As Ukraine’s hopes of signing an association agreement with the European Union fade, the government and media are blaming Brussels in an apparent bid to shift public sentiment toward a more Russia-friendly foreign policy.
President Viktor Yanukovych has been vociferously demanding that the association agreement include a clear path to full membership in the 27-nation bloc, something that officials in Brussels, the EU’s administrative center, have said will not happen.
Pro-government media, as well as high-ranking officials, have portrayed Europe as a bullying neighbor trying to impose conditions on Ukraine.
Brussels has demanded that Kyiv release former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, convicted on Oct. 11 and sentenced to seven years in prison in an abuse-of-office case seen as politically motivated in Western capitals.
In an interview on state-owned First Channel on Oct. 19, Yanukovych said he has the impression that Ukraine “is like a poor relative who asks, but is not let in.”
He added that he repeatedly voiced Ukraine’s demands, including the prospect of EU membership as part of an association agreement expected to be signed in December, but “received no reply.”
“If there is no such statement the agreement is empty,” Yanukovych said.
EU Commissioner Stefan Fule, however, has already made clear that, although the proposed agreement is aimed at bringing Ukraine closer to the EU, it would contain no such offer.
Hans-Jurgen Heimsoeth, the German ambassador to Ukraine, said the Yanukovych administration doesn’t seem to understand the values and standards of the EU and is persistently ignoring the need to carry out democratic and economic reforms.
“The prospect of the membership will appear when ‘Europe’ is built in Ukraine. For now we have rather moved farther than closer to this,” Heimsoeth said in an interview with Dzerkalo Tyzhnia weekly on Oct. 21.
A European diplomat in Kyiv, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the intensification of demands by Ukrainian leaders could be a way to find an “exit strategy” to save face if Europe backs away from the association agreement in December.
“To demand membership when you are offered a step in the direction of membership seems like a justification of not wanting membership at all,” said political analyst Vadym Karasyov.
The opinion voiced by Yanukovych dominates media coverage. “They say that the EU does not have the right to dictate their rules, does not respect our sovereignty and does not want us anyway. All major TV shows, including [talk show host Savik] Shuster’s, have debates over these provocative ideas and spreading these messages forms suitable public opinion,” Karasyov added.
On Shuster’s show on Oct. 21, broadcast on state-run First Channel, the audience was asked to vote on the loaded question: “Does the EU have the right to impose its rules on Ukraine?” Seventy-six percent of the audience answered negatively.
Shuster denied any controversy. “On the show, we ask questions that get people debating,” he said, reached by telephone.
But Oleksandr Sushko, an analyst at the Institute for Euro-Atlantic Cooperation, said most media seem to be providing full support for the campaign of “blaming the EU for blowing relations with Ukraine.”
The pro-government daily Segodnya, owned by billionaire Rinat Akhmetov who is a lawmaker in Yanukovych’s ruling Party of Regions, published a scathing travel report on Brussels on Oct. 19.
The report depicted the city as full of “Arabs, Gypsies, drug addicts and homeless people,” describing “stale fish” served in “Arabic and Turkish cafes,” and “Gypsies” who “of course beg and swindle.”
Experts say it is likely that media will be used to prepare public opinion for further changes in Ukrainian foreign policy.
“The easiest way is to publish paid stories in local media and use Internet. We have already seen this campaign start,” said Natalia Ligachova, head of Kyiv-based media watchdog Telekritika.
Karasyov said the message the authorities are sending out is: “They do not want us there (in Europe) – so let’s go somewhere where we are wanted: Russia.”
Ukrainian officials have hinted they may turn to a Russian trade deal if the European agreement falls through.
Four state-owned local newspapers in western Ukraine on Oct.13 ran an article by Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin advocating the Eurasian Economic Community.
This trade bloc consists of former Soviet republics Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. “The future which is being born now” reads the headline in Volyn and three other regional newspapers, featuring photos of Putin, Belarusian President Alexandr Lukashenko and Kazakhstan’s Nursultan Nazarbayev.
Kyiv Post staff writer Svitlana Tuchynska can be reached at [email protected]
