George W. Bush (in back) will comfort Viktor Yushchenko with the promise that Ukraine will feel NATO's embrace next year, if not this year.
Photo: PhotoXpress, PhotoXpress
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NATO, But Later
// George W. Bush in Ukraine
U.S. President George W. Bush arrives in Kiev today. The main purpose of his visit is to show support for Ukraine before the NATO summit in Bucharest. That is the consolation prize for Kiev, which along with Tbilisi, is likely to have to wait for the next summit for it membership action plan.
Ukraine Is Embarrassed
Preparations for Bush's visit took Kiev several days. The U.S. president arrives this evening from the United States and will spend all of tomorrow in Kiev. Municipal authorities announced in advance that the center of the city will be closed to traffic and the Interior Ministry warned city residents “not to be found on roofs with objects resembling weapons.” Otherwise, they will risk being shot by the snipers accompanying the president.
There are meetings with the key figures in Ukrainian politics lined up for Bush. According to the White House press service, the president will have talks with Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko, Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko and speaker of the Rada Arseny Yatsenyuk.
Besides meeting with politicians, Bush will visit the Cathedral of St. Sophia and a school, where the students have prepared a presentation for him on how Ukraine is fighting AIDS.
Anna German, advisor to Party of the Regions leader Viktor Yanukovich, told Kommersant that the Americans have already contacted Yanukovich and suggested that he have lunch with the president. German said that Yanukovich will tell the U.S. president that, if he respects the Ukraine people, he should give them the right to decide independently on NATO membership. Bush himself said last weekend in an interview with Die Welt that the Ukrainian people should decide on NATO membership itself, without outside interference.
Opponents of Euro-Atlantic integration also prepared for Bush's trip. Yesterday, the Party of the Regions, socialists and communists held a public meetings at which thousands chanted “NATO is a stab at the heart of Ukraine,” “The southeast's slogan is With Russian forever,'” “NATO wages war against Slavs” and “There will be bitter retribution if we join NATO.”
At the end of last week, Bush told journalists how he was preparing for his trip to Ukraine. He said he had found a lot out about Ukraine during one of his recent visits to Texas. During a meeting with relatives of soldiers killed in Iraq, a local doctor, a native of Ukraine, told him that a group of Ukrainian immigrants very much wanted to talk with him. “And there we were in Waco, Texas, with, I think, maybe 20 or 30 health care specialists from Ukraine that were in my home state. And it was sure good to meet them,” the president said.
The U.S. president repeated that he is in favor of Ukraine's speedy integration into NATO, but he added that his visit to Kiev would not influence its chances of receiving a membership action plan, because the final decision can only be made at the summit in Romania.
Dmitry Vydrin, director of the European Institute of Integration and Development in Kiev, noted that, although the U.S. president's negotiations in Kiev cannot influence the decision made in Bucharest, they can influence the attitude toward NATO in Ukrainian society. “Evaluations vary here. Many people think that Bush's unpopularity is so great here that nay politician who is photographed with him will lose 5 percent of his rating instantly. Others say that, since the U.S. is the most important player in world politics, a visit by the U.S. president will be perceived positively by the public.”
Even among proponents of Ukraine's accession to NATO, there is no agreement that it should take place right now. At the moment, the main opposing forces in Ukraine are the president and prime minister, practically all of whose political steps are calculated to reflect on the presidential election in 2009. Bush's visit will undoubtedly be used in the domestic political struggle in Ukraine. Yushchenko and Tymoshenko have the difficult task of obtaining the U.S. president's support, and as doing so out of the public view as far as possible, so as not to look too active in their support for Ukraine's admission to NATO. Tymoshenko, for example, has almost renounced pro-NATO rhetoric. At her last press conference, she called the issue of NATO membership a painful one and emphasized that it divides the country. “There should be public discussion of the problem that should end with a national referendum. Every Ukrainian should receiver information about NATO and then make a decision,” she said. Notably, the former foreign minister, Boris Tarasyuk, leader of the Ukrainian People's Rukh and an ardent proponent of NATO membership, stated that Ukraine's invitation to take part in a membership action plan may be delayed.
NATO Has Doubts
There remains division among the NATO member states over the upcoming decision on providing Ukraine and Georgia with membership action plans. NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer acknowledged this weekend that opinion was divided and said that he hoped a consensus could be found. The decision to provide membership action plans has to be unanimous, that is, if even one country votes against it, it will delay the issue to the end of next year.
The German government officially announced on the weekend that it was opposed to the forced Euro-Atlantic integration of the two former Soviet republics. Official spokesman for the German Foreign Ministry Thomas Steg said that “We are very reserved when it comes to the issue of deciding now on possible membership of Ukraine and Georgia. This is solely linked to developments in each country and in the region. We expect the necessary resolution (of outstanding issues) and stabilization, pacification to succeed before this question can have a different response than is the case at the moment.”
The government of The Netherlands has issued a similar statement already. Belgium, France, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Luxembourg, Norway and Spain are also against settling the question of Ukraine and Georgia's membership in Bucharest. Bush hinted last week that France may reconsider its position, saying that French President Nicolas Sarkozy “will pretty much ensure that this conference is a successful conference.”
the countries have expressed their open support for Ukraine and Georgia's bid for integration. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown called Yushchenko to express his support personally. Lithuanian President Valdas Adamkus also spoke out in favor of Ukraine and Georgia's membership. Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk also recently visited Kiev and promised his country's full support for Ukraine and Georgia. “If not today, then tomorrow,” Tusk said there about the possibility that will disappoint those countries' hopes. “If not tomorrow, then the day after tomorrow. We know that it is not easy, but you can always count on our support.”
Russian officials made their latest declarations of the unacceptability of Kiev and Tbilisi receiving membership action plans. “I am convinced that the current U.S. administration has firmly decided to do everything possible so that Ukraine and Georgia's movement toward NATO was irreversible and has chosen a course toward artificial, unnaturally fast attraction of Ukraine and Georgia to NATO,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov stated on TVTs television. According to the Russian minister, the majority of the public in Ukraine and Georgia are opposed to NATO membership. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko told Interfax information agency that Russia is ready to provide assistance to NATO in Afghanistan, on the condition that the alliance does not rush with membership action plans for Ukraine and Georgia. “Russia is ready to increase cooperation with NATO to solve the Afghan problem, but that won't happen if our legal interests are not taken into consideration.”
Russian ambassador at NATO Dmitry Rogozin specified that Grushko's statement was not to be interpreted as an attempt to make a deal. “There is not direct connection between the two questions,” Rogozin said, adding that Russia has developed proposals on cargo transit to Afghanistan that should be heard by NATO. Those proposals will be made to the alliance at the Bucharest summit. At the same time, Rogozin mentioned again that the entrance of Ukraine and Georgia into NATO would mean “the sound of foreign military vehicles on Russia's border.”
Maxim Zagoretsky
All the Article in Russian as of Mar. 31, 2008
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