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Chornobyl's Continuing Political Fallout

Fourteen years ago today, an explosion and fire at the Chornobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine spread a cloud of radioactive fallout over a large part of Eastern Europe and triggered a series of political developments which continue today.

On that day, the explosion of the no. 4 reactor sent radioactive dust over the Western portions of what was then the Soviet Union as well as over its East European satellites.

Initially, Soviet officials reacted as they always did before, first with silence and then with denial. But because the radioactivity also spread to Western Europe and because Soviet authorities were unable to prevent people in its empire from learning the facts about the accident, Moscow changed its approach and began to release some information about the tragedy.

That marked the real beginning of "glasnost," the policy of openness that Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev used to defeat his conservative opponents but also one that made a major contribution to the destruction of the country over which he and the Communist Party ruled.

At the time, that political fallout of the Chornobyl nuclear disaster attracted almost as much attention as the radioactive kind. But since then, its medical impact--the increased incidence of cancers among those exposed, the mounting number of deaths, and the continuing environmental degradation--has attracted most of the attention.

Given the scope of these medical consequences, that is entirely appropriate. But just as was the case 14 years ago, the Chornobyl disaster continues to have three kinds of political fallout which still affect both the people and the governments of this region.

First of all, the Chornobyl accident remains in the minds of many as a symbol of Moscow's insensitivity to the dangers of nuclear power and its willingness to put Ukrainians, Belarusians, and others at particular risk.

Only a few weeks before the accident, Soviet authorities gave a cash award to an engineer in Belarus who said that Soviet reactors were so safe that there was no need to build containment walls around them. And at the time of the accident, Moscow had concentrated nuclear power plants in Ukraine, Belarus, and western portions of the Russian Federation.

Ostensibly, Moscow did so to position itself to sell electricity to its East European satellites, but many in Ukraine and Belarus have said that they believed Moscow chose to do so to put Ukrainians and Belarusians at risk should something go wrong.

Both Moscow's handling of the accident at the time and its unwillingness to help out significantly with the consequences of the accident have only further deepened the anger of many Ukrainians at what they see as the latest example of a Russian policy directed at them.

Second, Western Europe's insistence that Ukraine close down Chornobyl and its unwillingness to provide the assistance Kyiv believes necessary to create an alternative source of power have infuriated many in Ukraine and in Belarus who expected that the West would help them to recover from this most dramatic of Soviet-era disasters on their territory.

No Ukrainian politician suffered as much from this combination of Western insistence and failure to pay as did former Belarusian President Stanislau Shushkevich, a nuclear physicist who exposed Soviet duplicity on Chornobyl in his republic and who campaigned on the expectation that the West would help him clean up this disaster.

But the doubts many Ukrainian leaders already had about the willingness of the West to help were only exacerbated by this series of events, and these doubts in turn have affected the attitudes these Ukrainian leaders have adopted on other issues as well.

And third, the Ukrainian authorities themselves have suffered a loss of popular support because of their failure to find the funds to help overcome the Chornobyl disaster. Ukrainian officials say that they need to spend approximately $830 million a year just to help the victims of Chornobyl but that they have only $290 million in this year's budget to do so.

As a result--and unless something is done soon--ever more Ukrainians, Belarusians, and others are likely to be angry not only at Moscow and at the West but at Kyiv as well, a pattern of political fallout that does not bode well for either the Ukrainian government or the Ukrainian people in the future.
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BELARUS HAPPY WITH RESULTS OF FIRST UNION COUNCIL OF MINISTER MEETING. Belarusian Prime Minister Vladimir Yermoshin told ITAR-TASS on 25 April that the first meeting of the council of ministers of the Union of Belarus and Russia, which took place in Moscow on 25 April, reflects the progress Minsk and Moscow have already made in bringing their two peoples back together. The meeting discussed the creation of a common currency and the formation of a legal basis for the further unification of the two republics. The German press agency dpa reported that the joint council of ministers has a 2000 budget of 2.2 billion rubles (approximately $77 million). One of the places the two sides may increase funding is support for victims of the 1986 Chornobyl explosion, ITAR-TASS reported. PG

ILO SAYS UKRAINE IN DEEP ECONOMIC CRISIS. The International Labor Organization on 25 April concluded that Ukraine has sunk into a deep economic crisis and is suffering from massive unemployment, Reuters reported. In issuing this report, ILO economist Guy Standing said that "if Ukraine were not in Europe, it would be rightly called a developing country." The ILO report said that monthly income had dropped in real terms from $37 in 1998 to $25 in 1999, that life expectancy had declined sharply, that industrial firms are now operating at less than 44 percent capacity, down from 66 percent in 1995, and that approximately one-third of the workforce is effectively unemployed, a statistic which makes "a mockery of the official rate of registered unemployment." PG

UKRAINE TO SEEK NEW IMF LOANS. Ukrainian Prime Minister Viktor Yushchenko will travel to Washington in early May to press the International Monetary Fund to resume loans to Ukraine, Interfax reported on 25 April. The IMF had blocked a loan package to Ukraine in 1999 because of concerns about Kyiv's failure to adopt needed economic reforms. Yushchenko told reporters in the Ukrainian capital that he will also press for more funds to help close the Chornobyl nuclear power plant, Reuters reported. PG

RUSSIAN NAVY BLAMES UKRAINIAN SHIP FOR MISHAP. The Russian Black Sea command on 25 April said that the captain of a Ukrainian ship damaged by a Russian dummy missile on 24 April (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 25 April 2000) was to blame for the incident because he had strayed into waters that both Russian and Ukrainian officials had declared off-limits during a naval exercise, ITAR-TASS reported. PG

Chornobyl's Continuing Political Fallout

On that day, the explosion of the no. 4 reactor sent radioactive dust over the Western portions of what was then the Soviet Union as well as over its East European satellites.

