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Action Ukraine Report

ACTION UKRAINE REPORT - AUR
An International Newsletter, The Latest, Up-To-Date
In-Depth Ukrainian News, Analysis and Commentary

Ukrainian History, Culture, Arts, Business, Religion,
Sports, Government, and Politics, in Ukraine and Around the World

ANDRIY SHEVCHENKO: THE BURDEN OF A NATION'S HOPES
World's most famous Ukrainian [article one]

ACTION UKRAINE REPORT - AUR - Number 707
Mr. E. Morgan Williams, Publisher and Editor
WASHINGTON, D.C., TUESDAY, JUNE 6, 2006

-------- INDEX OF ARTICLES --------
Clicking on the title of any article takes you directly to the article.
Return to the Index by clicking on Return to Index at the end of each article

1. ANDRIY SHEVCHENKO: THE BURDEN OF A NATION'S HOPES
Soccer forward is easily the world's most famous Ukrainian
By Jonathan Wilson, Financial Times
London, United Kingdom, Monday, June 5 2006

2. SHEVCHENKO & REBROV SHOULD BE READY FOR UKRAINE
Reuters, Kiev, Ukraine, Monday, June 5, 2006

3. TAYLOR SWORN IN AS NEW US AMBASSADOR TO UKRAINE
BY SECRETARY OF STATE CONDOLEEZZA RICE
By Morgan Williams, Publisher and Editor
Action Ukraine Report (AUR) #707, Article 3
Washington, D.C., Tuesday, June 6, 2007

4. UKRAINE SIGNS WTO ACCORD WITH EGYPT
Only Kyrgyzstan and Taiwan protocols left to be signed
TV 5 Kanal, Kiev, in Ukrainian 1700 gmt 5 Jun 06
BBC Monitoring Service, United Kingdom, Monday, Jun 05, 2006

5. FOR ENGLAND'S ARMY OF MIGRANT WORKERS, IT'S NOT
ALL STRAWBERRIES AND CREAM
East Europeans [including Ukrainians] amass for annual picking season
John Vidal, Environment Editor, The Guardian
London, United Kingdom, Monday, June 5, 2006

6. ADVISOR TO PRES BUSH SAYS US BACKS BLACK SEA FORUM
Rompres news agency, Bucharest, Romania, Monday, 5 Jun 06

7. US MARSHALL FUND GIVES 20M DOLLARS FOR BLACK SEA FUND
Rompres news agency, Bucharest, Romania, Monday, June 5, 2006

8. ROMANIA: BLACK SEA FORUM ADOPTS FINAL STATEMENT
Rompres news agency, Bucharest, Romania Monday, Jun 5, 2006

9. UKRAINE ACCUSES RUSSIA OF INCITING NEW 'CRIMEAN WAR'
By Andrew Osborn in Moscow, Independent
London, United Kingdom, Tuesday, June 6 2006

10. SENIOR RUSSIAN MP RAPS UKRAINE FOR FLIRTING WITH NATO
Interfax-AVN military news agency website,
Moscow, Russia in Russian 1215 gmt 5 Jun 06
BBC Monitoring Service, United Kingdom, Monday, Jun 05, 2006

11. UKRAINIAN MP'S JOIN PICKET OVER US PRESENCE IN CRIMEA
NTN, Kiev, in Ukrainian 1400 gmt 5 Jun 06
BBC Monitoring Service, United Kingdom, Monday, Jun 05, 2006

12. UKRAINE'S CRIMEAN PARLIAMENT SAYS INTERNATIONAL
EXERCISE "INEXPEDIENT"
Interfax-Ukraine news agency, Kiev, in Russian 0749 gmt 5 Jun 06
BBC Monitoring Service. United Kingdom, Monday, Jun 05, 2006

13. UKRAINE'S SOCIALISTS WANT DEFENCE MINISTER SACKED
Interfax-Ukraine news agency, Kiev, in Russian 1454 gmt 5 Jun 06
BBC Monitoring Service, United Kingdom, Monday, Jun 05, 2006

14. OPPOSITION SET TO BLOCK UKRAINE PRESIDENT'S BILL
ALLOWING FOREIGN TROOPS TO ENTER UKRAINE
ICTV television, Kiev, in Ukrainian 1545 gmt 5 Jun 06
BBC Monitoring Service, United Kingdom, Monday, Jun 05, 2006

15. FEODOSIA, CRIMEA: AUTHORITY-FREE AREA
Once again it exposed Ukrainian authorities' weak will, poor professionalism
and neglect of national interests. Branches of government have only
demonstrated their special talent to make a mess of everything they take up.
ANALYSIS & COMMENTARY: Tatiana SILINA
Zerkalo Nedeli On The Web, Mirror Weekly, No 21 (600)
International Social Political Weekly
Kyiv, Ukraine, Saturday, June 3-9, 2006

16. GAZPROM REPORTS PROBLEMS INJECTING GAS INTO
UNDERGROUND STORAGE IN UKRAINE
DOW JONES NEWSWIRES, Moscow, Russia, June 5, 2006

17. THE SECRETS OF YUSHCHENKO'S FIRST WIFE SVITLANA
By Oleksandr Chalenko, Segodnya, Kiev, in Russian 31 May 06; p 1, 12, 13
BBC Monitoring Service, United Kingdom, in English, Sat, Jun 03, 2006

18. A QUICK RUN TO KIEV AND DELTA GETS IT RIGHT
By JOE SHARKEY, The New York Times
New York, New York, Tuesday, June 6, 2006

19. UKRAINIAN LAWMAKERS, TV ANCHORS & PERFORMERS
GATHERED IN KIEV TO SEEK WAYS OF PROMOTING UKRAINIAN
AP Worldstream, Kiev, Ukraine, Monday, Jun 05, 2006

20. UKRAINE'S DONETSK REGIONAL COUNCIL PROCLAIMS
JUNE 6 RUSSIAN LANGUAGE DAY
Interfax-Ukraine news agency, Kiev, in Russian 0837 gmt 5 Jun 06
BBC Monitoring Service, United Kingdom, Monday, Jun 05, 2006
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1
. ANDRIY SHEVCHENKO: THE BURDEN OF A NATION'S HOPES
Soccer forward is easily the world's most famous Ukrainian

By Jonathan Wilson, Financial Times
London, United Kingdom, Monday, June 5 2006

At the start of PE lessons in Ukraine, pupils would be required to line up
from shortest to tallest so they could be divided into teams of equal
physique. Lidiya Serenko taught maths, but she remembers in the late 1980s
the exasperation of her school's PE teacher at one particular student. He
was of only average height, but he would insist on pushing to the head of
the queue.

What did height matter, he would ask, when he was so clearly better at sport
than the rest of the class. That pupil was Andriy Shevchenko, and almost two
decades on, he will carry the hopes of his nation at the World Cup.

Shevchenko has been carrying that burden for some time. In spite of the rise
to power of Ukraine's president, Viktor Yushchenko, the AC Milan forward is
easily the world's most famous Ukrainian, and the fact that he shares a
surname with Ukraine's greatest poet only strengthens the perception of him
as the modern figurehead of his nation.

Even his place of birth, the village of Dvirkivshchyna, locates him in the
national tradition. Taras Shevchenko wrote of the "wide-brimmed steppes" of
his "beloved Ukraine", awakening a nationalism that embraced the landscape
as he celebrated the rolling hills and the villages, the ponds and the
rivers that are typical of Ukraine's vast central plain. Dvirkivshchyna lies
in the middle of it, 60 miles east of Kiev, some way off the main road to
Kharkov.

His parents, Mykola Hryhorovych and Lyubov Mykolayivna, both grew up there,
but they moved away for 10 years when Mykola, an ensign in a tank regiment
in the Soviet Army, was posted to East Germany. Andriy's elder sister,
Olena, was born in Germany, but the Shevchenkos returned home before the
birth of their son.

Quick, good in the air and a clinical finisher, he has developed into
probably the most complete centre-forward since Marco van Basten, the Dutch
striker turned coach. But for a long time young Andriy was a disappointment
to his father.

"I was never a football fan," Mykola told me when I met him in Kiev. "I
dreamt that my son would become a military man like me. He probably got it
from my father Hryhoriy. He was just as skilful and lively. You should have
seen him dance: the whole village would come running to watch."

Andriy, though, was always devoted to football. "I don't think he ever
walked," said his mother. "From about 10 months old he was running all over
the place." Dribbling soon followed.

"We once sat down and tried to remember who had first brought a ball to the
house and given it to Andriy," his uncle Volodymyr said. "It seems to me
that he began to kick a ball even before he was walking."

He was only two when he picked up his first football injury. "I remember
going to visit," Volodymyr said, "and he was sitting there with a bandaged
head. He'd gone chasing a ball into the kitchen and ran into the door of the
stove. After that I only ever saw him with a ball. He would be out in the
yard the whole time thrashing a ball against the wall of the drying-house."

When Shevchenko was three, his father, because of his military status, was
offered an apartment in a new five-storey block in Kiev. An absence of
fields to run in, though, did not dim Shevchenko's appetite for the game.

"All day long, Andriy would disappear to the waste ground behind the
school," his mother remembers.

"He would come home dirty and covered in scratches, but telling everybody
proudly that he'd scored three goals. We would scold him and tell him that
we couldn't afford to buy him new boots every month, but he was prepared
to play barefoot.

"There was once when he broke his hand, but even the next day he was
desperate to get back playing. That was when we understood that we'd
never kill the footballer in our son."

Games were arranged between the local housing associations, and it was
during one of them, when Shevchenko was nine, that he was spotted by
Oleksandr Shpakov, the head of Dynamo Kiev's youth academy.

"He was playing as a defensive midfielder," he said, "but he had one great
feature: wherever the ball was, whether his side were attacking or
defending, he would be there. I liked him for that, and that was why I
invited him to join my squad at the Dynamo school."

Mykola, though, was concerned that all the time spent playing football was
impinging on Andriy's schoolwork, which in turn might harm his chances of
being accepted into the army. "I would punish him - forbid him to go to
training and shut him in his room," he said. "It helped a bit, but we lived
on the first floor, so he'd often just climb through the window and run
away. You'd turn away for a second and he'd be out there on the pitch."

Only when Shpakov agreed to discipline his son if his grades slipped did
Mykola sign the consent forms to allow him to join Dynamo.

Almost immediately, they ran into problems as large numbers of children were
evacuated from Kiev following the explosion at the Chernobyl nuclear power
station.

"The Dynamo school was unable to move all of its pupils away from Kiev,"
Shpakov explained. "So we met the parents of some of the younger ones,
explained the situation and agreed that training would restart after people
had returned to the city.

