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Thu Mar 29 09:46:19 EDT 2007

Financial Times

Businessman close to Ukraine PM shot dead

By Roman Olearchyk in Kiev

Published: March 28 2007 

A Russian businessman who backed Ukraine's prime minister in the disputed
2004 elections was shot dead outside a Kiev court on Tuesday, after warning
a contract had been placed on his life

Maksym Kurochkin, a reputed Moscow-based organised crime ringleader held in
connection with corruption charges, was shot minutes after a Kiev judge
turned down his plea to be released on bail and police had escorted him out
of the court.

A police officer was also injured. The unidentified assassin escaped.

Mr Kurochkin, who backed the presidential candidacy in 2004 of Viktor
Yanukovich, Ukraine's prime minister, said in court on Tuesday a contract
had been placed on his life. He pleaded to be released on bail, saying: "I
do not want to die."

The plea was an apparent expression of his distrust in the ability of
Ukrainian police to protect him after his bodyguards were gunned down
recently.

Mr Kurochkin, nicknamed Mad Max, had been linked to several high-profile
investments in Ukraine including a luxury hotel business and a disputed
open-air market. He was detained on extortion charges last November at
Kiev's international airport.

The trial, which began last month, had been closely watched because of his
ties to Mr Yanukovich.

During the 2004 presidential election campaign, Mr Kurochkin served as
director of the Russian Club, a Kiev-based think-tank made up of Russians
who backed Mr Yanukovich over the pro-western Viktor Yushchenko.

Mr Yushchenko was propelled to the presidency by the Orange Revolution, in
which there were massive protests against a fraudulent vote that had given
victory to Mr Yanukovich.

Mr Kurochkin narrowly escaped an attempt on his life during the 2004
elections when his car was blown up.

Opposition leaders rushed to label the murder as severely damaging to the
country's reputation, saying it raised questions about the ability to
protect witnesses and accused criminals held in custody.

"The killing of businessmen, questionable suicides, unsolved high-profile
crimes all give grounds to say that Ukraine is returning to the early 1990s
when the majority of conflicts in business were settled with arms," the
Yulia Tymoshenko opposition bloc said in a statement.

Eurasia Daily Monitor

March 28, 2007

UKRAINE NAMES NEW FOREIGN MINISTER

On March 21 Ukraine's parliament approved President Viktor Yushchenko's
choice for foreign minister, Arseny Yatsenyuk, 32. The appointment ends a
standoff of nearly four months between Yushchenko and the Cabinet of Prime
Minister Viktor Yanukovych. The new minister has no experience with
diplomatic work, but, despite his young age, he is an experienced government
bureaucrat. His pragmatism and neutrality should help the presidential
office and the Cabinet to overcome antagonisms, at least as far as foreign
policy is concerned.

The parliament, dominated by Yanukovych allies, dismissed Yatsenyuk's
predecessor, the pro-Western Borys Tarasyuk, on December 1. The
constitutional amendments of December 2004 had made it possible for
parliament to dismiss Cabinet ministers, which had been the president's
remit under Yushchenko's predecessor, Leonid Kuchma. Yushchenko did not
recognize Tarasyuk's dismissal, insisting that parliament's right to dismiss
ministers could not be applied to the two ministers whom, according to the
constitution, it is up to the president to appoint, namely the foreign
minister and the defense minister. Yushchenko ultimately backed down at the
end of January, signing Tarasyuk's resignation letter.  

Parliament twice rejected Yushchenko's effort to nominate Tarasyuk's deputy,
Volodymyr Ohryzko, on February 22 and March 20. The ruling coalition made it
clear that Ohryzko was unpalatable for them because of what they perceived
as his radically pro-NATO and anti-Russian convictions. They also accused
him of bad manners and inhospitality in relation to one delegation of
Russian policymakers that visited Ukraine last year. Ohryzko reportedly
refused to speak Russian with the delegation, saying that it was his right
to speak Ukrainian in his homeland.

Formally, nothing could prevent Yushchenko from offering Ohryzko to
parliament for a third time, but he chose not to exacerbate relations with
the ruling coalition. Late on March 20, he asked parliament to approve the
first deputy head of his secretariat, Arseny Yatsenyuk, as foreign minister.

This was an unexpected move. Only career diplomats have so far served as
foreign ministers in Ukraine, whereas Yatsenyuk is a trained economist and a
former banker. Yanukovych's Party of Regions had wanted Yushchenko to pick
another deputy head of his secretariat, Oleksandr Chaly, who is a former
deputy foreign minister. The influential weekly Zerkalo nedeli had predicted
that Yushchenko would nominate Petro Poroshenko, a businessman who served as
the secretary of the Security and Defense Council in 2005.

Despite the surprise candidate, parliament not only approved Yatsenyuk, but
displayed an astonishingly high degree of support for this choice of
Yushchenko - 426 votes "in favor" in the 450-seat chamber. Yatsenyuk is
widely perceived as a politically neutral technocrat, whose work should not
exacerbate the continuing confrontation between Yushchenko and Yanukovych.
The ruling coalition does not perceive Yatsenyuk as Yushchenko's man. "He is
a flexible political figure, not associated with any political camp," Kyiv
analyst Volodymyr Fesenko told Interfax. "This should compensate for the
lack of diplomatic education and the absence of a diplomatic career."

