UKL444 - Chair of Ukrainian Studies

compiled by Dominique Arel
Chair of Ukrainian Studies, U of Ottawa
www.ukrainianstudies.uottawa.ca
1 June 2010
#444
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**For regular postings from the Chair of Ukrainian Studies and UKL, join the Chair of
Ukrainian Studies page on Facebook by clicking the “like” option –DA**
1-Doctoral Scholarships on Contemporary Ukraine at the University of Ottawa
2-Danyliw Seminar 2010 Call for Papers, Chair of Ukrainian Studies (June 15
deadline)
3-New Book: Stephen Velychenko, State Building in Revolutionary Ukraine
4-Ukrainian Canadian Research and Documentation Centre: Orest Zakydalsky, New
Project on World War II in Ukraine
5-The Victor Pinchuk Foundation: Graduate Studies Grant for Ukrainian Citizens
6-Ukraine Business Online: In Memory of Ilko Kucheriv
7-Kyiv Post: Adrian Karatnycky, Fear and Loathing on the Post-Campaign Trail
8-Kyiv Post: Interview with James Sherr, “Yanukovych Has Miscalculated”
9-Den’: James Sherr on the Black Sea Fleet Agreement, the EU etc. [English original]
10-Korrespondent: Ukraïna/Ukraina [UKL translation]
11-RFE/RL: Russia Poised To Leapfrog Ukraine, Moldova In EU Visa Drive
12-AAUS List: An Exchange on University Entrance Exams in Ukraine
13-Boris Guziak: SBU Visit at the Ukrainian Catholic University
14-Kyiv Mohyla Academy President Supports Ukrainian Catholic University
15-Komsomol’skaia pravda Ukraïna: Dmytro Tabachnyk on the Holodomor
16-NYR Blog: Tim Snyder, Springtime for Stalin
17-Stephen Velychenko: On Israel 1948 and the OUN-Bandera Debate
18-Kyiv Post: In Lviv, Jewish Prayers Over Nazi Graves
19-OSCE Yearbook 2010: Oleh Protsyk, Ukraine After The Elections
**Thanks to Robert DeLossa, Derek Fraser, Adrian Karatnycky, Zenia Kish,
Oleksandr Melnyk, Bohdan A Oryshkevich, Wasyl (Bill) Pawlowsky, Blair Ruble
(Kennan Institute), Roman Senkus, James Sherr, Oxana Shevel, Stephen
Velychenko, Anya Yablonska, Orest Zakydalsky, and Roman Zurba **

#1
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Doctoral Scholarships on Contemporary Ukraine at the University of Ottawa
The Chair of Ukrainian Studies at the University of Ottawa, the only research unit
outside of Ukraine predominantly devoted to the study of contemporary Ukraine, is
pleased to announce the establishment of the Drs. Peter and Doris Kule Doctoral
Scholarships on Contemporary Ukraine. The Scholarships will consist of an annual
award of $20,000, plus all tuition, for a maximum of four years.
The Scholarships were made possibe by a generous donation of $500,000 by the
Kule family, matched by the University of Ottawa. Drs. Peter and Doris Kule, from
Edmonton, have endowed several chairs and research centres in Canada, and their
exceptional contributions to education, predominantly in Ukrainian Studies, has
recently been celebrated in the book Champions of Philanthrophy: Peter and Doris
Kule and their Endowments.
University of Ottawa President Allan Rock officially announced the establishment of
the Kule Doctoral Scholarships on May 20, 2010 at the Drs. Peter and Doris Kule
Recognition Event at the University of Ottawa. Present for the occasion were guests
from the University of Alberta and the Sheptytsky Institute at Saint Paul University,
past recipients of the Kules’ generosity.
Students interested in applying for the Scholarships for the academic year 2011-
2012 are invited to contact Dominique Arel, Chairholder, Chair of Ukrainian Studies,
at darel@uottawa.ca. Details regarding the application procedure will be announced
in September 2010.
For regular announcements from the Chair of Ukrainian Studies, please check the
Chair’s website at www.ukrainianstudies.uottawa.ca and join the Chair Facebook
page.
#2
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Sixth Annual Danyliw Research Seminar on Contemporary Ukraine
Chair of Ukrainian Studies, University of Ottawa, 28-30 October 2010
CALL FOR PAPER PROPOSALS
The Chair of Ukrainian Studies, with the support of the Wolodymyr George Danyliw
Foundation, will be holding its Sixth Annual Danyliw Research Seminar on
Contemporary Ukraine at the University of Ottawa on 28-30 October 2009. The
Seminar will feature research papers, touching on Ukraine, from the disciplines of
political science, history, anthropology (ethnology), sociology, economics, religious
studies, demography, geography, literature, cinema, folklore and other fields of
social science and humanities. Papers with a theoretical and comparative focus are
particularly solicited.
The Seminar is open to all social science and humanities research topics, including
topics in history and literature, on topics that include Ukraine-Russia relations,
Ukraine and the European Union, electoral politics, political regime and practices,

constitutional politics, national identity, religion and society, gender, language, and
more.
In addition, two of its sections will feature special themes:
The first will pursue the Seminar’s ongoing exploration of the politics of memory,
with papers touching on the Famine (Holodomor), the Holocaust (Shoah), the
purges, deportations, forced labor and other cases of mass violence, committed on
the territory of what is today Ukraine, in the 1930s, during World War II and the
immediate post-War period, involving, among others, the NKVD, German military
and paramilitary forces, the Soviet Army, Soviet partisans, the OUN, the UPA, and
the Polish Home Army, police, and military forces. We are inviting paper proposals
based on current research on social and political history for this period and/or on an
analysis of contemporary political issues raised by the memorialization of these
events, and are expanding the scope of social science and historical research to the
representation of memory in literature, cinema, and the arts more generally.
The second theme will continue our presentation of new research on the political
economy of Ukraine, particularly as it relates to the informal economy and informal
politics, trans-border exchange and other practices, internal and international
migration, economic “clans”, corruption, oil and gas politics, the impact of global
economic factors, the rule of law, rural political economy and related topics.
Scholars and doctoral students are invited to submit a 1000 word paper proposal and
a 250 word biographical statement, by email attachment, to Dominique Arel, Chair of
Ukrainian Studies, at darel@uottawa.ca AND chairukr@gmail.com. Please also
include your full coordinates (institutional affiliation, preferred postal address, email,
phone) and indicate your latest publication (or, in the case of doctoral applicants, the
year when you entered a doctoral program, the [provisional] title of your dissertation
and year of expected completion).
The proposal deadline is 15 June 2010. To be eligible, papers must not have been
accepted for publication by the time of the Seminar. The Chair will cover the
expenses of participants, including discussants, to the Seminar. An international
selection committee will review the proposals and notify applicants shortly after the
deadline.
The aim of the Seminar is to provide a unique forum for researchers from Canada,
Ukraine, the United States, Europe and elsewhere to engage in fruitful interdisciplinary
dialogue, disseminate cutting-edge research papers on the Chair web
site, encourage publications in various outlets, and stimulate collaborative research
projects. Papers of the first four Annual Danyliw Research Seminars in Contemporary
Ukrainian Studies can be downloaded at www.ukrainianstudies.uottawa.ca. The
Seminar adopts the format of a Workshop, where each presentation is followed by
group discussion, and is open to the public.
The Seminar is made possible by the commitment of the Wolodymyr George Danyliw
Foundation to the pursuit of excellence in the study of contemporary Ukraine.

#3
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A New Project on World War II in Ukraine
3 May 2010
The Ukrainian Canadian Research and Documentation Centre (UCRDC), in
partnership with the Ukrainian Jewish Encounter Initiative and the Judaica Institute
in Kyiv Ukraine, is launching a new project on World War II in Ukraine. The goal of
this project is to identify and recognize Ukrainians who took great personal risks in
hiding or otherwise helping Jews to survive during the horrific years of World War II.
Recognizing the actions of such individuals would make salient their personal
heroism, but also the existence of positive interaction and relations between
Christian and Jewish Ukrainians even during a period of deep crisis and pervasive
violence.
This project was initiated by Leonid Finberg of the Judaica Institute in Kyiv, and has
the support of the Ukrainian Jewish Encounter Initiative, a privately organized,
multinational initiative whose goal is to deepen scholarly and broader public interest
in the breadth, complexity and diversity of Ukrainian-Jewish relations, with a view to
the future. Canadians, notably Mr. James Temerty, are playing an important role in
the development and leadership of this initiative.
The Ukrainian Canadian Research & Documentation Centre (UCRDC), founded in
1983, is a non-profit, non-governmental community organization that collects,
catalogues, and preserves material documenting Ukrainian history. UCRDC produces
documentary films, prepares educational materials, and sponsors lectures,
conferences and exhibits on various topics related to Ukrainian issues. The UCRDC
functions as a resource centre which holds an archive, a library, oral histories (both
in audio and video format), photographs, memoirs, and personal archives.
This new project will build on existing research and cases that have already been
documented in Ukraine, at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, and at the Shoah Foundation in
Los Angeles, but will also conduct research to identify cases not known or publicized
to date. The UCRDC will focus on identifying and documenting cases that have a
Canadian connection. The UCRDC appeals to the community to provide any
information that might be helpful in identifying new cases – in particular, suggestions
regarding people who should be interviewed with connection with their own
experience or that of a family member. If can provide any information or would like
more information about this project, please contact
Orest Zakydalsky, Researcher
Ukrainian Canadian Research and Documentation Centre
620 Spadina Ave.
Toronto, ON
M5S 2H4
Email – orestzak@gmail.com
Tel – 416-966-1819 (office), 647-887-0662 (mobile)
Once a number of significant cases have been documented, the Ukrainian Jewish
Encounter Initiative, the Judaica Institute and the UCRDC will collaboratively
organize events to raise awareness about these exceptional people and those saved
by them.

#4
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State Building in Revolutionary Ukraine: A Comparative Study of
Governments and Bureaucrats, 1917-1922
by Stephen Velychenko
University of Toronto Press
Cloth
ISBN 9781442641327
416 Pages 4 Images
Published May 2009
$75.00
State Building in Revolutionary Ukraine examines six attempts to create
governments on Ukrainian territories between 1917 and 1922. Focusing on how
political leaders formed and staffed administrations, this study shows that in Ukraine
during this time, there was an available pool of able administrators sufficiently
competent in Ukrainian to work as bureaucrats in the independent national
governments. These people could sometimes implement policies, a significant
accomplishment in light of the upheavals of the time.
Stephen Velychenko compares Ukrainian efforts to create an independent national
government with the analogous successful efforts made in Russia, Poland, Ireland
and Czechoslovakia. He questions the notion that Ukrainian attempts at national
independence failed because its society was 'incomplete' and its leaders unable to
organize an effective administration. Pointing out that Bolshevik administrations at
the time were no more effective in implementing policies than their rivals,
Velychenko argues that more effective governance was not one of the reasons for
the Russian Bolshevik victory in Ukraine.
#5
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The Victor Pinchuk Foundation
www.worldwidestudies.org
Application deadline: March-June 2010
The WorldWideStudies grant supports Ukrainian citizens beginning a Master’s degree
program in the fall of 2010 in one of the world’s 200 best universities according to
the QS-Times Higher Education review. The priority fields of studies for 2010-2011
are: agricultural studies, environmental studies, law and public administration.
However, applicants in other fields may also submit their application to be
considered after the priority pool of applicants. Grants shall be used primarily to
cover university tuition, books and medical insurance. The amount is determined for
each individual case based on needs and merit. On average, grants shall cover up to
60% of the total amount required (maximum $50,000 for 1-2 years of study).

#6
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In Memory of Ilko Kucheriv
by Vasyl (Bill) Pawlowsky, Consultant
Ukraine Business Online, 31 May 2010
"I believe that people can and should change the world for the better.” – Ilko
Kucheriv, August 1, 1955 - May 29, 2010.
[Editor’s Note: Immediately upon learning of the death of Ilko Kucheriv, we called
one of his oldest friends and asked that friend, Vasyl Pawlowsky, if he would be kind
enough to pen an appropriate obituary. We know this was a painful exercise for
Vasyl and we appreciate his efforts. Please note that Vasyl has included at the end of
the obituary a note regarding funeral arrangements on June 1, 2010.]
On May 29, 2010, Ukraine and all those who cared about making the world a better
and democratic place lost a good friend, when the life of Ilko Kucheriv, the Director
of Kyiv-based Democratic Initiatives Foundations, came to an end. It was an end
that so many saw coming, while at the same time they all tried, in every way
humanly possible, to extend the life of a man, father and friend who had so many
plans, for a man who was 55 years young.
On May 15, I received an e-mail from my good friend and colleague Ilko Kucheriv
that he dictated to his wife.
“Hello, Bill. Thank you for your caring and troubles. Honestly, this little surprise has
substantially changed my life and priorities. I remain a cocksure optimist and am
preparing to fight for my life with all my strength.’
Two days earlier a friend had called me from Kyiv to inform me that the surprise Ilko
referred to was lung cancer a diagnosis he had received at the beginning of the
month of May. The troubles Ilko referred to were my effort to rally his friends and
acquaintances worldwide to help him in his battle of a lifetime.
The attitude and conviction I felt in his words were one hundred percent Ilko, the
Ilko that many in Ukraine’s NGO community had gotten to know over they years.
While Ilko had graduated from Shevchenko University with a degree in biology
following in the footsteps of his other family members, the events that transpired in
the mid to late 1980s completely changed the direction of his life.
He became involved in the dissident movement in the mid to late 1980s and as part
of that he made frequent train runs to the Baltic countries in order to print
publications in Ukrainian that were not sanctioned by the authorities. He was on the
organizing committee for the first meeting of the People’s Movement of Ukraine (for
reconstruction) Rukh in 1989, and worked in that organization’s secretariat from
1898-1990 in 1992 under the encouragement of Vyacheslav Chornovil he started the
Democratic Initiatives center, which later became a Foundation in 1996. Of all the
people who would have crossed paths with Ilko in those early years, or those who
worked with him or got to know him through the Democratic Initiatives Foundation,
be they sociologists, NGO activists, journalists or simply friends, they all knew or
quickly came to know one thing. Ilko was a man of conviction and vision and was
one of the very few in Ukraine who did not sell out to the politicos in the country. He