"I'll never forget what we had to do to get Andriy back. His father wanted
him to go into the army, and didn't think that football was a proper career
for him.

"I managed to convince him that even if Andriy wasn't going to become a
footballer, the training would help his general physical development and
self-discipline and would be useful preparation for entering a military
institute. I hope neither father nor son will be angry with me now for this
trick."

On the contrary, the whole of Ukraine has reason to be grateful. He
progressed rapidly through the youth teams, making his international debut
against Croatia in March 1995 when he was only 18.

Those were bleak times for Ukrainian football, as the national team finished
fourth - behind even Lithuania - in their qualifying group for Euro 96, and
got through three coaches in the space of six months.

With Shevchenko at the head of a highly-talented generation of players -
and the great Valeriy Lobanovskyi back from his sinecure in Kuwait to
coach them with both country and club - Ukrainian football rose.

Dynamo twice held two-goal leads before succumbing to Bayern Munich in
the Champions League semi-final in 1999, while the national side made a
similar specialty of failing at the last.

They lost to Croatia - who eventually finished third - in a play-off to
reach the World Cup in 1998, and then to Slovenia in a play-off to qualify
for Euro 2000. Four years ago, Germany denied them in another play-off.

This time, though, thanks to the development of a younger generation, they
made it, topping a tough qualifying group that also included Greece, Turkey
and Denmark. Their coach, Oleh Blokhin, is right to point out that Ukraine
is not a one-man team.

But there is no doubt it is to Shevchenko they will be looking for
inspiration - and goals.

His father once drove tanks in Germany; he will be looking to provide a
different kind of firepower. -30-
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2. SHEVCHENKO & REBROV SHOULD BE READY FOR UKRAINE

Reuters, Kiev, Ukraine, Monday, June 5, 2006

Strikers Andriy Shevchenko and Serhiy Rebrov should be fit to start in
Ukraine's final warm-up friendly match this week against Luxembourg, coach
Oleg Blokhin said in an interview published on Monday.

Neither player is likely to start in the match scheduled for Monday against
Libya in the eastern Swiss town of Gossau. "If everything goes well, he will
be able to play in the warm-up match against Luxembourg on Thursday,"
Blokhin told the Russian daily Sport-Express, referring to Shevchenko. "I
hope Rebrov will also be in proper shape by then."

Shevchenko is recovering from a knee injury sustained while playing for AC
Milan and has in the meantime completed a transfer to English premier league
side Chelsea. Rebrov is nursing a hip injury initially deemed not serious by
doctors.

Blokhin said he was generally pleased with the performance of his squad at a
scoreless match last week against Italy in Lausanne, though he said
defenders had not been adventurous enough in the first half.

"We had to make a few adjustments at half time and things went better in the
second half. We controlled the ball, calmed down and play moved away from
our half of the field," he said. "I am quite pleased with the physical state
of the team, though less so with its psychological state."

Blokhin has said the match with Italy was meant to approximate Ukraine's
opening match with Spain, while Thursday's encounter against Libya was aimed
at adjusting to their other opponents in Germany -- Saudi Arabia and
Tunisia. He has set as the team's minimum aim getting through to the second
round of the tournament.

Blokhain also told Sport-Express that he hoped four players from the
under-21 side due to join the squad after losing in the European
Championship to the Netherlands would provide backup to his injury-ridden
ranks. They include keeper Andriy Piatov, defender Olexander Yatsenko and
forwards Dmytro Chigrinsky and Artem Milevsky.

Blokhin also said team officials had thoroughly analysed Spain's preparatory
matches against Russia and Egypt and would be watching their last match
against Croatia closely. A change in emphasis had been noted, he said.

"This Spanish team differs from its predececessors in that it pays
considerable attention to defence," he told the daily. "I think earlier
Spanish teams placed greater emphasis on attack." -30-
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3. TAYLOR SWORN IN AS NEW US AMBASSADOR TO UKRAINE
BY SECRETARY OF STATE CONDOLEEZZA RICE

By Morgan Williams, Publisher and Editor
Action Ukraine Report (AUR) #707, Article 3
Washington, D.C., Tuesday, June 6, 2007

WASHINGTON - William B. Taylor, Jr. was sworn in on Monday,
June 5, by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to be the next United
States of America Ambassador to Ukraine.

A crowd of over 200 family members, friends, colleagues, Ukrainian-
Americans, businessmen, political experts and friends of Ukraine
gathered in the ornate Benjamin Franklin room on the top floor of the
State Department to watch the swearing in ceremony.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice spoke about the concept of
democracy and how people all over the world want to be free.
Building a new democracy is not easy or quick she said.

Secretary Rice said one of the most exciting events in recent years
was the Orange Revolution in Ukraine in November-December of
2004. The Secretary said Ambassador Taylor was highly qualified
to represent the U.S. in Ukraine and that both President Bush and
her had great faith in his ability to assist Ukraine in its march to
becoming a strong democratic nation.

Ambassador Taylor said that during his three year stay in Ukraine,
unless the unexpected happened, there would not be any major
elections. Taylor felt this was good at it would give time for the
leaders to build a strong private economy and to strengthen the
institutions needed to build a stable democratic society.

Taylor gave thanks to his wife, Deborah F. Taylor, for her many
years of support, especially while he was stationed recently in
Afghanistan and Iraq. He encouraged all of those present to visit
him in Kyiv and to continue to share their advice and counsel with
him. Ambassador Taylor will leave at the end of the week for Kyiv
to take up his new post.

The government of Ukraine was represented by the Charge d'Affairs
of the Ukraine Embassy Victor Niktiuk.

Four former U.S. Ambassadors to Ukraine were present: William
Miller, Steven Pifer, Carlos Pascual and John Herbst. Also present
was the new Special Advisor to the Vice President for National
Security Affairs, Ukrainian native, Eugene M. Fishel. -30-
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4. UKRAINE SIGNS WTO ACCORD WITH EGYPT
Only Kyrgyzstan and Taiwan protocals left to be signed

TV 5 Kanal, Kiev, in Ukrainian 1700 gmt 5 Jun 06
BBC Monitoring Service, United Kingdom, Monday, Jun 05, 2006

KIEV - Ukraine has moved a step closer to becoming a WTO member.
Kiev has signed a protocol on access to goods and services markets
with Egypt.

Ukraine has thus concluded talks with 47 member states of the working
group. Protocols remain to be signed with Kyrgyzstan and Taiwan.
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5. FOR ENGLAND'S ARMY OF MIGRANT WORKERS, IT'S NOT
ALL STRAWBERRIES AND CREAM
East Europeans [including Ukrainians] amass for annual picking season

John Vidal, Environment Editor, The Guardian
London, United Kingdom, Monday, June 5, 2006

When Val Salisbury walked down her Herefordshire lane and into a giant
plastic polytunnel where dozens of Ukrainians, Lithuanians and other east
Europeans were picking strawberries, the workers were surprised. She was,
after all, a 69-year-old Englishwoman using a walking frame. But when she
started pulling up the plants all around her and throwing them to the
ground, they understood why she was there.

Their reaction surprised Mrs Salisbury. According to people who witnessed
her act of defiance against S&A Davies, Europe's largest strawberry grower,
the east Europeans started clapping. As more and more plants went flying,
they cheered her on.

By the time several hundred plants were on the floor and the farm manager
had arrived, Mrs Salisbury was a hero not just for those people in
Herefordshire who object to thousands of acres of plastic covered farmland,
but to an army of students, the unemployed and professionals from all over
eastern Europe who have started to arrive to pick fruit for British
supermarkets - and who are already disgruntled about the pay and conditions.

5,000 PICKERS
"I felt so much better after my protest," says Mrs Salisbury yesterday. "The
manager said that I did not know what I was doing, but I put him straight.
We don't need these bloody strawberries and these polytunnels in
Herefordshire".

Welcome to the English strawberry fields, where the end of May annually sees
at least 5,000 people from eastern Europe descend on Herefordshire and
Worcestershire to pick fruit. This year two villages, each of more than
1,700 people, have sprung up without planning permission, sporting 400 or
more caravans, leisure centres, football pitches, internet cafes and even
saunas.

The pickers are welcomed by the majority of people in Leominster, but there
is concern that the migrant labour force is being taken advantage of. This
weekend, a straw poll of 50 people working in the tunnels suggested many
pickers are as angry as Mrs Salisbury.

Those who spoke English said they were being paid less than they expected,
that they had to wait for payment, that the accommodation was expensive,
that they had paid too much to get there and that the management were unduly
profiting from their stay.

Because of changes in the visa requirements, many pickers this year are not
agricultural students, as in the past, but people such as welders, policemen
and teachers seeking a better rate of pay than they get for doing their jobs
at home.

"In Lithuania I earn £200 a month," said Mindaugas, a Vilnius policeman. "I
thought I could earn more here. It looks like I am not going to. It cost
more than I thought to get here; it costs more to live."

"None of us like strawberry picking," said Svetlana, a Ukrainian student.
"Today I have earned £23. But I must pay £35 a week to live in a box with
three other people. Perhaps I earn £150 in a week, but when I have paid for
food, accommodation, tax, everything, maybe I have £70 for a six days. It's
not good".

"The money is bad," said Artur, a waiter from the Czech Republic. "We waited
days to have work. Last year we heard there was a strike here, perhaps here
is one too, this year. It is like a prison. I have been given a yellow card
already. One more and I am sent home."

"Work it out," said Waldemar, a Ukrainian student. "There are 3,500 of us.
We pay £35 a week to stay here. The season is 20 weeks. That's millions of
pounds they get from us."

Documents drawn up by S&A Davies and seen by the Guardian set out the terms
and conditions for workers, who live four or five to a room. They must pay
£26.25p a week for accommodation, £3 a week for sewage and waste collection,
£2.25 for electricity and £2.75 for leisure facilities, including a TV set,
football pitch and disco. For £30, they have access to medical and
translation advice.

The documents suggest a strict regime. Pickers can be sacked for eating a
single strawberry, for stopping work, going to the toilet in a hedge, or for
smoking indoors. If rooms are not "clean and tidy", they can be asked to
leave. If they want to invite a visitor to the camp, they must ask
permission two days in advance. "I have never been anywhere like this," said
Irynya, a Ukrainian housewife.

Yesterday the company said they guaranteed pickers £5.05 an hour when there
was work, and a bonus if they met targets. But they said that at the start
of the season or in bad weather, they could not guarantee hours. "When 3,500
people turn up, it's hard to get everyone going at the same time. We reduced
the accommodation charge to £10 when it was raining two weeks ago," said
Graham Neal, a manager with S&A Davies.

