INSIDE: • Lazarenko at business conference in Canada — page 3. • The first anniversary of Ukraine’s Constitution — page 6. • Kuchma speaks on the environment — page 11. HE KRAINI A N EEKLY T PublishedU by the Ukrainian National Association Inc., a fraternal non-profitW association Vol. LXV No. 26 THE UKRAINIAN WEEKLY SUNDAY, JUNE 29, 1997 $1.25/$2 in Ukraine O b s e r vers doubt Lazarenko Kuchma meets with Gore in N.Y. will resume PM’s duties at U.N. env i ronmental confere n c e by Roman Woronowycz “Had the prime minister and the gov- Kyiv Press Bureau ernment shown will power to ensure the adoption of the national budget, it would KYIV — While Pavlo Lazarenko, have been adopted by now,” said the Ukraine’s embattled prime minister, president, according to Interfax-Ukraine. awaits possible surgery to relieve a cir- He called the budget stalemate “advanta- culatory system problem, opposition geous to those who would manage the continues to mount against his return to budget at their own discretion,” a veiled his post. Few political leaders here, reference to Mr. Lazarenko’s autocratic including the president, are ready to tendencies in his management of the affirm that once healthy Mr. Lazarenko Cabinet of Ministers. will resume his duties, although official- Mr. Lazarenko, who was appointed in ly he remains head of government. May 1996, has had increasingly fractious President Leonid Kuchma, who relations with President Kuchma. In the appointed Vice Prime Minister Vasyl past several months the president has Durdynets acting prime minister the severely criticized Mr. Lazarenko’s same day that Mr. Lazarenko took ill work, stating that he was slow to move with what was originally thought to be on cleaning up corruption and that his exhaustion, did not express much sup- Cabinet had produced a shoddy and port for his former ally upon his return unworkable budget. from a United Nations-sponsored confer- However, on June 25 President ence on the environment in New York. Kuchma said Mr. Lazarenko is still in He blamed Mr. Lazarenko for the gov- charge of the government. “Pavlo ernment’s inability to get the Verkhovna Lazarenko is still the prime minister of Rada to pass a 1997 budget. Ukraine. What I have done was simply a required procedure.” In the last month Mr. Kuchma has come Khristina Lew under pressure from various political orga- President Leonid Kuchma (left) meets with Vice-President Al Gore at the United UNA executives nizations to relieve the prime minister of his Nations on June 23. duties. The National Democratic Party, by Khristina Lew set by the U.N. Conference on with which the president is closely connect- focus on investments, Environment and Development held in ed, called for Mr. Lazarenko’s ouster earlier UNITED NATIONS — Ukrainian Rio de Janeiro in 1992. Discussions this month, as did the Reform faction in the President Leonid Kuchma returned to the focused on the reduction of carbon diox- Verkhovna Rada. On June 24 the Trade sale of headquarters United States five weeks after co-chairing ide emissions, access to safe water, and Union Federation of Ukraine, the country’s the inaugural session of the U.S.-Ukraine the preservation of natural forests and the JERSEY CITY, N.J. — The regular largest, added its name to the list. The fed- Binational Commission to meet with world’s oceans. quarterly meeting of the Executive eration’s leader, Oleksander Stoyan, is Vice-President Al Gore on June 23 during The summit also provided an opportu- Committee of the Ukrainian National politically aligned with Verkhovna Rada the U.N. General Assembly’s special ses- nity for world leaders to meet privately, Association was held on Monday, June Chairman Oleksander Moroz. sion on the environment and development. frequently in an impromptu fashion, to 2, at the Home Office. With a tide of political opposition Mr. Kuchma addressed the special ses- discuss bilateral relations. One such The meeting was convened and chaired cresting, Mr. Lazarenko must organize sion, called Earth Summit + 5, on June 24. chance encounter between Mr. Kuchma by Ulana Diachuk, president of the UNA. his resurrection from a hospital bed. Leaders of the world’s nations gath- and Tony Blair, Britain’s new prime In attendance were: Nestor Olesnycky, Doctors at Republican Clinical Hospital ered for the Earth Summit + 5 on June vice-president, Anya Dydyk-Petrenko, have diagnosed Mr. Lazarenko’s illness 23-27 to assess progress made on goals (Continued on page 10) vice-presidentess; Martha Lysko, secre- as thrombophlebitis, a condition where a tary; Alexander Blahitka, treasurer; and blood clot forms in an enlarged vein, the chairman of the Auditing Committee, usually as a result of varicose veins. The Stefan Hawrysz. Dr. Petro Savaryn, direc- condition can be fatal if the clot breaks One year after its adoption, tor for Canada, was