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Today's
Stories
December
2, 2004
Saul
Landau
The Assassination of Danilo Anderson
December
1, 2004
Phillip
Cryan
Associated with Whom? Rightist Bias
in Wire Coverage of Colombia
Dave
Zirin
What's the Matter with "Leon"?:
Budweiser's Racist Commercial
Ghali
Hassan
Iraq's Health Care Under the Occupation:
200 Children Die Every Day
Donna
J. Volatile
Beware Western Nations Threatening "Democracy"
Patrick
Cockburn
How Saddam Tried to Arm the Insurgency
Nick
Meo
Chemical War Over Afghanistan
Mike
Ferner
The Battle of Toledo
Mokhiber
/ Weissman
Shame and Determination on Global AIDS Day: 40 Million and Rising
Kathy
Kelly
Looking the Other Way: the Real Crimes
of the UN in Iraq
November
30, 2004
Jennifer
Van Bergen
The Veil of Secrecy
Toni
Nelson Herrera
Meeting Kurtz: When Art is a Crime
Paul
Craig Roberts
The Bush Delusions: Successful at Incompetence
Patrick
Cockburn
The Insurgency Strikes Back: There Are No Safe Havens in Iraq
Chuck
Munson
WTO Protests Five Years Later: Seattle Weekly Trashes Anti-Globalization
Movement
Adam
Williams
Citizenship Sold: Back to Business in Indiana
Gregory
Elich
A Dangerous Turn in the US Plans for
North Korea
Website
of the Day
Read Lynne Cheney's Lesbian Novel Online!
November
29, 2004
Dave
Lindorff
Blowback in Ukraine: The Hand of
the CIA?
Omar
Barghouti
"The Pianist" of Palestine:
Roadblock Concerto at Gunpoint
Mike
Whitney
The US Media and Fallujah: How to
Market a Siege
Uri
Avnery
The Abu Mazen Style: "Give Me
Some Credit!"
Matt
Vidal
Globalization and Economic Inequality: a Look at the Numbers
Patrick
Cockburn
An Interview with Iraq's Foreign
Minister
Alan
Farago
Sex Change and Salvation: God, Girly Men and Endocrine Disrupters
Justin
Huggler
Bhopal 20 Years Later
Antony
Loewenstein
How Australia Reported Arafat's Death and Legacy
Gary
Leupp
Ukraine: Poll Results Aren't the Real
Issue
Website
of the Day
Mosul: Images from a Kill Zone
November
27 / 28, 2004
Peter
Linebaugh
Torture & Neo-Liberalism with
Sycorax in Iraq
Alexander
Cockburn
What Happened to O'Reilly's Loofa?
Fred
Gardner
Ashcroft v. Raich: Medical Marijuana and the Supreme Court
Kathy
Kelly
What We Can Control
Diane
Christian
The Other Cheek: "Empire Doesn't Analyze, It Acts"
Gary
Leupp
One More Neocon Target: South (Yes, South) Korea
Lenni
Brenner
Equality and Rights of Return: Jefferson Instructs the New York
Times
Ron
Jacobs
Death Squads and Iraq's Elections: the Mysterious Murders of
the AMS Clerics
Joshua
Frank
An Interview with Kevin Zeese on Nader, Kerry and the ABB Crowd
Toni
Solo
The Murder of Danilo Anderson
Saul
Landau
Fallujah, the 21st Century Guernica
JoAnn
Wypijewski
Matthew Shepard Case 6 Years Later: Why Hate Crimes Laws are
No Cure for Homophobia
Justin
Taylor
Empire's Lawless Opportunities
Amos
Harel
The Case of Captain R.
Walter
A. Davis
Tabloid Justice
Stephen
Hendricks
God's Kind of Men
Poets'
Basement
Albert, LaMorticella and Ford
November
26, 2004
Peter
Feng
Gavin Newsom: Man or Machine?
Greg
Moses
It's the White Vote, Stupid
Liaquat
Ali Khan
The Devil's Work: Bush's Minority Appointments
Michael
Mandel / Gail Davidson
Why Bush Should Be Banned from Canada: a Memo to the Ministry
of Immigration
Dave
Lindorff
Nation of Sheep, Turkey of an Election: Urkrainians Show the
Way
Gary
Corseri
When Black Friday Comes...
Paul
Craig Roberts
Whatever Happened to Conservatives?
Website
of the Day
Iraq Pipeline Watch
November
25, 2004
Willliam
Loren Katz
Giving Thanks to Whom?: "Thanks
to God We Sent 600 Heathen Souls to Hell Today"
Mitchel
Cohen
Why I Hate Thanksgiving
Mike
Ferner
An Uncommon Mom
November
24, 2004
Gila
Svirsky
License to Kill: the Example of Violence
is Set by the State
Winslow
T. Wheeler
The
Other Mess in Congress
Christopher
Brauchli
The Company He Keeps: the Syndicate of Tom Delay
Dave
Lindorff
Double Standards on Exit Polls: Hypocrisy Sans Irony
Ron
Jacobs
The Occupation of Iraq is the Root of t he Problem
Ken
Sengupta
Witnesses: War Crimes in Fallujah
Diana
Barahona
The Final Holocaust or Why I Voted for Ralph Nader
John
L. Hess
Safire the Shameless
Jason
Leopold
Did Harvard Hire (Another) War Criminal?
