Yushchenko returns to Ukraine; Cause of his illness remains unknown (10/17/04)

Yushchenko returns to Ukraine

Cause of his illness remains unknown

by Roman Woronowycz
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV - Leading doctors of the Rudolfinerhaus Clinic in Vienna, where presidential candidate Viktor Yushchenko has twice received treatment since September 9 for a mysterious ailment, expressed disagreement on October 11 over whether his symptoms could be construed as the result of biological poisoning.

Rudolfinerhaus Clinic President Michael Zimpfer on October 7 released a statement in which he explained that he and his chief doctor, Lothar Wicke, had officially requested help from bacteriological warfare experts to determine what had poisoned the Ukrainian presidential candidate. Subsequently, Dr. Wicke said he was forced to sign the request.

Mr. Yushchenko, looking worse than ever and far older than his 50 years, returned to Ukraine on October 11 from the Viennese hospital, where he had spent another 10 days and received additional treatment for the mysterious illness.

Mr. Yushchenko is in a dead heat with Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych in the race for the presidency of Ukraine, with two weeks left to election day.

Mr. Yushchenko and his team believe he was deliberately poisoned sometime before or on September 5 to sideline his candidacy and, perhaps, kill him. Government officials and supporters of Mr. Yanukovych have scoffed at such assertions and maintain that Mr. Yushchenko either suffered a viral infection or was poisoned by a spoiled meal.

"I have returned to Kyiv alive and well," noted Mr. Yushchenko at Boryspil Airport, where he asked that journalists not press him with questions. With his face heavily marked by blemishes, his nose a red bulb and his eyes slit shut by the swelling around them, his looks belied his words.

Mr. Yushchenko hit the campaign trail immediately upon his return with an appearance in Lviv earlier that day, where he was greeted by what some estimated to be nearly 100,000 supporters.

In Odesa three days later he told 10,000 energized voters that nothing would split Ukraine into east and west, no matter what the Yanukovych campaign team was warning could result with a Yushchenko presidency. He also apologized for his appearance.

"Please pardon the cosmetic defects. This is the price you pay in Ukrainian politics," Mr. Yushchenko said.

Dr. Zimpfer, president of Rudolfinerhaus, who flew into Kyiv with the presidential candidate from the Power to the People coalition, held a press conference after his arrival to shed some light on Mr. Yushchenko's illness.

Dr. Zimpfer continued to maintain that the doctors of Rudolfinerhaus could not yet confirm or deny the fact of a deliberate, premeditated poisoning. He said that the results of testing to determine whether an agent used in bacteriological warfare could have caused Mr. Yushchenko's condition would not be known for some three weeks.

Dr. Zimpfer explained that he had flown to Kyiv with the presidential candidate at the behest of the Austrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs to ensure that Ukrainian doctors understood how to give the presidential candidate the proper additional treatment required and avoid further problems in what has already became an international mess for Austria and the hospital.

The Rudolfinerhaus president arrived in Kyiv to find himself in the eye of another storm, this one caused by the hospital's chief physician, Dr. Wicke, who was also in Kyiv on what seemed to be a personal public relations tour. During an appearance on a talk show on one of the channels owned by supporters of Prime Minister Yanukovych, Dr. Wicke publicly disagreed with Rudolfinerhaus Clinic doctors on the source of Mr. Yushchenko's ailments, which included pancreatitis, colitis and facial paralysis.

Dr. Wicke told noted Russian journalist Dmytrii Kisiliev, who has a news program on Ukraine's ICTV, that he had ruled out the possibility that Mr. Yushchenko was poisoned by means of a bacteriological agent. Dr. Wicke said he was forced to sign the letter in support of a request from Rudolfinerhaus to have bacteriological warfare experts analyze tests done on Mr. Yushchenko.