unable to attend due to free and travels to the heart or brain. prior commitments. Doctors are not calling his illness life- The executives discussed the work of threatening, but the timing of its onset Constitution gets mixed reviews the recently formed Investment Advisory could kill Mr. Lazarenko’s current politi- by Roman Woronowycz Verkhovna Rada Chairman Oleksander Committee, the outcome of the determina- cal life. By law, a government official can- Kyiv Press Bureau Moroz himself suggested at the beginning tion made by the Division of Civil Rights, not be removed from his post for 45 days of the last session of Parliament. New Jersey Department of Law and Public while he is on sick leave, so few politi- KYIV — In the year since Ukraine’s However, the fact remains that the Safety, in regard to a complaint of sexual cians believe Mr. Lazarenko will be fired Verkhovna Rada ratified the country’s Constitution guarantees Ukrainians basic harassment made by an employee against in the next month. But a consensus seems first democratic Constitution, the docu- rights and freedoms and delineates the Svoboda Editor-in-Chief Zenon Snylyk to have developed that he is on the outs. ment has received mixed reviews. country’s branches of power and associ- and the formation of the UNA Convention Among several national deputies to Many believe that Ukraine’s funda- ated responsibilities. Committee for the 1998 Convention. the Verkhovna Rada asked for their mental law, which was finally passed by Such was the consensus presented on The sale and purchase of new UNA opinions, only one said that Mr. the Verkhovna Rada on June 28 after an June 25 at a town meeting on the occasion headquarters was the most widely dis- Lazarenko’s return depends on his recov- arduous 23-hour session, including a 16- of the first anniversary of Ukraine’s cussed topic at the meeting, since the move ery from the illness. Deputy Volodymyr hour overtime session that stretched into Constitution held in the Ukrainian Home in is scheduled to take place in September of Masol, once prime minister himself, the night and early morning, is funda- Kyiv. Sponsored by the National this year. The executives further discussed said, “It depends on his health, whether mentally flawed because it is a political Democratic Party of Ukraine (NDPU), the the upcoming season at Soyuzivka, UNA the operation is a success.” panel that led the discussion consisted of document: the result of compromise and summer teaching programs in Ukraine and However, Deputy Volodymyr Verkhovna Rada National Deputies Ivan political battle over a four-year period. the visit of UNA executives to the New Yavorivskyi was certain the prime minister Pliusch, the former chairman of the Already, there have been suggestions (Continued on page 16) (Continued on page 2) that the basic law needs to be amended, as (Continued on page 4) 2 THE UKRAINIAN WEEKLY SUNDAY, JUNE 29, 1997 No. 26 NEWS ANALYSIS Lazarenko’s “temporary” removal Belarusian opposition holds congress June 23 on issues of poverty and social development in Ukraine. “In this country by Roman Kupchinsky that the prime minister had illegally pri- MIENSK — The opposition Belarusian RFE/RL Newsline vatized his government-owned dacha in we have no methods to define what pover- Popular Front (BNF) held its fifth congress ty is,” said National Academy of Sciences Puscha Vodytsia — one of many corrup- here on June 21-22. Zyanon Paznyak, who On June 19 President Leonid Kuchma tion charges leveled against Mr. Human Development Department of Ukraine issued a decree naming First fled Belarus in 1996 and now lives in the Chairwoman Ella Libanova. “Legally we Lazarenko this year. United States, was re-elected leader of the Vice Prime Minister Vasyl Durdynets President Kuchma had appointed Mr. have only the notion of the low income acting premier due to Prime Minister movement. Lyavon Barsheusky, who was level.” By Western standards, 85 to 90 per- Lazarenko as prime minister in May arrested several days before the congress Pavlo Lazarenko’s illness. The same day, cent of the Ukrainian population would be 1996 to replace Yevhen Marchuk, a for- for his role in opposition protests earlier Mr. Lazarenko was taken to Kyiv’s considered poor. The richest 10 percent of mer chief of the Ukrainian Intelligence this year, was re-elected deputy leader. Mr. Feofania clinic, where he was placed Ukrainians were 30.7 times wealthier than Service. Before his appointment, Barsheusky was briefly released from cus- under strict observation. The first diag- the poorest 10 percent in 1995. In 1996 Lazarenko had been the presidential rep- tody to attend the congress and returned to nosis was that Mr. Lazarenko was suffer- that disparity grew to 66.7 times. resentative in Dnipropetrovsk Oblast and jail on June 22 to serve the remainder of ing from extreme exhaustion.