               Copyright (c) 2000 RFE/RL, Inc.
                     All rights reserved.

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RADIO FREE EUROPE/RADIO LIBERTY, PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC

RFE/RL Poland, Belarus, and Ukraine Report Vol. 2, No. 16, 25 April 2000

A Survey of Developments in Poland, Belarus, and Ukraine by the Regional Specialists of RFE/RL's Newsline Team

UKRAINE

COURTING STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIP IN KYIV. Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma scored several impressive political victories in the past two weeks. The major one was of course the overwhelming approval of all four questions in the 16 April constitutional referendum, which is widely expected to give him considerable additional levers of control over the parliament as soon as the will of the people is reflected in appropriate constitutional amendments. However, the two highlevel visits to Kyiv shortly before and after the referendum- -one by U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright on 14 April and another of Russian President-elect Vladimir Putin on 18 April--turned out to be no lesser successes for the Ukrainian leader that the plebiscite.

Albright moved up her trip to Kyiv, which had been originally planned for 20-21 April, thus giving rise to much speculation in Ukrainian and Russian media that she wanted to be in Kyiv before Putin in order to prevent Kuchma from making too many concessions to the Kremlin's energetic ruler. In particular, those media suggested that Albright would persuade Kuchma to stop paying the Russian gas debt with strategic bombers and cruise missiles. Also, Albright reportedly informed Kuchma about Washington's concern that he continue the course of reform and keep reformist Prime Minister Viktor Yushchenko in office as long as possible. In exchange for Kuchma's agreement, Albright reportedly pledged U.S. massive political and financial support to Kyiv.

Albright did not spare praise for Kuchma and his renewed pledges to put Ukraine on a reform path. "I was very impressed by President Kuchma's dedication to this [reform] process and his desire to move the reform process forward, and by the work the prime minister is undertaking," she told journalists. Ukraine is expected to receive $219 million in U.S. aid this year. Albright also said she was "heartened" when Kuchma reaffirmed his intention to close the Chornobyl nuclear power plant this year. And she expressed support for the constitutional referendum, which is, however, regarded by the Council of Europe as dangerous to Ukraine's fledgling democracy.

There was no mention, at least in official pronouncements, of what is believed to be a thorn in U.S.- Ukrainian relations--namely, Ukraine's pervasive corruption that hinders both the Ukrainian government and U.S. investors in promoting market reforms and generating economic growth in the country. Ukraine's National Bank has recently been checked by international auditors in connection with the charges of misusing IMF loans. Some commentators concluded that the audit, whose results are purportedly known to Washington, is not expected to do much damage to Kyiv.

On the other hand, Putin's visit promised a lot of unpleasant moments for Kuchma. In contrast to lumpish and cordial Yeltsin, who was guided primarily by Moscow's Sovietera patronage in "no neckties" contacts with his "younger brother" from Kyiv, Putin is believed to be a cold pragmatist. Ukraine's gigantic gas debt to Russia was to be the main topic of the Kuchma-Putin talks in Kyiv. Some Russian and Ukrainian left-wing politicians expected that Putin would use economic leverage to persuade Kuchma into making some steps toward to the "Slavic" union of Russian and Belarus.

However, Putin's visit turned out to be a reconnoitering rather than an attack. Officially it was said that both leaders discussed a variety of important bilateral issues, but no decision was taken and no document was signed. Putin's sharpest pronouncement with regard to Kyiv was at a news conference in Sevastopol, when he noted that Russia and Ukraine "should quit barter in mutual settlements and increase payments in cash to one another." To which Kuchma duly responded that "tomorrow or the day after tomorrow" he will see to this problem. Some Russian media speculated that Putin reiterated to Kuchma Russia's former demands that Ukraine pay its gas debt with shares in privatized companies. But other suggested that this plan has already been dropped because of Kyiv's strong objection. A special bilateral commission has to work out a mutually acceptable solution to the Ukrainian gas debt dilemma by the end of May.

In other words, one more time Kuchma has demonstrated his unshakable position of the leader of a geostrategically important country that permanently balances on the verge of economic collapse but nevertheless successfully maneuvers its political course through the conflicting interests of Washington and Moscow. Taking into account the latest outburst of popular love for and confidence in the president during Ukraine's constitutional referendum, Kuchma may be said to be one of the most successful politicians on the post-Soviet territory. Will he ever be held accountable for Ukraine's disastrous economic performance? At present such a development does not seem too likely. The first thing Kuchma did after the visits of Albright and Putin was to harshly criticize Viktor Yushchenko's government for a slow reform pace.

"RFE/RL Poland, Belarus, and Ukraine Report" is prepared by Jan Maksymiuk on the basis of a variety of sources including reporting by "RFE/RL Newsline" and RFE/RL's broadcast services. It is distributed every Tuesday.