was tireless, professional and devoted to everything he tackled in order to make the
world and his country a better place. In order to do this he used sociology and public
opinion. He wanted the people leading the country to know what the people who
were following thought, and from 1993 until the very end, he was editor of “Political
Portrait of Ukraine” a bulletin that came out as number 37-38 at the end of last year.
Ilko was a pioneer in so many ways. I met him in Kyiv in the spring of 1999 and it
was not long before he was asking me as a Canadian and native speaker of the
English language to help him go over an funding agreement he had received from a
major international donor to finance the Exit Poll his organization was going to
conduct during the Presidential elections at the end of October of that year. This was
only the second time Ukraine had ever had Exit Polls, the first were organized and
conducted by Ilko and his organization during the Parliamentary Elections in 1998. In
the international community, the word Exit Poll became synonymous with Ilko
Kucheriv.
Ilko was a strong advocate on importing foreign know-how for the cause of
improving Ukraine. Over the nearly eleven years that followed I became a good
friend of not only Ilko’s but also of his co-workers in acquiring the required resources
to carry out his projects and working towards the goals and objectives he had set
together with his colleagues. On many occasions, we traveled together as part of his
vision of gathering the experiences of Ukraine’s neighboring countries, Slovakia and
Poland and partnering with leading organizations in those countries in order to learn
from the very best.
Ilko was a man who was serious and had not problems in using unusual methods in
order to draw society’s attention to issues that are important to him and to Ukraine.
Being a strong advocate of Ukraine becoming a member of the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization he made a statement that caught the country’s eye, well at least it
caught the eye of the Ukrainian media. During NATO’s Secretary General Lord
Robertson’s one-day visit to Kyiv on October 20, 2003 Ilko presented Robertson with
his personal application to become a member of NATO. He clearly had a sense of
humor and this was true to the very end of his life.
In March of 2004, Ilko and I were on our way to Bratislava on business. Given NATO
by this time had a new Secretary General he said to me as our plane came into to
land, “Bill, you have to make out a new application for me to present to the new
Secretary General, he will be at a Minster’s conference this week.” I agreed that it
was a good idea and would turns heads, and he agreed that we would have to see if
would at all be possible. During one of those days in mid March from up on the hill of
Bratislava’s Castle Ilko and I planned an exit poll that would be as he dubbed it “a
litmus test for democracy in Ukraine”. It was an exit poll in the highly contested
mayoral elections in the Transcarpathian town of Mukachevo. A month later Ilko’s
“litmus test” proved to be highly acidic and a great deal of what Ilko had foreseen
and witnessed, played itself out during the second round of presidential elections in
November of 2004. The instrument which Ilko had introduced to Ukraine, the exit
poll, laid credence to electoral fraud which led to be what the world knows as the
Orange Revolution.
Ilko was well traveled, well spoken and well liked by those who got to know him.
While much of his travel abroad, like his projects, was funded by international donor
organizations he always tried to find a manner in which he could share his
experience with his family: his wife Iryna and daughters Olesia and Bohdanka.

One such journey was when he had obtained a Regan-Fascell Democracy Fellowship
and traveled to Washington, DC, as he prepared for his departure he said to me, “I
have to make sure that I have my family come and spend some time with me and
get to see things.” This attitude of travel did not stop with that trip. As I was
preparing for my departure from Ukraine last summer, Ilko was planning a trip for
his family through Europe by car. He was an avid driver, after getting his driver’s
license late in life and also had to meet with colleagues in Bratislava for a project so
he figured, why not make a family trip out it.
Over the last number of years, I had consulted for Ilko and his organization, and he
would often call me up on a Friday and say, “Bill, how about I pick you tomorrow
morning. The family is up at the dacha and we can join them. A swim, the fresh air,
it will help you think better, and we can put in a few hours of work on the project!”
The average Ukrainian probably never heard of Ilko Kucheriv but anyone who had
ever met him, talked with him, asked him for his opinion or advice knew that he was
passionate about what he did, and he was passionate for one single reason. He
wanted to make Ukraine and the world a better place, not just for himself, but also
for everyone.
Two weeks after I had received Ilko’s first little communiqué of thanks, the same
headstrong and positive Ilko Kucheriv made announcement via his organization’s
website. In it, he stated that he remains optimistic and shared with readers how he
had come to know of his condition, his recent trip to Indonesia for a conference that
I called beautiful and necessary. That conference was the Sixth Assembly of the
World Movement of Democracy and he stated he wanted to share the address of
President of Indonesia, the Honorable Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, with his Ukrainian
colleagues and he would publish the Ukrainian version soon. He closed with: “I feel
colossal support from people. They call me and write to me from Ukraine, Europe
and the United States…I am thankful to everyone. It is very important to me. None
of us knows how much time we have. Unconditionally, there was an overestimation
of all values and a personal value of time. I want to use this time in the most
effective and thought out way possible. I began to practice yoga like I did in the
1980s before Chornobyl, I go to church, I think about my work and my organization
and I believe, believe that people can and should change the world for the better. I
remain with you, and I am sincerely thankful. Ilko Kucheriv”.
Upon hearing the news of Ilko’s passing I immediately felt a loss. Incredibly the
feeling was one that I can only equate to the loss of my father that same year Ilko
completed his university studies over thirty years ago. Those who knew Ilko cried
out with one voice that Saturday evening, whether through statements on the
support page set up on Facebook, in e-mails or in long, tearful and necessary
telephone conversations of mourning.
I, together with everyone else who knew Ilko Kucheiv, will miss him immensely. May
the earth of your dear country Ukraine cradle you gently and may your soul and
spirit always be nearby to guide those who want the world to be a better place.

#7
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Fear and Loathing on the Post-Campaign Trail
by Adrian Karatnycky
Kyiv Post, 27 May 2010
Adrian Karatnycky, senior scholar with the Atlantic Council of the United States, is
the former president of U.S.-based Freedom House non-governmental organization.
Reading the Kyiv Post and many of Ukraine’s other newsweeklies, one gets the
impression that a measure of hysteria has seized normally sober-minded and serious
analysts. Respected analysts speak in dire terms of a wholesale sellout of Ukraine to
Russia and of the consolidation of dictatorship.
One excellent U.S. scholar of Ukrainian affairs, usually a voice of probity and a good
friend, has even gone so far as to suggest that Ukraine is hurtling toward
dictatorship and even invoked echoes of the Nazi (!!) consolidation of power.
He wrote: “Having succeeded in ‘coordinating’ government within two months—the
term the Nazis used for Hitler’s identical feat in 1933 was “Gleichschaltung”—[Victor]
Yanukovych and his band of dons are on a roll.
Having openly embraced dictatorship, they cannot retreat. They must now
consolidate their power, eliminate all opposition, and transform Ukraine into the
Donbas, both because their legitimacy depends on it and because anything less than
complete success for a dictator spells defeat.”
The author even compiled a list of individuals slated for “disappearance,” i.e. political
assassination. And many well-regarded analysts in Ukraine have adopted a similarly
hysterical tone, predicting that within weeks we will see the dismantling of Ukraine’s
sovereignty and fragile democracy.
In short, there has been a tsunami of articles suggesting Ukraine is about to become
a vassal of Russia led by an unchecked tyrant who has seized control of most media
content.
The reality, in my view, is somewhat different. During my most recent visit to Kyiv, I
saw what could only be described as “dissident day” on Ukraine’s television with
Yulia Tymoshenko shuttling between and appearing for several hours on the two
highest rated news talk shows, those of Evgeniy Kiselyov and Savik Shuster.
Rumors that independent Channel 5 being was to be sold under pressure to progovernment
owners were utterly refuted by its proprietor Petro Poroshenko.
Moreover, claims that media discussion of the Holodomor were being suppressed by
the Yanukovych team were undermined by the reality of Ukraine’s President and his
Russian counterpart laying a wreath at the memorial to the victims of the
Holodomor, which was shown prominently by all Ukraine’s main news channels.
When Yanukovych was struck by a memorial wreath during the recent Russo-
Ukrainian presidential summit, his zealous staff tried to prevent the incident from
being broadcast. But this, too, was remarkably similar to the actions of Yulia
Tymoshenko’s earnest staff when she uttered the phrase “all is lost” during a taping
of an Eastertime 2009 address to the public. The end result in both cases was the

same: “vsyo propalo” and the “fierce firs” incident in the end were all over television
and the internet for the amusement of all.
The television journalists of Channels 1+1 and STB, as well as the Stop Censorship!
movement, are to be commended for their open letters and actions against
censorship, however, many of the examples of censorship and politicized content
management they cited also occurred when Viktor Yushchenko and Yulia
Tymosehnko were in power. In short, these public protests show concern about the
phenomenon of ownership intrusion into news content and commentaries, i.e. a
longstanding practice (occasionally also on view in the United States – think New
York Times and Fox News) and not a consequence of Yanukovych’s accession to
power.
So, too, have rumors of Ukraine’s political death been exaggerated. Whatever one’s
opinions of the “gas for fleet” tradeoff, the commentary on growing Russia-Ukraine
cooperation that preceded the summit hosted by Yanukovych and Russian President
Dmitry Medvedev suggested Russia was taking over Ukraine’s gas, nuclear energy,
and aerospace industries, and surrendering the island of Tuzla to Russia control.
Instead, the main accomplishment of the summit was agreement on the demarcation
of the land borders of Ukraine, an accomplishment that had eluded three earlier
presidents.
Ukraine’s state institutions, the actions of Ukraine’s leaders, and the foreign policy
course of the country is only beginning to take shape. And that final shape is far
from determined. The current ruling elite consists of both reformers and retrogrades;
seasoned defenders of the national interest and those eager to dance to the
Kremlin’s leitmotiv.
This is why there is a far more restrained and nuanced view of developments in
European capitals, in Washington, and on the editorial and news pages of the
international media.
What, then, explains this explosion of fear and loathing on the part of Ukraine’s
media?
First, with a few exceptions, the current ruling elite in the main is the first without
direct experience of participation in the early struggles for Ukraine’s statehood and
sovereignty. Many of them have a tough time articulating a detailed case for why
Ukraine should be a state distinct from Russia.
Second, few in the current ruling elite had a track record of engagement in human
rights and civil liberties struggles.
Third, the selection of the rapier-witted Ukrainophobe Dmytro Tabachnyk as
education minister has turned the vast majority of the intelligentsia against the
government. Efforts to undo the inroads Ukraine’s language and cultural output have
made in education, government, and the marketplace of ideas are also calling forth a
hostile reaction. But such a justifiably hostile reaction should not deter scholars and
analysts from taking a more nuanced view of developments in the economic, foreign
policy, and civil liberties spheres.
Fourth, the rapidity and efficiency with which the president has shaped an effective
team and began implementing his agenda has caught people unawares. But this is
what happens in every democracy where executive and legislative powers are

consolidated. Certainly, this was the case 18 months ago in the U.S. when President
Barack Obama took power.
Readers should not misunderstand me. Legitimate concerns about some
developments in Ukraine are not without some foundation and do bear careful
watching.
Ukraine’s justice system, in particular its judges are easily influenced by corruption
and political pressure. Ukraine’s prosecutorial administration is oftentimes motivated
more by the desire to please those in power than by the pursuit of blind justice.
There is also is reason to be concerned by a proliferation of Russian proposals for
joint economic ventures that – if not balanced with interest and proposals from North
American, European, and Asian investors – can make Ukraine far more dependent on
Russia.
There is also a proliferation of crude behavior by zealous security service operatives,
who need to be reined and disciplined in by the president, government and
parliament. And there was the disgraceful fracas in the Ukrainian parliament in which
deputies from both opposition and majority engaged in vandalism and/or violence.
Deputies from both sides of the aisle should be held responsible for such
reprehensible behavior.
All these problems and issues call for vigorous discussion and civic engagement.
There are real problems and challenges in the areas of press freedom, foreign policy,
the economy, and the justice system. But this is precisely why analysts, journalists,
and public intellectuals have a moral responsibility to give a balanced and truthful
picture of the state of Ukraine and not fall prey to exaggeration.
Ukraine’s political discourse has been coarsened in recent years, primarily by the
tone set by its political elites. It is the responsibility of the media and of civic groups
not to join in this miserable and fruitless rancor.
#8
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James Sherr: “Yanukovych Has Miscalculated”
by Yuriy Onyshkiv
Kyiv Post, 30 May 2010
Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych has moved the nation’s foreign policy swiftly
in the pro-Russian direction since his Feb. 25 inauguration. He’s criticized the Hero of
Ukraine award that his predecessor, Viktor Yushchenko, bestowed on early 20th
century nationalist leader Stepan Bandera. He’s signed the Kharkiv accords, letting
the Russian Black Sea Fleet stay in Sevastopol until at least 2042. And Yanukovych
has formally renounced the nation’s ambitions to join the NATO military alliance.
Other blockbuster deals joining the nation’s energy, aviation and other industrial
sectors are believed to be in the works.
The breakneck pace has caught the West, which had grown weary of Ukraine’s
halting march towards democracy, flat-footed.
James Sherr, head of the Russian and Eurasian program at London-based Chatham
House, is a key Western expert on Ukraine and Russia. In a recent interview, Sherr