Mr Neal blamed agents in east European countries for sending them unsuitable
workers. "The old student agriculture workers quota scheme meant we could go
to an east European university and know people's history and character. We
had superb people. Now the government says that we must recruit EU people.
Some countries ... have sent over their unemployed drunks," he said.
Deteriorating relations

Yesterday there were signs that relations between the company and many local
people were deteriorating. Mr Neal accused a resident group which has
complained about the tunnels of paying people in the camps to complain about
conditions. "Last year there was a strike, but we then found out that Avra
[the local resident group] paid people £100 each to complain," said Mr Neal.
This was strongly denied by an Avra spokesman.

As a final irony, the east Europeans cannot afford to buy the fruit they
pick. "Yes, we like strawberries but we cannot pay for them," said Linas
Petraitis, a Ukrainian buying cheap white bread and margarine in the local
Morrison's. "When you eat one, just think of us in the tunnels." -30-
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6. ADVISOR TO PRES BUSH SAYS US BACKS BLACK SEA FORUM

Rompres news agency, Bucharest, Romania, Monday, 5 Jun 06

BUCHAREST - The United States backs the development of the Black Sea
Forum for Dialogue and Partnership, Jack D. Crouch, deputy national security
adviser to US President George W. Bush, told the summit meeting of the
Forum held at Parliament Palace, in the Romanian capital, on Monday 5 June.

The United States backs the efforts for the creation of a more prosperous,
freer and safer Black Sea region, said Crouch, a former US ambassador to
Romania.

He underscored the importance of the dialogue among the region's leaders
with a view to finding solutions to the threats to the region's security and
stability such as "frozen" conflicts, the trafficking in weapons, drugs and
people.

The US supports the Black Sea Forum since it deems it a foundation for the
creation of viable economic development and investment opportunities in the
region, as well as for providing the transport routes for the energy
resources of the Caspian Sea and Central Asia, for building a regional
mechanism of mutual support in the crises provoked by natural disasters,
Crouch stressed.

The US official highlighted the role played by the respect for the
democratic values and human rights and hailed the progress made in this
respect by Georgia, Armenia, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova.

The US deputy national security adviser announced the US government will
donate "a significant financial contribution" to the Black Sea Fund that is
to be set up with a view to financing the projects that have common goals
with those of the regional initiative.

The initiative to establish a Black Sea Forum was also welcomed by the
representatives of France - Frederic Baleine du Laurens, director general at
the French Foreign Ministry; Germany - special representative Norber Baas;
Italy - State Secretary Famiano Crucianelli; Spain - special representative
Pablo Zaldivar; Belgium - Foreign Minister Karel de Guht; Poland -
Undersecretary of State Stanislaw Komorowski.

Messages of appreciation for the launching of the Black Sea Forum were
communicated by Sergey Ordzhonikidze, Director General of the Geneva-based
UN Office; Terry Davis, the Council of Europe's secretary-general; Marc
Perrin de Brichambaut, OSCE secretary-general; Brunson McKinley, director
general of the International Migration Organization; Erhard Busek, special
coordinator of the Southeastern Europe Stability Pact; Marek Belka,
executive secretary of the UN Economic Commission for Europe; Robert
Simmons, NATO special representative for the Caucasus and Central Asia;
Peter Semneby, the EU special representative for the Caucasus and Central
Asia. -30-
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7. US MARSHALL FUND GIVES 20M DOLLARS FOR BLACK SEA FUND

Rompres news agency, Bucharest, Romania, Monday, June 5, 2006

BUCHAREST - The Marshall Fund of the United States announced on
Monday 5 June, at a summit meeting of the Black Sea Forum for Dialogue
and Partnership, having set up a Black Sea Fund for funding democracy
consolidation, good governance, regional cooperation and civil society
development projects in the Black Sea area.

The Marshall Fund has earmarked 20m dollars for the establishment of the
Black Sea Fund and started negotiations with the US Agency for International
Development (USAID), the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation, the Romanian
government as well as with other US and European public and private donors
over support for this initiative.

Marshall Fund Chairman Craig Kennedy says the Black Sea area is vital to
long-lasting stability and peace in Europe, the United Sates and NATO.
According to him, the Black Sea Fund will help secure progress in the
region, as well as at national and international levels.

An annual fund of 42m [dollars] will be available for the earmarking of two
fellowships of between 1,000 dollars and 75,000 dollars for which NGOs,
local and regional authorities, learned bodies and the media of the Black
Sea Forum countries -Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Georgia, Moldova,
Romania, Russia, Turkey and Ukraine - will qualify.

According to a press release of the Marshall Fund, the fellowships will be
distributed for two main components - the Civic Programme, under which
the consolidation of democracy, the state of law, good governance, citizen
education in participatory democracy are supported, and the Cross-Border
Programme for cross-border cooperation projects.

The Marshall Fund highlights the important contribution of Romanian
President Traian Basescu and the Romanian Foreign Ministry to the
establishment of the Black Sea Fund, mentioning that it is conducting
negotiations with the Romanian government over setting up the Fund's
secretariat in Bucharest. According to the release, the Black Sea Fund will
become operational this year. -30-
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8. ROMANIA: BLACK SEA FORUM ADOPTS FINAL STATEMENT

Rompres news agency, Bucharest, Romania Monday, Jun 5, 2006

BUCHAREST - The final declaration of the summit meeting of the Black Sea
Forum for Dialogue and Partnership held on Monday 5 June in Bucharest
provides for the creation of this forum as a "platform for finalizing a
common vision on the development of democracy and a market economy".

The declaration states that the need for this regional cooperation
initiative is the result of interdependence between the Black Sea countries,
highlighting that all these countries will have to strive to secure peace,
stability, prosperity and good neighbourly relations by efficient use of the
other forms already existing in the area, particularly the Black Sea
Economic Cooperation Organization (BSEC).

The final document of the Bucharest summit meeting indicates that the
challenges to regional stability - terrorism, pollution, natural calamities,
trafficking and organized crime as well as unsettled disputes - require a
new, action-oriented strategy on the part of the countries in this region.

The Black Sea Forum, the document says, will aim to promote regional
cooperation, good governance, democracy, human rights, the consolidation of
tolerance, the development of the civil society, while offering better
opportunities to young people through education and scientific research. At
the same time, it will seek new ways of winning the active involvement of
the business communities in all these priorities and of accommodating the
regional priorities with those of the Euro-Atlantic community.

"There will be no standing bodies of the Forum and the Forum will not
overlap the cooperation mechanisms already in place in the region. Tits
operational framework will be minimal and flexible based on partnerships,"
reads the document.

Likewise, it mentions that further consultations will be held and the Forum
will be open to all the countries of the region and all partners concerned,
be them countries or international organizations.

The declaration also hails the interest on the rise of the European Union in
the Black Sea area and encourages the national authorities of the countries
in these region to make good use of the financial instruments to be made
available by the European Union beginning with 2007 - the European
Neighbourhood Policy, the European Neighbourhood Policy Instrument
(ENPI) and the Instrument for Pre-Accession (IPA).

The document is signed by state officials from Armenia, Azerbaijan,
Bulgaria, Georgia, Greece, Moldova, Romania, Turkey and Ukraine.

The Russian Federation is not a party to the Forum, but she was represented
in the summit meeting as an observer by Ambassador to Bucharest Aleksandr
Tolkaci.

Tolkaci did not deliver any message to the participants, but he said at the
end of the meeting that the position of the Russian Federation remains the
same as the one voiced by the Russian Foreign Ministry. "Such regional
initiatives are good, but there are too many of them," Tolkaci told
journalists.

The Russian Federation voiced reservations over the need to establish the
Black Sea Forum, arguing that this initiative is overlapping the BSEC.
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9. UKRAINE ACCUSES RUSSIA OF INCITING NEW 'CRIMEAN WAR'

By Andrew Osborn in Moscow, Independent
London, United Kingdom, Tuesday, June 6 2006

Ukraine has accused Russia of stirring up anti-US and anti-Nato protests on
the Crimean peninsula where Russia's Black Sea Fleet is based. The
allegation - made by the Our Ukraine party of President Viktor Yushchenko -
follows a week of anti-Nato protests in Crimea that appear to have caught
the government unawares.

Emotions are running high ahead of a multinational military exercise on the
peninsula, called Sea Breeze, due to begin in July.

Coaches carrying US Marine reservists have been stoned, the Ukrainian
Socialists have demanded the resignation of the Defence Minister, Anatoliy
Hrytsenko, and Russian MPs have called for Crimea to be taken away from
Ukraine and incorporated into Russia.

The dispute comes as Ukrainian politicians are struggling to form a
coalition government more than two months after the election that confirmed
the country's apparently irreparable split into pro-Russian and pro-Western
camps.

The issue of Nato is divisive; President Yushchenko, the leader of the 2004
"orange revolution", wants his country to move closer towards the EU and
Nato with a view to joining both organisations. But while many Ukrainians
would be happy to become part of the EU, two-thirds of the 47 million
population is strongly opposed to joining Nato.

Pro-Russian forces believe it would be "high treason" to join Nato and
feelings run particularly high in Russian-speaking Crimea where Russia's
Black Sea Fleet is based as a hangover from the Soviet-era.

Many locals feel closer to Moscow than Kiev and want the Russian base at
Sevastopol to remain. The pro-Western "orange" politicians running the
country have told Moscow they will not renew its lease on the base when it
expires in 2017. Anti-Nato and anti-US feelings came to a head at the end of
May, when a ship carrying US Marine reservists docked in the Crimean port of
Feodosia ahead of Operation Sea Breeze.

The Marines were supposed to help refurbish a Ukrainian naval base for the
exercise but their arrival has instead triggered a firestorm of protest that
shows no sign of abating. The Marines have been stoned, subject to bomb
hoaxes, been trapped in their accommodation, ridiculed in the Russian press,
and construction supplies have been blocked at the port. Opposition has been
led by die-hard Communists, Russian nationalists and by the neo-Communists,
headed by the MP Natalya Vitrenko.

Russian MPs have flown in to offer their support, a development that has
prompted Mr Yushchenko to rush through legislation allowing him to deport
foreigners taking part in the protests. Pro-Russian forces accused Mr
Yushchenko and Nato of planning to build a Nato base in Crimea and of
shipping in toxic waste. Both allegations have been denied and the
government has suggested Russian special forces have had a hand in
whipping up the protests.

