Ukraine seeks better ties with EU, Yanukovych says

Mr Yanukovych is seen as closer to Russia than his predecessor Viktor Yushchenko was - yet his first foreign visit as head of state is to Brussels.

"European integration is a key priority," he said after talks with EU leaders on Monday.

Mr Yanukovych said the talks focused on a planned association deal with the EU that would allow free trade.

His defeated rival, Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, now faces a vote of no-confidence on Wednesday in the Ukrainian parliament.

She was an Orange Revolution ally of Mr Yushchenko, the former president whose pro-Western stance, including the ambition to join the EU and Nato, angered Moscow.

Mr Yanukovych pledged to "enhance" relations with Russia to ensure reliable deliveries of Russian gas to the EU via Ukraine. A dispute with Russia over gas prices disrupted supplies to the EU in January 2009.

The BBC's James Rodgers - a former Moscow correspondent - says Russia sees in Mr Yanukovych a friendlier partner than Mr Yushchenko, but its reaction to his victory has been quiet, not triumphalist.

Ukraine's foreign policy is no longer a simple question of East or West, our correspondent says. Europe also wants Ukraine and Russia to get on well.

Mr Yanukovych, who was sworn in as president last week, will head to Moscow on Friday.

Reviving the struggling Ukrainian economy is another big challenge that lies ahead of him.

The International Monetary Fund has suspended part of a $16.4bn (£10.8bn) loan for Ukraine, demanding that the government implement economic reforms.

Source:bbc:co.uk

Yanukovich Seen as Front-Runner in Ukraine Presidential Election

Former Ukrainian Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich faces current Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko in a presidential runoff February 7. Mr. Yanukovich, who lost the last presidential elections in 2004, but is now seen as the front-runner.

He is the leader of the powerful "Party of Regions" in the Ukrainian parliament.

University of Toronto Ukrainian expert Frank Sysyn says the party is composed of various business interests in the south and east of Ukraine. "It comes predominantly out of the Donbass and particularly the Donetzk Oblast (province). It is a party that represents forces who wish to keep control by certain oligarchs within that region and to a very considerable degree it was financed by one of the richest, or the richest, man in Ukraine, Rinat Akhmetov. In many ways the Donetzk Oblast can seem to be his bailiwick. It also has influence throughout the south and east of the country, although there are other regional and economic elites that oppose it. It has relatively little support in central Ukraine and almost none in western Ukraine. And it also is a party that is closely allied with what may be seen as Russian-language interests and with the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate in Ukraine," he said.

Mr. Yanukovich was born in 1950 in the industrial city of Dnipropetrovsk, in eastern Ukraine. His chief rival for the presidency, Yulia Tymoshenko was also born in that city, but 10 years later.

David Marples, an expert on Ukraine from the University of Alberta, says Yanukovich had a troubled youth. "He was arrested in 1968 and convicted to a juvenile colony for manslaughter. And then in 1970 he was arrested again and sent to jail, apparently for beating up someone. His official biography has been actually revamped, removed most of this early period out of there," he said.

Ironically, says Marples, Yulia Tymoshenko also spent time in prison - but for so-called "white collar" crimes. "So both the presidential candidates of Ukraine have been in jail, which I think must be quite unique in the history of presidential elections in any country. They are very different kinds of felonies: one arrested for corrupt business practices and the other for attacking somebody. So one is a kind of working class felon and the other is a kind of middle-class business felon, you could say," he said.

Marples says Mr. Yanukovich has a masters degree in international law and a doctorate in economics - as does Ms. Timoshenko. He is also a member of Ukraine's National Academy of Sciences.

Source:voanews.com/

Did Georgian Leadership Try To Influence Ukraine Presidential Election?

Several prominent Georgian oppositionists have expressed concern at the political implications of two telephone conversations, posted first on Ukrainian then on Georgian websites, which could be construed as evidence that the Georgian leadership sought to influence the January 17 Ukrainian presidential election to secure a victory for Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko.

Relations between Tymoshenko and Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili have been haunted by rumors of a torrid love affair between them. Saakashvili denied those rumors as early as 2005, but that did not prevent the production of a movie chronicling the alleged romance.

The first conversation posted online was apparently between Saakashvili and Tymoshenko, who thanks him for sending a team of election observers. Saakashvili's administration responded on January 15 to that recording by denying that Georgia supports any of the presidential candidates.

The second conversation purportedly took place on January 14 between all-powerful Georgian Interior Minister Vano Merabishvili and Givi Targamadze, chairman of the Georgian Committee on Defense and Security, who at the time of the conversation was in Donetsk. Merabishvili tells Targamadze that Akhalaya (Georgia's defense minister) has promised to provide personnel; Targamadze replies that they have already arrived in Donetsk. Merabishvili then orders Targamadze to impress upon his Ukrainian contacts the need to provide air transport for additional Georgian observers prior to the second round of voting.

The Georgian authorities have not formally denied the authenticity of either conversation. Targamadze was quoted on January 20 as saying "I think Ukraine now needs to be focused on a more important issue [meaning the second round] rather than wasting time listening to my mobile phone conversations."

The Ukrainian Central Election Commission (CEC) refused on January 11 to register 2,011 would-be election observers from Georgia, having already registered a total of 3,149 from other countries. Targamadze was quoted as saying that CEC members from presidential candidate Viktor Yanukovych's Party of Regions were behind that refusal, and that the 300-plus Georgian election observers already in Donetsk were being hindered in their activities.

The Yulia Tymoshenko bloc (BYuT) appealed the CEC decision to the Kyiv Appellate Court on January 13 and demanded that the Georgian contingent be accredited. The BYuT subsequently alleged that members of Yanukovych's campaign staff beat up two Georgian journalists in Donetsk on January 16.

Saakashvili told journalists on January 18, the day after the election, that the dispatch of 2,000 Georgian election observers was agreed in advance "with all Ukrainian political parties" and that the objective was "to express solidarity and provide assistance to Ukraine," not to "interfere in politics."

But prominent Georgian opposition politicians have argued that whatever Saakashvili's intent, his apparent meddling in the Ukrainian presidential ballot could negatively affect relations between the two countries. Eka Beselia of the Movement for a United Georgia argued that in any other country, an interior minister or prominent parliamentarian would have resigned if such damaging allegations came to light.

Former Foreign Minister Salome Zourabichvili argued that "it is not the business of an interior minister to deal with the sending of election observers -- assuming that the persons in question were bona fide observers" and not, as some have alleged, Georgian Interior Ministry personnel.

Former Georgian Prime Minister Zurab Noghaideli, for his part, was quoted by Caucasus Press as telling journalists on January 21 that a formal investigation should be launched and that Merabishvili and Targamadze should be held criminally responsible if that probe yields evidence that they violated the law.

Source:rferl.org/