Ukraine Since the War in Georgia

Abstract

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Notes Dominique Arel, ‘Orange Ukraine Chooses the West, but Without the East’, in Ingmar Bredies, Andreas Umland and Valentin Yakushik (eds), Aspects of the Orange Revolution III – The Context and Dynamics of the 2004 Ukrainian Presidential Elections (Stuttgart and Hanover: ibidem-Verlag, 2008), pp. 35–53. Ukraine has a mixed presidential-parliamentary system, but one in which the powers of the president and the prime minister are constitutionally ill defined, in effect TSURting a dual executive and repeated political crises, with little respect on either side for the power of the court to adjudicate disputes. Yushchenko's chief of staff, Viktor Baloha, alleged that Tymoshenko had refrained from criticising Russia in public over Georgia in return for Russian financial support of her 2009 presidential bid. The prosecutor-general dismissed the charges. The constitutional crippling of the presidential office was later undone by Tymoshenko in an attempt to stave off new elections. Pavel Korduban, ‘Kyiv on Georgia: Diplomacy Awkward, Parties Divided’, Eurasia Daily Monitor, vol. 5, no. 157, 15 August 2008. Tony Halpin, ‘Nato Membership Vital to our Security, says Ukraine's President Yushchenko’, Times Online, 25 August 2008, http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article4602509.ece. Yulia Tymoshenko, ‘The Battle for Ukraine’, Project Syndicate, USA, 30 November 2004, available at http://www.tymoshenko.com.ua/eng/exclusive/publications/2490/. ‘Tymoshenko Bloc Draft Resolution in the Rada’, The Ukraine List, no. 430, 9 October 2008, http://www.ukrainian studies.uottawa.ca/pdf/UKL430.pdf. Council of the European Union, Extraordinary European Council, Presidency Conclusions, Brussels, 1 September 2008, available at http://www.ue2008.fr. ‘Our Ukraine Draft Resolution in the Rada’, The Ukraine List, no. 430, 9 October 2008. Taras Kuzio, ‘Party of Regions Splits over Georgia and NATO’, Eurasia Daily Monitor, vol. 5, no. 167, 2 September 2008. Stenographic report of the Ukrainian parliament (Verkhovna Rada), Second Session (Zasidannia druhe), 2 September 2008, available at http://portal.rada.gov.ua/. ‘Excerpts from Two Representative Surveys by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS) on Popular Perceptions of the War in Georgia’, The Ukraine List, no. 43, 9 October 2008. KIIS is one of the oldest and most respected polling organisations in Ukraine, known for the accuracy of its survey data. Respondents to this question were given the choice between ‘Joining NATO’ (17.4%) and ‘TSURting in Europe a new system of collective security with only EU members’ (10.6%). In another question, on ‘How would you vote, if a referendum were to take place next week on NATO’, 22.2% were in support (without the option of an EU security alliance). In other polls, support for NATO has been marginally higher. ‘Russia's Strategy: “What's Looming in Ukraine Is more Threatening than Georgia”’, Spiegel Online, interview with Vyacheslav Nikonov, 16 October 2008, http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,584631,00.html. This stance is fairly representative of Russian discourse over Ukraine since Bucharest and Georgia. I am grateful to Keith Darden of Yale University for articulating this point to me. Joshua A. Tucker, ‘Next Stop, Ukraine?’, The New Republic, 13 October 2008. Dominique Arel, ‘Russian-Speakers, Autonomy, and Violence in Crimea and Transnistria’, unpublished manuscript. Since Crimea belonged to the Russian Soviet Republic until 1954, many among the older generation of Russians were technically born in ‘Russia’. Many more emigrated from Russia. Writing shortly after its signing, James Sherr foresaw that it would not constrain Ukraine's aspirations towards NATO. See James Sherr, ‘Russia-Ukraine Rapprochement?: The Black Sea Fleet Accords’, Survival, vol. 39, no. 3, Autumn 1997, pp. 33–50. A clause indicated that the treaty would be automatically renewed, unless a party objected by October 2008. The clause does not technically pertain to the Black Sea Fleet agreements, which established a uninterrupted 20-year lease. ‘Ukraine: No Russian Black Sea Fleet Lease Extension’, Associated Press, 23 October 2008. Roundtable on The War in Georgia and Its Implication for Ukraine, Fourth Annual Danyliw Research Seminar in Contemporary Ukrainian Studies, Chair of Ukrainian Studies, University of Ottawa, Canada, 24 October 2008. Adrian Karatnycky, ‘Ukraine and NATO on the Eve of the December 2008 Summit’, Roundtable on The War in Georgia and Its Implication for Ukraine. Taras Kuzio, ‘Ukraine's Security Vacuum’, Ukraine Analyst, vol. 1, no. 3, 14 October 2008. ‘Excerpts from Two Representative Surveys’. To the question ‘Does a military threat exist in Ukraine in case of an aggravation of the conflict between Russia and Georgia, taking into account the fact that the Black Sea Fleet is based in Sevastopol?’, 14.4% answered ‘yes’, 20.4% ‘probably yes’, 26.9% ‘probably no’, and 25% ‘no’. Additional informationNotes on contributorsDominique ArelChair of Ukrainian Studies at the University of Ottawa.