Charlotte Observer | Doping amnesty offer prompts questions for Ukraine Charlotte Observer A plan to offer amnesty to Ukrainian track and field athletes who confess to doping has led to inquiries from the IAAF and World Anti-Doping Agency. The Ukrainian Athletics Federation wrote on its website last week that athletes on the country's ... |
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Doping amnesty offer prompts questions for Ukraine - Charlotte Observer
Georgia, Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Azerbaijan are joining forces to increase freight turnover, ensure uninterrupted traffic, transit of goods between member countries of the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route (TMTM).
Furthermore, the four countries agreed to expand the geographical area of the routes and enter the European Union (EU) within the TMTM.
The TMTM was established in October 2016 and its activities are aimed at attracting transit and foreign trade cargo, as well as developing integrated logistics products via the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route.
The Trans-Caspian International Transport Route runs through China, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Georgia and then through Turkey and Ukraine to Europe.
Yesterday heads of all four countries railway administrations met with the Prime Minister of Ukraine Volodymyr Groysman, where the future plans of the TMTM was discussed.
The railway authorities claim it is important to create favourable conditions for transport service consumers in order to raise the competitive advantage of the TMTM in the corridor.
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Georgia, Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Azerbaijan to increase freight turnover - Agenda.ge
KYIV -- Ukrainian central bank chief Valeria Hontareva has resigned amid political pressure.
Hontareva, a reformist who won praise from the West, told reporters Kyiv that she submitted a letter of resignation to President Petro Poroshenko on April 10.
"I think my mission is accomplished as the reforms have been implemented," Hontareva said.
She added that her successor will face the same political pressure that she faced, and that the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) should be independent from politics.
Hontareva's efforts to clean up Ukraine's financial sector irked tycoons who critics say have treated the country's banks like their private coffers.
She also came under fire from some ordinary Ukrainians who blamed her for losses they suffered after she was appointed to follow the International Monetary Fund's advice to partially abandon state support for the hryvnya currency.
The hrynvya has fallen from 12 to the dollar on the day of her appointment in June 2014 to 27 on April 10, diminishing people's savings and stoking inflation hat reached almost 50 percent in 2014.
But Hontareva's decisions helped the central bank stay afloat and helped bolster ties with the IMF and other lenders.
On April 3, The IMF approved a $1 billion tranche of its $17.5 billion bailout program, in what Proshenko said was "recognition of Ukrainian reforms."
The IMF had postponed the disbursement of the tranche after Kyiv imposed a trade embargo on eastern parts of the country that are controlled by Russia-backed separatists.
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Ukraine's Reformist Central Bank Chief Resigns Amid Pressure - RadioFreeEurope/RadioLiberty
Ukraine's State Space Agency is currently in accession discussions with the European Space Agency (ESA) to become its member, Chairman Yuriy Radchenko told Sputnik on the margins of the Space Symposium in Colorado Springs.
Last Tuesday, Radchenko said during the symposium that Ukraine was actively cooperating with the ESA with a goal to become a member of the agency.
When asked whether Ukraine is holding discussions on the accession with the ESA, Radchenko said, "Yes."
"Today, we held talks with the Head of the European Space Agency on this matter," he explained. "The strategy and the tactics on the matter have been worked out. It is required to fulfill a number of conditions to become a member of the European Space Agency."
He said the membership could be secured within "a reasonable" timeframe.
"We continue to wish to become a member of the European Space Agency, and I think that this program will be implemented by Ukraine within a reasonable period of time, because there are some conditions there," Radchenko added.
Radchenko did not specify what the accession conditions are.
The annual 33rd Space Symposium brings together representatives of the world's space agencies, commercial space businesses as well as military, national security and intelligence organizations to discuss and plan the future of space exploration.
Moreover, Ukraine's State Space Agency is discussing various projects with the NASA, the agency's Chairman Yuriy Radchenko told Sputnik in Colorado Springs.
"We have a number of projects that we are discussing with the Americans," Radchenko said. "We are working, we are in the working process. Therefore, today [NASA] is our very serious partner in space exploration and space activities."
Radchenko is currently in the United States where he participated in the 33rd annual Space Symposium. Earlier at the symposium he said that Ukraine was considering missions related to lunar exploration.
The event brings together representatives of the world's space agencies, commercial space businesses as well as military, national security and intelligence organizations to discuss and plan the future of space exploration.
Source: Sputnik News
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Ukraine in talks with ESA to become member - Space Daily
This article first appeared on the Atlantic Council site.
While the world is distracted by multiple crises, Ukraines ruling elites are trying to undo the modest progress the country has achieved since the Maidan Revolution.
Despite the mainstream narrative, when it comes to reforms in post-revolutionary Ukraine, the record has been anything but black and white.
But if you need a consensus on the most outstanding achievements, most Ukraine watchers would probably agree on four: the establishment of market prices on gas; a globally hailed e-procurement system; the creation of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine; and the launch of an electronic declaration system that discloses the assets of public officials.
The last two are now at the epicenter of the biggest attempt to rollback reforms since the Maidan Revolution.
