Ukraine government proposes more talks with EU, which isn’t interested

Ukraine’s parliament will consider today a bill to dismiss the Cabinet of Ministers for undermining preparations for signing the Ukraine-EU Association Agreement. Four out of five parliamentary factions will support the measure, including several MPs from the ruling Party of Regions. Opposition MPs also called for the impeachment of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych. The Cabinet building remained blocked by thousands of government opponents, who also retained control of the Kyiv City Administration and Independence Square.

Yanukovych called EU Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso to request a meeting of respective delegations. Barroso responded that the European Commission is ready to discuss aspects of implementation of agreements already initialized, but it won’t reopen any negotiations. Yanukovych told television reporters about the need to renew negotiations to change the agreement’s conditions “to the advantage of our producers,” referring to the already initialized Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area portion of the Association Agreement. “Today, we want to achieve better conditions in this agreement, because that’s related to our economic interests, above all,” the president said. He acknowledged part of the responsibility for failing the sign the agreement lies with the Cabinet, while also blaming officials “who are no longer in power,” a claim that the Kommersant newspaper cited as inaccurate. Taras Kachka, a lawyer who worked on the Association Agreement, dismissed as “nonsense” the claim that the free trade agreement has clauses not agreed upon during the negotiation process.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Mykola Azarov met with Western diplomats to inform them that he’s “almost sure” the government will sign the Association Agreement when it returns to the issue, the Kommersant-Ukraina newspaper reported on December 3. He said the government is dissatisfied with several clauses in the free trade agreement (already initialized), including those that apply to “agriculture and machine building.” He said the nation’s industrialists believe that too much was surrendered and proposed compensating the negative trade balance between Ukraine and the EU. Azarov avoided responding when asked by diplomats whether the Ukrainian government intends on renewing negotiations on the free trade agreement, which was completed in December 2011 and initialized in July 2012, after which it couldn’t be amended. A delegation led by First Vice Prime Minister Serhiy Arbuzov will travel to Brussels soon, Azarov said.

Russian President Vladimir Putin on December 2 dismissed the mass demonstrations in Kyiv. “The events Ukraine no longer resemble a revolution, but a pogrom,” he said. “In my view, they’re little related to relations between Ukraine and the EU.” In Putin’s view, the current events in Ukraine “were prepared” for the March 2015 presidential elections.

Zenon Zawada: It’s apparent that the current government has no intention of resigning, which will have very negative implications for Ukraine’s stability and increases the likelihood of further violence. Meanwhile, complaints against the completed agreement on the Free Trade Area look absurd at this point, reflecting just how far out of touch with reality the current government is. Putin’s comments indicate that Yanuokvych and Azarov will be relying on the Russian government’s ready support should the situation deteriorate.