said the West is too bureaucratic and to diverse to respond so quickly to the Ukraine-
Russia rapprochement. But he explains why Yanukovych miscalculated with
concessions to Russia. Here are excerpts from the Kyiv Post interview:
KP: Were you surprised by the speed and scale of Yanukovych’s move in his foreign
policy towards Russia?
JS: “Once the law of March 9 passed [stating that a coalition may consist not only of
party factions, but also of individual deputies], the ‘art of the possible’ changed in
Ukraine. The view that I had expressed -- ‘Yanukovych will not be able to use power
unless he shares it’ — ceased to be valid. Many of us also assumed that Viktor
Yanukovych would return to the moderate, multi-vector policies of the [ex-President
Leonid] Kuchma era. We expected him to reverse the more controversial policies of
ex-president Viktor Yushchenko, but no more. After March 9, a coalition with the
‘swamp’ became possible, and forces that we assumed were old and dying returned
to the center of the political scene.”
KP: Do you mean the Communists?
JS: “Especially the Communists. [Paraliament Speaker Volodymyr] Lytvyn’s party is
what it is: androgynous and discreetly supportive of Russia’s geopolitical agenda. But
the speed with which Yanukovych consolidated vertical power was surprising, indeed
impressive. And I don’t think it would have mattered whether he won by 3 percent or
by 0.3 percent. He is determined to consolidate his power to the fullest extent, as
swiftly as possible, before anyone can conceivably contest it.”
KP: How much further do you think Yanukovych will take Ukraine into Russia’s orbit?
And what are the consequences?
JS: “With his opening moves – with the Kharkiv accords alone – Yanukovych has
reversed the entire direction of Ukraine’s development since 1991. It was not
Yushchenko who determined that the Black Sea Fleet must leave in 2017. It was
Kuchma. Kuchma’s multi-vector policy was intended to deepen friendship with Russia
on a pragmatic basis and, step-by-step, bring Ukraine into the Euro-Atlantic system.
Inside the Ministry of Defense, general staff and senior command echelons of the
armed forces, the sentiment was that Ukraine should become as fully integrated as
possible into NATO, short of membership. All of this predated Yushchenko. Three
Ukrainian presidents, including Yushchenko (who formed a coalition with
Yanukovych, after all, and sought another – and who never sent his opponents to the
Prosecutor General’s office!) have tried to govern Ukraine from the center.
Yanukovych is breaking the mold internally as well as geopolitically. He is neither
doing this because of irresistible Russian pressure, nor because he is a creature of
Russian interests. He is doing this to cement his power in Ukraine, which also means
power for the financial and political interests underpinning the Party of Regions. Over
the past five years, Ukrainian civil society has been dealt two heavy blows: the first
thanks to the disorder and disillusionment of the Yushchenko/[ex-Prime Minister
Yulia] Tymoshenko era; the second because of the financial crisis, which cost Ukraine
15 percent of its gross domestic product in one year.
Yet in a geopolitical sense, I think that Yanukovych has miscalculated. With
breathtaking naivety, he assumed that if Ukraine gave Russia everything it
reasonably could ask for, the pressure would stop. Instead, Russian pressure has
intensified. We see this with the Naftogaz-Gazprom merger proposal. We see it with

demands to acquire more and more assets in Ukraine’s energy system and the
pressure on the gas transit system. It is already reaching a point where the
businesses that support the Party of Regions, those upon whom Yanukovych
depends, are feeling pinched.
But Yanukovych has already thrown his strongest cards away. First, he has conceded
everything regarding the Black Sea Fleet. Second, he secured none of the quid pro
quos he sought over energy (including the abandonment of the South Stream
pipeline and a guarantee of minimal Russian gas trans-shipments across Ukraine’s
pipelines to Europe).
Third, he has widened the field of internal opposition, alienating not only
Tymoshenko’s most devoted supporters, but those, like [former chief of staff in
Yushchenko's administration Viktor] Baloha, who threw all of their efforts behind the
formation of a centrist coalition with him, which he, unceremoniously has spurned.
And fourth, having assured Brussels that his top priority was to enter the European
Union, he did not even have the courtesy to consult with the EU before concluding
these extraordinary agreements. So when he gets into trouble with Russia, who will
he mobilize? Who will rally behind him? Maybe no one, because he has rejected
them, and they have walked away.
The approach to the accords has been improvised, everything has been done with
breathtaking incompetence, belligerence and haste. That includes the all too sudden
geopolitical shift: the astonishing brusque termination of intelligence collaboration
with
NATO, the de facto (if still unacknowledged) halting of defense and security sector
reform, the return of the old guard to the Ministry of Defense, general staff and SBU
[Security Service of Ukraine], the carte blanche given to Russian intelligence
services, and most astonishingly, the preservation of all the deficiencies of the 1997
Black Sea Fleet accords, now extended to 2042. That’s an astonishingly cynical price
to pay for what is likely to be a short-term boost in economic performance and
internal popularity.”
KP: The West, namely Brussels and Washington, D.C., seems to be turning a blind
eye to a lot of events in Ukraine. Why is this so? Have they turned their backs on
Ukraine, or do they see recent events in Ukraine as positive developments?
JS: “The naivety of Yanukovych and his partners is to forget that for Russia,
Ukraine’s independence is an historical aberration. As long as Russia feels it holds
the cards – and that is exactly the way it feels now – it will not let up the pressure
until it feels it has succeeded in reducing Ukraine’s independence to a purely
decorative state. Moscow seeks complete control of Ukraine’s energy sector and a
veto over who, if anyone, can develop new energy resources. It seeks the integration
of Ukraine’s defense and intelligence structures into Russia’s own. It also seeks
unrestricted and unfettered operation of Russian capital inside Ukraine. Once you
have all of those, what independence is left?
First, let’s understand that the absence of Western reaction thus far reflects a large
degree of shock. Experts might have understood what the March 9 coalition law and
the new coalition meant. But bureaucracies and the decision-makers of the EU, NATO
and the U.S. absorb information much more slowly, and they are only beginning to
adjust to the fact that events are taking a different course from what was expected.

So, the pertinent question is what the Western reaction will be in six months time
after a proper assessment is made. Even now, the EU is not blind to the fact that,
when it came to gas, Yanukovych presented them with a fait accompli. Yet, for some
bizarre set of reasons, the new authorities expect that the EU will still hand over
funds for modernising Ukraine’s gas transit system.
Of course, the post-Cold War generation of leaders in the West has disappeared. The
new generation have both a broader and much narrower range of concerns. Ukraine,
East-Central Europe, the Black Sea and Caspian Sea are no longer the center of
attention that they were before the events of 9/11. Certainly not in the United
States! And one must then ask whether the EU as a whole has a vision of itself
beyond recovery from the financial crisis and coping with the Greek emergency.
So, much as I lament it and condemn it, Ukraine has been off the radar. And the
Russians know this better than anyone else.
They have concluded, cynically but entirely rationally, that they should use this
moment to grab everything they can get. That’s not because they are confident in
themselves. Quite the opposite. They know that despite modest recovery from the
financial crisis, their underlying problems are serious. They have no clue how to
address their modernization agenda, to measure up to the performance, adaptability
and innovation of the BRIC [Brazil, Russia, India, China], and that the various
insurgencies in the North Caucasus are tantamount to having a bit of Afghanistan in
one’s backyard. Ironic, is it not, how the moments of convenience coincide: How
Yanukovych, for internal reasons, and the Moscow tandem, for geopolitical reasons,
seek to grab as much power as they can before the window of opportunity closes.”
KP: Are there any instruments that the West and the opposition in Ukraine can utilize
to change this tilt of Ukraine towards Russia?
JS: “Let’s be harshly realistic. In the short term, few or none. The West needs to
have a clear mind and be clear about what it communicates to Ukraine’s new
authorities. Ukraine is a sovereign country. It has the right to diminish cooperation
with us or even end it, with or without consultation. We should not pound the table,
threaten, preach, whine or complain.
But Ukraine needs to understand that we have our interests too, not to say
principles. Just as Ukraine is a sovereign state, the EU is a union of sovereign states.
Just as Ukraine’s authorities must address their economic priorities and answer to
their people, the EU must answer to the European taxpayer, who has every right to
demand to know who is receiving their money and why. The EU has no obligation to
finance economic inefficiency and malpractice, let alone an energy sector that has
turned its back on the standards and principles of the Energy Community.
And we certainly have no obligation to subsidize Russia and its energy policy. NATO
has been present in Ukraine because three presidents concluded that this served
Ukraine’s national interests. They also concluded that NATO played an irreplaceable
role in securing defence reform in the country. If the new authorities take a different
view, that is their prerogative, and if they want us to leave or diminish our presence,
we should. But if they put us under pressure and make us feel unwelcome, we
should take the initiative and depart before we are asked to. Ukraine has to choose,

and we have to respect its choice. Ukraine will then have to accept the consequences
of its choices and live with them.
“Over the mid-term, I think the new authorities will regret living with the choices
they are making today. By that point, I hope the West will take Ukraine more
seriously than it does today and be capable of conducting a more serious discussion
than it does today. I also hope, by then, we will finally be in a position to present
Ukraine with a real perspective of integration and with our conditions for realizing it.”
KP: Speaking of the opposition, if it comes to power should they denounce the
Russian Black Sea Fleet agreement?
JS: “Well, there is a problem, isn’t there? The opposition will be on firm legal grounds
denouncing that agreement. That is not the issue, at least where Ukraine is
concerned. But to Moscow, it will be a big issue, and in practice a casus belli. Quite
an expensive casus belli, because in five years time, Russia’s economic investment in
Crimea will be far greater than it is today. One shudders to think of what can
happen. Would it not therefore make sense for the opposition, perhaps with advice
from outside experts, to think of how these new, most regrettable and grotesquely
unfavourable agreements could be amended with provisions and safeguards to
ensure that the Black Sea Fleet conforms to normal international deployment
practice in a foreign country; that its intelligence presence be curbed and controlled;
that its economic interests be transparent, regulated and properly taxed, that its
employment in any activity short of national self-defense be subject to oversight and
approval? These modifications would not only be in Ukraine’s interests, but Europe’s
interests, and if the EU and NATO wish to avoid tension, not to say conflict, they
should encourage such a process — and participate in it — as soon as possible.”
KP: Are you talking about a possibility of a civil conflict in Ukraine?
JS: “Not so much because of the Black Sea Fleet, but because Yanukovych is
governing a divided country in a divisive way. Ukrainians are not used to this.
Imagine the following scenario one year from now, when tempers are running higher
than they are today. A group of musicians enter a bar in Lviv and start singing
«LIUBE» [a Russian band singing military songs] repertoire in Russian. They are
asked to stop and they don’t. It sparks a fight which spreads. Supposing the local
militia support the local residents? What does the Interior Ministry under its new
authority do? I don’t like the question, but it is necessary to pose it. I don’t like
posing a second question: for how long will we be able to say that Ukrainians are all
moderate people and, irrespective of how they are governed, will publicly roll over
and privatize their worries and reactions?”
KP: What do you think is the end-game in all of this? Do you think they are driven by
national interests or gains in their personal pockets?
JS: We should not forget the historical context. In the Soviet Union, security meant,
first and foremost, security of the regime. Yanukovych is part of this tradition. For
him, geopolitics is the extension, and the servant, of the process of regime creation
and perpetuation. That is what I think he is after. Of course, Russia is in so many
ways different. It is an enormously significant geopolitical player. Why does Russia’s
military doctrine define NATO as the ‘main danger’ to Russian security, when any
passenger on the Moscow metro knows that the main danger is something very
different? Because the NATO enemy helps to sustain a particular regime and model

of development. Why is Moscow so keen to show that Ukraine’s independence is an
historical aberration and that the project of its integration with the West is over? In
order to reaffirm the legitimacy of the regime and its definition of Russian identity.
What has happened thanks to Yanukovych has given the Moscow tandem a new
lease on life, whatever the configuration of power that emerges in 2012. I fear that
the latest events in Ukraine will be very bad for those in Russia who know or sense
that the neo-imperial paradigm is an obstacle to the transformation of Russia into a
modern and decent country.”
KP: Do you see Ukraine crossing a point of no return in its rapprochement with
Moscow?
JS: “In the literal sense, Ukraine has already reached a point of no-return. It no
longer is possible simply to undo what has been done. The February elections and
the Kharkiv accords have changed so much that the country will never simply be
able to go back through the same door whence it came.
The flaws will become visible and the contradictions will build up. By then, a new
path and a new door will appear, and there will be new leaders too. But they are not
visible today.
We can, and also must, engage the new authorities in any dialogue open to us, with
the aim of focusing their attention on the implications and consequences of their
actions. Let’s not exclude the possibility that they will evolve and, in their own
interests, seek to abandon the basis of consultation, participation and even power.
If the opposition is to play this role, it will have to renew itself. Until it comes to
terms with what went wrong between 2005 and 2010, it won’t be able to renew
itself.
I am confident of one thing. The more Ukrainians know of Russia, the more they will
conclude that it is not a healthy model for Ukraine. It is no longer the country in
which, like Ukraine, money bought power and de facto privatized part of the state.
Under Putin, it has become a different place: a place where power buys money,
where anyone powerful enough can seize property and assets belonging to others. If
you want something and you are big enough, take it!
That model has driven millions of Russians out of the country, a disproportionate
percentage of whom amount to the ‘best and the brightest.’ Is that an appropriate
model for Ukraine? I doubt it. I think that Yanukovych also doubts it. So instead of
thinking about ‘points of no return,’ we need to think about what the West should
propose to Ukraine once its authorities find themselves in a dead end. They will. The
question then is whether Yanukovych’s opposition and Ukraine’s friends abroad have
something to say.”

