From fight to self-dissolution

Ukraine faces new early elections

In Ukraine, where early parliamentary elections were held in September last year, a deep political crisis is beginning again. Yesterday, President Viktor Yushchenko was unable to speak in the Verkhovna Rada with his annual message “On the internal and external situation of Ukraine,” and the leadership of the parliament started talking about self-dissolution .

The work of the Verkhovna Rada has been blocked since January 18. Opposition deputies from the Communist Party and the Party of Regions are thus protesting against an open letter to the NATO Secretary General, signed on January 15 by President Yushchenko, Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko and Verkhovna Rada Speaker Arseniy Yatsenyuk, but not agreed upon with parliament. The document contained a request to begin procedures for admitting Ukraine to the alliance. In addition, parliamentarians demand to investigate the circumstances of the fight between the mayor of Kyiv Leonid Chernovetsky and the head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Yuri Lutsenko, which occurred in January at a meeting of the National Security and Defense Council.

On the eve of yesterday's meeting, the president unsuccessfully tried to resolve the crisis through negotiations with the leadership of parliament and the leader of the “regions” Viktor Yanukovych. Yesterday, at about 10 o’clock in the morning, deputies from the Party of Regions blocked the passage to the presidium with chairs, and on the presidium itself and the parliamentary rostrum they hung two banners with the slogan “NATO will not pass!” In addition, the “regionals” blocked the service entrance to the hall, which is used by the Chairman of the Rada Arseniy Yatsenyuk - they simply stood in the doorway and did not let anyone in.

The “regionals” themselves claimed yesterday that at first it was not they who tried to disrupt the meeting, but deputies from the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc (BYuT), dissatisfied with the fact that the president did not agree with them on some important issues. The BYuT members allegedly took a copy of the constitution and a stand for it from the hall, without which it was impossible to open the meeting.

In such circumstances, Viktor Yushchenko refused to read the message. The head of the presidential secretariat, Viktor Baloga, said that “the president cannot and will not speak in a hall agitated by passions, where noise drowns out words, and emotions drown out reason.”

“What the opposition is now insisting on is completely impossible,” Ukrainian political scientist Igor Losev from the Kiev-Mohyla Academy noted to Vremya Novostey. - The opposition demands a complete abandonment of the state strategy, which, by the way, was supported by Viktor Yanukovych as prime minister. They actually demand that Ukraine abandon Euro-Atlantic integration.”

However, the deputy director of the Russian Institute of CIS Countries, Vladimir Zharikhin, told Vremya Novostey yesterday that the current parliamentary unrest was provoked by the “orange” deputies and Arseny Yatsenyuk personally: “They decided to work off the advances they received in the West, and therefore it is no coincidence that in the middle January, they published an appeal for Ukraine’s accession to NATO .” The Chairman of the Parliament, according to the expert, “did not have the right to sign this document on behalf of the Rada, which had not even discussed this issue yet.” In addition, recent public opinion polls in Ukraine indicate that the vast majority of voters oppose the country's entry into NATO.

On the eve of President Yushchenko's departure to Geneva, Speaker Yatsenyuk nevertheless took the chairman's chair and tried to start the meeting. He was guarded by a cordon of members of the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc. After counting the deputies in the hall, the speaker announced that 68 absentees would not receive their salaries for that day, regardless of party affiliation. Then he called for a discussion of the problem of Ukraine's accession to NATO, saying that if the deputies do not agree on this issue now, they will never agree. In response, Yanukovych's supporters stormed the presidium. A massive brawl broke out between the “orange” and “regionals”. There were many who wanted to fight on both sides, but the narrow passages near the podium and the presidium did not allow the legislators to turn around with all their might. Only the deputies who stood at the forefront fought.

Arseniy Yatsenyuk announced a break from work and hastily took refuge in his office. He did this in vain: the “regionals” immediately blocked the office, and the other deputies remaining in the hall soon dispersed.

Yesterday at about 2 pm the leaders of the Ukrainian factions gathered for a conciliation council. The leader of the bloc named after himself, Vladimir Lytvyn, then came out to journalists and announced that the parliament was facing self-dissolution: “If the Verkhovna Rada does not work, then today the countdown of thirty days will begin during which it is incapacitated.” According to him, “all faction leaders” are in favor of new elections. “According to the constitution, this has no legal basis. The question is on a different plane: do the Ukrainian people need such a Rada?” - added Mr. Litvin. As a result, the Rada did not start work yesterday.

Russian expert Vladimir Zharikhin, in a conversation with Vremya Novostei, did not rule out the possibility of dissolving the Rada, but does not see a tragedy in this: “Ukraine has already proven that it can live for six months without parliament, six months without a government, but it cannot live a day without gas.” The main problem is that the country does not have a centralized government with which to conduct dialogue at the international level. “Everyone considers himself to be in charge. Yushchenko declares that he must lead foreign policy, Tymoshenko takes on this role, and the Rada believes that foreign policy decisions cannot be made without her. The question arises: with whom should we deal?” - noted our interlocutor.

Director of the Kyiv Center for Political Research and Conflict Studies, Mikhail Pogrebinsky, agrees with the Russian expert. He told VN that “Ukraine is now living in a situation of significant uncertainty. Therefore, the slightest movement will destabilize the situation, such as the “letter of three” on NATO. This is, generally speaking, nonsense, a document that does not change anything. However, he unbalanced the situation.”

According to the expert, “in Ukraine there has never been such a strong separation between the position of the country’s leaders and public opinion. Before this, the government maneuvered, moved away from public opinion, but did not “pedal” this departure, as Yushchenko is doing now. This creates great instability. Viktor Yushchenko does not understand this, and his movement into NATO and all other international organizations is considered in the country as a challenge to society.”

Igor Losev has his own interpretation of events. He is convinced that “all this anti-NATO hysteria is 90% Russian in origin”: “Russia’s policy of keeping satellites in its orbit at any cost, or at least not letting them float freely, has remained unchanged. The Kremlin is invisibly present in many seemingly purely internal Ukrainian disputes,” says Vremya Novostey’s interlocutor.

According to Igor Losev, “there are several ways to solve the problem that has arisen.” He recalled precedents when Rada meetings were held not in the parliament building on Grushevsky Street, but in the so-called Ukrainian House - a cultural center in Kyiv. “You can also use the so-called presidential decree and govern the country without parliament, since, contrary to the constitution, it does not fulfill its functions. If the ruling coalition acts decisively and principledly, then all this will end in nothing. But if she again begins to negotiate all sorts of concessions, the situation could result in a crisis with unpredictable consequences.”

Mikhail ALANDARENKO, Kyiv, Nikolay GOLYGIN