During the Orange Revolution Ukrainians proved their belonging to the European civilization, said former President Leonid Kuchma during a summit in Yalta.
Kuchma held office from 1994 for more than 10 years and retired right after the popular people’s revolt in 2005. He flew to the Crimean capital along with other top Ukrainian and foreign officials to take part in the forum "Ukraine and the World: Common Challenges, Common Future," at Livadia Palace on Sept. 15-18.
"The first and foremost difference of the Ukrainian revolution from the Arab ones is the respect to human life and non-violence," Kuchma said during the debates on the issue of the Northern Africa revolutions at the 8th Annual Meeting of Yalta European Strategy on Sept. 16. Despite the complexity of those processes, all political institutions and forces did everything so that the revolution was conducted in the European peaceful way.
"The president’s will was required so that the defense and law enforcement agencies acted under the law. And one should give proper respect to all political leaders – ‘the white-blue’ and ‘the orange’ – that we did not allow the use of force. We proved that we are Europeans," he said.
The second significant difference of the Ukrainian revolution is that it emerged during the economic growth and was not related to any economic problems.
Finally, the third difference is that contrary to the Arab countries, Ukraine did not have a problem of the political leadership, which hadn’t been changed for many years prior to the revolution.
"Despite the Constitutional Court’s decision, I believed that two terms of presidency are enough," Kuchma said.
At the same time, Kuchma said that he believes that Yanukovych was a real winner of the 2004 elections, which was proved by the 2010 elections.