#9
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Mistaken Calculations
Interview with James Sherr
Den’, 26 May 2010
[English original]
James Sherr: “Yanukovych and his team have opened doors that will be
extremely difficult to close”.
Den’: Mr. Sherr, you probably have heard the reactions to the so-called
Kharkiv deals between Yanukovych and Medvedev. Most experts and even
some European officials and politicians condemn them, saying that this is a
sign that Ukraine is surrendering part of its sovereignty to Russia. From the
other side on Mykhailivska – site of the Ministry of Foreign affairs – they say
that Western governments accept this deal on the premise that Ukraine
should have better relations with Russia. What you think about this deal and
its implication for Ukraine’s Euro-integration course?
James Sherr: The outside world expected Yanukovych would take measures to
resolutely reverse the more controversial policies of Yushchenko. To any
halfway informed person it is clear that he has gone beyond this. The law of
9 March, which enabled the Party of Regions to go into coalition with old and
hitherto declining political forces, changed everything. The Kharkiv accords
and subsequent agreements amount to a fundamental revision of the course
that Ukraine has pursued since 1991. It was not Yushchenko who insisted that
Black Sea Fleet should leave in 2017. It was Kuchma and the Ukrainian
defence establishment of that time. In the 1990s, the goal of the defence and
armed forces leadership was to realise as much integration with NATO as
possible short of membership. In 2002 NATO membership became the
‘ultimate goal’ of this policy. Kuchma’s multi-vector policy was designed to
balance good relations with Russia with steady, step-by-step incorporation
into the Euro-Atlantic system. Even leaving aside additional agreements
concluded during Medvedev’s 17 May visit, the Kharkiv accords alone have
surrendered significant gains achieved by three previous Ukrainian presidents.
Ukraine has also abandoned the principal cards that allow it to resist Russian
pressure. The result, as we now see, is further Russian pressure.
Den’: But deputies from the Party of Regions argue that due to political
potepleniya or thawing of relations with Russia, Ukraine has already secured
economic dividends – cheaper gas prices. What might you say about this?
JS: Even in the short term, these dividends are questionable. First, the
agreement preserves unrealistic and unaffordable quotas of gas imports by
Ukraine. In 2009, Ukraine imported 26.6 bn cubic metres (bcm) of Russian
gas. Between 2011-19 Ukraine will be obliged to import 52 bcm with a
cushion of 20 percent. Of course, these quotas were set under the January
2009 accords concluded by Tymoshenko’s government, but despite
Yanukovych’s pledge to annul that agreement, this stipulation remains.
Second, the new price structure only applies the discount to the first 80
percent of these imports, thereby effectively ruling out the re-export of gas
at a profitable mark-up for Ukraine. In practice, Ukraine will seek to import

less than it is supposed to, and it will also seek to re-export what it cannot
consume. But its ability to do either of these things will depend on the good
will of Moscow, in short on further Ukrainian concessions. The latest
concessions demanded are already threatening what Yanukovych is still
determined to protect: retention of at least partial Ukrainian control of gas
transit and the interests of businesses that now support the Party of Regions.
Third, Russia has categorically rejected a further Ukrainian requirement: a
minimum quota on its own trans-shipment of gas across Ukraine. Thus,
Russia preserves the option of shipping gas across other pipeline routes to
Europe if and when they are built. Fourth, the 60 percent rise in transit fees
secured by Tymoshenko has, by virtue of the discount, been annulled.
Finally, Russia has flatly refused to give ground regarding one of
Yanukovych’s core aims: its abandonment of the South Stream project. On
every one of these points, Kyiv has conceded and Moscow has refused to
budge one iota.
The long-term calculations are also faulty. As oil prices rise in 2011 and
possibly beyond, the gains secured by the new pricing formula will be washed
away. Further leniency by Moscow will be needed, and it will come at a price.
The root cause of this sorry state of affairs is not, as Yanukovych supposes,
high energy prices, but the grotesquely unreformed condition of Ukraine: its
inordinately wasteful consumption of energy, its failure to attract investment
in new energy resources, its barriers to genuine market relations and its
failure to stimulate honest entrepreneurship in the country. As early as the
mid-1990s, Western energy companies presented Kyiv with proposals that
would progressively—and substantially—diminish Ukraine’s inordinate
dependency on Russia. Yet Kuchma (in practice, Lazarenko and Tymoshenko)
rejected these proposals for the same reason that Yanukovych, Azarov, Boyko
and Lavochkin reject them now. The reforms required would break the link
between money and power. Which is more affordable for Ukraine: discounts
on 52bcm of Russian gas or a diversified and competitive economy paying
European prices on 26bcm of Russian gas? The question answers itself.
Den’: Who can force the people mentioned by you to reform? Can the West
provide incentives to pursue these reforms?
JS: The new authorities seem to expect that the EU will, in accordance with
the 2009 initiatives, provide finance for the modernisation of Ukraine’s gas
transit system. Why? The premise of that initiative was further steps by
Ukraine to eliminate subsidy and bring Ukraine’s energy market into
accordance with EU standards. Without any consultation with the EU, Ukraine
has now moved in the diametrically opposite direction. It has presented us
with a fait accompli. What obligation do we now have? What interest do we
now have? Why should the EU taxpayer finance economic malpractice in
Ukraine or subsidise Russia? Ukraine is a sovereign country, and its new
authorities had every right to act as they did. But the EU is a collection of
sovereign states with their own interests, their own economic priorities and
their own taxpayers to answer to. Given the scale of the emergency we now
face in Greece, I find it absolutely fanciful that the EU would decide to uphold
its side of the 2009 initiative after Ukraine has walked away from it. And if, by
some series of mishaps, we did grant money for modernisation, we would
merely persuade the new leadership that it had no standards to uphold, no

conditions to meet and no choices to make.
Den’: But as you maybe know, Hryshchenko constantly repeats that close
economic relation with Russia would help Ukraine integrate in EU…
JS: Konstantin Hryshchenko is an accomplished diplomat, and he knows how
to make the best of a bad situation. What he thinks privately is possibly
something else.
Den’: Some may suppose that those guys you mentioned before are very
clever because they succeeded in getting money from Russia for leasing Black
sea fleet before 2017…
JS: What cleverness do you have in mind? The energy discount is not a gift
from Russia. It is calculated as a Ukrainian state debt, to be offset from the
Black Sea Fleet’s rent of facilities in Crimea. So a bad financial deal for
Ukraine in energy terms now becomes bad in defence terms. The most
lamentable aspect of the fleet accords is not the extension to 2042,
unfortunate as that is. If certain persistent rumours are correct, Yulia
Tymoshenko was willing to contemplate an even longer extension than that.
The lamentable thing is that the basic deficiencies of the 1997 accords
remain intact. Conditions in the Black Sea region have changed dramatically
since then. They are far more worrying for Ukraine and surrounding
countries than they were 13 years ago. In 2008, the Black Sea Fleet played
a significant role in a war against a country that was Ukraine’s de facto ally.
With the fleet’s presence legitimised by agreement until 2017, Ukraine
could honourably claim to be a reluctant bystander. Now Ukraine’s authorities
can make no such claim. Having seen that the fleet can be used against other
states, they have graciously extended its deployment for a further 25 years.
The new accords set Ukraine on a course inconsistent with friendship with
Georgia and with that country’s basic national security interests. In a future
conflict, Ukraine can no longer claim to be a bystander. It will become an
accomplice—or so, at least, the Georgians will see it. And that is exactly what
Russia wants. So whether or not Russia finds the resources to modernise the
fleet, it has already secured a strategic triumph.
Yet the most worrying aspect of the agreement is its impact on Ukraine’s
sovereignty. The fleet’s naval/military significance has always been
secondary to its ability, by economic, political and intelligence means, to
weaken Ukraine’s hold on Crimea and its sovereignty in general. As soon as
the ink on the Kharkiv accords was dry, Medvedev instructed Serdyukov,
Russia’s Minister of Defence, to draw up a plan with the Sevastopol
authorities for the modernisation of the base and the development of
surrounding facilities. By these means and others, he clearly hopes to secure
the de-facto integration of Crimea into Russia’s economy. By authorising the
return of osobistiy (military counter-intelligence, subordinate to the FSB) to
Crimea, Kyiv’s new authorities have effectively given them license to do what
they did before: undermine those who draw a distinction between Ukraine’s
sovereignty and Russian influence. The brusque termination of NATO-Ukraine
intelligence cooperation, the revival of former patterns of SBU-SVR (Russian
Foreign Intelligence) collaboration and the possible future expansion of GRU
(Russian Military Intelligence) activity in Ukraine are intended by Moscow to
consolidate a fundamental shift in Ukraine’s geopolitical direction. In my view,

the geopolitical objectives of Yanukovych and his government are less radical
than this. But they have opened a door that will be very difficult for them to
close.
Den’: Mr. Sherr, in your opinion, was this shift of direction inevitable or is it
connected to some arrangements between Obama and Medvedev?
JS: There have been no deals between Obama and Medvedev at Ukraine’s
expense, and I don’t believe there will be any. But you have put the question
the wrong way around. It is not up to United States to define Ukraine’s
national interests. It is not up to EU do so. It is up to the Ukrainian state
leadership to articulate the national interest, take concrete measures to
advance it and then secure support abroad. That is what the Poles, Czechs
and Baltic states did before joining the EU, and had they not done this—and
backed words with deeds—they would still be outsiders. The EU and United
States cannot be expected to care more for the national interests of Ukraine
than Ukrainians.
All this said, the post-Cold War generation of Western leaders has left the
scene, and the new generation is neither as worldly nor as impressive.
Washington’s horizons are both more global and more narrow than they were
in the 1990s. Despite some sterling exceptions, the Obama administration
has shown a tin ear towards East-Central Europe—indeed, to the entire region
stretching from the Neisse to the Caspian—and this is felt as much in Warsaw
and Baku as it is in Kyiv. Today, the EU has very little vision of itself beyond
recovery from the financial crisis. Its overwhelming interest in the former
Soviet Union is ‘stability’, i.e., peace and quiet, even if it isn’t very peaceful or
very nice. Ukraine is not helped by the weakness of its friends in the West,
and the West is not helped by the weakness of its friends in Ukraine.
Den’: Recently the Director of the Carnegie Center in Moscow, Dmitry Trenin,
said that Ukraine is not in Russia’s sphere of influence but, like Germany,
belongs to Russia’s sphere of interest. What might you say about this?
JS: Dmytryi is doing what he does very well – playing with words. The
distinction is sophisticated but irrelevant. Ukraine is not Germany. Germany
is Russia’s equal—at least! Ukraine is not. Russia regards Germany’s
independence as indestructible. Russia regards Ukraine’s independence as an
historical aberration. Russia is pursuing goals inimical to Ukraine’s
independence: control of Ukraine’s energy system, the unrestricted basing
and operation of the Black Sea Fleet, a welcome mat for Russian business,
carte blanche for Russian intelligence services, de-facto control of Crimea
and, by these means and others, the transformation of Ukrainian
sovereignty into a purely decorative term. That is what Moscow seeks to do
and is, to a worrying extent, doing. It is irrelevant what you call it.
Den’: What political or geopolitical price do you think Ukraine will pay for
pursuing a policy of non-alignment?
JS: Non-alignment is not the issue. Ukraine, de jure, has been a non-aligned
state under three presidents. The issue is Ukraine’s orientation. Sweden
remains a non-aligned state, but its orientation is clear. Ukraine’s orientation
is profoundly unclear. Ukraine has to choose. It cannot be part of two

contradictory schemes of integration at the same time, neither in the
economic nor in the security sphere. It cannot stand alone. It is neither
Switzerland (in Kuchma’s choice phrase), nor is it China. It can orientate itself
to the West without losing any independence it does not wish to lose. Indeed,
by meeting the conditions of the West, the more Ukraine will acquire the
capacity to do things for itself. But it cannot orientate itself to Russia and
remain independent. These are historical realities, and they will remain
political realities as long as Russia continues to define its interests and
identity in the way that it does. If Ukraine loses the West and the West
abandons Ukraine, its independence will shrink—in some spheres, rapidly. The
paradox is that if Ukraine wants to re-engage the West, it will have to do
something for itself.
Den’: After the first round of presidential election we printed an interview with
Liovochkin in which he said that Ukraine has forgotten that it is a strong
country and can dictate its condition. How in your opinion Ukraine can regain
its former strength after all that has happened in the past weeks?
JS: I would have thought that Ukraine needs to overcome its condition before
it can ‘dictate’ it. How it can do so after all that has happened is the question
I ask myself.
#10
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Ukraïna/Ukraina
By Vasyl’ Samokhavlov and Yaroslav Vedmyd’
Korrespondent, 21 May 2010
[translated by Anya Yablonska for UKL]
[The title juxtaposes the word “Ukraine” in Ukrainian and in Russian –UKL]
There is no mixture that can unite two Ukraines in one. But there is a civilized
solution to this problem, as is being stated by political advisors Vasyl’ Samokhvalov
and Yaroslav Vedmid’ in column, which they published in the latest issue of
Korrespondent.
With its current borders, the state of Ukraine has no future. This is due to the fact
that contemporary Ukrainian history is a history of complete failures and defeats.
The electoral division between Centre-West and South-East only seemed a challenge
at the beginning. It then became a given. In the future, sooner or later, it will lead to
tragedy. Especially since the pendulum, that was set in motion by independence, had
reached a threatening amplitude.
In 1991, the East elected Kravchuk for themselves, being too scared of the rather
radical candidate Chornovil. In 1994, the same Kravchuk looked like a frantic
nationalist, in comparison with Red director Kuchma. It seemd like the victory of the
East, yet instead, the pendulum for the next 13 years went to the West of the
Dnipro. Under the loud policy of “multiple-vectorism”, the new President took the
course on a “crawling” European integration.
In1999, Lviv and Ternopil voted for Kuchma, the only other choice being
Symonenko. In 2002, the political forces of Yuschenko and Tymoshenko arose. In
2004, the peak was reached, with Yuschenko a President. The pendulum then once

again went in the direction of the East. Slipping by inertnia in 2006, 200y, and in
2010 it forced the Dnipro and once again flipped from head to toes the main
priorities of Ukrainian national identity.
Just yesterday our leaders were writing letters to NATO. Today they sign agreements
with Russia. Yesterday, we made dubbing movies into Ukrainian a must, today we
cancel this norm. Yesterday, we positioned the Holodomor with the status of a
national archetype, and today we call into question the very fact of its existence.
Walking on an electric razor between the East and the West not only brings
frustration in Ukraine’s image from within a network of friends, but also enemies.
The main problem lies in a politician’s hidden desire to sit on two chairs, which leads
only to one thing: sooner or later the seat gets tired of such permanent starch and
tears apart, and the time, which the country so much needs to implement reforms,
hopelessly flies away.
Within almost 19 year long yarn between East and West, Ukraine hopelessly
laggedbehind its neighbors. While we were busy identifying who is the master of the
household, Poland joined the EU and overwhelmed Europe with its agriculture
products, Belarus built a government machine not afraid of economic crises, and
Russia resumed his forgotten game of being a superpower.
One should not hide its head in the sand. The victory of the West or the East
inevitably leads to the euphoria of one principle and the neglect of the other. This is
a strategy of mutual destruction. We should just take it as it is: in Ternopil or Ivano-
Frankivsk there will never be monuments erected to Stalin. In Luhansk or Simferopil
they will never consider Bandera a hero. This is just the way it is, for historical
reasons.
If you look at the voting maps of last few elections, the conclusion is that there
exists a unbearable mental abyss between East and West. This is obvious. Then,
could it be that the “spiritual unity” (sobornost’), celebrated in history textbooks, is
not, essentially, understood by anyone?
In the end, this is our chance to get out of the vicious circle, when one part of
population celebrates a victory at the expense of the other. In the United States,
similar differences were solved by the Civil War. In Russia as well, but half-a-century
later. But we are civilized, aren’t we? If there is no sense in living in an odious
marriage, then divorce remains maybe the least favorable, and yet the only possible,
option. And then everything become clear. Some will put as many Shukhevych
monuments as they wish. The others will reinstate historical justice to Stalin. Some
will be waiving EU flags on holidays, others – the Russian three-color.
There is no such idea which can unite. The mantra about a total increase of the
standard of living, which would let us forget about our mental conflicts, only applies
during the “between two stools” electoral rhetoric. The hosting of Euro 2012 is too
abstract, even for someone who cares about soccer. We are not planning on going to
war, and even if we do so in the future, it is not clear if Eastern and Western Ukraine
will be allies. Maybe that is why the numerous intellectuals running around a
“national idea” are not getting any success? With that same effect we can try and
divide by zero: even though we want so much, we cannot.
Those who think you can break a political opponent with your knee are mistaken. In