The Our Ukraine party went even further yesterday, accusing Moscow of
directly fomenting the crisis. "The deliberate incitement of Crimean
residents over the multinational military exercises by certain political
forces directly supported by Moscow endangers not only the international
image of this country, but also the national security and interests of
Ukraine," it said in a statement.

It argued that military exercises of the same kind have been held regularly
since 1997 and that Russia holds similar exercises too.

Locals have also been outraged by the scenario for this year's exercise; it
involves Nato forces restoring order in a breakaway peninsula caught between
the clutches of a totalitarian government and a democratic one.

Ukraine has accused Russia of stirring up anti-US and anti-Nato protests on
the Crimean peninsula where Russia's Black Sea Fleet is based.

The allegation - made by the Our Ukraine party of President Viktor
Yushchenko - follows a week of anti-Nato protests in Crimea that appear to
have caught the government unawares.

Emotions are running high ahead of a multinational military exercise on the
peninsula, called Sea Breeze, due to begin in July.

Coaches carrying US Marine reservists have been stoned, the Ukrainian
Socialists have demanded the resignation of the Defence Minister, Anatoliy
Hrytsenko, and Russian MPs have called for Crimea to be taken away from
Ukraine and incorporated into Russia.

The dispute comes as Ukrainian politicians are struggling to form a
coalition government more than two months after the election that confirmed
the country's apparently irreparable split into pro-Russian and pro-Western
camps.

The issue of Nato is divisive; President Yushchenko, the leader of the 2004
"orange revolution", wants his country to move closer towards the EU and
Nato with a view to joining both organisations. But while many Ukrainians
would be happy to become part of the EU, two-thirds of the 47 million
population is strongly opposed to joining Nato.

Pro-Russian forces believe it would be "high treason" to join Nato and
feelings run particularly high in Russian-speaking Crimea where Russia's
Black Sea Fleet is based as a hangover from the Soviet-era.

Many locals feel closer to Moscow than Kiev and want the Russian base at
Sevastopol to remain. The pro-Western "orange" politicians running the
country have told Moscow they will not renew its lease on the base when it
expires in 2017. Anti-Nato and anti-US feelings came to a head at the end of
May, when a ship carrying US Marine reservists docked in the Crimean port
of Feodosia ahead of Operation Sea Breeze.

The Marines were supposed to help refurbish a Ukrainian naval base for the
exercise but their arrival has instead triggered a firestorm of protest that
shows no sign of abating. The Marines have been stoned, subject to bomb
hoaxes, been trapped in their accommodation, ridiculed in the Russian press,
and construction supplies have been blocked at the port.

Opposition has been led by die-hard Communists, Russian nationalists and
by the neo-Communists, headed by the MP Natalya Vitrenko.

Russian MPs have flown in to offer their support, a development that has
prompted Mr Yushchenko to rush through legislation allowing him to deport
foreigners taking part in the protests. Pro-Russian forces accused Mr
Yushchenko and Nato of planning to build a Nato base in Crimea and of
shipping in toxic waste. Both allegations have been denied and the
government has suggested Russian special forces have had a hand in whipping
up the protests.

The Our Ukraine party went even further yesterday, accusing Moscow of
directly fomenting the crisis. "The deliberate incitement of Crimean
residents over the multinational military exercises by certain political
forces directly supported by Moscow endangers not only the international
image of this country, but also the national security and interests of
Ukraine," it said in a statement.

It argued that military exercises of the same kind have been held regularly
since 1997 and that Russia holds similar exercises too.

Locals have also been outraged by the scenario for this year's exercise; it
involves Nato forces restoring order in a breakaway peninsula caught between
the clutches of a totalitarian government and a democratic one. -30-
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10. SENIOR RUSSIAN MP RAPS UKRAINE FOR FLIRTING WITH NATO

Interfax-AVN military news agency website,
Moscow, Russia in Russian 1215 gmt 5 Jun 06
BBC Monitoring Service, United Kingdom, Monday, Jun 05, 2006

MOSCOW - Ukraine's growing contacts with NATO run counter to the
public interest of Ukraine as well as Russia and the entire international
community, said Andrey Kokoshin, head of the Russian State Duma's
Committee on the Commonwealth of Independent States and Relations
with Compatriots.

"Ever more active attempts to bring Ukraine into NATO, being undertaken by
the authors of the 'Orange Revolution', run counter to genuine interests of
Ukraine and Russia and the international community as a whole," Kokoshin
told Interfax today.

The latest events in Crimea once again demonstrate that "there exists an
enormous gap between the anti-NATO social attitudes in Ukraine and the
position of a portion of the Ukrainian political class with 'pro-Atlantic
sympathies,'" Kokoshin said.

Kokoshin said that NATO activity surrounding the Ukrainian issue and
pro-NATO forces within Ukraine are both strengthening. Meanwhile, this is
occurring against the backdrop of a worsening situation in Afghanistan,
where the responsibility for stability and security lies with NATO, whose
forces apparently cannot cope, he said.

NATO continues to demonstrate its "aspiration for extensive development, for
expansion of the alliance with an evident decrease in its effectiveness in
such essential areas as the struggle against extremist organizations that
use terrorist methods".

Ain connection with this, Kokoshin stressed, many State Duma deputies are
raising questions concerning the effectiveness of Russian cooperation with
NATO in the area of combating international terrorism. -30-
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11. UKRAINIAN MP'S JOIN PICKET OVER US PRESENCE IN CRIMEA

NTN, Kiev, in Ukrainian 1400 gmt 5 Jun 06
BBC Monitoring Service, United Kingdom, Monday, Jun 05, 2006

KIEV - An assault group of Members of Parliament has landed in Feodosiya
[in Ukraine's Crimea]. MPs of the Ukrainian and Crimean supreme councils
[parliaments] representing the [opposition] Party of Regions and the
Communist Party joined picketers outside the entrance to the Feodosiya
seaport.

Our correspondents report that the picketers are inspecting every vehicle
leaving the seaport. Suspicions about cargoes intended for the Sea Breeze
2006 military exercise have arisen after the MPs established that a batch of
containers from US ships disappeared from the seaport.

The MPs were not stopped by the Defence Ministry's explanations that the
containers were empty from the outset, as they are refrigerators for keeping
foodstuffs in field conditions.

Feodosiya and Alushta residents launched a blockade of the seaport and of
the sanatorium where US servicemen were to be accommodated. The US
servicemen had already been taken to Feodosiya. The Alushta residents who
picketed the sanatorium returned home.

[Protesters have been blocking the port of Feodosiya following the arrival
on 28 May of a US ship carrying materials to the Ukrainian navy's Staryy
Krym training range due to host the Sea Breeze Ukrainian-US exercise this
summer.] -30-
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========================================================
12. UKRAINE'S CRIMEAN PARLIAMENT SAYS INTERNATIONAL
EXERCISE "INEXPEDIENT"

Interfax-Ukraine news agency, Kiev, in Russian 0749 gmt 5 Jun 06
BBC Monitoring Service. United Kingdom, Monday, Jun 05, 2006

Kiev, 5 June: The presidium of the Crimean Supreme Council [parliament] has
expressed its concern over the escalation of tension in Crimea, blaming for
it the actions of the Ukrainian Defence Ministry regarding the unloading in
the port of Feodosiya of a US military cargo.

"The presidium of the Supreme Council of the Crimean Autonomous Republic
expresses its serious concern over the escalation of the sociopolitical
situation in the republic, which has been triggered by the thoughtless
actions of the Ukrainian Defence Ministry regarding the unloading in the
port of Feodosiya of a US military cargo, as well as by the arrival of a
group of US servicemen at Simferopol airport," the presidium said in its
statement, which Interfax-Ukraine received today.

The statement said that the autonomous republic's leadership had not been
informed about the events, while the National Security and Defence Council,
the Foreign Ministry and the Defence Ministry failed to timely react to
media reports. In this connection, the presidium believes that it would be
inexpedient to conduct the Sea Breeze-2006 exercise in Crimea.

"In the current socioeconomic situation, the presidium of the Supreme
Council of the Crimean Autonomous Republic believes that it would be
inexpedient to hold the Sea Breeze-2006 exercise in Crimea," the statement
said.

Simultaneously, the Crimean parliament's presidium asked the Supreme Council
[Ukrainian parliament] to urgently consider this matter in order to prevent
further escalation. -30-
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========================================================
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========================================================
13. UKRAINE'S SOCIALISTS WANT DEFENCE MINISTER SACKED

Interfax-Ukraine news agency, Kiev, in Russian 1454 gmt 5 Jun 06
BBC Monitoring Service, United Kingdom, Monday, Jun 05, 2006

KIEV - The Socialist Party of Ukraine has recommended that President
Viktor Yushchenko dismiss Defence Minister Anatoliy Hrytsenko over
the incident in Feodosiya.

[Anti-NATO protests are continuing in the Crimean city of Feodosiya after
a US ship called at the local port in late May in the run-up to an
international peacekeeping exercise - see TV 5 Kanal, Kiev, in Ukrainian
1800 gmt 4 Jun 06.]

In a statement passed today and posted on the party's website, the Socialist
Party's political council also asked the president "to consider the
responsibility of other officials involved in deliberately creating this
incident".

In addition, the Socialists demand that Yushchenko, acting within the bounds
of his powers, facilitate the bringing of actions by all government agencies
that have to do with the Crimean incident into line with the constitution
and laws of Ukraine.

The Socialist Party explained his position by saying that actions by top
officials "fall outside legal norms, discredit government institutions and
are another source of tension in society". The Feodosiya incident was
provoked by "a violation of laws on conditions for the presence of foreign
troops in Ukraine".

"Ukraine must adhere to the accord on partnership and cooperation with NATO
and can hold exercises within the framework of this agreement, but this must
be accompanied by relevant resolutions by parliament," the statement says.
[Passage omitted: background]

[The Socialist Party is seen as a potential member of an "Orange" coalition,
also involving propresidential Our Ukraine and the bloc of prominent Orange
Revolution figure, Yuliya Tymoshenko.] -30-
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14. OPPOSITION SET TO BLOCK UKRAINE PRESIDENT'S BILL
ALLOWING FOREIGN TROOPS TO ENTER UKRAINE

ICTV television, Kiev, in Ukrainian 1545 gmt 5 Jun 06
BBC Monitoring Service, United Kingdom, Monday, Jun 05, 2006

Ukraine's opposition Party of Regions MP Yevhen Kushnaryov has said that
the party will not vote for President Viktor Yushchenko's bill allowing foreign
troops to enter Ukraine to take part in multinational military exercises.