Jeffrey
St. Clair
The Mark of McCain: the Senator Most Likely to Start a Nuclear
War
Map
of the Day
Now and Then: 2004 v. 1860
November
23, 2004
Forrest
Hylton
Bush and Uribe at the Beach
November
22, 2004
Dave
Zirin
Fight Night in the NBA: Selective Outrage
in Detroit
Paul
Craig Roberts
On to Iran: We Won't Get Fooled Again?
Michael
Mandel / Gail Davidson
Why Bush Should be Banned from Canada
Kathie
Helmkamp
Our Son: a Marine Who Won't Kill
Ken
Sengupta
The Triangle of Death: "This is Now the Most Dangerous Place
in Iraq"
Mike
Whitney
Greenspan's Hammer
Roger
Burbach
Why They Hate Bush in Chile
Website
of the Day
Fed Up with Government Lies and Corporate Spin?
November
20 / 21, 2004
Alexander
Cockburn
The Poisoned Chalice
Todd
May
Religion, the Election and the Politics of Fear
Abbas
Ahmed Ibrahim
The Horrors of Fallujah: a First-Hand Account
Kevin
Zeese
Mishandling Nader
Landau
/ Hassen
After Arafat
Tom
Barry
The Vulcans Consolidate Power: The Rise of Stephen Hadley
Fred
Gardner
Pot Shots: Ask Dr. Todd
Justin
E.H. Smith
Triumph of the Will: the Sequel
Carl
Estabrook
Where We Are Now
Gary
Leupp
Imperial History-Making vs. Reality-Based Thought: a Dialogue
Dave
Lindorff
Apocalypse Soon
Jenna
Michelle Liut
Plans Colombia and Patriota: Wanton Wastes of Money, Manpower
and Lives
Mickey
Z.
The Granma Moses of Radical Writing: an Interview with William
Blum
Greg
Moses
The Same Old Struggle Against Imperial America
Sharon
Smith
Abortion Rights and the Election: What Now?
Ron
Jacobs
Sandwiches and Car Bombs
Ben
Tripp
Raising d'Etre: Finding Money in Hollywood These Days
Richard
Oxman
Basketbrawl Two Pointer: Iraq Rules!
Gilad
Atzmon
Politics and Jazz
Poets'
Basement
LaMorticella, Albert, Ford, & Anon.
Website
of the Day
Voice of the Forest
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante
Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click
Here for More Stories.
|
December 2, 2004
The Bad vs.
the Corrupt
Standoff
in Ukraine
By
LEE SUSTAR
The election standoff in Ukraine is
portrayed in the U.S. media as a battle between pro-Washington
democrats and pro-Moscow authoritarians. But it's really a scramble
for power within a ruling class dominated by corrupt politicians
and their wealthy backers.
It's almost certainly the case
that the current government's candidate for president, Prime
Minister Viktor Yanukovich--who has the high-profile support
of Russian President Vladimir Putin--stole the election with
widespread fraud in the runoff election November 21. But according
to election observers, there were also reports of fraud in the
Western Ukrainian strongholds of Viktor Yushchenko, a former
prime minister who's supported by the U.S. and the European Union
(EU).
Yushchenko's supporters captured
the attention of the world by mobilizing 100,000 supporters in
the streets of the capital city of Kiev for more than a week,
blockading government buildings and calling for a general strike
while demanding a new election. Yet Yanukovich also had mass
meetings in the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk, the economic
powerhouse of the country where the majority of the population
is Russian-speaking.
The election plays on the historic
divisions in Ukraine between the Russified East of the country
and the Ukrainian-speaking West, which has only been under Moscow's
rule since 1940, when Stalin's USSR invaded and took over. But
if the candidates have played up such differences, it's because
their real policy differences are minimal.
The notion that that the crisis
is simply Russian-speaking Eastern Ukraine versus West Ukraine
is "pure nonsense," Russian author and activist Boris
Kagarlitsky told Socialist Worker. "The key place
where you have most of the resistance to the government is Kiev,
which is Russian-speaking," he said. "In class terms,
it is petty bourgeois protests against the oligarchs of the East--and
the oligarchs are Russian-speaking. You cannot describe this
in purely class terms, unfortunately. Both sides are quite reactionary."
Kagarlitsky compares the mobilization
to the "people power" mass protests in the Philippines
in 2001, which forced out one conservative government--and led
to its replacement by another.
Indeed, the crisis reflects
the battle within the Ukrainian ruling class over how to orient
to both Russia and the West. For example, Yanukovich, portrayed
by the U.S. as a lackey of Moscow, has sent 1,600 Ukrainian troops
to Iraq and ordered the Ukraine military to ferry NATO troops
to Afghanistan.
