Ukrainian President Victor Yushchenko (left) is at one with Lithuanian President Valdas Adamkus (right) in the question of participation in the Moscow 60th anniversary of the Victory. However, he hopes the Russian leadership will understand his stance (centre - Russian State Duma’s speaker Boris Gryzlov)
Photo: AP
| Other Photos |
 |
|
 |
Yushchenko to Come Back to His Veterans
// Ranks of the presidents at the May 9th celebration in Moscow thin
Victory day
Ukrainian President Victor Yushchenko Saturday put an end to the question of his participation in the May 9 celebrations in Moscow marking the 60th anniversary of the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany. He will attend the CIS summit on May 8 but he will celebrate the Victory Day in the Kyiv’s central Kreshchatik street together with the Ukrainian WW2 veterans. Thus, Ukrainian president has joined the ranks of those ex-Soviet republics’ leaders who declined to take part in the Moscow festivities. Thus the event will evidently lack the propagandistic impact Russian leadership wanted it to have.
“I will feel uneasy when our Ukrainian veterans celebrate the great Victory down here, in Kyiv, while I will be in Moscow,” Ukrainian president said Saturday. Victor Yushchenko made a promise, though, that he would come to Moscow the day before, on May 8, when an informal CIS summit would take place. He said he hopes that “Mr. President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin and other counterparts will understand” his decision. Earlier, on March 18, in an interview with Interfax Ukrainian president gave quite a different itinerary of his: according to that version he was to celebrate the Victory Day first in Kreshchatik, then come to Moscow for a few hours.
Be that as it may, Ukrainian president has entered the list of the ex-Soviet republics’ leaders who refused to take part in the Moscow celebrations. Earlier this month, Lithuanian president Valdas Adamkus and his Estonian counterpart Arnold Rüütel turned down the invitation to visit the Russian capital. The issue of coming is not settled with the leaders of other countries but according to the Kommersant’s information, the good half of the post-Soviet countries’ presidents may decline to arrive.
Every leader has his formal reason for the refusal. For instance, Baltic countries account it for the fact that the WW2 finished for their countries not in 1945, but in early 90s when the Russian “occupation” troops were withdrawn. At the same time, the fact that an opportunity to meet a large number of world leaders may be missed has not influenced the decision of Lithuanian and Estonian presidents. The problem has been solved in a simple way: on his way to Moscow U.S. President George W. Bush will visit Riga on May 6, where the U.S.A – Baltic states summit will be held.
According to the latest reports Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili is not going to visit Moscow either. He pleads the necessity to get prepared for the visit of the U.S president who will arrive in Tbilisi on May 10 after the Moscow festivities are over.
If one believes the hints that come from Baku, Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev may refuse to take part in the CIS summit and the Victory Day celebrations in Moscow as well. The problem here is of a different kind: Moscow laid its hopes to take advantage of this occasion to make Azerbaijani president resume talks with Armenian president Robert Kocharian on the Nagorno-Karabakh issue. But the Baku officials lately have been very skeptical about the way the conflict is being settled and are not likely to be ready for high-level negotiations.
As a result, the propagandistic impact may prove to be far weaker than Moscow wanted it to be, since the Kremlin was going to hold the 60th Victory Day celebrations with even more impressive grandeur than the 300th anniversary of St. Petersburg.
Moreover, the leaders who confirmed they would attend the Moscow festivities are going to put a fly in the ointment. Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski will put forward the question of the condemnation of Molotov-Ribbetrop Pact which enabled Nazi Germany to invade Poland and divide the country. Moreover, the Polish president wants to explain his country’s viewpoint on the Yalta agreements as of 1945 which split Europe into the two confronting parties.
Latvian President Vaira Vike-Freiberga, the only one of the Baltic leaders who is to come to Moscow, does it reluctantly. On the one hand there is a good reason for the visit: the desire to improve tense relations with Russia. On the other hand, the problems accumulated cannot be resolved within a couple days spent in Moscow. At any rate, the political declaration on the principals of relations, which Moscow was looking forward to be concluded, is not to be signed.
And finally Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi’s participation in the Moscow celebrations looks very improbable. Media reported several weeks ago that Japanese PM declined to visit Moscow pledging the celebrations contemporizing with the second half of the Parliament session. This lame excuse must have seemed so unconvincing even for the Japanese officials that the Japanese Foreign Ministry immediately retracted saying that its final position is not determined yet. It seems that the question is still being decided upon, and Tokyo still can’t choose which fits their interests best – a gesture of good will or the demonstration of steadfastness in the country’s dispute over the four South Kuril islands.
Boris Volkhonsky
All the Article in Russian as of Mar. 28, 2005
|
|
|
