Quotable notes
"I personally participated in all the consultations undertaken by the president during this crisis. As far as this process was under strong public scrutiny and all the details became well-known to the mass media and the whole society, I would limit myself only to drawing a conclusion.
"And my conclusion is that these events are evidence of democracy, a part of a democratic process in my country. This is the main substance of what happened. In analyzing this process one should not be lost in details. Then one will see the whole forest - not just the trees.
"I regret that yesterday's brothers in arms, who had gone through extremely difficult years of fighting for democracy, follow different paths today. But this is what we mean by democracy - the right of people to choose freely their way and to follow it without fear to be punished for their political views.
"There is no tragedy here - even if we are perfectly aware that unity among national-democratic forces is better for the country and internal skirmish is not."
- Acting Minister of Foreign Affairs Borys Tarasyuk, speaking on September 19 in Washington at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, as reported by the Action Ukraine Report.
"We continue to believe the Ukrainian government is headed in the right direction. ...
"The job we [the United States] have is to be a good friend of Ukraine and support the reforms and to encourage private investment and have them work with us on the security issues that are so important for the world."
- U.S. Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns, commenting on September 15 at the United Nations, where President Viktor Yushchenko met with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, as reported by the Associated Press and the Reuters news service.
"If this is not a political crisis and the collapse of the 'Orange project,' I don't know what else would represent a similar collapse."
- Petro Symonenko, leader of the Communist Party of Ukraine, as quoted by the RIA Novosti news service on September 16.
Copyright © The Ukrainian Weekly, September 25, 2005, No. 39, Vol. LXXIII
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