George Soros visits Kyiv

The world-famous financier and philanthropist George Soros, who is also the founder and president of the Open Society Institute, recently paid a visit to Kyiv. Widely believed to have funded the revolutions in Georgia and Ukraine, he rejects these kinds of “accusations,” with good reason. “I have never played any role in elections or financed one side or another,” Mr. Soros told the European Debate Forum in Kyiv.

“Changing a regime by way of revolution is just the beginning of a march toward building an open society. Then comes the difficult work of developing open-society institutions, which takes a long time; it is a long journey, full of difficulties, and ups and downs. But you must go forward, because only by establishing open-society institutions will you be able to achieve the goals to which the revolution aspired,” he said. Mr. Soros noted that Ukraine already had a revolution in 1991, when the Soviet Union collapsed, but that revolution “was not finished, it did not lead to the manifestation of an open society.” “This is why you needed another revolution 13 years later. The work has only started; we can exult over what has happened, but we cannot rest on our laurels,” he said. Mr. Soros said that he was very pleased to be here after the Orange Revolution. “I see that many things have changed. I watched the revolution from a distance and always kept my fingers crossed because nobody knew what would happen next, but everything went smoothly.”

Mr. Soros was met quite hospitably, in contrast to his previous visit, when he was splashed with mayonnaise during a press conference. Still, there were a few problems this time around, too. Representatives of the International Renaissance Foundation complained about the low professional level of the new staff at the Presidential Secretariat. When the renowned philanthropist’s assistants requested the presidential staff to organize a meeting between Mr. Soros and President Yushchenko, it turned out that some of the staff had never heard about the Renaissance Foundation and George Soros.