Ukraine's leading English-language newspaper since 1995

The animal-protection group SOS went public on Feb. 10 with charges of corruption at Kyiv's city-run animal shelter and of intense police harassment and intimidation of the group since it first brought up the corruption charges privately to city officials. Tamara Tarnawska, director of the Kyiv-based group, said the issue had grown beyond the city's animal-control practices. 'This is not about cats and dogs,' she said. 'This is about whether Ukraine is capable of developing a civic society and whether it can tolerate independent civic activism.' Tarnawska charged that the city-run 'Animals in the City' shelter kills stray animals for profit and had not spent Hr 1.5 million of municipal funds intended for introducing humane methods of animal control for that purpose. She said that ever since Kyiv Mayor Oleksandr Omelchenko began looking into the charges, the group had faced intense intimidation. Tarnawska said Omelchenko was supporting her group, and city officials were present at the news conference to assure the public that Omelchenko's administration is concerned about the issues SOS has brought up. Tarnawska described a series of cases of intimidation, one of which, on the evening prior to the press conference, the Post partially witnessed. When Post reporters arrived at the S.O.S. office on the evening of Feb. 9, a Mercedes sedan and a Western jeep were parked outside. Several men with earphones in civilian dress stood on watch. Tarnawska's secretary said Lt. Col. Mykola Martynets, deputy head of the Interior Ministry's narcotics division, was meeting with Tarnawska and that he would not leave with reporters outside. After Martynets left, Tarnawska said the purpose of his visit was to warn her not to hold the press conference. 'They also told me it was not a good idea for me to go out on the street tonight,' she said. Tarnawska said the visit was just the latest in a series of police raids on SOS' office and its animal shelter. On Dec. 31, she said, police and animal-control officials forcibly entered the flat of volunteer Halyna Shiyanova and beat to death with steel pipes several dogs and puppies she was sheltering. On Jan. 25, Interior Ministry narcotics agents raided the SOS shelter in Pirohovo, outside Kyiv, and confiscated its Pentobarbitol, a barbiturate. According to the newspaper Segodnya, the Interior Ministry found nine liters of Pentobarbitol, whose possession, it reported, violates Ukraine's new controlled-substances law. SOS' lawyer, Mykola Katerinchuk, said Martynets had also visited his office on Feb. 9 and warned against discussing certain topics at the press conference. Katerinchuk said that SOS was being investigated for distribution of narcotics, but no formal charges had been brought against the group. 'Martynets was here on a so-called 'private visit,'' he said. 'If a case had formally been opened, then they wouldn't be able to avail themselves of pressure or threats - no interference would be allowed.' Phone calls to Kyiv branch of the Interior Ministry went unanswered, and Martynets could not be reached for comment. The news conference went ahead as scheduled, with Tarnawska complaining before reporters and an emotional crowd of animal lovers that SOS veterinarians and staff had been called in for repeated questioning. No mention was made at the news conference about the events of the previous evening. Both Tarnawska and SOS supporters said that pressure mounted against the organization after they urged Kyiv Mayor Oleksandr Omelchenko to conduct an investigation of the Animals in the City center, a city-subsidized shelter in Borodyanka, 60 kilometers outside of the city center. At a Jan. 22 meeting with city officials, SOS criticized Animals in the City, saying it abused its mandate as an animal-welfare shelter through slaughtering and skinning animals for profit. SOS also charged that Animals in the City could not account for Hr 1.5 million in city funds that were allocated for the purpose of introducing humane treatment. Neither Animals in the City nor its director, Nina Samofalova, could be reached for comment. David Bowles, head of international affairs for Britain's Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, traveled to Ukraine to show his support for SOS. He said in an interview on Feb. 9 that Animals in the City was a throwback to the old system of stray-animal control, 'in which exterminators earned bonuses for the number of animals they killed and used primitive, inhuman methods - killing with hammers and other tools.' Animals in the City, he said, was little more than a skinning factory, 'geared toward generating profit from animal hides and providing animals for experiments.' SOS set up its shelter in 1997 on the grounds of a former dog pound. Bowles praised SOS for creating a model center for sheltering strays and finding them homes, and for providing services such as veterinary treatment, neutering and, when necessary, humane killing. 'The SOS is a satellite for the region, providing a model of human stray control not only for the rest of Ukraine, but neighboring countries as well,' he said at the press conference. 'Many people from around the world welcomed the closing of the old pound and watch with interest to see that the SOS' humane programs are built upon.' Tarnawska said that Pentobarbital 'is considered acceptable for use in any European country.' SOS furnished copies of the manifests, waybills and certificates of quality for the Pentobarbital, which was delivered by a foreign donor on Feb. 26, 1998. According to the Segodnya article, Pentobarbital was banned from import a month later, on March 23. Tarnawska claimed the Interior Ministry was acting against her group at the urging of a leftist parliamentary deputy whom she said had political and business ties with the Animals in the City center. '[The deputy] proposed that we cooperate with him, but we told him that we have no involvement with politics or any political party,' Tarnawska said. 'But he was more on a reconnaissance visit - he asked what pharmaceuticals we used, what quantities we had, and so on.' The Post couldn't contact the deputy for a response. Tarnawska apparently has her own allies, however. A representative of the Kyiv city council, Daniel Karabayev, and a city administration official responsible for animal control policy appeared at the press conference to reassure a rather emotional audience that the mayor and city council shared their concerns. Fending off questions from a woman who said that staff members of the Animals in the City center were 'worse than fascists,' Karabayev said that an investigation of the center was underway, and that Omelchenko had issued appeals to law enforcement and the Interior Ministry to back down. Bowles expressed hope for a resolution, but said that the situation was 'alarming.' Bowles said Ukraine's handling of animal-control issues could affect its standing with the Council of Europe. 'Council of Europe guidelines recommend a method [of killing animals] which involves the immediate loss of consciousness by the animal.' 'We have found that the treatment of animals is a good indicator of the level of respect for civil liberties in a society,' he said.