organization:ukraine's government

Ukraine political squabbles delay formation of new government | GlobalPost
▻http://www.globalpost.com/article/6758703/2016/04/12/ukraine-finance-minister-yaresko-will-not-stay-new-government-mps

Squabbling over top jobs in Ukraine’s government delayed a parliament vote on a cabinet reshuffle on Tuesday that is likely to see the departure of Finance Minister Natalia Yaresko and tighten President Petro Poroshenko’s grip on key policy areas.

Legislators are in the final stages of agreeing a new coalition following the resignation of Prime Minister Arseny Yatseniuk in the biggest shake-up in Ukraine since the 2014 Maidan uprising brought in a pro-Western leadership.

Deadlock has stalled billions of dollars in foreign loans and the delay in forming a government will frustrate Kiev’s allies, including the United States, who warn that political infighting can threaten efforts of recovery for the war-hit economy.

A close ally of Poroshenko, Volodymyr Groysman, is up for nomination to replace Yatseniuk who has headed governments since the “Maidan” street uprising which forced the Moscow-backed president Viktor Yanukovich to flee.

But Oleksiy Goncharenko, a deputy in Poroshenko’s BPP faction, told journalists there was still no agreement on who would fill the ministerial posts of economy, energy, culture and health. The vote on the coalition and government would “hopefully” take place on Wednesday or Thursday, he said.

But MPs said the new cabinet would not include Yaresko and some other foreign-born technocrats brought in late in 2014 in the hope that their outsider status and international experience would help Ukraine root out corruption.

Special Report: Ukraine struggles to control maverick battalions | Reuters

▻http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/07/29/us-ukraine-crisis-battalions-special-rep-idUSKCN0Q30YT20150729

▻http://s4.reutersmedia.net/resources/r/?m=02&d=20150729&t=2&i=1067846126&w=&fh=545px&fw=&ll=&pl=&sq=&r=LYN

From a basement billiard club in central Kiev, Dmytro Korchynsky commands a volunteer battalion helping Ukraine’s government fight rebels in the east. A burly man with a long, Cossack-style moustache, Korchynsky has several hundred armed men at his disposal. The exact number, he said, is “classified.”

In the eyes of many Ukrainians, he and other volunteer fighters are heroes for helping the weak regular army resist pro-Russian separatists. In the view of the government, however, some of the volunteers have become a problem, even a law unto themselves.

#ukraine

Black Tulip volunteers halt work recovering bodies of slain soldiers in eastern Ukraine
▻http://www.kyivpost.com/content/kyiv-post-plus/black-tulip-volunteers-halt-work-recovering-bodies-of-soldiers-in-eastern-

Their work in recovering the bodies of Ukrainian soldiers is not over. But volunteers from the Black Tulip group have run out of money and, lacking support from Ukraine’s government, have been forced to give up their mission of finding and identifying the nation’s missing slain soldiers. There may still be hundreds of soldiers not accounted for.
[…]
When the first such burials of unknown soldiers took place in Autumn 2014, the Dnipropetrovsk city council provided buses so that people could attend.

On this June day there had been no public announcement and no buses. Just four mourners came.

It was an indication of the Ukrainian government’s unwillingness to acknowledge its failure to recover and identify its mounting wartime dead. Another, damning indictment came on 15 July. Black Tulip, the volunteer organization which since September 2014 has returned many soldiers like Serdyukov to their grieving families, announced it was stopping work for lack of any government support or acknowledgement.
[…]
Because this war is largely fought with artillery, 40 percent of the bodies of those killed are just fragments, according to Olha Bohomolets, Ukraine presidential advisor on humanitarian affairs. Many bodies are only found months after they died; those left unburied have been mauled by wild animals. Ukraine does not collect dental records or fingerprints from its serving soldiers; until January this year, it did not issue dog tags. Documents and effects have often been removed from battle sites, some to end up posted, along with videos and photographs of the dead, on websites supporting the Russian-backed separatist regime against which Ukraine is fighting.
[…]
After Zhilkin’s announcement of stopping work on July 15, Ukrainian newspaper Ukrainska Pravda sent out an information request to all relevant state agencies, asking how much the government spends on recovering and returning for burial those it sent to war. The answer: no funding at all was allocated, either last year or this year.