the West, even under the conditions of Soviet occupation, people managed to save
the Greek-Catholic church and the memory of UPA (Ukrainian Insurgent Army). The
hundreds of thousands of fellow citizens who dressed in orange did not make the
East stand back on its own principles. The pendulum does not care: the stronger it
gets hit, the more power it comes back. And when it comes back, it is not merciful
Of course, it is desirable that these thoughts about the total incompatibility between
East and West will forever remain as just thoughts. At the end of the day, in the
framework of pure theory, it is the task of any state to fight for resources, of which
territory it belongs. The most importantly is that this fight does not become a fight
with a shadow.
#11
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Russia Poised To Leapfrog Ukraine, Moldova In EU Visa Drive
by Ahto Lobjakas
RFE/RL.org, 14 May 2010
BRUSSELS -- Russia is putting pressure on the European Union to turn the next toplevel
meeting between the two -- the Rostov-na-Donu gathering on May 31 -- into a
"visa summit."
Officials in Brussels say the EU and Russia will jointly sign a document at Rostov-na-
Donu outlining "common steps" toward visa liberalization. This would represent a
significant advance for Russia in its decade-long drive toward visa-free travel in the
EU. At the same time, it would hand Russia a psychological and political victory over
countries like Ukraine, Moldova, and Georgia, who have long awaited visa
liberalization and have offered political reforms to get it.
If Russia, which has no obligations to reform, steps ahead of those countries in the
visa-free queue, it will only serve to emphasize that the status of the EU's Eastern
Partnership countries matters very little when it comes to strategic concessions from
the bloc.
Diplomats say a majority of EU foreign ministers, debating the issue in Brussels on
May 10, supported the plan. (Under EU rules, a qualified majority decision is
sufficient.) A concession on visas is seen as essential to ensure the success of the
Rostov-na-Donu summit on May 31.
There, the EU wants Russia to commit to a broad "modernizing partnership" by
reaffirming its commitment to concluding a new strategic partnership agreement,
joining the World Trade Organization, and cooperating on a range of issues from
border management to trade issues.
Russia's champions in this debate are Germany, France, and most of the EU's
southern member states -- along with, somewhat surprisingly, Finland. Poland
continues to sound a cautionary note, but even the plan's detractors now see it as a
foregone conclusion.
'Road Map' In All But Name

In all but name, the common steps constitute a "road map" -- the EU term for an
agreement committing the bloc to dropping its visa requirement for short-stay
visitors to its Schengen space (comprising all EU countries except Britain, Ireland,
Cyprus, Bulgaria, and Romania; as well as Switzerland, Norway, and Iceland) once
its conditions have been met.
Visa-free travel in the EU has become the most desirable goal for all of the bloc's
Eastern neighbors, who see in it great psychological, political, and economic benefits.
So far, only countries in the western Balkans have been awarded such road maps.
No ex-Soviet country outside the EU has managed to secure one.
A visa-liberalization road map sets out detailed requirements for reforms to be
implemented in key areas. Chief among the EU's concerns are document security --
above all, the introduction of biometric passports; border management; combating
illegal migration; and the fight against organized crime and corruption.
The road map does not fix the date when visas will be lifted, but it effectively
commits the EU to doing so once all its conditions have been met. In the western
Balkans, Serbia, Croatia, and Macedonia late last year became the first countries to
complete a road map -- and are now seen as having set a precedent for others.
Top EU foreign policy official Hugues Mingarelli made the link at the European
Parliament in early April, when he said a number of EU member states are reluctant
to give Ukraine a road map for fear of making movement toward the abolition of
visas a virtually "automatic process." Instead, these EU countries would like to retain
what Mingarelli described as their "political discretion."
Most Desirable Goal
Visa-free travel in the EU has become the most desirable goal for all of the bloc's
Eastern neighbors, who see in it great psychological, political, and economic benefits.
Most EU member states, on the other hand, are fearful of greater immigration and
crime, and generally do not want to send Eastern neighbors signals which could be
interpreted as encouragement to pursue a course aimed at eventual accession.
As a result, movement toward visa liberalization has been a drawn-out process.
Russia was the first to secure it as a "long-term" goal in 2003. Ukraine followed suit
in 2008, and Moldova did the same earlier this year.
A number of ministers on May 10 warned that Russia is attempting to manipulate the
EU, offering unenforceable promises of partnership and cooperation in return for
what remains effectively the bloc's only real leverage.
Visa 'Currency'
Poland's Radoslaw Sikorski warned that visa liberalization is a "currency" the EU
should spend wisely. Sikorski noted that the EU's visa policy "must not go against its
foreign policy," with its declared aim of transforming Russia into a European society
where the rule of law prevails. Talks on a new EU-Russia strategic partnership treaty
have stalled, largely as a result of Russia's palpable lack of interest in saddling itself
with further obligations.

Sikorski, along with the ministers of the Baltic and Nordic countries as well as
Romania, also argued that Russia must not advance ahead of Ukraine, Moldova, and
the EU's other Eastern neighbors, who this week celebrated five years of
membership in the European Neighborhood Policy and last week the first year of
their Eastern Partnership with the EU.
A number of ministers said the issued should be linked to Russia's cooperation on
frozen conflicts involving Georgia, Moldova, Armenia, and Azerbaijan.
But the Friends of Russia club appears to have carried the day, supported by the
EU's executive arm, the European Commission. France, Spain, and Portugal once
again emerged as champions of "positive interdependence" between Russia and the
EU. Greece and Cyprus highlighted the prospective benefits of visa-free travel with
Russia. All were identified as primary targets for Russian foreign policy engagement
in a memo published last week by the Russia version of "Newsweek."
Officials say the outcome of the Brussels meeting was decided by Germany.
Traditionally skeptical of immigration, Berlin appears to have concluded that the
economic benefits of improved ties with Russia will be sufficient to offset the
downside.
After the Brussels meeting on May 10, Germany was described as the "swing state"
by the Finnish Foreign Minister Alexander Stubb -- representing another country
which has pursued an increasingly pragmatic course in its relationship with Moscow
over the past few years.
#12
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An Exchange on University Entrance Exams in Ukraine
AAUS List, 31 May 2010
Bohdan A Oryshkevich, Founder, USA/USA Program:
Our students in the USA/USA Program on the ground in Ukraine inform me that
university entrance exams will begin as normal this week. No changes came into
effect since the new presidential administration. This may be due to student and
other protests. No concessions towards Russian learners went into effect. There will
be no additional testing by universities.
If there are additional details, I will keep you abreast.
All university candidates in Ukraine must take an exam in Ukrainian literature and
language. They must take a second exam which is either Ukrainian history or
mathematics. All exams are in Ukrainian. Students can take up to five exams.
Oxana Shevel, Tufts University:
The students may have misunderstood or miscommunicated some of the details.
First, these are not technically university entrance exams but independent testing
the results of which are used as one of the criteria (no longer the only one though as
was the case under Vakarchuk, as now high school graduation marks (atestat) are
also used) in the university admission process.

Second, changes were indeed introduced with regard to the language of testing. The
exam questions are now offered not only in Ukrainian, but also in other languages to
those who attended schools were instructions were in languages other than
Ukrainian (in practice, requests were made for exams in Russian and Hungarian).
#13
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Memorandum Regarding the
Visit to UCU of a representative of the
Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) (former KGB)
(responsible for contacts with Churches)
18 May 2010, office of the rector, 9:50-10:34
At 9:27 in the morning Fr. Borys Gudziak received a call on his private mobile phone
from a representative of the Security Service of Ukraine requesting a meeting. The
meeting was scheduled for 20 minutes later at the rectorate of UCU. This official had
had contacts with the UCU rectorate a year ago at the time of the visit to the
university of the then President of Ukraine Viktor Yushchenko. He had made a visit to
the rectorate in the late afternoon on May 11 with regard to a request of the
Ecumenical and Church History Institutes to sign an agreement to use the SBU
archives. At that time members of the rectorate were away from the office. He had,
what Dr. Antoine Arjakovsky, director of the Institute of Ecumenical Studies, called a
“very good meeting.”
Upon arrival on May 18 in a polite manner the agent related that certain political
parties are planning protests and demonstrations regarding the controversial (and in
some cases inflammatory) policies of the new Ukrainian authorities. Students are to
be engaged in these protests. There is a danger that some of these manifestations
may be marred by provocations. He stated that, of course, students are allowed to
protest but that they should be warned by the university administration that those
involved in any illegal activities will be prosecuted. Illegal activities include not only
violent acts but also, for example, pickets blocking access to the work place of
government officials (or any protests that are not sanctioned by authorities).
After his oral presentation the agent put on the table between us an unfolded onepage
letter that was addressed to me. He asked me to read the letter and then
acknowledge with a signature my familiarity with its contents. He stated that after I
had read and signed the letter it would be necessary for him to take the letter back.
Since I could see that the document was properly addressed to me as rector (I also
noticed that it had two signatures giving it a particularly official character) I replied
calmly that any letter addressed to me becomes my property and should stay with
me -- at least in copy form. Only under these conditions could I agree to even read
the letter (much less sign).
The agent was evidently taken back by my response. It seemed that the situation for
him was without precedent because in my presence using his mobile phone he called
his (local) superiors to ask for instructions on how to proceed. The superior refused
permission to leave me either the original letter or a copy, saying that the SBU fears
I “might publish it in the internet.” I questioned this entire procedure and the need
for secrecy and refused to look at the letter and read its contents. The young official
was disappointed and somewhat confused but did not exert additional pressure and
did not dispute my argumentation.

Our conversation also had a pastoral moment. I cautioned the agent of the fact that
the SBU as the former KGB, with many employees remaining from the Soviet times,
has a heavy legacy of breaking and crippling people physically and morally and that
he as a young married person should be careful not to fall into any actions that
would cause lasting damage to his own identity and shame his children and
grandchildren. I sought to express this pastorally as a priest. To his credit he both
acknowledged the past and declared his desire to serve the needs of Ukrainian
citizens. He also asked that I indicate to him if I feel that he is exercising improper
pressure.
Finally, I expressed my and the general population’s profound disappointment that
the work of the SBU is so uneven, that security and police officers live lavishly on low
salaries because they are involved in corrupt activities, and that the legal rights of
citizens and equal application of the law are severely neglected. I gave the recent
example of my cousin Teodor Gudziak, the mayor of Vynnyky, who in February 2010
(three days after the election of the new president) was arrested in a fabricated case
of bribery that was set up by a notoriously corrupt political rival and former
policemen through the regional and city police. Despite the fact that two weeks
before the fabricated affair the mayor, based on a vote of the town council, had
given the SBU a video of plainclothes policemen breaking into his office and safe in
city hall in the middle of the night and using town seals on various documents the
SBU took no action. (The leadership of the Church, specifically Cardinal Lubomyr
Husar, fears that by manipulated association this case may be used as a devise to
compromise the rector of UCU and the whole institution which has a unique
reputation of being free from corruption.) I also related that I had reliable testimony
and audible evidence that my phone is tapped and has been for many months.
The population of Ukraine continues to fear and distrust both state security and
police personnel because of the woeful track record of law enforcement and because
of the diffuse practice of police intimidation of honest politicians, journalists, and
common citizens, and the wonton extortion practiced by security institutions and
police with respect to middle and small business. I asked the young agent to convey
these concerns to his superiors. I had the impression that personally he is open to
moral argument but that he also was simply doing his job. It was clear to me that he
was dutifully “following orders.”
During our conversation the agent asked me about the imminent (May 20-22)
General Assembly of the Federation of European Catholic Universities (FUCE) that
will be hosted by UCU in Lviv. He characterized it as an important event (it has
received considerable publicity) and asked about the program and whether it is open
to the public. It was clear that he would have been interested in participating in the
proceedings. I said that the main theme, “Humanization of society through the work
of Catholic universities,” was announced in a press release, as will be the outcome of
the deliberations. The working sessions of the university rectors, however, are not
open to the public. I explained that the 211 members of the International Federation
of Catholic Universities (IFCU) and the 45 members of FUCE follow closely the
development of the only Catholic university in the former Soviet Union. They will be
monitoring the welfare of UCU, especially since in Japan in March at the annual
meeting of the Board of Consultors of IFCU I had the opportunity to describe some of
our socio-political concerns and the threats to the freedom of intellectual discourse
(imposition of Soviet historical views, rehabilitation of Stalin and Stalinism, to whom

a new monument was unveiled in Zaporizhzhia 5 May 2010) and new censorship of
the press and television, which are incompatible with normal university life.
Subsequently, as had been arranged at the beginning of the meeting, I called in the
UCU senior vice rector, Dr. Taras Dobko, to whom the official repeated the SBU’s
concerns.
Besides noting the SBU’s solicitude for stability in Ukrainian society, there are a few
conclusions to be drawn from the encounter and the proposals that were expressed:
1. Signing a document such as the letter that was presented for signature to me is
tantamount to agreeing to cooperate (collaborate) with the SBU. The person signing
in effect agrees with the contents of the letter and their implication. In KGB practice
getting a signature on a document that was drafted and kept by the KGB was a
primary method of recruiting secret collaborators.
2. Such methods have no known (to me) precedent in independent Ukraine in the
experience of UCU and of the Lviv National University, whose longtime rector (and
former minister of education, 2008–10), Ivan Vakarchuk, I consulted immediately
after the meeting. These methods were well known in Soviet times.
3. The confiscation of the letter after signature makes the letter and signature
instruments to be used at the complete discretion of the SBU
4. The possible scenarios for the exploitation of such a document include the
following:
a. In case of the arrest of a student, the SBU could confront the rectorate and charge
that the university was informed of the danger to students and did not take
necessary measures to protect them from violence or legal harm. In this case the
university administration could be charged with both moral and legal responsibility. A
charge with legal ramifications could become an instrument to try to force the
university to compromise on some important principle (freedom of expression, forms
of social engagement and critique, even religious practice, all of which have
precedent in recent history). Furthermore, the authorities could use such a pretext to
exert a high degree of pressure on the university to curb any and all protest by
students.
b. After a hypothetical arrest of a student or students, the students and their parents
as well as other members of the university community could be shown the document
with which the administration was warned and counseled to curb student activities.
Since the administration did not stop the students from the activities that became
the pretext for the arrest, parents or others could draw the conclusion that the
university does not have adequate concern for the welfare of its students. This would
be a most effective way of dividing the university community and undermining the
university’s reputation among its most important constituents—the students.
5. The apparent genuine surprise of the agent at my refusal to do as requested could
mean that he is not used to such a reaction. He had explained to me that he works
with clergy on a regular basis. It could be assumed that other clergy (who work with
youth, students, etc.) have been approached and that they have not refused to sign
such documents.
6. Measures of this nature create apprehension and unease. They are meant to
intimidate university administrations and students. They are part of a whole pattern

