A couple of newish blogs that Fistful readers might find interesting: Transition Trends, a blog from the people behind Transitions Online, and Lose The Delusion, a British blog that describes itself as ‘proudly battling Euroscepticism’. Feel free to plug any other new and interesting blogs in the comments.
And to plug ourselves, if you’re a LiveJournal user then you might be interested to know that Fistful is available as an LJ feed.
The Independent reports a ‘government source’ in Kiev telling their reporter that plans are afoot to try and connect the opposition forces with a terrorist attack:
Ukraine’s embattled government is ready to stage faked terrorist attacks to destabilise the country and discredit the opposition ahead of a rerun of the presidential vote, a senior government source has told The Independent.
The official, who works for the government of the Moscow-backed candidate and current Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych, said: “One of the plans is to blow up a pipeline and blame it on opposition supporters. Ukraine is the key transit country for Russian gas supplies to the West.”
Mr Yanukovych’s backers fear the prospect of their candidate losing to Viktor Yushchenko and are ready to plunge the country into economic chaos, the source revealed. “They are planning to use criminals – plain bandits – that they have a hold over.” The source said that a senior member of the government had been tasked with overseeing terrorist acts.
There’s also talk of potential financial chaos in Ukraine because of the protests:
Supporters of Mr Yanukovych and the current President Leonid Kuchma will also seek to play on fears that inflation will wipe out people’s savings as it did after the disintegration of the Soviet Union.
There has already been a run on banks and black market money changers are returning to the streets with far higher dollar and euro exchange rates.
The government has already suggested that it will not be able to pay pensions and government salaries in December, although the opposition claims there are adequate reserves to pay everything.
Harry’s Place and Cabalamat both got to this Robert Kagan piece in the Washington Post (registration or Bug Me Not required) before me, and there’s not too much to add to Phil’s rather interesting remarks on it. As a sidenote to his contention that the EU is the Borg – ‘you will be assimilated (and enjoy it) – resistance is irrelevant’ – I can remember an episode of one of the myriad Star Trek series where someone made the same argument about the Federation.
I have a feeling that the Ukrainian crisis may, when we look back at it from ten or twenty years down the line, turn out to be one of those crucial turning points for the EU. It’s not just in terms of the Europe-Russia-US geopolitics that have been discussed quite extensively over the last two weeks, but it’s also important in the EU’s image of itself. It’s reiterated the idea that the countries of the former Eastern Bloc want to join the EU, that it has what Kagan calls ‘the power of the attraction’ but it’s also shown, as Phil discusses, that there are ways to use the ‘soft power’ of the EU constructively. Javier Solana may talk softly, but his big stick is economic and cultural rather than military, even though these may take longer to have an effect and cause changes.
Of course, one test for the EU will be to see how far away from its borders this sort of power can be wielded (it’s important to remember that the EU will most likely have a border with Iran in the medium term) and whether this soft power can be applied globally or merely within the neighbourhood.
While everyone takes the chance to catch their breath after the twelve days of the Orange Revolution, it’s worth remembering that the political crisis in Ukraine continues, just that the focus has shifted to Parliament from the streets. There’s already deadlock over the attempts to reform the Central Electoral Commission with Yuschenko’s supporters unable to get a majority for their proposals while pro-Government deputies seek constitutional reforms to transfer powers from the Presidency to the Prime Minister. The Parliament has adjourned for ten days, while President Kuchma has asked for more foreign mediation to try and resolve these new issues.
Of course, Ukraine’s not the only country voting this month – as The Argus points out, Uzbekistan also goes to the polls on the 26th December which may cause a shortage of election monitors in both countries – Yuschenko is already asking the international community to send more observers to Ukraine.
Two other countries also vote today in the next week. Romania has the second round of its Presidential election next Sunday – see Alexander at the Head Heeb for more on this – while Crooked Timber’s Eszter Hargittai discusses the Hungarian referendum which takes place today. (edited to correct my inability to remember today’s date – Nick)
For those of you interested, the BBC’s website has an English translation of several parts of the Ukrainian Supreme Court’s ruling yesterday. I’m not a legal expert – especially on Ukrainian law – but I was struck by one aspect of the case that we either didn’t notice, or didn’t deem important enough to acknowledge during all the other events of the past twelve days, namely that Yuschenko’s lawyers concentrated their appeal solely on the runoff election, rather than the election as a whole. This meant that the Supreme Court was only given the choice of deciding the question of whether the election on November 21st was invalid, rather than the entire electoral process. The Court could only rule on the issue before it, and while Yanukovich’s team would have preferred the whole election to be rerun (assuming they weren’t going to get the election approved by the Court) they couldn’t argue for that without asking for even more evidence of voter fraud in the first round to be introduced.
There’s a question of whether this strategy emerged by accident or design, but it enabled them to get the result they wanted – a rerun against Yanukovich – rather than the idea that seemed to be gaining strength amongst Kuchma and the government in recent days – an entirely new election, with the opportunity for them to choose a new candidate to oppose Yuschenko while also being able to delay the election process for two or three months. Of course, my lack of legal knowledge could be completely off-base here, so I’d welcome comments from readers more knowledgeable on these matters.