Protests are under way in the Crimean seaport of Feodosiya following the
arrival on 28 May of a US ship carrying materials to the Ukrainian navy's
Staryy Krym training range due to host the Sea Breeze Ukrainian-US exercise
later this month. The following is an excerpt from the report by the
Ukrainian ICTV television on 5 June:

[Presenter] The Defence Ministry today dismissed some rumours about the
arrival of a US ship in Crimea, which the Russian media have been
broadcasting particularly actively.

[Passage omitted: The Defence Ministry spokesman says there were empty
refrigerators among US containers to keep foodstuffs in field conditions.]

[Correspondent] President Viktor Yushchenko sent a draft law on allowing
foreign troops to take part in multinational exercises to parliament for
out-of-turn consideration. But Socialist leader Oleksandr Moroz believes it
is not realistic that parliament will meet before its leaders are elected
and factions are formed. [Opposition] Party of Regions members are saying
that the parliamentary session will not be held for other reasons. They
demand that the draft law should be withdrawn.

[MP Yevhen Kushnaryov of the Party of Regions, in Russian] You are telling
us to vote for the draft law submitted by the president. Does this mean that
by doing so we must admit that the Ukrainian constitution and laws have been
violated with impunity; that the Supreme Council [parliament] has been
degraded - excuse me - to the lowest possible level on this occasion; and
that it has to make legal the unscrupulous, unlawful and unticonstitutional
actions by officials? [Passage omitted: Correspondent says anti-US protests
continue in Feodosiya.] -30-
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15. FEODOSIA, CRIMEA: AUTHORITY-FREE AREA
Once again it exposed Ukrainian authorities' weak will, poor professionalism
and neglect of national interests. Branches of government have only
demonstrated their special talent to make a mess of everything they take up.

ANALYSIS & COMMENTARY: Tatiana SILINA
Zerkalo Nedeli On The Web, Mirror Weekly, No 21 (600)
International Social Political Weekly
Kyiv, Ukraine, Saturday, June 3-9, 2006

The show in Feodosia, Crimea was professionally staged by foreign directors
and diligently performed by the local crowd. Once again it exposed the
Ukrainian authorities' weak will, poor professionalism, and neglect of
national interests. So far, all branches of government have only
demonstrated their special talent to make a mess of everything they take up.

This is not the first multinational exercise in Ukraine: the Sea Breeze
exercises, for instance, have been held here since 1997. But there has never
been a shameful scandal like this. Nine years ago, when preparations were
underway for the first Sea Breeze, the true Leninists kicked up a row,
demanding the Defense Minister's resignation and threatening to impeach
President Kuchma.

They blocked the parliament rostrum and started a melee in the session hall.
Russia's reaction was painful, too: the Duma accused Ukraine of a "rather
unfriendly step". But twelve months later the Russian Federation took part
in the Sea Breeze 98 and has been an active participant in these exercises
ever since.

This year, together with 16 other countries, Russia is supposed to take part
in the Sea Breeze 2006, and its representatives have attended all planning
conferences. The picketers demand that "NATO get out of Ukraine". But did
they know that this year their idol - Russia - is going to take part in the
Active Endeavor, which is not just a NATO exercise, but a NATO operation!

There are simple questions to these protesters and their
Progressive-Socialist, Communist, and Regional directors: where were you
last March, when the Russian assault-landing ship Nikolai Filchenkov
illegally crossed Ukraine's state border and landed marines near Kerch
without even asking Ukrainian authorities?

Why didn't you protest when Russian S.W.A.T. units staged an unwarranted
exercise in Crimea? Why were you silent when Russian Marines departed for
Chechnya from Ukraine's territory? These questions may be rhetoric because,
as they say, the one who pays orders the music.

It is senseless to adduce reasonable arguments when nobody hears and won't
listen to them. It is no use disputing with [Progressive Socialist leader]
Natalia Vitrenko or [Communist leader] Petro Symonenko: they pursue their
own goals. But those stunned and confused by the anti-NATO cacophony and
official reports should know a few facts.

[1] Firstly, the Sea Breeze is not a NATO exercise. It is a joint
Ukrainian-US naval exercise in the frameworks of the Partnership for Peace
program. Other countries - both members and partners of the Alliance - are
also invited.

This year, for example, invitations were sent to 40 countries and 17 decided
to take part. It should be reminded that Ukraine began to host Sea Breeze
exercises back in the times when its previous leadership was pronouncedly
set against joining NATO.

[2] Secondly, those "horror stories" about NATO "preparing an intervention"
are just ridiculous. The Sea Breeze has always involved mock peacekeeping
and relief operations: elimination of consequences of an elemental disaster,
search and rescue operations, evacuation from a damaged ship, or
anti-terrorism operations.

[3] Thirdly, nobody is going to deploy NATO bases in Crimea, which was once
again confirmed this week by NATO's official representative D. Apaturai:
"NATO has no plans, no reasons, and no intentions to deploy any bases in
Crimea. NATO does not have its own armed forces, so it is impossible in
principle for the alliance to have bases in Crimea or elsewhere."

[4] There is one more thing to be added: it is not NATO but an individual
country that may have military bases on the territory of another country.
The United States, for instance, has an air force base in Kyrgyzstan (which
is a member of the CIS Collective Security Treaty).

Currently, the Kyrgyz government is negotiating with Washington on raising
the rent. And Moscow rejects even the idea of revising the meager rent it
pays Ukraine for stationing its Black Sea Fleet in Crimea.

The United States is not going to deploy its military bases in Ukraine. The
ship anchored at the Feodosia port is commercial, not "military" as the
opposition alleges. It delivered construction machines and materials as part
of technical assistance to the Ukrainian Armed Forces.

The Ukrainian Defense Ministry explained that these machines and materials
were meant for upgrading the training base of the Starokrymsky Range - the
venue of the Sea Breeze 2006. It was planned to build several hangar-type
barracks for the exercise personnel and other training base facilities.

The Defense Ministry stated officially that after the exercise the
Starokrymsky range would be used for regular combat training of Ukrainian
personnel and exercises of Ukrainian peacekeepers.

In other words, for the ninth year in a row the Americans delivered
construction machines and materials (bought with their taxpayers' money) to
improve the living conditions of Ukrainian military trainees, but were met
by pickets and insulting mottoes.

Vitrenko spat fury and dudgeon, demonstrating to TV viewers a list of
firearms delivered by the American ship. But the weapons entered Ukraine's
territory with the permission from the State Export Control Service. They
are regular weapons of the US personnel intended for the exercise and are
not liable under the law "On Admission of Military Units of Foreign States".

Besides, the Ukrainian and the US sides agreed that the weapons would be
kept in a Ukrainian depot, pending the Ukrainian parliament's consent to
host multinational exercises. Therefore, the American military engineers
brought by the US ship Adventure may not be regarded as a military unit and
they may be admitted to Ukraine's territory even without the parliament's
consent.

The Prosecutor General's Office, having received the Commissioner for Human
Rights [Nina] Kaprachova's and Communist Party leader Petro Symonenko'
petitions on the American ship's arrival in Feodisia, conducted an
investigation to make a preliminary conclusion that ".the transport vessel
Advantage was staying in Ukraine on legal ground".

Commenting on the incident on Thursday, deputy Prosecutor General N.Holomsha
said that - by Article 1 in the Law of Ukraine "On the Admission of Foreign
Military Units into the Territory of Ukraine" -- admission permits are only
necessary for ships armed with light or heavy weapons, adding that the
vessel Advantage, according to the preliminary investigation findings, was
commercial.

The Prosecutor General's Office representative also reminded for that matter
that Ukraine joined the Partnership for Peace program back in 1995, and an
agreement to this effect was ratified by the Verkhovna Rada in 2000.
Holomsha citied Article 4 in the Law of Ukraine "On the Admission of Foreign
Military Units into the Territory of Ukraine" as saying that foreign troops'
admissions do not need to be approved by the Verkhovna Rada if these are
provided for by international agreements.

While the American ship's legal status is more or less clarified, then the
destiny of the six multinational military exercises planned to take place on
Ukraine's territory within the next four months looks vague, considering
that a law on the President of Ukraine's approval of admission permits for
the foreign troops coming to this country for participation in multinational
military exercises in 2006 is non-existent at this point.

This issue has already been given a lot of coverage by Zerkalo Nedeli. So in
this article we would only remind a few things. Documents of this kind have
been adopted by Verkhovna Rada every year, but no problems have ever
cropped up either under Kuchma or Yuschenko [as Presidents].

For example, the previous-convocation Rada approved a related presidential
decision by 246 votes. Furthermore, this decision received not a single
"nay" vote, even from Communists, which was the first such case in history
of Rada voting on decisions of this kind. But in February, just in advance
of the parliamentary election, a similar bill was short of 11 votes to be
adopted.

Two more attempts to put this issue on the Verkhovna Rada's agenda had all
failed. In the obtaining situation, according to information available to
ZN, a decision was made at one of the National Security and Defense Council
(NSDC) meetings - that was attended by the President, Prime Minister,
Verkhovna Rada Speaker, Prosecutor General, chief Supreme Court justice and
other NSDC members - to confirm to partner countries Ukraine's invitation
for their military units to come here within the timeframes agreed on
previously, in the hope that the required bill would be approved by the
following-convocation Rada.

Letters of invitation had even been sent out to partner nations by the then
NSDC Secretary Anatolii Kinah pending the Rada's approval of the bill.

The new Rada did not come together for its inaugural session until May 25 --
not to adopt the urgent bill but rather to call a break until June 7. Will
the bill -- about which there is so much buzzing now - be adopted at the
Rada's session scheduled for next Wednesday? Such a possibility looks very
unlikely. If it does happen anyway, this will be a true wonder.

For this wonder to come true it is necessary for the President to lay again
the required bill before parliament for consideration and approval (in that,
according to the Verkhovna Rada's new internal procedural operations, a bill
that failed to be adopted by parliament before the expiration of its mandate
is considered to be withdrawn), and for the parliament to bring the bill
through all the required procedures, from its registration with the Rada's
secretariat to examination by three Rada Committees concerned, approval
according to established procedures and signature by the Rada Speaker - all
within the four days remaining. But the Rada, as is well known, does not
have not only a speaker but even parliamentary committees thus far.

Therefore, at least two of the six exercises included in the bill -
Ukrainian-British Tight Knot scheduled to begin on June 14, and
Ukrainian-American Combined Effort, also slated to take place in June -- are
under very justifiable threat of frustration, with all the implications for
Ukraine's international image and implementation of its strategic goals.

Following all these events, can Ukraine be now treated as a predictable,
consistent and reliable partner? Is it ready to compensate the states it
invited to take part in the exercises for the money they spent preparing for
the events?