Dr. Wicke claimed also that National Deputies Petro Poroshenko and Yevhen Chervonenko, both of whom are very close to the presidential candidate and have paid for his hospital stays, had harassed him. Dr. Wicke pointed out that he had received a threatening phone call and had subsequently requested bodyguards.

Dr. Wicke, whose specialty is radiology and not bacteriology or toxicology, cast doubt on the competency of the presidential candidate's attending physician, Mykola Korpan. He criticized Dr. Korpan's qualifications and questioned whether he had a license to practice medicine in Austria and whether he had passed the proper exams to present himself as a professor as well as a doctor.

Dr. Zimpfer responded to Dr. Wicke's allegations in a second press conference, held on October 11, in which he pointed out that no one had pressured the chief physician for his signature on the document requesting aid from bacteriological warfare experts, inasmuch as it wasn't needed since he, as president of Rudolfinerhaus, had full authority to make the request alone.

"I put no pressure on Dr. Wicke. I wouldn't even know how to do that," explained Dr. Zimpfer, reported Ukraina Moloda.

Dr. Zimpfer also pointed out that his chief doctor was bound by hospital rules to speak in line with the diagnosis made by the lead doctor in a case, in this instance Dr. Korpan, and had no right to propose a varying diagnosis or even opinion. Dr. Zimpfer said he put his full trust in the professionalism of the Ukrainian doctor, UNIAN reported.

In another matter, Dr. Zimpfer stressed that Ukraine's Procurator General Hennadii Vasyliev had never contacted Rudolfinerhaus or its doctors, adding that if Ukraine's chief law enforcement official would have done so someone would have met with him. Mr. Vasyliev, who had traveled to Vienna to investigate the poisoning allegations, said after his return that he was denied meetings with hospital officials and that Mr. Yushchenko's colleagues had blocked all information-gathering attempts.

UNIAN also reported that National Deputy Poroshenko said he had never tried to purposely intimidate Dr. Wicke and had never met with him without other doctors or lawyers present.

Meanwhile, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), which Mr. Yushchenko has alleged is responsible for his poisoning, stated on October 11 that it never had bacteriological weapons.

"Neither the Ukrainian SSR nor Ukraine today has ever had or does have, and has never produced or does produce, or spread any biological weapons," stated SBU Deputy Director Ihor Dryzhachnyi.

Mr. Dryzhachnyi also stated that those who accuse the SBU of bacteriologically poisoning Mr. Yushchenko "do not understand what a biological weapon is."

He added, "It cannot be used against only one person and it cannot be used without protection. A biological weapon is a virus spreading without control."

Mr. Dryzhachnyi did not say whether Ukraine simply had bacteriological agents at its disposal that might be directly injected into a person, but noted that the country had signed international conventions that prohibit the proliferation of biological weapons.

The SBU official also denied that it had ordered the surveillance of Verkhovna Rada Chairman Volodymyr Lytvyn, who claimed on October 8 that he and members of his family, including his children, were being secretly watched.

Mr. Lytvyn, who has attempted to stay determinedly neutral as the pre-election battle between the two top contenders has become ever more brutal, also said that an international team of doctors should examine Mr. Yushchenko.

"It is necessary to request the European community, a number of countries, particularly the presidents of Poland and Lithuania, to call an international meeting of doctors to examine Yushchenko's state of health," stated Mr. Lytvyn.

Also on October 8, Austrian police took under their control Mr. Yushchenko's medical documents from Rudolfinerhaus, including the results of various tests, reported Interfax.

The same day, Ukraine's President Leonid Kuchma ordered that all law enforcement and health ministries of the Ukrainian government undertake a thorough investigation into the possibility of a biological poisoning of the presidential candidate and demanded that a report be produced within two weeks. He ordered the Foreign affairs and Health ministries to obtain cooperation from international organizations for "thorough assistance in investigating the circumstances of presidential candidate Viktor Yushchenko's illness," explained Vasyl Baziv, deputy chief of staff in the Kuchma administration.

State Department comments on Ukraine's presidential election

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