Anatoliy Orel

Following the recent presidential elections in Ukraine, and the very day after the signature of a new treaty between Russia and Ukraine which extended the lease on the naval base at Sebastopol for thirty years until 2040, IDC was honoured to receive Ambassador Anatoliy Orel who spoke on “Ukraine and its foreign policy”.

Anatloiy Orel is Director-General of the Centre for International and Comparative Studies in Kiev.  A former ambassador to Italy, he has also served as deputy foreign minister and as an advisor on foreign policy to the former president Leonid Kuchma and to Victor Yanukovich, the new president, when he was prime minister.  He was accompanied to IDC by Oleg Gritsayenko, Director of European Studies at the Centre

Ambassador Orel began his talk by emphasising the non-partisan nature of the think tank he runs.  Neither he nor Mr Gritsayenko are members of the Party of the Regions (led by Victor Yanukovich) although Ambassador Leonid Kozhara, the president of the Centre, is a deputy for that party.  The Centre’s role is to foster political debate between all parties.

Mr Orel then discussed Ukrainian politics.  He began by saying that the West’s understanding of it is far too simplistic.  The West seems to adopt the following analysis: Soviet totalitarianism followed by democracy, then authoritarianism again under Leonid Kuchma, followed by the Orange Revolution, and now the election of a “pro-Russian” president about whom people know little.  The problem with this analysis lies principally in its idealisation of the term of Victor Yushchenko, the outgoing president who had been elected thanks to the Orange Revolution.  His term in office had in fact been characterised by a huge gap between appearance and reality.  Yushchenko spoke of “European values” but in fact pursued a policy of marked intolerance towards the main minority language in Ukraine, Russian.  His unilateral imposition of Ukrainian as the sole language of the state did not correspond to the vision of history shared by most Ukrainians.  Public opinion had been particularly outraged by Yushchenko’s decision to commemorate people who had been compromised by the Nazi regime during World War II.

Mr Orel also insisted that the famous division of Ukraine between East and West in fact dates purely from the time of Victor Yushchenko.  Prior to his arrival to power, people did not speak in those terms.  It was Yushchenko who started the politics of confrontation, dividing the country into “good” and “evil”.

In foreign policy, the outgoing president had imposed a policy of rapid accession to Nato, even though only 13% of the population wanted this.  Nato had never even been mentioned during the Orange Revolution.  This had also put Ukraine onto a collision course with Russia.  This policy had soon yielded its bitter fruits, especially the international isolation of Ukraine.  President Yushchenko never met President Medvedev, he was not received in Paris or Berlin, and he did not even get to go to Washington during the last year of his term.

As a result, the Ukrainian people had been massively disappointed by Yushchenko.  At the February elections, he made electoral history: never in the history of a democratic state has an outgoing president polled such a low percentage of the vote (5%).  His massive unpopularity also explains why Julia Timoshenko was defeated: although she had tried to distance herself from Mr Yushchenko in recent  years, everyone remembers her role in the Orange Revolution and therefore she remained tainted by her association with him.

Mr Orel then discussed the new government’s policies.  He emphasised that the main lines of this would be stability, the protection of democratic values and the freedom of the media.  The Ambassador said he was convinced that the Victor Yanukovich was determined to carry out reforms.  The new president would pursue policies which are in conformity with European norms, especially by supporting the rights of minorities including in education.  Other reforms which had been delayed by the previous administration would also be tackled.

Ukraine’s new foreign policy would be in the best European traditions of neutrality and non-alignment, Orel said.  55% of the population of Ukraine wanted the country to stay out of all military alliances.  This did not, of course, mean that Ukraine would not take part in humanitarian excercises in conjunction with other countries.  Ukraine wanted pragmatic cooperation with other European countries and with the European Union.  He quoted President Yanukovich saying that “Ukraine has taken up once again its policy of good neighbourliness and pragmatism.”  With Russia, Orel said, Ukraine would establish a strategic partnership.  The disputes with Russia, especially over energy, would cease.  Orel emphasised that Ukraine intended to participate in the policy of nuclear disarmament which had recently been launched by the Russian and American presidents.