Can there be any talk of Ukraine joining NATO's Membership Action Plan,
much less the alliance itself, if the Ukrainian authorities are not in a
position even to arrange for routine military exercises - held on a yearly
basis and preplanned long ago?

Questions of this kind are legion, but not at all to ask Vitrenko or
Symonenko, who will not stop-short to anything in order not to fell into
oblivion during the five years remaining until the next parliamentary
election. These questions are rather addressed to the authorities, which
control the entire state machinery but are losing battle by battle, allowing
the show to be run by the marginalized political forces that only gained a
combined six percent of the vote during the most recent parliamentary
election.

If the country's international image is not an empty phrase to the
President, why hasn't he in the situation obtained laid before parliament
yet a bill approving his own decision on admission of foreign military
units?

Why did the 'orange' factions, which draft coalition agreement contains
provisions on the adoption of the identified bill, forget about it
altogether and postpone the next Verkhovna Rada session to as late as
June 7th. Why the 150 votes of deputies required to immediately resume
parliamentary sessions had not been collected when all the fuss [over the
American ship's arrival in Feodosia] began?

Why the Prosecutor General's Office's conclusions related to the American
ship's stay in Ukraine came as late as on the fifth day of the scandal but,
instead, were not drawn up and declared officially before the ship's arrival
in order to prevent the controversy?

Wasn't the Security Service (SBU) aware of the preplanned protest actions?
If it was not, then such a security service is not worth a red cent. If it
was, why didn't it ward off possible unrest? Why weren't law enforcement
agencies alarmed in advance in order to keep the Advantage laid on the
roadstead as one of possible options until the situation is settled?

Is an Interior Ministry existent in Ukraine, and if it is, then what its
head who has remained silent to date is doing at a time when unauthorized
rallies are taking place and roads and airports are being blocked by all
wishing so?

The law enforcement agency performs poorly if it is unable to provide
freight delivery and the passage of three buses with foreign servicemen to
the venue of the exercises, thereby endangering implementation by Ukraine of
its international obligations.

Why the political parties that are going to form a parliamentary majority
and a coalition government have remained silent to this day? Are they aware
at all of what is going on in this country? Why the Narodnyi Rukh (People's
Movement) was the only party to come out with a statement on the events in
Crimea?

What do [Our Ukraine bloc leaders] Yekhanurov and Bezsmertnyi and [Socialist
Party leader] Moroz think of this situation? Our Ukraine did not seem to
wake up until yesterday when it issued a statement of its own. Doesn't Mrs.
[Yulia] Tymoshenko, a hopeful Prime Minister, have anything to say on the
subject?

Or at least clarify whether members of her [eponymous] BYuT bloc were among
those picketing the Feodosia seaport, as some local deputies claimed. If
they were there, then what the bloc leader and its members are going to do
next?

Is Yulia Vladimirovna, as was already the case with the gas accords [with
Russia], going to sort it out and issue angry statements when the battle
will be over? Or is she going to take refuge in silence? Why her party has
not given its appraisal to what deputies of the Feodosia City Council have
done? Isn't it because her faithful companion-in-arms Andriy Shkil believes
what is going on in Crimea to be "nothing else than just epatage"?

Our policy makers seem to have been so much absorbed in the coalition game
and the distribution of portfolios, big and small, that they are simply
oblivious to what is going on. The standoff has continued in Crimea for
seven days now, but it was not until yesterday that this emergency situation
was for the first time talked over [at the Presidential Secretariat] on
Bankova and, later on the same day, by the NSDC. Didn't the President have
time for this or did he have other fish to fry?

The trouble is that this problem is much more serious than just possible
frustration of multinational military exercises or the Feodosia turmoil.
Don't
the authorities and the politicians claiming power see that the country has
come very close to the edge of collapse as the Constitutional Court is still
non-existent and the budget implementation is endangered?

A number of local legislatures, having sneezed at all laws, the Fundamental
Law among them, give Russian the status as regional language on their
respective territories. Then they in Luhansk Region threaten to nominate the
governor for the region on their own and are obstructing the border guards
who are digging control trenches on the border with Russia as part of the
program for the prevention of smuggling.

The Cossacks in Feodosia warn they would continue blocking the freight from
the American vessel, no matter whether the legislation mentioned above is
approved by the Verkhovna Rada or not, adding in so saying that "the
authorities should be aware of what the Cossacks are capable of".

Meanwhile, Feodosia declares itself "a NATO-free territory". It looks very
likely that Kherson, for example, will tomorrow declare itself a UN-free
territory, Ternopil a territory free of the [Russia-dominated] Common
Economic Space, Lviv a CIS-free territory and the Ukrainian citizens will
declare themselves free of enforcing laws or paying taxes.

The authorities are demonstrating weakness and lack of will in a situation
where they have to close the ranks and be as strong as never before. Because
a threat is posed to Ukraine and its statehood not only from inside the
country. The major threat is posed from the outside.

Ukrainian mass media - either naive or lacking professionalism - continue to
describe the protest actions by locals in Crimea as "spontaneous". But the
country's leadership, according to information available to this newspaper,
was notified (albeit behindhand) by the SBU that the mass rallies had been
organized and staged on the peninsula by Russian special services, and that
many of those rallying have Russian passports. Why hasn't this fact been
given the air?

Why haven't the Russian citizens who rode roughshod over Ukrainian laws
been detained by competent authorities and shown on TV screens all over the
country?

Why -- when it comes to Russia - our officials lower their voices to a
whisper, looking at Moscow fearfully? If they are indifferent to the
country's national interest, they at least should be guided by the instinct of
self-preservation, because it is evident to all that Russia will be doing
what it can to see the "Orange Regime" toppled in Ukraine.

War on Ukraine was declared by Russia back in the winter of 2005, and
nobody seems to have any doubt about this.

The unprecedented gas attack by Gazprom (which sells its gas to Ukraine for
$230 and to Germany for $160), embargo on meat and milk exports from
Ukraine, obstructing Ukraine in its effort to take an inventory of the land
plots and facilities employed in Crimea by the Russian Black Sea Fleet,
wrapping up of military-technological cooperation programs or the
Kremlin-authorized information campaign unleashed by the Russian media to
tar Ukraine's international image - aren't these graphic enough evidences of
this?

And Moscow does not seem to be going to stop-short to this, as it has in
store a good deal of other leverages to bring very painful pressure to bear
on Ukraine.

But this campaign in Crimea - organized and launched without too much effort
or imagination - is nothing compared with what is to come. Moscow realizes
too well that Kyiv has gone away from it to a critical distance and to an
equally critical distance closer to NATO membership, which would mean
Ukraine's abort from the Russian orbit for ever.

To prevent such a turn of events, Russia stands ready to make great
sacrifices, not excepting outrage upon the rights and interests of its own
citizens, and putting to risk its own economy and international image.
Ukraine will only be able to stem the onslaught if its leadership is strong,
wise and decisive. If.

On the sixth day of the awaited scandal the National Security and Defense
Council adopted a resolution which implementation is yet to be provided by
courts of law, local legislatures, law enforcement agencies and the
parliament.

The NSDC, and its yesterday's meeting, confirmed the need for Ukraine to
host in 2006 the military exercises specified in a presidential decree
issued on January 31, and made it incumbent upon ministries and other
government agencies to take measures to ensure that the events take place as
scheduled.

The Council pointed to the fact that some local legislatures, having
overstepped their authority as set by the law, adopted resolutions banning
the exercises and obstructed preparations for the exercises. For this reason
the NSDC demanded that top officials with local legislatures, in particular,
heads of local councils, should put an end to illegal activities and law
enforcement agencies give a legal appraisal to such activities.

The NSDC demands that law enforcement agencies provide the implementation
of all the events in accordance with law and take the measures necessary
for the military exercises to take place as scheduled.

The NSDC has also issued instructions to the SBU, Interior Ministry and
Border Authority to deport from Ukraine the foreign nationals who are taking
part in road and airport blockades and protest actions on the Ukrainian
territory or otherwise violating Ukrainian laws or meddling in domestic
affairs of our country.

The NSDC has also directed the Interior Ministry and Defense Ministry to
provide law and order during the multinational military exercises.

For that matter it should be pointed out that the NSDC has only dotted i's
and crossed t's on some individual aspects of the problem, while the Crimean
issue has been high on the agenda for several months now and requires
all-round strategic approaches to be settled. -30-
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16. GAZPROM REPORTS PROBLEMS INJECTING GAS INTO
UNDERGROUND STORAGE IN UKRAINE
DOW JONES NEWSWIRES, Moscow, Russia, Mon, June 5, 2006

MOSCOW -- Russian gas monopoly OAO Gazprom (GSPBEX.RS) said
Monday it had experienced problems injecting gas into underground storage
in Ukraine.

The company said in a statement that a meeting at Gazprom headquarters
chaired by Chief Executive Alexei Miller had observed that "gas is being
injected at too slow a rate" into storage facilities by Ukrainian oil and
gas company Naftogaz Ukrainy (NGAZ.YY).

The statement didn't specify who made the allegations, nor did it specify
who was present at the meeting. No one at Gazprom was immediately available
to give precise details.

Prompt withdrawal from storage facilities in Ukraine is essential to the
smooth supply of natural gas from Russia to central and western Europe in
the peak demand season in winter.

"The creation of necessary reserves in underground storage in Ukraine in
time for the start of the winter heating season is of cardinal importance
for guaranteeing uninterrupted gas supply to Ukrainian customers and for the
fulfillment of Ukraine's obligations in transporting gas to European
states," Gazprom said in a statement.

Gazprom added that it will insist that Naftogaz Ukrainy form sufficient
reserves in time for the start of the winter.

The statement raised the specter of renewed problems in gas supply after a
bitter dispute at the start of this year. Gazprom had interrupted supplies
to Ukraine in the depths of winter following the latter's refusal to agree
to a sharp increase in the price it paid for Russian gas. As a result,
Ukraine illicitly siphoned off Russian gas destined for customers further
west in Europe, such as Hungary and Italy.

The dispute caused alarm in western Europe, reviving fears that Russia may
use gas supply as a political weapon. The Russian government and Gazprom
both reject any such suggestion, noting that supplies were maintained to
Europe even during the Cold War.

No one at Naftogaz was initially able to comment. A spokesman for Naftogaz
later said he was unaware of any problems filling the underground storage.
But he said that problems transiting Russian gas to European consumers
through Ukraine could arise this winter due to Gazprom's refusal to put any
of its own gas into Ukrainian storage.