of practice that is well known to the Ukrainian population. The revival of such
practices is a conscious attempt to revive the methods of the Soviet totalitarian past
and to re-instill fear in a society that was only beginning to feel its freedom.
7.Since only two of the approximately 170 universities of Ukraine have been voicing
there protest regarding recent political and educational developments and many
rectors have been marshaled/pressured to express their support regarding the turn
of events, it is clear that in recent months fear and accommodation are returning to
higher education at a rapid pace. It can be expected that UCU will be subject to
particular attention and possible pressure in the coming months. The solidarity of the
international community, especially the academic world, will be important in helping
UCU maintain a position of principle regarding intellectual and social freedom.
8. Speaking and writing openly about these issues is the most peaceful and effective
manner of counteracting efforts to secretly control and intimidate students and
citizens. As was apparent during this incident, state authorities are particularly
sensitive about publicity regarding their activity. Information can have a preemptory,
corrective, and curing role when it comes to planned actions to circumscribe civic
freedom, democracy, and the basic dignity of human beings.
It should be noted that on 11 May 2010, when Ukrainian students were organizing
protest activity in Lviv as well as in Kyiv, a representative of the office of Ihor
Derzhko, the deputy head of the Lviv Oblast Administration responsible for
humanitarian affairs, called the rectorate and asked for statistics on the number of
students participating in the demonstrations. UCU's response was that the university
does not know how to count in that way.
Please keep UCU and all the students and citizens of Ukraine in your thoughts and
prayers.
Fr. Borys Gudziak
Rector, Ukrainian Catholic University
19 May 2010
#14
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Kyiv Mohyla Academy President Supports Ukrainian Catholic University
27 May 2010
The SBU representative’s intimidation of Father Boris Gudziak, rector of UCU, has
caused great indignation. I am not referring to the disregard of the principles of
university autonomy because university autonomy does not exist in Ukraine. We
must understand that a university is not merely walls, people and books. A university
exists where the spirit of the university lives, based on the principles of freedom -
academic freedom, freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, freedom to participate
in political and public associations and in various gatherings. We are all different, but
a singleminded approach in the conduct of the academic community can be attained
only when the community protects these freedoms. We hereby express our support
of the Ukrainian Catholic University, a partner of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, and our
support of the critical position of our colleagues Rector Boris Gudziak, Pro-Rector
Myroslav Marynovych, and Professor Yaroslav Hrytsak.

Serhiy Kvit
President of National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy
#15
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Education Minister Dmytro Tabachnyk: “All Ukrainian Students Can Obtain a
Diploma Recognized in Europe”
Komsomol’skaia pravda Ukraïna, 28 May 2010
[translated by Anya Yablonska for UKL]
(…)
Elena from Zhytomyr: Don’t you find that the teaching of history in Ukrainian schools
is rather subjective and often depends on the views and beliefs of the teacher?
Dmytro Tabachnyk: Our Ministry of Education is currently working on the most
difficult question – defining the standards of education, because the delirium with the
extravagance of just simply the grading system in schools is not a reform, but an act
of dumbing-down students and deceit of society.
If talking about the subjective history teaching by a teacher, I should say that a
teacher must follow the academic curriculum, where it must be clearly stated that
the Holodomor of 1933 is a joint tragedy of the people of Ukraine, Russa, Belarus,
and Kazakhstan, and how many people have died from this misfortune in each of the
republics. At the same time, writing the truth that the biggest losses among the rural
population, more than 41 per cent, were in the Saratov region [in Russia –UKL]. In
this case, a teacher will not be able to brainwash students, using his/her subjective
opinions.
#16
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Springtime for Stalin
by Timothy Snyder
NYR Blog, 26 May 2010
http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/nyrblog/2010/may/26/springtime-for-stalin/
Three and a half months after a Ukrainian court convicted Stalin of genocide against
the Ukrainian nation during the famine of 1932–1933, a new monument in honor of
the Soviet dictator has been erected in the southeastern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhia.
Separating the two events was this year’s Ukrainian presidential election, in which
Viktor Yushchenko, who had pursued a radically anti-Stalinist memory policy, was
defeated and replaced by Viktor Yanukovych, who promised to avoid extremes and
unite the nation. Though Yanukovych would prefer to steer clear of such ostentatious
nostalgia for Stalin, he is responsible for a remarkable change in mood.
In his final months in office, Yuschchenko favored an ill-considered “trial” against
Stalin and other long-dead defendants as a way to define the history of Ukraine’s
past within the Soviet Union; Yanukovych, by contrast, has overseen the formation
of a new coalition government that includes the Communist Party of Ukraine. Rather
than simply letting his predecessor’s strident anti-communism fade into the past, the
new president has pronounced on Ukrainian history in a contrary spirit. Thus,

Yanokovych told the Council of Europe in late April that the deliberate starvation of
the three million inhabitants of Soviet Ukraine by the Stalinist regime was not
genocide, but rather a “common tragedy for all people who lived in the former Soviet
Union.” His bland formulation blurs important truths.
While it is true that Stalin’s policy of collectivization—the state seizure of farmland
and the coercive employment of peasants—brought enormous suffering throughout
the USSR in the early 1930s, it is also true that Stalin made deliberate decisions
about grain requisitions and livestock seizures that brought death to three million
people in Ukraine who did not have to die. Some of the very worst of the killing took
place in southeastern Ukraine, where Stalin is now being celebrated and where
Yanukovych has his political base. The famine destroyed that region’s rural society
by killing many, cowing more, and permitting the immigration of people from beyond
Ukraine—chiefly Russians, some of whom inherited the homes of the starved. The
cult of Stalin is thus no empty symbol in Ukraine; it is a mark of active identification
with a person who owed his mastery of Ukraine to a campaign of death.
Against this background, the new Stalin monument in Zaporizhia has disturbing
implications. Yanukovych himself would have preferred the city to have held a local
referendum before erecting the monument, as has been the custom with public
monuments in other Ukrainian cities. But the district committee of the Communist
Party of Ukraine in Zaporizhia proudly declared on its Web site that the action was
entirely legal. However that may be, the monument stands.
Communism is remembered for its killing, but communists ruled and repressed by
subtler methods most of the time. In Yanukovych’s Ukraine, other signs of the
Stalinist past, less prominent but perhaps more frightening, are beginning to
resurface. As students organize protests of Yanukovych’s policies in western and
central Ukraine, the Ukrainian secret service has returned to the discredited
approaches of its institutional predecessor, the Ukrainian branch of the old Soviet
KGB. Its officers now approach the rectors of universities and ask them sign
statements that amount to promises of loyalty.
The premise is subtle but effective: the rectors take cognizance of the fact that
students might be arrested and imprisoned. Then, when students are arrested and
imprisoned, the secret service shows the students the letter, thus breaking their
trust in the university system. The secret service keeps the letter, which also serves
as an instrument of blackmail for university officials who later might think of refusing
their cooperation. What seems at first like an anodyne acceptance of police authority
quickly becomes a tool to force cooperation. These statements were the institutional
basis for the effective collaboration of millions of people with the old communist
regime. They had disappeared from independent Ukraine; now they return.
Meanwhile, the Ukrainian secret services seem to have accepted a rather surprising
concession: their colleagues in Russia’s FSB now have the open right, confirmed be
an agreement between the two agencies on May 19, to act on Ukrainian sovereign
territory. Late last year Ukraine was expelling Russian secret service officers; now it
is inviting them back. In the Russian and the Ukrainian press, analysts speculate that
the Russian officers will recruit from retired staffers and sailors of Russia’s Black Sea
Fleet. The change coincides with debates in the Russian parliament about the
“strategic” use of ethnic Russians beyond Russia’s borders. The Crimean Peninsula,
where the Russian fleet docks, is the only part of Ukraine with an ethnic
Russian majority.

According to the treaty signed in April between Ukraine and the Russia, the Russian
naval force will have the right to base at the Ukrainian port at Sevastopol until 2047.
This makes NATO and EU membership very unlikely for Ukraine for the foreseeable
future. Thus Yanukovych takes a political argument away from his political
opponents, who say that they are the ones who can lead Ukraine into western
institutions. If Russian military forces are to be stationed in Ukraine for the political
lifetime of anyone now active in politics, which is what the thirty-year extension
amounts to (Russian already had basing rights until 2017), it is hard to see how the
conversation about joining NATO and the EU will even be possible in Kiev.
All of this represents a step backward for Ukraine, but the biggest loser—ironically—
is probably Russia. Moscow will pay for basing rights in Crimea by subsidizing natural
gas in Ukraine, a gain for the Ukrainian but a loss for the Russian budget. Moscow
gets little of significance in return but the certainty of decades of headaches. The
Black Sea Fleet is an important political presence in southern Ukraine, and that is
precisely the problem for Russia. The very last thing Russia needs is to be drawn into
imperial competition for Ukraine. Russian statebuilding (whether democratic or not)
depends precisely on the ability of Russian politicians to attend to the obvious
problems within their own country, rather than creating permanent distractions for
themselves and their successors abroad.
Russian civil society is also threatened by endorsement of Stalin from beyond
Russia’s borders. The plane crash that killed Poland’s president and ninety-five other
Poles in April provoked a Russian conversation not only about the shootings of Poles
at Katyn, which Polish dignitaries were coming to commemorate, but about Stalinist
killing in general. Both Putin and Medvedev have encouraged not only political
commemoration of the tragedy of Katyn, but also these broader discussions. At just
such a moment, it is to be rued that viewers of Russian television watch a monument
to Stalin erected in Ukraine, a land that suffered under Stalin even more than
Russia itself.
#17
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From: Stephen Velychenko
Date: Sat, May 29, 2010 at 3:02 PM
Participants to [the OUN-Bandera] debate should look well into the politics of
Zionism and the Arabs to understand what is going on regarding Ukrainian issues
and when deciding about which issues to discuss and which not to. Kto -kogo, as
Lenin said.
The Zionist goal is complicated by the existence of a large compact Arab minority
(Palestinians). In the 1920s and 30s, Ben Gurion and Jabotinsky espoused a Jewish
version of social-darwinism that called for a mass explusion of those Arabs -- but at
an opportune time when it would not incur international condemnation. That time
came in 1948 when 750 000 Palestinian Arabs were expelled from territory claimed
by Israel. Only the next next year was the Fourth Geneva Protocol ratified that
unequivocally prohibited the deportation of civilians. But by then the deed was done,
Israel was founded and would exist, condemnations notwithstanding. Even the most
radical critics of Zionism and Israel call only for the 1948 borders -- not for the
dissolution of Israel.

By 1949 the OUN had failed to establish independence. Its attempt at massive
displacement of Poles and Jews, much like the Zionists had done with Arabs, thus
has different consequences. The OUN did not advocate a similar massive expulsion of
Russians, although this might have occurred and would have been logical. In Ukraine
today we see not calls for Russians to emigrate but for Russian-speaking areas to
secede!! In any case, condemnations of the explusions and deaths that did happen
in the 40s now morally compromise the very idea of Ukrainian independence to a
much greater degree than the condemnation of Zionist expulsions compromise
Israeli independence.
In the case of Israel such condemnations have little impact on its foreign policy
which, since at least 1977, is aimed at fragmenting the Arab and Muslim countries
around it into a mosaic of sectarian and ethnic groups that it can be easily controlled
with US backing --
thanks to US neoconservatives and George II.
In the case of Ukraine, condemnations of wartime OUN policies, orchestrated by the
Kremlin and Tabachnyk, have much greater resonance in EU-US “liberal circles”
where most are ignorant about Ukrainian and Russian history. These people, for the
most part, jump as Russia expects on the impulse of moral outrage. They have their
doubts about whether Ukraine as a distinct political economic political unit should
exist as a “normal” European state. This in turn isolates national democrats in
Ukraine from the world community -- where ironically their case is normally backed
by right-wing groups that support US expansionism and Likhud -- and whose rightwing
counterparts in Ukraine national democrats normally keep at arms length. EU-
US “liberals” meanwhile are normally pro-Arab. Perhaps it is in Ukraine's interest
that the right in Ukraine should be as strong as the Zionist-Likud bloc in Israel and
the US. But that is not the case.
Add to this mix the fact that national democrats still do not control the means of
mass communications in Ukraine, and thus for the last 20 years have been unable to
reach all the population with the national message, while the Russian-language
media controlled from Ostankino and local non-Ukrainian oligarchs do reach all the
people with their imperial message, who should be surprised that Putin stands a
good chance of destabilizing the country and thus keeping it in hand by dividing it
into a mosaic of sectarian ethnic groups under a gubernator like Yanukovych.
#18
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In Lviv, Jewish Prayers Over Nazi Graves
by Natalia A. Feduschak
Kyiv Post, 27 May 2010
LVIV, Ukraine – At first blush, the scene in a remote corner of Lviv’s Yanivskiy
Cemetery on May 8 seemed almost unimaginable.
Mark Blessing, a rabbi’s assistant from Ukraine’s progressive Jewish community,
stood on a small plot of damp earth, singing a prayer in Hebrew.
Surrounding him were the graves of 40 unknown German soldiers, one-time
prisoners of war.