Controverse autour d’une lettre à Iatseniouk attribuée au chef adjoint du groupe des démocrates au Sénat…

Dick Durbin letter to Ukraine PM may be Russian forgery - NY Daily News
▻http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/dick-durbin-letter-ukraine-pm-russian-forgery-article-1.2283423

The letter, on realistic-looking letterhead, uses stilted language.

“It is necessary to invest every effort to keep Olseksiy Pavlenko in his office of Minister of Agrarian Policy and Food,” the letter says. “His discharge will create additional obstacles on the way of widening cooperation between the U.S. and Ukrainian agricultural companies.”

… attribuée à la propagande russe, avec des arguments du genre, jamais un sénateur n’écrit dans une telle langue de bois…

ou encore

Critics of Ukraine’s government get propaganda mileage out of hoax letter
▻http://www.kyivpost.com/content/ukraine/critics-of-ukraines-government-get-propaganda-mileage-out-of-hoax-letter-3

Marter [the senator’s spokesman] also noted that the forged letterhead states Durbin’s position as “assistant minority leader” while authentic letterhead has “assistant Democratic leader.”

Sachant que WP[en] présente ainsi la fonction en question :

Party leaders of the United States Senate - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
▻https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Party_leaders_of_the_United_States_Senate

The Assistant Majority and Minority Leaders of the United States Senate (commonly called Senate Majority and Minority Whips) are the second-ranking members of the party leadership of the United States Senate. The main function of the Majority and Minority Whips is to gather votes on major issues. Because he or she is the second ranking member of the Senate, if there is no floor leader present, the whip may become acting floor leader. Before 1969, the official titles were Majority Whip and Minority Whip.

On pourrait ajouter que ce n’est pas du tout le genre des sénateurs états-uniens d’agir en intermédiaire entre les sociétés états-uniennes et les membres d’un gouvernement étranger…

D’ailleurs, la preuve que c’est de la propagande, c’est que ces sordides individus ressortent le célèbre coup de téléphone de Victoria Nuland dictant le futur gouvernement ukrainien à l’ambassadeur é.-u. à Kiev.

Ukraine renews license for under-fire TV station | Daily Mail Online
▻http://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/ap/article-3119788/Ukraine-renews-license-fire-TV-station.html

Ukraine’s government broadcasting authority has extended the operating licensing for a popular television station that has been accused of a pro-Russia stance.

The broadcasting authority said in a statement that its executive board voted Thursday to renew Inter’s license for seven years.

Prominent members of parliament had demand action against Inter for adopting an editorial policy allegedly detrimental to the country. Inter is also facing unrelated criminal investigations.

The broadcasting authority says there were no legal grounds to revoke Inter’s license.

Ukrainian miners protest against Ukraine’s government intentions to close down 12 state mines - watch on - uatoday.tv
▻http://uatoday.tv/politics/ukrainian-miners-protest-against-intentions-of-ukraine-rsquo-s-government-to

Mine workers across Ukraine have been protesting gainst plans announced by the Ukrainian government to close down 12 state mines. What’s more, according to the protesters, the so-called “coal crisis” announced by Ukrainian authorities earlier this year was an attempt to enrich a group of oligarchs and was completely without foundation.

“There’s a huge amount of coal in Ukraine! Why do we need to buy it from somewhere else? What we do is grow the South African economy and economies of other countries. At the same time Ukrainians are left jobless. What are we supposed to call it, genocide?”