"The problems that could arise, I think, are absolutely analogous to the
same problems that arose last year," he said. "I don't think it will be more
severe than that, though."

Last winter, cold temperatures across Europe sent demand for gas
skyrocketing, leading Ukraine to siphon gas traveling through its pipelines
from Russia to European consumers while several European countries
complained of falling import levels. Russia supplies about a quarter of
European gas consumption, the majority of which travels through Ukrainian
pipelines.

"I'm not aware of any problems (on the Ukrainian side)," the spokesman said.
"The only problem is that Gazprom doesn't want to put it's own gas in
there."

The spokesman declined to say how much gas is currently being stored in
Ukraine or to identify the companies who own the stored gas, saying it was a
"commercial secret."

Ukraine and Russia have squabbled over gas supplies, transit and storage for
years, and after a dispute last year Gazprom announced it would no longer
save gas in Ukrainian storage. -30-
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-By Geoffrey T. Smith and Greg Walters, Dow Jones Newswires
(+7 495) 974 8055; greg.walters@dowjones.com
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========================================================
17. THE SECRETS OF YUSHCHENKO'S FIRST WIFE SVITLANA

By Oleksandr Chalenko, Segodnya, Kiev, in Russian 31 May 06; p 1, 12, 13
BBC Monitoring Service, United Kingdom, in English, Sat, Jun 03, 2006

Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko's first wife Svitlana has built a new
life for herself following their divorce in 1997, has remarried and now
lives with a businessman ten years her junior, a Ukrainian newspaper has
reported. A very devout person, she is having her own church built in the
grounds of her house near Kiev.

The following is the text of the report by journalist Oleksandr Chalenko
entitled "The secrets of Yushchenko's first wife", published in the Segodnya
newspaper on 31 May; subheadings have been inserted editorially:

MYSTERY OF SVITLANA'S PAST
Was Svitlana Yushchenko the niece of Vadym Hetman? How did she split
with Mr Yushchenko? What about the rumours of her murder in 2004? How
does she run her life now and with whom?

Segodnya has revealed what was behind the rumours about the murder of
Yushchenko's first wife Svitlana, her mother has spoken about "family ties"
with the murdered banker Vadym Hetman and her friends reveal how she
survived her divorce from the current president.

Svitlana Yushchenko (nee Kolesnyk) now lives in the village of Ivankovychi,
near Kiev. She is a very devout woman, a parishioner of the Moscow
Patriarchate, and is now building a church next to her home. After the
divorce she even used to go to parents' meetings dressed in black, like a
nun.

The public at large already has a detailed picture about the life-style of
the Ukrainian president's wife Kateryna Chumachenko, brother Petro, nephew
Yaroslav and daughter Vitalina, let alone his son Andriy. The only member of
Viktor Yushchenko's family, whose past and present is shrouded in darkness,
is Svitlana Yushchenko (nee Kolesnyk), the Ukrainian president's first wife,
but we have managed, to some extent, to break the "conspiracy of silence"
around her.

Many things have been written about Svitlana Yushchenko, that she was the
alleged god-child (or even niece) of the eminent banker Vadym Hetman who was
murdered in the 1990s and who at the beginning of the 1990s was head of the
Ukrainian National Bank. But just before the 2004 presidential elections
someone let out a rumour that she had been murdered. But what really
happened?

MOTHER ABOUT DAUGHTER
Segodnya was able to speak to Svitlana's mother, Lyudmyla Fedorivna
Kolesnyk. She is now 70 years of age and lives with her son Valeriy
Ivanovych in the village of Velyki Zhovtnev (Bilopilskyy District, Sumy
Region).

"Svita was born on 12 April 1959 in the village of Ulyanivka in Sumy
Region," Lyudmyla Fedorivna told us. "At school she took up sport, history,
literature and foreign languages. She won a class two rating in volleyball
and table-tennis. She used to write the scripts for her team in stage plays.

She was hard-working, and used to help me in the garden and in the
allotment, but also looked after the rabbits with her grandmother. She
learned how to embroider and to crochet. When it came to her relationship
with Hetman, Lyudmyla cut me short: "There is no truth in that. We did not
have such a relation."

After graduating from Sumy University, Svitlana worked in Ulyanivka as a
teacher of Ukrainian language and literature. It was here, in the second
half of the 1970s, that she also got to know Viktor Yushchenko who was
working as economist in the Ulyanivka branch of the USSR State Bank.

At the beginning of the 1990s he, Svitlana and the children - Andriy and
Vitalina - took an apartment on the first floor of a house at No 20
Instytutska Street. Viktor Yushchenko lived there until he divorced Svitlana
in the mid-90s.

In the president's home village of Khoruzhivka they say that even before he
met Kateryna Chumachenko in 1993 things were not going well between them,
and after his wife found a photo of Kateryna in Mr Yushchenko's jacket
things took their normal course.

As Yushchenko's now late mother told us: "Vitya's divorce from Svitlana was
a difficult time for me. She once came to me and said: 'Nobody else is to
blame, only ourselves.' She once even called on me with his present wife
Kateryna."

There is no doubt that this was a very big blow. One relative, whose
offspring studied together with Andriy Yushchenko in school No 109 in Kiev,
remembers that in 1997, after their separation, Svitlana Ivanivna came to
visit dressed all in black: "She looked like a nun: a long black skirt,
black coat, black scarf and a black nun's cap. Svitlana would deliberately
arrive late for the parents' meetings so she didn't have to talk to anyone.

When they finished she soon disappeared."

MARRIAGE TO SERHIY
In 2004 before the presidential elections Svitlana sold the apartment on
Instytutska Street. Before that she married a businessman called Serhiy. It
is interesting that he is ten years younger than her. Now, our sources tell
us, she is actively helping her husband in his firm's business. Svitlana's
friends say that she jokes about this age difference.

She told them what her son Andriy had allegedly said: "You ought to know
better at your age!") (meaning that both parents chose partners younger than
themselves).

People close to Svitlana said that during the 2004 election campaign she
canvassed for her former husband (after the divorce!) in Sumy Region and it
was there she had an accident, which probably led to rumours about her
death.

Segodnya tried to get in touch with Svitlana at her home in Ivankovychi
(near Kiev) and on the telephone. We rang and asked for a meeting or even a
brief telephone conversation, but she refused: "I am a religious person and
to give you an interview would be too much of a temptation, so I'm afraid I
can't go along with that."

Our sources, who have kept in close contact with Svitlana Yushchenko over
the years, say she is a very religious and devout person who devotes
virtually all her spare time to the church. She even has people from within
the church working for her.

For example, when she was living in Instytutska Street some time before the
middle of 2004 a lay-brother of the Pochayiv Lavra named Petro was her
private chauffeur. He basically drove her to the dacha. At the present
moment a nun, Varvara, lives with Svitlana at the dacha and helps her to run
the house.

RELIGIOUS LIFE
Svitlana is a firm follower of the Moscow Patriarchate and does not
recognize the church of Filaret Denysenko. The monks of the Kiev-Pechersk
Lavra and the Svyato-Vvedenskyy Monastery know her very well.

She is very well acquainted with the primate of the Ukrainian Orthodox
Church Metropolitan Volodymyr (Sabodan), with whom she may have an
audience for several hours. At the same time Svitlana, in the opinion of
people who know her, is an extremely modest, responsive and serene
woman.

Her religious life is not confined to prayers and vigils (she can often be
seen in the choir where, with her husband Serhiy, she reads the canon and
psalms in Church Slavonic) and the pilgrimage on the sacred places of
Ukraine and Russia. Svitlana also tries to help the church in a material
way.

For example, she and her husband wanted to buy a two-storey house from a
neighbour in Ivankovychi in order to build a church there. However, the deal
did not go through because they could not agree on the price. The owner's
aunt told us that her niece wanted 150,000 dollars for the house, but
Svitlana could only offer 100,000.

Svitlana's money was spent on building a chapel on the land of a hospital
for water transport workers on Yuriy Kotsyubynskyy Street. Now, she can
often be seen there at services together with her new husband.

SVITLANA'S HOUSE
Svitlana Yushchenko now lives outside Kiev in the village of Ivankovychi
(Vasylkiv District). You can get there via the Odessa Highway, passing
through Chabany, Vita Poshtova, and near Hlevakha village you turn left and
carry on for another six kilometres.

Ivankovychi is divided into two parts - the village itself, in which the
locals live in ordinary little old houses, and the new housing estate called
Tsarskoye Selo. The houses built there are like those in the elite
settlements of Koncha-Zaspa and Pushcha -Vodytsya.

When a Segodnya correspondent visited this area he noted that he didn't come
across many local people, only construction workers. An are [100 sq. m.]
here costs from 1,500 to 3,000 dollars. In 2004 Viktor Yushchenko's first
wife bought with her new husband a house on Sadova Street in this Tsarskoye
Selo before the presidential election. The owner at the time was one
Korniychuk. He was the former deputy minister of internal affairs.

Incidentally, neighbours told us that, apparently, the house next door
belonged to the former head of the Interior Ministry Vasylyshyn, to whom
Korniychuk was deputy.

The house stands on a plot of approximately 20 ares and is a two-storey
construction with a red-tiled roof. Alongside is another two-storey house
but smaller. Between them, behind the larger house, there is a garden and
the land from the side of the driveway is enclosed by a two-metre wall of
white stone. Svitlana has a garage, and, it seems, two cars. One of them
(the one in the garage) is a dark-coloured Mercedes-Viano (a mini-van).

Behind the gate, which, incidentally, was unlocked, was a small patio with
an improvised arch draped with vines. In summer, when all the leaves are
out, the patio is shady. There is no dog to be seen.

Opposite her house Svitlana has acquired another piece of land of 20 ares
where the church is now being built. This does not interfere with the garden
which is also situated there. The foundations have already been laid. Next
to the wall enclosing the land you can see several rows of bricks.

Some neighbours thought that that they would be building a house for Andriy
Yushchenko because they saw him when the bricks were being brought in for
the building.

Incidentally, Andriy visits his mother during his days off and when he is on
leave. Her daughter Vitalina also visits. We were told that a priest whom
Svitlana intends to bring from Zhytomyr Region will conduct the services at
the new church. They say it will be her own private church. -30-
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18. A QUICK RUN TO KIEV AND DELTA GETS IT RIGHT

By JOE SHARKEY, The New York Times
New York, New York, Tuesday, June 6, 2006

KIEV, Ukraine - YOU'RE where?" my friend asked.

"Kiev" "What are you doing in Kiev?"

