WEEKLY ROUNDUP 

On June 24 the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) imposed a five-year ban on Israeli citizen Vadym Rabynovych entering Ukraine following the disclosure of his involvement in "activities inflicting considerable losses on the Ukrainian economy and against the interests of this country's security." The SBU press center informed The Day that this decision had been made on the basis of Article 25 of the law of Ukraine On the Legal Status of Foreigners. Mr. Rabynovych, a well-known Ukrainian businessman, owns equity in several Ukrainian mass media outlets. Earlier, on December 17, 1998, the SBU also banned from entering Ukraine for the same period the Israeli citizen Leonid Wolf, who maintains close ties with Mr. Rabynovych. The SBU information notes that Mr. Wolf is known in the criminal world as leader of an organized crime group and is suspected of having committed a series of big league murders and attempts in Odesa, Kyiv, and Dnipropetrovsk oblasts.

It has happened. A "successful businessman" by his own definition, a Ukrainian "oligarch" by the ranking-list of local oligarchiologists, Israeli citizen Vadym Rabynovych has been pronounced persona non grata in Ukraine.

The Ukrainian People's Embassy all-Ukrainian foundation to foster international cooperation (with Leonid Kravchuk as honorary chairman) has granted Mr. Rabynovych, as he said with joy the other day, the title of People's Ambassador of Ukraine for his " great personal contribution to the development of friendly relations between nations and strengthening Ukraine's international prestige."

"Ladies and gentlemen," Mr. Rabynovych exclaimed, "I love Ukraine. This is my fatherland!" He also loves President Kuchma, and his affections have long been requited - to the extent that he even tried to sink Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council Volodymyr Horbulin (of course, in a fit of jealousy toward the Daddy) on a television channel he controlled. Then, when tempers cooled, he was denied access to the royal person whom he could adore only from a distance through his business partner Boris Berezovsky and by heaping fulsome praise on his beloved on the pages of his Stolichnye novosti.

All this seems not to have helped. Or did it? In the long run, it is a stroke of luck to leave without hindrance a country, where you know you could wind up behind bars. Mr. Rabynovych is said to have been still in Kyiv on the morning of his Judgment Day, and he personally heard the ruling read out to him, according to which he was barred from entering Ukraine. Not by accident was "another Israeli who maintains close ties with Mr. Rabynovych" also allowed to leave, one "suspected of having committed a series of big league murders and attempts Odesa, Kyiv, and Dnipropetrovsk oblast."

And who is covering the tracks? Is there any doubt that what happened is not the result of independent action by the agency under Leonid Derkach but the execution of a political task given by higher-ups? I wonder if all this caused any resentment in alleged "workaholics" Andriy Derkach and Viktor Pinchuk who were linked with Mr. Rabynovych by common views on the world and its actors. A little boy went up to his father and asked, "What's right and wrong?" It would be interesting to know the answer.

One more thing: tell me, if you can, how long and at what length will we be told about the man set packing in order to conceal the truth about others who stay behind.

By Tetiana KOROBOVA, The Day

PS. "I think this report is a mistake or a provocation. In any case, I am ready to stage an extended press conference on June 30 in Kyiv or, if this is not recognized as a mistake, outside Kyiv," Mr. Rabynovych, now abroad, told UNIAR executives.