Presenting his platform to parliament before his approval as new foreign
minister, Yatsenyuk pledged that European integration would remain the main
goal of Ukraine's foreign policy. However, he made it clear that he would
not insist on the fastest possible accession to the European Union, unlike
Tarasyuk, whose Euro-optimism was viewed by the ruling coalition as
excessive. Yatsenyuk's statement that "Europe is not a goal by itself, but
European values are" sounded very much like the statements on the issue that
Yanukovych had made on his Western trips.

Yatsenyuk said that the EU will be Ukraine's priority partner, while close
ties will be developed with Russia, which Yatsenyuk singled out as one of
the priority markets. He also promised that dialog with the United States
will be deepened. Pragmatism was the keyword in Yatsenyuk's five-minute
acceptance speech. He pledged that Ukraine's foreign policy will be guided
primarily by economic considerations during his tenure.

Yatsenyuk has degrees in law and economics. In 1998-2001, he climbed the
career ladder from a consultant to deputy chairman at one of Ukraine's
biggest private banks, Aval. In 2001, he was picked to serve as economics
minister in the government of the Crimean Autonomous Republic. In 2002, he
became first deputy to National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) Chairman Serhy
Tyhypko. In 2004, when Tyhypko headed Yanukovych's presidential election
headquarters, Yatsenyuk managed the NBU in his absence.

Yatsenyuk resigned from the NBU in 2005, after the Orange Revolution, and
went to Odessa to serve as deputy regional governor. In September 2005, the
Orange Prime Minister Yuriy Yekhanurov appointed Yatsenyuk as economics
minister. In September 2006, Yushchenko picked Yatsenyuk for the post of
first deputy head of the presidential secretariat. Liaison with parliament
and supervising the Security Service were among Yatsenyuk's tasks in
Yushchenko's team before his appointment as foreign minister.

(Channel 5, March 20, 21; Interfax-Ukraine, March 21; Zerkalo nedeli, March
24)

--Pavel Korduban

Ruslana Lyzhychko

Member of Parliament of Ukraine; Goodwill Ambassador, UNICEF; and Winner of
Eurovision 2004 to Speak at Woodrow Wilson Center

Co-sponsored by the U.S.-Ukraine Foundation and

 the Children of Chornobyl Relief and Development Fund

Since Ukraineâs Orange Revolution in 2004, politicians and civil society
activists have been trying to meet the nationâs demands for political and
social reform.  Ukraine remains a geopolitical crossroad, and leaders of the
Orange Revolution are working for integration into Euro-Atlantic and global
structures, such as the WTO, NATO, and the European Union.  As part of the
efforts, many leaders in Ukraine are striving to raise public awareness of
and build popular support for these international organizations, as well as
reform Ukrainian laws to meet international standards in a number of areas.

In the process of becoming European and global, Ukraineâs youth faces
additional social pressures from unemployment, environmental disasters and
substance abuse. In an effort to promote a healthy lifestyle and motivate
the next generation of Ukrainian citizens to live well, activists are
encouraging the youth to participate in athletics, while warning them of the
dangers of drug use.

Ruslana Lyzhychko, Member of Parliament of Ukraine, will discuss ongoing
efforts to promote domestic and foreign policies that focus on integrating
Ukraine into a global society, while protecting the wellbeing of its youth.

What:              Leading Ukraine Into a New Era of Global and European
Citizenshipä

Who:               Ruslana Lyzhychko, Member of Parliament of Ukraine

When:                         Friday, March 30, 2007, Noon - 1:00 p.m.

Where:            Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, 6th
Floor Flom Auditorium.  The Center is located at 1300 Pennsylvania Avenue,
N.W.

RSVPs are required to attend. Please call 202-691-4243 or e-mail
<mailto:Renata.Kosc-Harmatiy at WilsonCenter.org>
Renata.Kosc-Harmatiy at WilsonCenter.org.

[Ruslana will also appear at the Slavic Spring Festival to be held at George
Washington University campus - near the intersection of 21st and H St. NW--
from Noon to 6 pm on March 31, 2007:  visit  <http://www.scfcusa.org/>
www.scfcusa.org]

OSCE Project Co-ordinator in Ukraine 
Press release

OSCE Project Co-ordinator trains NGOs to help trafficking victims

KYIV, 26 March 2007 - Twenty five NGO representatives are taking part in a
training course on helping victims of human trafficking, organized this week
by the OSCE Project Co-ordinator in Ukraine and the Ukrainian Helsinki Human
Rights Union. 

"In Ukraine, NGOs often lack knowledge of relevant legislation and
understanding of the key role they should play when assisting victims of
trafficking during court proceedings," said Begona Pineiro Costas, Human
Rights Officer at the Project Co-ordinator's Office. 

"As a result, they are not always able to provide the assistance that
victims require." 

The course will strengthen the capacity of social workers and psychologists
working for NGOs and help them develop skills to better assist trafficking
victims. 

Participants will learn about human rights standards related to the
protection of trafficking victims, legal responsibilities for actions
connected with human trafficking (criminal and civic responsibility and
administrative procedures), as well as stages and tasks of the criminal
procedures. They will also discuss the rights of victims and their
representatives, and compensation for moral and material damage to victims.
Participants will also get the opportunity to conduct a case study on
protecting the rights of trafficking victims. 

"Victims of trafficking in Ukraine need better support when they return to
their country, not only during the criminal proceedings, but also following
the final verdict. NGOs could provide more comprehensive assistance to
victims, including support during investigation procedures and in court,"
added Begona Pineiro Costas. 

Another training course is planned for 10 July. 

The courses are financed by the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs as part
of the Danish Programme Against Human Trafficking in Eastern Europe.

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