New Claims on the Bloc
// Ukraine’s plans to join NATO enrage opposition and Russia
Ukrainian opposition has lashed out at President Vladimir Yushchenko, Prime Minister Yulia Timoshenko and Parliament speaker Arseny Yatsenyuk for sending to NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer on Tuesday an address to announce Kyiv’s intention to join the NATO Membership Action Plan at the bloc’s summit in April. The news drew even more blistering criticism from Russia as Moscow threatened to review its partner relations with Ukraine.
“The statement signed by the president, prime minister and Supreme Rada speaker on Ukraine’s possible accession to the NATO Membership Action Plan proves that incumbent authorities violate the constitution of Ukraine. An opinion of the Ukrainian people is no important factor for them in making crucial decisions,” the Party of Regions said on Wednesday in a statement. Viktor Yanukovich and his allies demanded that Ukraine go to a referendum on the possible NATO membership as they cited Ukraine’s constitution: “Only citizens of Ukraine can change the non-bloc status of our country which is set in the Main Law. We won’t let anyone trample on the Constitution.”
The paper which triggered severe criticism from the Party of Regions was signed by Viktor Yushchenko, Yulia Timoshenko and Arseny Yatsenyuk and posted on the Ukrainian president’s web-site Tuesday night. The Ukrainian leaders called on the NATO secretary general to put Ukraine on the list of the NATO Membership Action Plan at the summit in Bucharest in April.
“Fully sharing the European democratic values our state identifies itself as part of the Euro-Atlantic security area and is willing, together with NATO and partners thereof, to counteract common threats to security under equal conditions,” the document says. Kyiv assured Brussels that Ukraine is set to join NATO but the leadership needs to “deliberate it with the Ukrainian people” beforehand.
Kommersant sources report that the address was signed as early as on January 11.Viktor Yushchenko was planning to make the announcement on television but the plans were messed by the U.S. Senate’s deputy chairman of the foreign relations committee Richard Lugar who was on a visit in Kyiv at the time. He met Viktor Yushchenko early Tuesday morning to discuss Ukrainian-U.S. relations and how to strengthen Ukraine’s energy independence and further integrate it into European and Euro-Atlantic structures. Viktor Yushchenko informed the Senator of the address, and the American spilt the beans at the press conference. The president’s office then had to post the full text on the web-site.
Kyiv had to give out apologies the whole day long on Wednesday. Foreign Minister Vladimir Ogryzko was the one to start. “There’s not a single word there that says Ukraine is applying to join NATO,” he said. “It’s all about a new stage of the cooperation between Ukraine and NATO. If it concerns the accession to NATO, then, as the letter says, the leadership of the state will deliberate with the Ukrainian people.” The president’s spokesman Alexander Chaly explained how the deliberation would be arranged: “At the time when Ukraine’s NATO membership will be considered, we will hold a referendum but we cannot give an exact timing now.” He added that the Ukrainian constitution contains no restriction on NATO membership. The non-bloc status of Ukraine is set out only in the Declaration of Independence. It means that the Constitution will not have to be amended when joining the alliance, which makes things easy for Kyiv as any attempts to amend the constitution would face violent confrontation from the Party of Regions.
Russia has joined the vivid discussion of prospects of Ukraine’s NATO membership. The Russian Embassy in Kyiv reacted to Viktor Yushchenko’s address to Jaap de Hoop Scheffer by posting on its web-site excerpts from Ambassador Viktor Chernomyrdin’s interview with TV channel Ukraina. “Our relations are too close –in ‘sensitive’ technologies, political affairs as well – to feel nothing about the fact that Ukraine will become a NATO member,” he said. “Organizations Ukraine wants to join, who it wants to be friends with, who it wants to love – that’s its own business. We are just trying to explain that if you join NATO we will have to review our relationship.”
The Russian Foreign Ministry’s spokesman Andrey Krivtsov confirmed in an interview with Kommersant on Wednesday that Vladimir Chernomyrdin’s warning expresses Moscow’s official position. “It’s their business whether to join the alliance or not,” he said. “But if Ukraine will enter NATO, we will have to review our foreign policy to take this fact into account.”
Alexander Gabuev, Moscow, and Sergey Sidorenko, Kyiv
All the Article in Russian as of Jan. 17, 2008
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