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Where there is no law, but every man does what is right in his own eyes, there is the least of real liberty
Henry M. Robert

Ukraine Loses a Friend

24 November, 1998 - 00:00


Our digest seldom contains much on things in other countries, for our
English-language readers have other sources of information. Sometimes,
however, something happens that we just cannot ignore. Friday's contract
murder of Galina Starovoitova is one such event. Local democrats recall
how at the beginning of this decade, when the Democratic Platform called
a conference in Kyiv, she was detained at the Kyiv railroad station despite
her status as a USSR People's Deputy. Hers was one of the clearest, most
consistent, and bravest voices for democracy in the CIS. She long ago renounced
Russia's imperial legacy and hoped only that Ukraine and Russia would evolve
independently but amicably into modern European democracies with market
economies.

Official law enforcement spokesmen have already stated that the murder
is "a very complicated case." In postcommunist Aesopian language, this
can be translated more or less as follows: "We have a pretty good idea
who did it, but they are too rich, important, or powerful for us to touch.
So don't expect us to look very hard." The big boys play for keeps, and
those who get in the way wind up in the morgue. In this part of the world,
those who can pay for such murders are simply above the law, and that is
not likely to change anytime soon. Meanwhile, big league murders simply
are never solved.

Building a democratic Ukraine with a market economy and honest government
is almost impossible without Russia being cleaned up to some extent, because
the criminal structures that run that country are so intermeshed with those
in other former Soviet republics that nobody really knows just how much
independence the newly independent states really have. Galina Starovoitova
wanted above all else for Russia to clean up its act. And they killed her.

Hers was an unwavering voice for sanity and democratic principles in
a part of the world not oversupplied with either. Those who want such things
as well will mourn her in Ukraine as well as Russia. Her death was Ukraine's
loss as well.

 

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