Cheney had the misfortune to drop in on Kiev just as the government of President Viktor Yushchenko collapsed. Yushchenko and his coalition partner Yulia Tymoshenko’s already strained relationship fell apart over the recent conflict in Georgia. Yushchenko wanted to condemn Russia for their actions in Georgia, but Tymoshenko refused, which caused Yushchenko to accuse her of being an agent of Moscow and basically accuse her of treason.
Things went downhill from there.
I’ve written a number of times here about the feuding between Yushchenko and Tymoshenko, the two heroes of Ukraine’s pro-democracy Orange Revolution in 2004, so I won’t go into it again now, other than to say when they formed this coalition back in January, I said it wouldn’t last, their competing egos wouldn’t allow it.
Yushchenko is really in a bind now; he has a few choices, all of them bad. He has about a week to form a new coalition that means either mending fences with Tymoshenko, which experts put at 50-50 odds, or forming a coalition with the country’s other political power, former Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich. But since Yanukovich’s base of power is in the east of Ukraine, where much of the country’s Russian population lives, it’s pretty unlikely he’ll team up with the pro-Western Yushchenko. That means Yushchenko would have to call for new elections, and there is no enthusiasm in Ukraine for that.
Ukrainians are getting fed up with their whole political situation. After the Orange Revolution there were promises of closer ties with Europe that would boost the economy, and speedy entry into the European Union and NATO. But almost four years later, the economy is in the doldrums (inflation is among the highest in Europe), while membership in the EU is in the far future. And the population is getting fed up with power just shuffling among Tymoshenko, Yushchenko and Yanukovich.
Currently Tymoshenko is leading in the polls, with Yanukovich close behind (each have just over 20% support). In more bad news for Yushchenko, his party is polling in the single digits, down with the old Communist Party of Ukraine. This also means that NATO membership could be put on the back burner. Tymoshenko wants to be in the EU, but is cool on NATO membership; the pro-Russian Yanukovich is opposed to it outright.
As are a significant number of Ukraine’s citizens. In fact, the US Coast Guard Cutter Dallas, fresh from it’s mission to Georgia, had to cut short a call on the Crimean port city of Sevastopol after the ship was met by a large group of very vocal protestors. Sevastopol is the historic home of Russia’s Black Sea fleet, and the Crimea was a part of Russia until 1954, about half of Crimea’s residents are ethnic Russians. Reportedly a crowd gathered on the dock, played patriotic Russian songs from the Second World War and chanted anti-NATO slogans while Ukrainian officials visited the Dallas.
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