Ukraine Is Honoring its Pledges To Council of Europe

There are no grounds for the Council of Europe to hear any so-called Ukrainian question at the January session of its Parliamentary Assembly (PACE), Viktor MEDVEDCHUK, First Deputy Speaker of Verkhovna Rada, believes. “The latest achievements of, first of all, Verkhovna Rada show that Ukraine is really honoring its pledges, so the Council of Europe should make an adequate assessment of this situation,” Mr. Medvedchuk said on December 7 after meeting a CE Committee of Ministers delegation headed by its chairman, Lithuania’s Foreign Minister Antanas Valionis. As Mr. Medvedchuk said, “If you take everything literally, we will never meet all our commitments.” Yet, the first vice speaker emphasized, Ukraine has now honored “94-95%” of the pledges it took in 1995, Interfax-Ukraine reported. “The most important and crucial strategic commitments have already been met,” he stated. It will be recalled that the PACE Monitoring Committee plans to hear on December 11 a question about the way Ukraine is honoring its CE pledges. It will depend on the committee’s decision whether the Ukrainian question will be put on the agenda of the assembly session in January 2002.