He doesn’t have a white beard, he doesn’t dress in a silly red suit, and he won’t be flying into Kyiv on a reindeer-driven sleigh. But the members of Ukra-ine’s government are nonetheless looking forward to the arrival of U.S. Vice President Al Gore with all the anticipation of children waiting for the arrival of Santa Claus on Christmas Eve.
Ukrainian ministers have even put together a sort of Christmas wish list – a copy of which has been obtained by the Post – in which they specify projects they would like Uncle Sam to fund.
The primary item on the agenda of Gore’s July 22-23 visit to Ukraine is the second annual meeting of the Kuchma-Gore Commission, a forum set up for hashing out the finer points of U.S.-Ukrainian relations.
One of the main functions of the commission is to make preliminary decisions on how future allotments of U.S. aid to Ukraine will be spent. The final decisions are made by the U.S. Administration and Congress.
The wish list represents the Ukrainian government’s starting point in the negotiations. Gore’s White House helpers will bring a similar list to the table.
They’ll also be briefing Gore on who has been naughty and who has been nice, and suggesting specific reform demands to be made on the Kuchma administration.
The Agriculture Ministry’s requests are the most remarkable: none assume the implementation of reforms. The ministry wants a ‘soft’ loan to meet ‘urgent demand for agricultural inputs’ and ‘allocation of commercial credits to Ukrainian producers by American businessmen without government guarantees,’ as well as help upgrading the quality of Ukraine’s grain products to international standards and Internet connections for its headquarters and regional and district offices.
According to a May report by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, privatization of Ukraine’s state-owned grain elevators through which the state controls the grain market by controlling wholesale prices was one of the demands made to the Kuchma administration during last year’s meeting of the Kuchma-Gore Commission. A year later, little has changed.
The State Securities Commission, by contrast, seems eager to embrace such Western economic concepts as transparency and a level playing field. The commission wants help bringing accounting practices in line with international standards and a reform of Ukraine’s voucher privatization system, and funds for a national depositary, a stock-market monitoring system and a system for registering property rights – all ideas the U.S. government is likely to support.
The main wish of the Energy Ministry is a carry over from last year: completion of reactors at the Khmelnitsky and Rivne nuclear power plants. Ukraine has said it can’t close the half-destroyed Chernobyl plant unless the United States and other members of the Group of Seven industrialized nations fund the completion of the two other reactors.
There are signs that Gore will make an announcement relating to Chernobyl during his visit. Gore is scheduled to pay a brief visit to Chernobyl on Thursday and later that day to give a speech at the Chernobyl museum in Kyiv’s Podil district. U.S. Embassy spokesman Ken Moskowitz said he could give no specifics but said Gore will be delivering a ‘major policy address.’
Observers have speculated that Gore, currently the man to beat in the race to succeed U.S. President Bill Clinton in 2000, hopes to beef up his environmentally friendly reputation by connecting his name to efforts to close Chernobyl, site of the world’s worst nuclear accident in 1986.
The G-7 and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development have so far promised less than half of the estimated $1.2 billion cost of closing Chernobyl and completing the Khmelnitsky and Rivne reactors. Another project to repair the disintegrating concrete shell around Chernobyl’s exploded reactor No. 4 is also short of funds, but that project is notably absent from the wish list.
The Energy Ministry is also asking for help improving the reliability, efficiency and safety of Ukraine’s thermal and nuclear power plants and for an extension of support for market reforms and pre-investment studies.
The Ministry of Science and Technology says its priorities are ‘pyroelectric infrared sensors,’ ‘biotechnology’ and ‘precise models of quantum wires.’
The Environment Ministry wants funding for an ‘ecological television’ project, improvements to water supply systems, a ‘Regional Ecology Center,’ and unspecified pilot projects aimed at improving national environmental policy. It’s also asking for extensions of a waste management project and of a project in Mariupol studying environmental impacts on the health of mothers and children.
The Health Ministry is rather modest, given the scale of health problems in Ukraine. All it wants is implementation of a previously announced project to help victims of thyroid cancer (often caused by radiation) and medical and social assistance to orphans in state care.
The Justice Ministry has only one wish: an agreement on mutual assistance in criminal investigations. Likewise, all the Foreign Trade Ministry wants is help joining the World Trade Organization.
The Economics Ministry wants help developing a state procurement system modeled on American practices, including a central agency to coordinate state procurement.
Also represented are the State Committee on Geology and Natural Resources, the State Committee on Land Resources, the State Committee on Entrepreneurship, the State Property Fund, the Antimonopoly Committee and one small fry: the administration of Kyiv’s Dniprovska district, which wants funding for the ‘Support’ charity’s project to give social and economic aid to the ‘vulnerable.’
Presidential aides speaking to the Interfax news agency under condition of anonymity have suggested Ukraine will again demand compensation for Kharkiv-based Turboatom’s cancellation of a contract to supply Iran with parts for a nuclear power plant. However, no such item appears on the government wish list.
Moskowitz said he could not comment on the Kuchma-Gore Commission meetings in advance or give details of Gore’s schedule before a Tuesday press conference by U.S. Ambassador Steve Pifer.
Moskowitz even declined to confirm the location of Gore’s speech on Thursday, although Ukrainian sources have said it will be at the Chernobyl museum.
Gore is scheduled to fly to Moscow after the speech where he will meet with Russian Prime Minister Sergei Kiriyenko. Gore’s visits to Ukraine and Russia come as both countries are negotiating major loans from the International Monetary Fund.
Ukraine is the third-largest recipient of American financial aid, receiving $225 million in 1998.
