yuschenko has improved substantially (permitting the payment of overdue pensions), Ukraine's GDP remains a mere $642 per head, a miserable showing compared to Russia's $1,740, Poland's $4,660, Slovakia's $4,660, Egypt's $1,430 and Bulgaria's $1,890. The Kyiv Post recently reported that the World Bank "has added Ukraine to the group of the world's poorest countries."

President Kuchma, meanwhile, continues to apply Soviet-style pressure to silence his opponents. According to The Economist, rectors of various Lviv institutions of higher learning were ordered to stifle recent student protests against the president. Ivan Vakarchuk, rector of Lviv University, refused, arguing that the country should be pleased that its young people have a public spirit. "Now his university faces a tax investigation - a well-used weapon in the authorities arsenal."

The Rev. Borys Gudziak, reactor of the independent Ukrainian Catholic Lviv Theological Academy and an American citizen, was asked by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), to inform on his student protesters. When he refused, the SBU hinted that an audit may be in order to determine the extent of the seminary's foreign donations. The Economist reported that a television news broadcast later declared that "rectors who are American nationals are being directly threatened with deportation."

Early in March, President Kuchma dumped governors in the Lviv and Zaporozhia oblasts for insufficient loyalty. On March 30 he appealed to Ukraine's business leaders (read oligarchs/nomenklatura types), to support him during the present crisis. They will, of course, because non-compliance means tax audits, property surveys, etc.

The independent media has been effectively muzzled. According to a recent article by Mykola Ryabchuk, "virtually all Ukrainian journalists who were murdered, beaten, wounded, all who suddenly disappeared or committed 'suicide,' used to practice investigative reporting: all of them traced very concrete political and economic affairs in which the top Ukrainian officials and their friends - 'oligarchs' - were involved."

More recently, Ukraine's National Television and Radio Broadcasting Council revoked the frequency of the independent station Radio Kontinent for allegedly failing to repay a bank loan of some $300,000. The murdered journalist Heorhii Gongadze once worked for the station, which also relayed such Western broadcasts as Voice of America and the BBC.

Mr. Kuchma is outraged that the United States granted asylum to Myroslava Gongadze, widow of Mr. Gongadze, and Mykola Melnychenko, the man who smuggled out secret audiotapes that purportedly link the president to the death of the journalist. Charging the U.S. with trying to conceal the truth in the political scandal surrounding the Kuchma administration, Ukraine's state prosecutor is demanding Melnychenko's immediate extradition, reports the Kyiv Post.

In order to save his skin, President Kuchma is snuggling ever closer to Russia's President Vladimir Putin. Mr. Kuchma recently dismissed a pro-Western foreign affairs minister, Borys Tarasyuk, replacing him with Anatolii Zlenko, a move applauded by Moscow. Mr. Kuchma's recent "garage sale" permitted Russia to acquire Ukrainian oil refineries, aluminum plants, dairies, banks and the broadcast media. The Putin/Kuchma summit of last February produced protocols increasing Ukraine's dependence on Russian energy resources, as well as economic cooperation through joint military, aerospace and industrial production. Several other protocols remain a secret. According to the Financial Times, Mr. Kuchma has blamed "certain non-Ukrainian forces (read the U.S.) not pleased with Ukraine's closer links to Russia" for "masterminding a well-prepared campaign" to discredit him.

The United States should not, cannot, remain indifferent. Weak, bowed, corrupt and miserably governed as it is, Ukraine remains the world's best hope against a resurgent, expansionist Russia. Things may be bad, but there's hope. As Mr. Karatnycky points out, "public outrage is contributing to the emergence of a potentially crucial new factor in Ukraine's political life: a broad coalition committed to honest government."

President Woodrow Wilson turned his back on Ukraine in 1918 because he was surrounded by Russophile advisers who couldn't imagine Russia without Ukraine. Thus was born the USSR. Some 70 years later the first President Bush, surrounded by dolts with similar views, openly urged Ukraine to submit to Russia's will. The younger Bush must not repeat his father's blunder.

Myron Kuropas' e-mail address is: mbkuropas@compuserve.com.

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