As Blessing’s voice cut through the heavy air, still thick with moisture from the rain
that pounded this picturesque city the night before, those present at this ceremony
stood silent for many moments. The enormity of the moment had finally sunk in:
Blessing had just spiritually recognized men who had come to this region in World
War II not out of goodwill, but to conquer and kill.
“We know these were people who didn’t come with peace, but we want to remember
them with peace,” said Taras Yavorsky, one of the organizers of Fairness and Peace,
a group that for the last five years has brought together people of all faiths to pay
tribute to all the victims of World War II. “There is not one name here, no title. This
is the most neglected (gravesite) in the city of Lviv. When we talk about the tool of
death, genocide, the deadly annihilation of people, this all began with the greatest
crime – the wiping out of humanity.”
Those who came to the May 8 ceremony, including priests, ministers and young
people, are part of a small but growing movement of individuals in western Ukraine
who are beginning to rethink the region’s difficult history. They are asking questions
about their countrymen’s complicity in some of its most tragic chapters, while at the
same time honoring those who suffered as a consequence.
Discussions are also heating up over many other divisive issues. Those include
whether elevating the status of nationalist leader Stepan Bandera (1909-1959) helps
or hurts the cause of unifying Ukraine’s diverse regions. Debate is also flaring over
the extent to which western Ukrainians were responsible for the demise of the
region’s Jewish community during World War II, and why Ukrainians from the east
do not appear ready to support the version of Ukrainian nationalism their western
counterparts frequently offer.
The advent of a new pro-Russian government in Kyiv that looks ready to revise
Ukrainian history in a way that is more acceptable to Moscow and often maligns
western Ukraine has added urgency to this reassessment. There is a feeling that if
western Ukrainians don’t soon come to terms with their own regional history, it will
be too late to counter the theses forwarded by a less-friendly Kyiv.
One of the most widely debated topics these days is how western Ukrainians see
Bandera, the man who led the more radical wing of the Organization for Ukrainian
Nationalists. The movement was founded in 1929 with the goal of uniting territorially
divided Ukraine and establishing it as an independent nation.
While many western Ukrainians admire Bandera for leading a movement that was
able to withstand Soviet repression for more than two decades, not everyone agrees
with the decision former President Viktor Yushchenko made earlier this year to
bestow Bandera with the nation’s highest honor, the Hero of Ukraine award. They
are concerned that the recognition was bestowed on the eve of the Jan. 17
presidential election – a vote that Yushchenko lost by a landslide, as predicted. The
award has since divided Ukraine and allowed the region’s history and its historical
figures to become objects of political manipulation.
“If you want to have a discussion in Ukraine, throw in Bandera and you will have
soon it,” Yaroslav Hrytsak, a leading historian who heads the humanities department
at Lviv’s Ukrainian Catholic University told an audience on May 11 during a
discussion about World War II.

“Yushchenko, of course, acted very badly in that he accented historical memory
(during his presidency). This is not what he should have been engaged in; at least
not in the first place… It is necessary to take a more serious stance toward history. ”
To that end, the Bandera award makes it only more difficult for western Ukrainians
to shake the image, often perpetrated by Moscow and more recently by Ukraine’s
pro-Russian Party of Regions, that everyone living in the region is a rabid nationalist
or, by default, an anti-Semite.
To be sure, western Ukrainians have had a complex relationship with their Jewish
neighbors. Much of the region’s centuries-old Jewish community was annihilated
during the Holocaust, often with the aid of Ukrainians who cooperated with the
Germans when they occupied the territory from 1941-1944. Latent anti-Semitism
still exists; anti-Jewish comments can be heard from places ranging from markets to
elite gyms.
At the same time, another prayer that Blessing, the rabbi assistant, participated in
on May 8 is indicative of a new undercurrent here.
The ceremony at the German gravesite ended that day’s memorial service. The first
stop, however, had been at Yanivskiy Prison, which during World War II had been a
concentration camp for Jews. Located on the outskirts of Lviv, thousands of Jews had
been incarcerated by the Nazis there. A large memorial stone outside the prison
remembers the many who perished at the camp.
“It is huge,” Blessing responded, when asked how significant it was that Ukrainians
had included that particular site in their prayer. Even though only a small group was
present, it was a start for understanding and reconciliation, he said.
Perhaps the most critical assessment under way in western Ukraine is why the region
has been unable to sell its version of Ukrainian nationalism to the eastern part of the
country.
In a comment that drew widespread recognition at the Ukrainian Catholic University
roundtable, historian Hrytsak said Lviv and so-called national-patriotic forces have
not provided a goal around which all Ukrainians can unite. Yushchenko, he said, was
successful in helping to erase myths about the Holodomor, the 1932-1933 Stalininstigated
famine that left millions dead. But that has not been enough to unite the
country, he said.
“What is done in Lviv will be done in Ukraine,” Hrytsak said. “Lviv determines to a
considerable extent what will be done in Ukraine.”
To that end, Lviv has failed.
“If we don’t pay attention to the crimes made before us, we are destined to commit
them again,” said Myroslav Marynovych, Ukrainian Catholic University vice rector. He
noted that the infighting between the former president and former Prime Minister
Yulia Tymoshenko mirrored arguments that occurred among leaders of Ukraine’s
nationalist movement in the 1930s and 1940s. Those arguments led to the eventual
loss of Ukrainian sovereignty.

“This is the same paradigm,” Marynovych said. “For the future, we need to judge the
steps of our ancestors.”
#19
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Ukraine After The Elections
Forthcoming in OSCE Yearbook 2010 (Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft)
By Oleh Protsyk (protsyk@ecmi.de)
Oleh Protsyk is Senior Research Associate at ECMI, Flensburg, Germany
In February 2010 Ukraine saw the inauguration of its fourth president since the
proclamation of independence in 1991. Viktor Yanukovych, the leader of the Party of
Regions, won the highly contested presidential election. The elections were generally
perceived as free and fair. Yanukovych´s victory was clear and not seriously
disputed. It was, however, not an overly impressive win: Yanukovych received the
lowest share of votes of any winner in a presidential race since independence. Even
the fact that elections took place at the time of a very acute economic crisis and that
Yanukovych’s opponent in the second round was an incumbent prime minister –
sitting governments usually suffer significantly in times of crisis – did not help to
make the victory more convincing.
Regardless of the actual strength of Yanukovych’s electoral mandate, the
expectations for change have been, and remain, very high. Obviously, different
constituencies inside the country have quite different types of changes in mind.
There are, however, some widely shared expectations that constitute a common
denominator for the changes that Ukrainian society hopes for. The following three
items would feature prominently on any hypothetical list of societal wishes: reducing
ideological polarization and regional divisions, strengthening the governability and
the effectiveness of state apparatus, improving the health of the economy.
This chapter provides an overview of how the new Ukrainian administration has
started addressing these societal wishes. Each of the wishes constitutes a formidable
challenge for the government. At the time of writing (May 2010), the new president
had not been in office long enough for this chapter to offer any definite assessment
of the strategies and approaches he is likely to pursue. What follows is a very
preliminary analysis of the first steps, and possible trajectories suggested by these
steps.
Country’s unity
Ukraine’s ethno-cultural heterogeneity does not need to be a liability for the
country’s political and economic development. After all, many countries, which -
similarly to Ukraine - are culturally diverse polities, manage to turn their diversity
into a competitive advantage. The problem is not diversity per se but rather the
growing politicization of ethno-cultural differences in Ukraine over the last decade.
To conceptualize Ukraine´s diversity, some scholars prefer to use the term regional
differences rather than ethno-cultural differences – these are legitimate and
consequential conceptual disagreements - but the essence of the problem remains
the same: Ukrainian politics is increasingly organized along ethno-cultural rather
than socio-economic lines.

The last presidential election confirmed this pattern – voters in different parts of
Ukraine had radically different preferences in terms of candidates. Identity politics
and related geopolitical issues were used by the candidates to rally their core
supporters and mobilize the base, irrespective of the costs for societal cohesion or
the country‟s unity. The election results revealed a familiar pattern: the vote for the
two leading candidates was heavily concentrated in the east and the west of the
country, with the center regions showing less unequal distribution of votes for the
two candidates. Yanukovych’s rival, Yulia Tymoshenko, was, however, the clear
winner in all the central regions of Ukraine, including the city of Kyiv.
Prioritizing ethno-cultural differences over other lines of societal differences, and
turning the former differences into the basis for defining society’s primary political
cleavage, is very problematic, unless a society is already deeply divided in ethnocultural
terms (e.g. Northern Ireland). Organization of politics along classical
ideological lines – usually left-right divisions about economy and redistribution - is
superior to the organization of politics along ethno-cultural or regional lines. This
thesis has strong theoretical foundations. It is also borne out by the experience of
many Western democracies where socio-economic divisions and left-right party
competition which exploits these divisions form the principal cleavage line and
structure the entire political process. Much of the Ukrainian political class
nevertheless seems to be bent on pursuing a course of action that hardens societal
identities and turns them into the main source of political conflict.
While ethno-cultural differences have always been a factor in Ukrainian politics, their
politicization became firmly institutionalized in the 2000s with the events of the
Orange revolution and, especially, with the 2006 legal changes that introduced a
fully proportional (PR) electoral system. The PR rules empowered political parties at
the expense of independent or party-unaffiliated regional politicians that played a
major role during the first decade of transition. After having acquired a monopoly on
political representation in the second half of the 2000s, parties started to face the
need to articulate coherent programmatic positions and to build societal support for
politics based on ideologies. Instead of pursuing the difficult task of building
universalistic political agendas based on the pursuit of policy programs that
distribute benefits and costs to all citizens, the main political parties choose an easier
route – to campaign on ethno-cultural differences and on promises to deliver
targeted benefits for their regionally concentrated clientele.
Ukrainian politics is not, of course, all about clientelistic linkages. As elsewhere,
parties try to mix their strategies for building ties with voters, so parties also put
some efforts into forming two other types of voter linkages – programmatic and
charismatic. Yet while the charisma of individual leaders has been an important
(albeit inherently unstable) source of strength for some parties, appeals to regionally
concentrated electorates proved to be a more enduring source of parties´ electoral
success. As has already been implied, programmatic linkages – understood here as
ties based on party promises of universally conceived social and economic policies –
are significantly underdeveloped. Such ties usually characterize parties built on
market-liberal or, alternatively, socialist ideologies. These are not parties that
dominate Ukraine’s political landscape. The very name of President Yanukovych’s
party illustrates this point. The party’s name -- Party of Regions – highlights the
party´s original intention to use regional issues as the primary basis of its political
appeal.

During the Yushchenko period Ukrainian politics was characterized by the alteration
of power between two political camps that were defined primarily in terms of ethnocultural
differences. Yanukovych’s election provided an important opportunity to
break the pattern of politicization of these differences. The opportunity arose from
the fact that Yanukovych’s party faction in the parliament was not numerically
strong enough to form either a one party cabinet or a cabinet based on a coalition
with two minor parties in the parliament. The Party of Regions had to go across the
main political divide to secure the legislative majority required to form a cabinet.
There were thus strong expectations in the weeks following Yanukovych’s elections
that his party would form a coalition with the party of departing president
Yushchenko, who informally backed Yanukovych in the second round of elections.
Such a coalition was seen as instrumental for de-politicizing some of the very
sensitive issues that fall under the ethno-cultural domain and tend to polarize
opinions in Ukrainian society. The coalition could also have helped to make socioeconomic
lines of political competition more salient: both parties share a similar promarket
economic agenda that puts them on the same end of the socio-economic
dimension of politics. Any opposition towards such an alliance would then have had
to highlight more left-oriented programmatic appeals. Parties that would have been
outside the coalition – especially the communists and people´s (former agrarian)
party - would have had few difficulties in adapting to such a format of party
competition.
This coalition never materialized. [Footnote: This is an outcome which can not be
entirely attributed to Yanukovych - he had difficult counterparts in these
negotiations - but he, as a key political actor, bears a significant share of
responsibility] Yanukovych also chose to defy any expectations that he would show
moderation in matters of identity politics. Instead, his first policy steps indicate a
willingness to pursue a course that caters to the interests of a narrow base of his
most radical supporters, thus further polarizing society. A telling example of this
willingness is the appointment of a very controversial figure - Dmytro Tabachnyk - as
the minister of education. Tabachnyk has in the past provoked numerous scandals
with statements like, “Galicians (OP: the Ukrainian population of Galitcia, the largest
historic region of Western Ukraine) have practically nothing in common with people
of the rest of Ukraine mentally, religiously, linguistically, or politically.” The politician
has a history of similar statements which set one region of Ukraine against another.
For many in Ukraine it was hard to imagine a more divisive figure to head a ministry
which is supposed to play a major role in constructing a non-conflictual national
identity narrative. The appointment unleashed a wave of protests among university
students and the intelligentsia, and repeated calls for the minister’s resignation in
the parliament.
A number of other developments and policy initiatives had a similar effect of
antagonizing a large number of civil society actors and invigorating political
opposition. These include the promotion of a largely Soviet narrative of the Second
World War, the lack of a strong government response to communists‟ attempts to
rehabilitate Stalin, a revision of the government position on the issue of Holodomor
(the 1930s human-caused famine), and abolishment or declaration of plans to
abolish a number of cultural and educational policies aimed at reviving the Ukrainian
language.