And when a Russian steel firm
tried to buy out a major Ukrainian one for $1.2 billion, Yanukovich
blocked the deal and arranged for a sale to a Ukrainian government
insider for just $800 million. Yushchenko, by contrast, sold
off four utility companies to Russian-controlled companies.
If Yanukovich got Putin's backing,
it's in part because the Russian government concluded that the
current president, Leonid Kuchma, was going to help him steal
the election--and that it was better to go with a winner.
In his campaign, Yanukovich
made populist appeals by claiming that western Ukraine is a parasite
on the industrial East, which accounts for an estimated 80 percent
of gross domestic product.
Yushchenko, for all his posturing
as a democratic hero, is a former central banker who used his
term as prime minister to impose austerity measures that hit
working people hard--in a country where the average monthly wage
was just $80 in 2002.
His top ally is Yulia Tymoshenko,
one of the country's wealthiest oligarchs among the tiny circle
of former Communist Party members and industrial managers who
won out in the corrupt privatization of state industry when Ukraine
became independent when the USSR collapsed in 1991. As energy
minister in Yushchenko's government, Tymoshenko used government
power to squeeze her rivals until Kuchma forced her out on corruption
charges. Yushchenko himself was pushed out of office in 2001
after trying to discipline the oligarchs with economic and political
reforms.
Today, Yushchenko plays to
the sentiments of millions of people fed up with corruption of
Kuchma, who was caught on audio tape in 2000 ordering the murder
of an opposition journalist. But as prime minister, Yushchenko
himself was at the center of Kuchma's operation.
By mobilizing their base and
demanding the immediate ouster of Yanukovich, Yushchenko and
Tymoshenko have raised the stakes and risked the situation slipping
out of their control. Behind closed doors, however, they were
negotiating a deal for a new election or a power-sharing deal
in which Yushchenko gains the presidency while Yanukovich remains
a power broker for the Eastern Ukraine.
"Everybody will be happy--with
the exceptions of those who demonstrated in the streets,"
Kagarlitsky said. However, he added, "it will be much harder
to control Ukraine when the new government comes to power. There
is a genuine democratic movement, and it is very much out of
control of the current leadership."
What's at
stake for Washington?
WHEN U.S. Secretary of State
Colin Powell declared that the U.S. wouldn't recognize the results
of Ukraine's election, it was the capstone of Washington's efforts
to get Viktor Yushchenko elected.
Following the model used successfully
in Serbia and Georgia and unsuccessfully in Belarus, much of
Yushchenko's operation has been "funded and organized by
the U.S. government, deploying U.S. consultancies, pollsters,
diplomats, the two big American parties and U.S. non-government
organizations," Britain's Guardian newspaper noted.
Representatives of the Serbian
student movement--who had extensive training from U.S. government-funded
outfits like the National Endowment for Democracy--set up shop
in Kiev during the election campaign.
Business Week explained why the U.S. is interested.
"With its vast swathe of fertile black earth and well-educated
population of 49 million, Ukraine is an emerging market worth
playing for." As a major producer of steel and machinery,
Ukraine is benefiting enormously from demand in China. The economy
is on track to grow by at least 11 percent this year--the fastest
in Europe--and the stock market is up100 percent.
Nobody should be fooled by
the U.S. claims of supporting democracy in Ukraine. Washington
has turned a blind eye to election fraud across the former USSR--from
Russia to the oil-rich Central Asian states.
By trying to help Yushchenko
into office, the U.S. aims to pull Ukraine into Washington's
orbit.
Lee Sustar is a regular contributor to CounterPunch
and the Socialist Worker.
He can be reached at: lsustar@ameritech.net
Weekend Edition
Features for November
27 / 28, 2004
Peter
Linebaugh
Torture & Neo-Liberalism with
Sycorax in Iraq
Alexander
Cockburn
What Happened to O'Reilly's Loofa?
Fred
Gardner
Ashcroft v. Raich: Medical Marijuana and the Supreme Court
Kathy
Kelly
What We Can Control
Diane
Christian
The Other Cheek: "Empire Doesn't Analyze, It Acts"
Gary
Leupp
One More Neocon Target: South (Yes, South) Korea
Lenni
Brenner
Equality and Rights of Return: Jefferson Instructs the New York
Times
Ron
Jacobs
Death Squads and Iraq's Elections: the Mysterious Murders of
the AMS Clerics
Joshua
Frank
An Interview with Kevin Zeese on Nader, Kerry and the ABB Crowd
Toni
Solo
The Murder of Danilo Anderson
Saul
Landau
Fallujah, the 21st Century Guernica
JoAnn
Wypijewski
Matthew Shepard Case 6 Years Later: Why Hate Crimes Laws are
No Cure for Homophobia
Justin
Taylor
Empire's Lawless Opportunities
Amos
Harel
The Case of Captain R.
Walter
A. Davis
Tabloid Justice
Stephen
Hendricks
God's Kind of Men
Poets'
Basement
Albert, LaMorticella and Ford
|