And one final note of explanation for our readers who may find references to a ‘Boxing Day election’ in the British press confusing – it doesn’t mean that the runoff will be settled by the Queensberry rules, merely that Boxing Day is the name used in Britain and other countries for the 26th December.
After an internal party referendum, France’s Socialists have agreed to back the EU Constitution. Approximately 80% of party members voted in the referendum, with 55% of them voting for the party to support the Constitution in the national referendum planned for next year. It also strengthens the position of party leader Francois Hollande, boosting his chances of being the party’s nominee for President in 2007.
Ten days on, and we may be close to a resolution of the crisis in the Ukraine. There’s definitely been some agreement between Kuchma, Yuschenko, Yanukovich and the mediators (Solana, Adamkus, Kubis and Kwasniewski) but, as ever, the devil is in the details. The basic points seem to be that there will be a revote, there will be constitutional reforms before the vote occurs, protestors will stop blockading government buildings and an all-party working group will implement changes based on the rulings of the Supreme Court.
The questions that remain to be answered though, are:
As I said, reaction seems to be mixed amongst both the media and the bloggers as to whether this is the end of this stage of the crisis, or whether it still continues. See the Kyiv Post, PA/Scotsman, Le Sabot, Foreign Notes, Notes from Kiev and SCSU Scholars for more.
In related news, The Argus notes that while the events in Ukraine may have inspired protestors in Tajikstan Uzbekistan, while attention’s been focused elsewhere, Russia is demanding Abkhazia reholds its recent election.
Finally, I’ve received a report from Tarik Amar, who reported from Ukraine on John Quiggin’s blog last week. He’s been talking to the people in the tent city and you can read the full thing below the fold.
Continue reading
While attention remains focused on Ukraine’s political crisis, another one is forming on the other side of Europe in Portugal. A crisis of a somewhat lesser magnitude, admittedly, but it seems likely that President Sampaio is about to dissolve the Portuguese parliament and call fresh elections, making the Pedro Santana Lopes face a vote after just four months in office.
The President has to meet with leaders of the parties in parliament and the Council of State before officially being able to dissolve Parliament, but given that Sampaio believes Santana Lopes ‘lacked the indispensable conditions to continue to mobilise Portugal and the Portuguese in a coherent, rigorous and stable fashion‘ I suspect his mind may be made up, unless the governing parties decide to replace Santana Lopes with a new Prime Minister.
If elections are called, they’re not likely to happen until February, but they could lead to Socrates leading a European country – the Socialist Party, currently in opposition, is ahead in the polls and led by Jose Socrates.
Tobias’ post below has some good analysis of what’s happening in Ukraine at the moment, so I’ll restrict myself to a few links.
The situation is being discussed in the European Parliament today – David McDuff has the text of a draft resolution that will be discussed.
Siberian Light discusses the economic effects of the protests. The FT also looks at the measures being taken to stabilise the Ukrainian economy during the crisis.
Via Neeka, who also has other updates, comes news of another new blog – UA Rule Of Law – looking at legal aspects of the crisis.
There are several updates to Notes From Kiev, including links to interesting articles in the Moscow Times – Now Ukraine Has Earned Its Independence and The Guardian, where Nick Paton Walsh looks at some of the family ties in the crisis.
Orange Ukraine has updates, including a call for people to volunteer as election observers.
Meanwhile, millions of people have gone on strike to protest against the government – oh sorry, that’s in Italy.
After such a busy week in Ukraine, it seems to have become almost quiet over the last day or so, but that’s mainly because the focus of the action has moved away from the streets (though the protestors – from both sides – remain, and show no sign of leaving) to the Supreme Court and, today, the Parliament as well, which will be debating (and if Saturday’s vote is anything to go on, approving) a vote of no confidence in Yanukovich as Prime Minister.
There are various explanations for Kuchma’s offer of new elections last night. For instance, one could think that it means he feels the Court is about to rule in such a way as to make Yuschenko President and he sees it at as the least worst option, another is that it’s for him to be seen being magnanimous and can then claim that the opposition refused his ‘generous offer’ when clamping down on the protests or there’s also the idea that he’s done it to make sure he’s got another six months in office. There is already speculation that a new election might feature a different government candidate than Yanukovich – Neeka has a translation of an article talking about Tyhipko in this regard.
Another Parliament is set to discuss Ukraine – alongside the biometric passports issue Tobias discusses below, the European Parliament will be discussing the issue at its session tomorrow. Maidan has details of a rally to take place outside during the session.
Elsewhere in the media, Salon has an interview (subscription or ad viewing required) with the editor of Ukrayinskya Pravda and David Aaronovitch continues the Guardian civil war with an expose of John Laughland and the British Helsinki Human Rights Group. Update: See Doug’s comment below for an interesting analysis of the BHHRG’s position.
And on the blogs, there are lots of new posts on Foreign Notes, Le Sabot has a picture of a result sheet from the election which seemingly shows vote-rigging, as well as other updates there are more photos from Neeka – and send some good thoughts her way as her camera now seems to be broken – and Crroked Timber’s Henry Farrell has a post on the OSCE’s role in spreading democracy.