Ukraine would also initiate a dialogue with other parts of the world and seek to establish good relations with developing countries.  Priority would be given to the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China).  The previous administration, Orel said, had made grave mistakes in this area too: there had been no visits at the level of president, prime minister or foreign minister to India or China over the past five years.  He said there would also be new impetus in relations with the members of the Commonwealth of Independent States.

Mr Orel then spoke about the agreement signed between Russia and Ukraine on 21 April 2010, the day before he spoke in Paris. He addressed criticisms which have been made at home and abroad, including those which claim that Ukraine has sold its inheritance for a mess of pottage.  In reality, he said, Ukraine was merely being guided by its national interests.  Victor Yushchenko’s policy of hostility towards Russia was ideological and largely artificial:  he was elected in 2005 and left office in 2010, yet throughout these five years he never ceased to say that the naval base would have to be closed in 2017.  These declarations merely poisoned relations without achieving any result.  The decision now to prolong the lease on the base, by contrast, would ensure stability in the Black Sea region and favour economic investment in the Crimea and in Ukraine as a whole.  The agreement was therefore in the interests of both parties, and indeed in the interests of Europe as a whole because it meant an end to the gas war which had affected the whole of Europe.  Orel said he expected the Ukrainian economy to benefit to the tune of $4bn a year.  The lower price of gas would allow Ukraine to do what the IMF has been demanding, which is to restructure the energy sector, but without excessive job losses.

Following Mr Orel’s talk, there was a lively discussion.  The questions were about various subjects.  Asked about the deal signed in Kharkov, Orel said that Ukraine had at all costs to avoid creating situations in which the world was forced to choose between Ukraine and Russia.  Faced with such a choice, the world would always choose Russia simply because it is such an important country.  In any case, whereas during the Cold War there was  a conflict between two rival ideological systems, the conflict with Russia made no sense now because everyone has the same goals.  Ukrainians want what everyone wants – to live in peace and prosperity.

Oleg Gritsayenko, the Director of European Studies at the Centre of which Ambassador Orel is the Director, emphasised that both the EU and NATO had always insisted that the question of the base was a bilateral one to be resolved between Ukraine and Russia.  That said, the decision to keep it in Sebastopol was good for European security because if it had been closed then the Russians would have had to relocate elsewhere and may, for instance, have tried Abkhazia.  This would have been no good for regional security.

On Poland, Mr Orel said that Ukraine had traditionally always had good relations and that he expected them now to improve further.  President Yanukovich had attended the funeral of President Kaczysnki, as indeed had President Medvedev.  Relations with Belarus were also excellent, trade between Ukraine and Belarus being higher than that between Ukraine and the USA.  Oleg Gritsayenko added that while Poland had long been considered a model for Ukraine, where NATO accession was concerned, this was no longer the case.

Ambassador Orel said that one of the negative outcomes of the previous administration’s policy on Europe was that Ukraine had behaved as if reforms would be carried out by others (e.g. European experts) rather than by Ukrainians themselves.  It was a sort of political escapism.  Ukraine, he said, wanted concrete things from the EU like trade agreements and visa free travel.  There was little point talking about “associate membership” or other things if these concrete issues were not clarified.

Oleg Gritsayenko added that President Yushchenko had had only one desire, which was to enter history was the person who signed an agreement with the EU – any agreement.  But what counts for the new government is not speed by results and the national interest.  Without any prospect of visa free travel and for commercial accords, there was little hope of progress.

Both speakers expressed their frustration at the way the EU dealt with Ukraine, especially at the fact that the country is part of the “Eastern partnership”.  Whereas Turkey and Russia were direct partners of the EU, Ukraine was put in the same category as other states, such as Moldova and Georgia, with which it had very little in common.  Why should Ukraine be put in this position?  Every businessman knows what he wants from the EU, and it is not another seminar on human rights and democratisation.