These types of issues are not simply another set of policy questions with
distributional implications. These issues are intricately linked to the core beliefs of a
very substantial number of Ukrainians and evoke a strong emotional response. While
fierce criticism of government action by opposition parties was predictable, the
mobilization of various civil society groups and numerous protest actions in different
regions of the country was less expected. In a very short time the policies of the new
government in the cultural realm seem to have produced a wave of indignation and
furor. This provides little hope that the new president will be able to reach out to the
half of the country that did not vote for him.
The identity-based conflicts in Ukraine are not limited to the cultural realm. The April
2010 Ukrainian-Russian agreement that saw a considerable reduction in gas prices
for Ukraine in exchange for the prolongation of the lease term for the Sevastopol
base of the Russian Black fleet has also had strong repercussions for identity politics.
The way in which the deal was negotiated – behind closed doors and at an extremely
fast pace – shocked the opposition and provided it with another reason for accusing
Yanukovych’s government of dismantling the country’s sovereignty, a highly
sensitive issue in the Ukrainian context. The process of ratification of this agreement
saw large demonstrations outside the parliament and the worst confrontation in
years inside the parliament.
Overall, the first steps of the new administration indicate a strong willingness to
continue politicizing ethno-cultural differences. The process of societal conciliation in
Ukraine has already been seriously hindered by the initiatives of the new
government. Yanukovych seems to have learned little from his predecessor,
Yushchenko, whose often justifiable but somewhat sporadic and poorly prepared
moves in the sphere of identity politics sometimes polarized public opinion and
encouraged radicalism among societal actors. The newly minted Yanukovych
administration already faces a large number of small scale but highly vocal societal
protests accompanying very antagonistic fights in the parliament – something that
the previous Ukrainian presidents were able to avoid during their honeymoon period.
Democracy and governance
The majority of Ukrainians do not put concerns about democracy on the top of their
list of priorities in the post-election period. Yet the public´s concerns about
governability and the effectiveness of state apparatus can be legitimately addressed
only in a democratic framework of governance. The state of Ukrainian democracy
matters, both for improving governability and state effectiveness at home and for
Ukraine´s dealings with the external world.
One of the achievements of Yushchenko´s presidency was the further
democratization of public life. While observers of Ukrainian politics might disagree to
whom or to what factors these achievements should ultimately be attributed, the
very fact of democratization is indisputable and is reflected in various international
ratings of democratic performance, such as the one produced by Freedom House.
Democratization, however, came at considerable costs to governance. The discipline
and effectiveness of the state apparatus have been seriously compromised and state
authority has been generally weakened.
There is widespread fear in Ukraine’s civil society that Yanukovych’s attempts to
improve governability will come at the expense of democracy. The first steps of the

new government confirms some of these fears by indicating a willingness to limit
media pluralism and to overhaul various formal rules and procedures that limit the
government’s ability to monopolize political power. These steps also signal a
willingness to use informal mechanisms of coercive pressure, reminiscent of practices
of the “blackmail state” associated with the rule of Leonid Kuchma, Ukraine´s second
president. Before briefly reviewing these worrying signs, a major institutional
problem of governance has to be highlighted.
The constitutional distribution of executive powers remains a major bone of
contention in Ukrainian politics. The 2004 constitutional amendments reduced
considerably the powers of a president. After this constitutional reform, Ukraine
remains a semi-presidential republic but the reform legally transferred the center of
executive decision-making from the president to the prime minister. The president
also constitutionally lost almost all powers in terms of cabinet appointment and
dismissal. In political terms, however, the president continues to enjoy strong
legitimacy due to a popular election mandate. In the past this institutional set-up
encouraged fierce intra-executive competition between president Yushchenko and
prime ministers. The conflict reverberated through the entire state apparatus and
bogged down Yushchenko’s entire presidency.
Yanukovych’s current strategy for reducing this constitutionally-generated potential
for intra-executive conflict has been to secure the appointment of a loyal and nonambitious
prime minister. After securing such an appointment Yanukovych was able
to concentrate all executive powers in his hands. The ability to enjoy this level of
control over the executive depends, however, on the stability of the ruling coalition.
When this coalition’s stability becomes threatened by policy disagreements or the
prospects of mid-term parliamentary elections, the president might face strong
incentives to revise the terms of the 2004 constitutional deal and restore the pre-
2004 presidential powers. If events evolve in this direction, how new constitutional
reform is handled will be a major test for Yanukovych’s democratic commitments.
These commitments started to be questioned as the new president formed the
government. The existing parliamentary rules and procedures for forming a
governing coalition in parliament were quickly revised by pro-Yanukovych deputies to
suit the needs of the new president. The earlier rules, confirmed by a Constitutional
Court decision, allowed only parliamentary factions but not individual deputies to
form a coalition. This norm is a rare one in the parliamentary practices of democratic
states; it was adopted by the Ukrainian parliament in order to stop the practice of
frequent migration of deputies among factions. Such migration was an important tool
in president Kuchma’s control of parliament. Pro-presidential parliamentary
majorities during Kuchma’s period were constructed through the use of informal
pressures and rewards in order to affect individual deputies’ decisions about joining a
parliamentary faction.
The parliamentary procedure from Kuchma‟s period was reinstated after
Yanukovych’s election, despite protests from the opposition. The Constitutional Court
– despite its own earlier decision but in a familiar pattern of serving the interests of
whoever is in power – approved the new rules for coalition formation. The pro-
Yanukovych government coalition, which would have been impossible without a
number of individual deputies who defected from opposition factions, was legitimated
by this decision of the Constitutional Court. Among the defectors from the opposition
factions were a number of business people, some of whom informally explained their
decision to support a new coalition by the fear of government actions against their

usinesses if they were to remain in opposition. Other defectors appear to have been
rewarded by allocation of government posts to their close relatives. Overall,
executive domination and clientelistic practices seem set to return in full force to the
Ukrainian parliament. Deputies’ defections induced either by positive or negative
sanctions of the executive are a very important indicator of how limited the role is of
programmatic/ideological factors in Ukrainian politics and how weak the social norms
are that prevent such defections en masse in the context of consolidated
democracies.
Another example of a problematic change of the rules of the game is provided by the
new coalition’s decision to cancel the scheduled local elections, something that the
critics claim the constitution does not allow the government to do. In a somewhat
similar but more radical way, the government wants to address the issue of local
self-government in the capital city. Pro-Yanukovych forces traditionally enjoy a low
level of support in Kyiv. A draft bill introduced by the government proposes an
overhaul of the system and the abolishment of direct elections for the mayor of Kyiv.
Problems for democracy are also signaled by developments in the media sphere.
Sustaining pluralism in this sphere in the past was made easier by Yushchenko’s
personal commitment to freedom of speech. According to the dominant view in the
media, the situation changed significantly for the worse with the arrival of the new
government. The leading media watchdogs – web-portal “Telekritika,” Academy of
Ukrainian Press, and Institute of Mass Media - report a number of moves directed at
monopolizing control over media, and accuse the new government of orchestrating
these moves. The journalists working in the newsrooms of two leading TV-channels
– STB and 1+1 – signed collective letters blaming the channel’s management for
imposing politically-motivated censorship on news coverage. The international
organization “Reporters Without Borders” has voiced concern about the deterioration
of media freedoms in Ukraine.
While problems with democracy are mounting, what do the prospects for improving
state effectiveness and governance look like? Although it is too early to discuss
substantive policies of state reform, appointments to key political and bureaucratic
positions can be seen as a precursor for what is to come in this area. Ukraine´s
leading analytical weekly, “Dzerkalo Tyzhnia,” ran a series of reports in April 2010
about key appointments in central and regional governments. The main conclusion of
these reports is that loyalty criteria trumps considerations of professionalism when it
comes to the appointment decisions of president Yanukovych’s government. Further
concerns are raised by the persistence of a pattern of appointing big business
representatives to important government posts. A telling example of this practice is
the appointment of one of the owners of the largest and the least transparent media
groups to head a national security agency. A popular web-portal, “Ukrainska
Pravda,” reported also in April 2010, that this agency recently started an
investigation of the results of one of the auction sales of media frequencies. The
auction results were not beneficial for the media group with which the head of the
secret service had been associated. Overall, Yushchenko’s old and unfulfilled
promises of depoliticizing the bureaucracy and separating big business and
government remains topical for Ukraine under the new administration. The
appointment policies of this administration suggest that little progress should be
expected in this direction.

Economy
Civil society might have been less vocal about the deficiencies of Yanukovych style
democracy if the new government signaled a credible commitment to deliver on
socio-economic issues. Ukraine’s challenge in this domain is not simply to find a
means to recover from the recent global economic crises that hit Ukraine especially
hard. What is required is a large number of major structural reforms that have been
long overdue, even prior to the start of the recent meltdown in the global economy.
There is a broad and well articulated understanding of what has to be done. One
authoritative statement recently produced by a non-partisan expert group, which
includes analysts from leading Ukrainian think tanks and the academic community,
has a list of twenty two priority measures in the socio-economic realm. The list
includes measures to overhaul the budget formation process and social welfare
system; pension and health reforms; comprehensive tax and property rights
reforms; land privatization; public utilities and transport sector reforms. [See Reform
Support Network, “Road map for Reforms,” March 2010, English version summary of
the document is accessible at
http://parlament.org.ua/upload/docs/Road_Map_final_eng.pdf]
Launching most of these reforms would require time, and the new government has
not yet been in office long enough to tackle various issues seen as preconditions for
these
reforms. The government has, however, already made explicit its intentions in the
socio-economic sphere. These are very detailed and comprehensive declarations –
they come in the form of the 2010 government program of social and economic
development and the 2010 state budget enacted by the new parliamentary majority.
These documents allow some preliminary evaluation of the government’s intentions.
The expert assessment of both documents has been highly critical. Admittedly, the
government inherited a very difficult economic situation and has to exert a great
deal of effort to addressing the most urgent current economic problems. Yet in 2010
the government plans to implement very little of the reform package envisioned in
the above-mentioned document prepared by the consortium of think tanks or in
several other policy recommendation reports produced by various domestic and
international organizations. Many required reforms can have painful social
consequences at the early stages of their implementation; a government decision not
to start these reforms immediately after the elections also diminishes the probability
of them being launched at a later stage. The political costs of launching these
reforms will be much higher for the new president after his post-election honeymoon
period is over. The electoral timetable, which includes both local and parliamentary
reforms in the course of the next two years, will dictate other priorities.
The strategy adopted by the new government appears to be based on an ad-hoc
patching of some of the most obvious cases of economic mismanagement,
strengthening government regulations and government interventions into particular
sectors of the economy, improving tax collection, and similar types of policies. No
comprehensive measures intended to deal with the huge burden of various types of
social welfare payments, with systemic corruption, or with monopolism in various
sectors of Ukraine’s economy, are part of this strategy.
Political confrontation provoked largely by the government policies discussed in the
first section of this paper made it impossible for the government to seek broad cross-

political spectrum support for structural reforms. This confrontation prevents even
regular types of deliberation about budget and economic policy issues. The 2010
budget was passed by the parliament in less than 10 minutes, without any discussion
on the parliamentary floor. Regardless of whether the complete lack of consultation
and deliberation was unfortunate or welcome by the new government coalition, the
end result is documents that lack the usual benefits associated with critical
discussion and outside input.
Without any hopes for the opposition’s cooperation on issues related to overcoming
the consequences of the economic crisis, the government has to go on its own. It
seems to base its policies on expectations that a global economic recovery, which
has already improved demand of products from such traditional export sectors of the
Ukrainian economy as metallurgy, will help to stabilize the nation’s economy and
limit the problems of a huge budget deficit. This in turn will enable the government
to continue policies of external borrowing, which, critics say, just encourages a
familiar pattern of living beyond one’s own means.
In the view of many Ukrainian economic analysts, obtaining financial subsidies and
economic preferences from one of Ukraine’s main economic partners, the Russian
Federation, in exchange for strategic geopolitical concessions, is another major
element of the overall economic strategy. The controversial April 2010 agreement
with Russia about the reduction of natural gas prices in exchange for the
continuation of the navy base lease is seen by many as an indication of the approach
that the new government will take. This is, for example, a sentiment that runs
through a number of analytical pieces published in the already mentioned “Dzerkalo
Tyzhnia”, the nation’s leading weekly. The weekly’s analysts expect a series of deals
in other economic sectors that will see the government reversing political decisions
of the previous administration or relinquishing control over strategic assets in
exchange for financial subsidies.
For an analysis of the geopolitical aspects of the April 2010 agreement or other
government plans, the reader has to consult other accounts. The gas deal, however,
provides a good illustration of the many issues with reforming the Ukrainian
economy. Some of them are briefly mentioned here. While the deal provides a very
considerable reduction of gas prices, it does not help to address the structural
problems of energy dependency. It also illustrates the government’s unwillingness
to undertake unpopular reforms – the agreement enables the government to persist
in maintaining extremely low gas prices for households. It also produces a very
concentrated group of winners, a small group of the so-called “oligarchs” controlling
energy-intensive industries in the east of the country. The deal is designed to
politically benefit only the current government - while the lease of the navy base is
extended for 25 years, the reduction in gas prices comes only in the first 10 years,
which is also the maximum length that president Yanukovych, provided that he is
reelected, can remain in office.
The concentrated winners – big business from the country’s east – are a core
resource-rich constituency of president Yanukovych’s government. The influence of
this constituency over the design of economic policies constitutes another major
challenge for the new government. Will the economic policies of the government be
dictated primarily by the interests of this constituency in a typical clientelistic fashion
in which financial support for politicians prior to elections is exchanged for
government favors when these politicians are in public office? The interests of this
constituency are numerous. For one thing, they want to maintain control over

industries they own, so there are limits to how much dependence on foreign capital
they are willing to tolerate – thus the experts’ concerns about Ukraine losing control
over strategic assets might prove to be exaggerated. More critically for the prospects
of economic reforms, Ukraine’s “oligarchs” have an established record of seeking
privileged public works contracts, regulatory decisions, subsidies, and monopolies.
Whether the new administration will be willing to restrain rent seeking behavior and
resist the temptation to sell protection against market uncertainty remains an open
question for some in Ukraine. For others this question has already been negatively
answered.
Conclusion
The chapter provided a brief overview of Ukraine’s affairs at the start of president
Yanukovych’s term. It outlined some of the major challenges that the new
presidential administration faces and discussed some of the first steps it has taken.
These steps have proved controversial, posing questions about Ukraine’s unity and
the direction of its political and economic development. While questions about unity
are frequently raised by commentators and this paper also focused on them, it is
important to keep in mind that the country’s internal cohesiveness is much higher
than it might appear to a casual observer of Ukraine’s fractious political scene.
Ukraine is not a deeply divided society. There is overwhelming public support for the
integrity of the country and any talk of separation is very painfully perceived both in
the country’s east and west. While the first steps of Yanunkovych’s administration
postpone societal conciliation, they do not prevent it.
The verdict on Yanukovych’s ability to deliver on the dual goals of political and
economic development will be uncertain for quite some time. Over the past five
years Ukraine has made significant progress in democratizing public life. Now there
appear to be doubts about whether these gains will be sustained and consolidated
under the new government. President Yanukovych’s administration faces serious
questions about its commitment to sustaining political pluralism and guaranteeing an
equal playing field for all participants in the political process. The answers to these
questions will also shape the government’s ability to address problems of governance
and state effectiveness. No less challenging are issues of economic development.
While few doubt the new government’s ability to stabilize the economy, the
government has yet to give any credible signs of determination to pursue much
needed structural reforms.
Achieving progress on these political and economic objectives is vital for Ukraine’s
European aspirations. This is one area where the new government seems to be
willing to accept some continuity with the objectives and policies of the previous
government. It is claimed that European integration remains a priority for the new
government. Domestic developments related to various issues raised in this article
will constitute a major test for how genuine the new government’s resolve is to purse
such integration.
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UKL 444, 1 June 2010
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