(AP) A top opposition leader in Ukraine charged Friday that President Leonid Kuchma's economic policies threaten to turn Ukraine into a colony of the industrialized West. In a campaign stop at a Kyiv factory in advance of March 29 parliamentary elections, Socialist Party chief and Parliament Speaker Oleksandr Moroz said the government is a slave to Western lenders and advisers.
Kuchma and his government 'blindly implement Western prescriptions instead of making their own economic policy,' the Interfax news agency quoted Moroz as saying. 'The policy being implemented in Ukraine is oriented toward its transformation into a raw materials provider for other countries,' he said.
Moroz harshly criticized the conditions of credits the former Soviet republic receives from international lending bodies, saying they force the state to cut jobs and social guarantees.
Installments of a $542 million loan from the International Monetary Fund are conditioned on observance of spending parameters and other conditions, and loans from groups such as the World Bank are also conditioned on reforms. Moroz, who has spoken out against the purchase and sale of land, said Ukraine can expect a deepening crisis in the limping agricultural sector if Kuchma pushes ahead with reforms.
An alliance of the Socialists and the Peasants' Party appears likely to be one of a handful of groups to win seats in the new parliament, and Moroz is widely seen as a challenger to Kuchma in a presidential vote slated for 1999.
Kuchma has attacked the Parliament – and Moroz as its speaker – for blocking the economic reforms needed to attract investment, but many analysts put at least as much blame on the executive branch.