"Trying out a new business-class service on Delta. I left New York last
night, got to Kiev this afternoon, and fly back home tomorrow morning."
My friend replied, "You have very bizarre travel habits."

True. But lots of business travelers put in this kind of grind - and, unlike
me, many do it routinely, as business increasingly becomes global, and the
time to get it done shrinks.

Last week's column discussed the thriving trans-Atlantic business-class
market and the leapfrog competition by airlines to provide more comfortable
seats and amenities.

As I noted, American and United airlines are also planning expensive
improvements soon in their long-haul business-class cabins, even as brash
all-business-class start-ups like Eos and MaxJet nibble away at market share
with discount fares and quality service. And British Airways - whose
business-class service is already regarded as among the best in the
industry - is also planning to announce another major upgrade.

Meanwhile, Delta Air Lines - still operating under bankruptcy protection,
though its finances are improving - has added 11 trans-Atlantic routes since
March. This week, Delta proclaimed itself the "world's largest airline
between the United States and Europe" as measured by destinations served,
seat capacity and the number of weekly flights, and it introduced a
business-class product on its inaugural flight between Kennedy International
Airport and Kiev.

Which explains why I made the jet-lag-inducing quick trip to sample the
newest major business-class improvement introduced by a domestic airline
since Northwest Airlines - whose major long-haul routes are mostly over the
Pacific - began its World Business Class service three years ago featuring
lie-flat seats and an all-digital in-flight entertainment system.

My report on Delta's refurbished business-class seats: not bad. Even if they
aren't fully horizontal, they are designed well enough that you can sleep
comfortably. The new digital in-flight entertainment system? Excellent,
though not up to the level yet of luxury business-class in-flight
entertainment products like those available on Singapore and Virgin
Atlantic. Food? Best in its class, largely thanks to a menu redesign by the
celebrity chef Michelle Bernstein.

Delta said its new business-class service is currently available on three
767's, with an additional eight 767's to be refurbished by the end of June.
By next summer, the product will be available on the entire wide-body
international fleet, including eight 777's and 51 additional 767's.

"What we're doing now is a substantial upgrade, but frankly it's an interim
step," said James M. Whitehurst, Delta's chief operating officer. Unlike
American and United, "we're not spending over $100 million to upgrade our
seats," he said. Instead, the existing seats, with 60 inches of legroom and
a wide-angle recline, were redesigned with higher-rising leg-rests and
additional cushioning, leather covering and better headrests and tray
tables.

Most of the money Delta is spending on the business-class upgrade (he didn't
say how much) is on the entertainment system, which Mr. Whitehurst called
"completely state of the art." It's Panasonic's eFX digital system, with 20
on-demand movies, 24 channels of television programs, digitally streamed MP3
programs with 1,600 songs that allow you to customize your own playlist, and
12 interactive video games.

The walk-up round-trip business-class fare on the New York-Kiev flight was
about $6,200, but Delta also has a 50-day advance purchase fare at about
half off what it usually charges on international routes. Corporations that
do a lot of business also negotiate much lower fares as well as upgrades,
which are also available to loyal customers paying full-fare coach prices or
using frequent-flier miles.

"Depending on the market, typically no more than a quarter of the people
sitting in the front of the plane paid a full business-class fare," Mr.
Whitehurst said.

During my Kiev flight, I am happy to report, the cabin service was superb,
as good as any in its class. In recent years, domestic airlines have sharply
cut wages and benefits for flight crews, and anybody who's still doing a
great job under trying circumstances deserves a pat on the back.

As United States airlines start to rebound, crews like this are part of the
reason. -30-
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
E-mail: jsharkey@nytimes.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/06/business/worldbusiness/06road.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
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19. UKRAINIAN LAWMAKERS, TV ANCHORS & PERFORMERS
GATHERED IN KIEV TO SEEK WAYS OF PROMOTING UKRAINIAN

AP Worldstream, Kiev, Ukraine, Monday, Jun 05, 2006

KIEV - Lawmakers, television anchors and performers gathered in Kiev on
Monday to seek ways of promoting the Ukrainian language, as more regions
grant Russian a special status that many fear will undermine this ex-Soviet
republic's native tongue.

Ukraine has yet to develop a way to promote its language despite 15 years
of independence, said lawmaker Olha Herasimyuk, a former TV anchor.
Ukrainian is constitutionally protected as the sole state language but often
overshadowed by Russian in this nation's films, books and music.

"Our children should soak up Ukrainian together with their mother's milk,"
said Ruslana Lyzhychko, the 2004 Eurovision singing contest winner who was
elected to parliament as a member of pro-presidential Our Ukraine party.

Singer Slava Vakarchuk, who performed during the 2004 Orange Revolution
street protests that helped pro-Western Viktor Yushchenko win the
presidency, said the country should "create a qualitative Ukrainian
product - in music, sports, politics."

The informal gathering, which included Deputy Prime Minister Vyacheslav
Kyrylenko and former WBO heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko, was held
after more local councils in eastern and southern Ukraine voted to grant
Russian a special status as a regional language. On Saturday, the Kharkiv
regional council joined the list of local legislatures that have adopted the
measure.

The language issue has become one of the most sensitive in Ukraine, where
Russian dominated during Soviet times and many still consider their native
language, particularly in the east and south. In western regions, Ukrainian
dominates and nationalists see protecting the language as a way to prevent
meddling from Moscow.

The Party of the Regions, the pro-Moscow opposition party that won the most
votes in the March parliamentary election, campaigned on a promise to make
Russian a second state language.

Declaring Russian a regional language is a lesser move than declaring it a
second state language, but the government fears it could open the door to
those efforts. -30-
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20. UKRAINE'S DONETSK REGIONAL COUNCIL PROCLAIMS
JUNE 6 RUSSIAN LANGUAGE DAY

Interfax-Ukraine news agency, Kiev, in Russian 0837 gmt 5 Jun 06
BBC Monitoring Service, United Kingdom, Monday, Jun 05, 2006

KIEV - The Donetsk regional council today decided to hold the day of the
Russian language on 6 June. This decision was passed at the initiative of
the Party of Regions [of former presidential candidate Viktor Yanukovych]
on the occasion of Aleksander Pushkin's anniversary.

Only the deputies representing the Party of Regions took part in the voting
on all issues of the second session, as the deputies representing the
[radical left] Bloc of Nataliya Vitrenko blocked the rostrum, demanding
introduction on the agenda the issue of proclaiming the region "a territory
free of NATO" and on a no-confidence motion against the regional
prosecutor.

The bloc's sympathisers also blocked the exits from the building, as a
result of which the deputies had to leave the building via the basement.
The Donetsk regional council consists of representatives of the Party of
Regions, the Nataliya Vitrenko Bloc, the Socialist Party and the Communist
Party. The Party of Regions controls 80 per cent of the council. -30-
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Additional supporting sponsors for the Action Ukraine Program are:
2. UKRAINIAN FEDERATION OF AMERICA (UFA), Zenia Chernyk,
Chairperson; Vera M. Andryczyk, President; Huntingdon Valley,
Pennsylvania
3. KIEV-ATLANTIC GROUP, David and Tamara Sweere, Daniel
Sweere, Kyiv and Myronivka, Ukraine, 380 44 298 7275 in Kyiv,
kau@ukrnet.net
4. ESTRON CORPORATION, Grain Export Terminal Facility &
Oilseed Crushing Plant, Ilvichevsk, Ukraine
5. Law firm UKRAINIAN LEGAL GROUP, Irina Paliashvili, President;
Kiev and Washington, general@rulg.com, www.rulg.com.
6. BAHRIANY FOUNDATION, INC., Dr. Anatol Lysyj, Chairman,
Minneapolis, Minnesota
7. VOLIA SOFTWARE, Software to Fit Your Business, Source your
IT work in Ukraine. Contact: Yuriy Sivitsky, Vice President, Marketing,
Kyiv, Ukraine, yuriy.sivitsky@softline.kiev.ua; Volia Software website:
http://www.volia-software.com/ or Bill Hunter, CEO Volia Software,
Houston, TX 77024; bill.hunter@volia-software.com.
8. ODUM- Association of American Youth of Ukrainian Descent,
Minnesota Chapter, Natalia Yarr, Chairperson
9. UKRAINE-U.S. BUSINESS COUNCIL, Washington, D.C.,
Dr. Susanne Lotarski, President/CEO; E. Morgan Williams,
SigmaBleyzer, Chairman, Executive Committee, Board of Directors;
John Stephens, Cape Point Capital, Secretary/Treasurer
10. UKRAINIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH OF THE USA, South
Brown Brook, New Jersey, http://www.uocofusa.org
11. UKRAINIAN AMERICAN COORDINATING COUNCIL (UACC),
Ihor Gawdiak, President, Washington, D.C., New York, New York
12. U.S.-UKRAINE FOUNDATION (USUF), Nadia Komarnyckyj
McConnell, President; John Kun, Vice President/COO; Vera
Andruskiw, CPP Wash Project Director, Washington, D.C.; Markian
Bilynskyj, VP/Director of Field Operations; Marta Kolomayets, CPP
Kyiv Project Director, Kyiv, Ukraine. Web: http://www.USUkraine.org
13. WJ GROUP of Ag Companies, Kyiv, Ukraine, David Holpert, Chief
Financial Officer, Chicago, IL; http://www.wjgrain.com/en/links/index.html
14. EUGENIA SAKEVYCH DALLAS, Author, "One Woman, Five
Lives, Five Countries," 'Her life's journey begins with the 1932-1933
genocidal famine in Ukraine.' Hollywood, CA, www.eugeniadallas.com.
15. ALEX AND HELEN WOSKOB, College Station, Pennsylvania
16. SWIFT FOUNDATION, San Luis Obispo, California
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TO BE ON OR OFF THE FREE AUR DISTRIBUTION LIST
If you would like to read the ACTION UKRAINE REPORT- AUR,
around five times a week, please send your name, country of residence,
and e-mail contact information to morganw@patriot.net. Information about
your occupation and your interest in Ukraine is also appreciated. If you do
not wish to read the ACTION UKRAINE REPORT please contact us
immediately by e-mail to morganw@patriot.net. If you are receiving more
than one copy please let us know so this can be corrected.
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PUBLISHER AND EDITOR - AUR
Mr. E. Morgan Williams, Director, Government Affairs
Washington Office, SigmaBleyzer
Emerging Markets Private Equity Investment Group
P.O. Box 2607, Washington, D.C. 20013, Tel: 202 437 4707
Mobile in Kyiv: 8 050 689 2874
mwilliams@SigmaBleyzer.com; www.SigmaBleyzer.com
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Power Corrupts and Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely.
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