Experts believe that Ukraine does not need imported coal. They say that even with 2/3 of the country’s mines shut down because of a Russian-backed insurgency in its eastern regions, Ukraine is still able to provide itself with coal and electricity. Reasons for the manipulation of coal prices, they suggest, are connected with private business interests.

(transcription de la vidéo)

BBC News - Ukraine crisis : Rockets ’kill 15’ in Mariupol
▻http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-30964970

At least 15 people have been killed and 46 injured in a series of rocket attacks by pro-Russian rebels in Ukraine’s government-held port of Mariupol, police there say.

The Grad rockets hit a market in a residential area in the east of the city, the police chief said.

http://cdn.rt.com/files/news/37/26/30/00/54654576867.si.jpg

A spokesman for the rebels denied that they had any involvement in the attack, calling it “blatant misinformation”.

More than 5,000 people have died in fighting in the east since April.

Some 5.2 million people live in conflict-affected areas and 1.4 million are considered “highly vulnerable and in need of assistance”

More than a million people have fled their homes with 633,523 living as displaced persons within Ukraine and 593,622 living outside Ukraine, mostly in Russia

More than 5,000 people have been killed in the fighting and more than 10,300 injured

Source: UN report of 9 January for refugee figures; news reports for casualty estimates

#ukraine #mariupol

Global recruiting agencies find 24 foreigners to work in Ukraine’s government
▻http://www.kyivpost.com/content/ukraine/global-recruiting-agencies-found-24-foreigners-to-work-in-ukraines-governm

Prague-based Pedersen & Partners and Korn Ferry, global head hunting firms, have found 185 potential employees, many of whom are members of Ukrainian community in Canada, the U.S. and the U.K.

After the job interviews, 24 candidates were recognized as fully qualified to serve in Ukraine’s public offices. However, their names haven’t been disclosed so far.

Four of them are expected to be employed with the Agrarian Ministry and another four with the Finance Ministry.

The Renaissance Foundation, a global network of policy consulting centers launched by American billionaire George Soros, has sponsored the headhunting process. It paid as much as $82,200 to two companies involved in finding the capable employees for the government agencies.

As of now, Ukrainian legislation doesn’t allow the foreigners to hold any public offices, which is why those who’ll accept the government’s job offers will have to take Ukraine’s citizenship. Meanwhile, dual citizenship is not allowed.

President Petro Poroshenko during his Nov. 27 speech in parliament offered to allow the foreigners be officially employed in the country’s government. Moreover, he asked the lawmakers to provide him with legal tools to grant Ukrainian citizenship through special decrees

Les noms ne sont pas dévoilés, mais ça n’empêche pas de supputer…

Meanwhile, Natalie Jaresko, U.S. citizen of Ukrainian descent and chief executive officer of Horizon Capital, a private equity fund with $650 million in assets, is considered to be a candidate for the position of finance minister, according to the Kyiv Post research.

Georgia’s former president Mikheil Saakashvili, who is currently a political science lecturer at Tufts University in the U.S., may become Ukraine’s deputy prime minister.

Et quand Poutine sera tombé, je vois bien Soros rerécupérer Saakashvili, lui coller un passeport russe et le faire candidater…

Important accord du Groupe de contact à Minsk, le 19/09/14

BBC News - Ukraine deal with pro-Russian rebels at Minsk talks
▻http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-29290246

Ukraine’s government and pro-Russia rebels have agreed a memorandum on a peace plan for the eastern conflict.

The nine-point deal includes setting up a 30km (19-mile) buffer zone, a ban on overflights of part of eastern Ukraine by military aircraft and the withdrawal of “foreign mercenaries” on both sides.

L’OSCE serait d’accord pour envoyer ses observateurs dans la zone tampon.

Former Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma, representing Kiev at the talks, said that all sides had agreed to move back some of their heavy weapons.

“Heavy artillery will be moved 15km away from the front line” he said.

He added that the deal would be implemented within 24 hours and monitors from the OSCE would travel to the buffer zone to check for compliance.