Ukraine has fallen out of focus in the last year. Local rent-seeking elites havent wasted the opportunity and have started rolling back reforms that impede the profitable coexistence of big business and politicians.
The former head of Ukraine's tax and customs service, Roman Nasirov, under investigation for embezzlement, attends a court hearing in Kiev, Ukraine, March 6, 2017. Maxim Eristavi writes that the democratic freedoms won in the Maidan protests are being steadily eroded by crooked politicians, elites and oligarchs. Valentyn Ogirenko/reuters
Ukrainian oligarchs, whose positions were damaged by the popular uprising of 2014, still managed to retain control over many key state institutions.
The real picture started to emerge last year with the governments almost full purge of reformers. Around mid-2016, almost all key reforms in the country had come to a halt. But things quickly escalated this spring.
In March 2017, the newly created National Anti-Corruption Bureau indicted Roman Nasirov, the head of the State Fiscal Service of Ukraine. Nasirovs arrest is the biggest anticorruption case in history and a huge embarrassment for the General Prosecutors Office. Prosecutor General Yuri Lutsenko had been promising to launch big anti-corruption cases but never did.
Related: How Putin Uses Fake News to Wage War on Ukraine
The retaliation was swift: the presidents parliamentary majority, in a bipartisan effort with key oligarchic groups and opposition politicians tied to former President Viktor Yanukovych, sped up the nomination of the auditor for the National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU). The auditor must determine whether the current management of the two-year-old institution was successful enough in fighting corruption.
Anticorruption activists see this move as a disguised tactic to sack Artem Sytnyk, the 37-year-old head of NABU, and install someone less eager to prosecute graft. Auditor candidates from civil society were brushed off and a virtually unknown protg from the ruling party was pushed forward through procedural violations.
Only an uproar among key reformist MPs, foreign allies and Ukrainian civil society stopped the candidacy. But another vote is soon to follow.
The next step was to curtail civil society, which plays a crucial watchdog role. It was cunningly combined with an attempt to water down the key reform of electronic declarations. Packaged in manipulatively formulated legislation, the same bipartisan group exempted junior officers, sergeants and rank-and-file combatants who fought in eastern Ukrainian from the e-declaration requirements. One can easily see how bureaucratic maneuvering can add virtually any official to this group.
This vote happened with procedural violations, too. The same amendment forces Ukrainian nongovernment organizations and their sub-contractors as well as journalists who write about corruption to declare their assets the same way officials do.
Like Russias foreign agent laws, the move puts severe operational restrictions on Ukraines vibrant civil society. By adopting the amendments, the authorities have openly declared war on civil society for the first time since the Maidan Revolution, Mykhailo Zhernakov, an expert at the Reanimation Package of Reforms, wrote, and hes right.
Related: The Ukraine Payments That Link Manafort to Putin
With Ukraine awash in a record amount of foreign aid and grants in recent years, theres no doubt that enhanced transparency for NGOs is a must. At the same time, the new law exploits the drive for transparency in an effort to weaken the anticorruption movement.
As someone who works extensively with NGOs in Ukraine, I find the environment in Kiev one of the harshest in Eastern Europe. Already facing a human resources deficit, such a substantial increase in the operational obligations the new law requires will push plenty of civil society initiatives over the edge.
Corrupt elites have marshaled enormous wealth in Ukraine in the last twenty-five years of their unchecked rule. For example, during pre-trial hearings, Nasirov had nine lawyers arguing on his behalf. NABU had just two detectives making their case. So, forcing the same transparency requirements on the anticorruption movement as the corrupt officials they are supposed to expose will make for a tragically unfair game.
Poroshenko signed the controversial amendment on March 27 amid growing calls from civil society and foreign allies to veto it. In a rare move, even the EU Commissioner for Neighborhood Policy criticized the law. Some of my anonymous high-profile sources in Brussels told me that it has the potential to endanger the implementation of Ukraines pending visa-free regime.
Buoyed by the passage of this amendment, Ukraines ruling elites will keep at it. A lack of international attention and ineffective diplomatic strategies on the part of Ukraines allies will embolden the counterrevolution forces. Things could quickly get out of control, with the rise of populism and the blockade in eastern Ukraine threatening the countrys recently restarted growth and the IMFs $17.5 billion program.
It is time for Ukraine's friends and donors to call the bluff of the countrys ruling elites by making clear that recent counterrevolutionary moves must be rolled back and Ukraines political leadership will face serious consequences in terms of political and economic support for any future ones. Trivial statements and tweets wont work this time; old-school political pressure is needed.
One of the main lessons of the Maidan Revolution for Ukrainian allies has been that local civil society is the best partner in delivering progressive change in Ukraine. Now is the time to reaffirm strong vocal support for it. And making sure that Ukraines ruling elites know the exact price for attacking reforms.
Maxim Eristavi is a nonresident research fellow with the Atlantic Council and co-founder of Hromadske International, an independent news outlet, based in Kiev.
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Ukraine's Corrupt Elites Make a Mockery of Western Support - Newsweek