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UKRAINE: FOREIGN POLICY OF VIKTOR YANUKOVYCH’S GOVERNMENT
DMITRY VYDRIN,
MP of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, Director of the European Institute for Integration and Development, Kyiv, Ukraine
The visits of Ukrainian Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych to Brussels and then to Moscow were quite predictable.
Judging by the Prime Minister’s statements and actions, he in many respects copies the foreign-policy strategy of Ukraine’s ex-President Leonid Kuchma. The main point of this policy is orientation to the two political partners, West (EU and USA) and Russia simultaneously.
Kuchma managed to follow this foreign policy during his two presidential terms. It is not clear how efficient Yanukovych will be, since the situation in Ukraine has changed.
Firstly, under the Constitution, the President is entitled to work out the foreign-policy strategy. So, the Prime Minister’s efforts to take part in this sphere causes severe jealousy and resentment among the President’s environs, which is fraught with a serious political conflict. Yanukovych’s visits are regarded as a direct encroachment on the presidential powers.
Secondly, the Prime Minister’s double policy or the foreign policy of double standards may result in Viktor Yanukovych’s failure. He may lose credit in Russia and in the West.
This has happened once to Leonid Kuchma. Now the West gives him the cold shoulder and Russia has suspicious attitude towards him.
September 22, 2006
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