Alexander J.Motyl argues in his June 24 World Affairs Journal blog that a group of experts, including these three authors, are wrong to believe the European Union should take a tougher line against President Viktor Yanukovych’s administration over democratic regression since he came to power eighteen months ago.
He believes that the strategic factor of denying Ukraine to Russia and the Customs Union outweighs any democratic failings (which Motyl has himself repeatedly criticized) and that once inside the free-trade zone the EU will have leverage over Kyiv and be able to gradually ‘Europeanize’ Ukraine.
There are five problems with this argument.
First, we did not argue that Ukraine should be a consolidated democracy bound by the rule of law before it is invited into a free-trade agreement. But, after 18 months of democratic regression the scorecard of democratic and rule of law gains is zero out of 10, as seen in reports by the EU and other international organizations and think tanks.
The scorecard should be at least 4-6 out of 10 that would give us hope that it could be improved once inside the free-trade area. Second, we did not believe that we are faced with a clear-cut choice between the ‘bad’ CIS Customs Union and Eurasia, on the one hand, and ‘good’ Europe, on the other.
The Yanukovych administration, like that of Leonid Kuchma, espoused the rhetoric of seeking EU membership while undertaking non-European policies at home. We did not therefore believe either former President Kuchma or current President Yanukovych are genuinely committed to seeking EU membership.
The Yanukovych administration is seeking ‘EU enlargement-light’; that is, membership of the free-trade zone while preserving a monopoly on political and economic power inside Ukraine.
In the same manner as the Yanukovych administration seeks to keep Brussels from intervening inside Ukraine, so it does not want Russia to intervene in economic and energy affairs (while giving Russia inordinate influence over national identity and foreign and security policy).
Second, Kuchma and Yanukovych are economic nationalists, like Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko.
Yanukovych and his oligarch allies seek the benefits of the free-trade deal and the Customs Union without interference from Brussels or Moscow. Ukraine and Belarus are seen as the personal fiefdoms of Yanukovych and Lukashenko, which can be asset-stripped and used as a source of corrupt rents and their populations treated as subjects with no rights.
The threat by Kuchma and Yanukovych to therefore ‘go to Russia’ if they cannot have their cake and eat it in Brussels is an empty threat.
As a Ukrainian official told Kommersant-Ukraina (June 21): “We had the illusion that everything would work out if we removed from our relations with the Russian Federation key irritants like recognition of the Holodomor [1930s famine] as genocide, plans to join NATO, and the reluctance to extend the stationing of the Black Sea Fleet. But this has not happened. Moscow wants us to stay in its orbit and even pay it for this.”
The Yanukovych administration is seeking to freeze its monopoly of power and the partial transition between communism and a market democracy – not open the system to Europeanization after joining the free-trade zone. Most oligarchs, after all, have luxurious homes, offices and children in private schools in the EU and they have no need for the stringent criteria and EU interventionism of EU membership or Russia’s overbearing arrogance and greed in the Customs Union.
Third, the EU is not offering Ukraine membership and the EU is therefore unable to balance the ‘carrot’ of membership against the ‘sticks’ of non-compliance to the 1993 Copenhagen Criteria. The EU has also learnt from its mistake letting in Bulgaria and Romania too early in 2007 and has been tougher on pre-membership compliance with Croatia which is set to join the EU in 2013.
“Democratization has not occurred as an automatic outgrowth of trade and other ties, but because European governments have explicitly demanded it. Thus in 1962, the European Community rejected membership for Francoist Spain. In the 1970s, the benefits of integration were a major stimulus for democratization after Franco died. Subsequently, the EU played a major role in the democratization of the Balkans not by passively waiting for it to happen but through intensive monitoring and conditionality.”
The EU has not balanced the ‘carrot’ of free-trade zone membership against any ‘sticks,’ and the main difference between Motyl and ourselves rests over whether Brussels should use ‘sticks.’
It is imperative to get Ukraine right before it joins the free-trade area – as seen in the bad example of Bulgaria and Romania and the good example of Croatia, where the EU learnt its lessons of stricter conditionality before a country is let in.
Fourth, conditions on the ground in Ukraine may overtake our debate as Tymoshenko, former Interior Minister Yuriy Lutsenko and others are likely to be sentenced over the summer. The argument that the strategic priority of bringing in Ukraine outweighs all other considerations will be far more difficult to make if Tymoshenko and Lutsenko are imprisoned.
The launch of the trial of Tymoshenko on June 29 is an unprecedented step coming just two months before Ukraine celebrates its twentieth anniversary of independence on August 24.
To place this into historical context, the trials are the first occasion in three decades that political repression has returned to Ukraine, the last occasion being under Ukrainian communist leader Volodymyr Shcherbytsky in the 1970s.
Fifth, the strategic ramifications of political persecution and selective use of justice are that the hoped for ability of the EU to influence Ukraine after it joins the free-trade agreement are practically impossible. This is especially seen in the Yanukovych administrations reactions to Western criticism with the standard Soviet response of ‘Don’t lecture us!’ The Yanukovych administration is not a listening administration which is clearly seen in their unwillingness to halt the selective use of justice.
In launching political repression the Yanukovych administration sends two signals that it intends to remain in power indefinitely and future elections will be not in accordance with democratic practices. In addition, the aim of changing the election law is to ensure the Party of Regions receives a majority or constitutional majority; the current election law only gave it a plurality in the last two parliamentary elections.
With a badly crafted election law, decapitated opposition, media censorship, and most likely domination of election commissions by the party of power, there is only a remote possibility that Ukraine’s 2012 elections will be held in accordance with democratic practices. Indeed, recent discussions among policymakers and experts in Washington point to skepticism on the holding of free elections in Ukraine next year.
Brussels should coordinate three policies with Washington.
First, delay the signing of the free-trade agreement until after the 2012 elections and freeze negotiations if the elections do not meet democratic standards in the eyes of the OSCE.
Second, recognize that if members of the opposition are given jail sentences the Yanukovych administration will have crossed the line.
In such an eventuality, Brussels and Washington should coordinate a visa denial list consisting of the president, senior oligarchs, officials from the presidential administration, prime minister and government ministers with responsibility for law enforcement, the prosecutor-general and judges involved in show trials.
Third, introduce a visa-free regime for average Ukrainians and increase student and other exchanges that target young Ukrainians. While visa denials will prevent Ukraine’s elites the ability to travel to their homes and businesses in Western Europe, a visa-free regime will give average Ukrainians the right to freely travel throughout Europe.
The free-trade deal is the flagship of the EU’s Eastern Partnership and Ukraine is the most important country of its six members and it is therefore a test for Europe.
Just as the EU corrected its mistakes over Bulgaria and Romania in the course of negotiations with Croatia it is imperative that Brussels adopts tougher criteria towards the Yanukovych administration while supporting the Ukrainian populations right to be part of Europe.
Taras Kuzio is a senior fellow at the Center for Transatlantic Relations at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Relations; Lucan Way is a professor at the University of Toronto; and Serhiy Kudelia is a professor at Kyiv Mohyla Academy University.
