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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

What Are We Able to Do?

17 November, 1998 - 00:00


Ukrainian-Russian negotiations on possibly paying off part of Ukraine's
gas debts in foodstuffs lasted a long time, speeding up noticeably after
the August 17 Russian crash, and finally ended supposedly in oral agreement
on Ukraine's supplying $1 billion worth of foodstuffs to its northern neighbor.
No actual documents to this effect were signed, and the Russian government
is claiming that nothing has yet been determined on who will buy what and
at what prices in Ukraine.

Russian-US talks on Washington's offer of food assistance to Moscow
were also difficult. It was even announced that they still had accomplished
nothing. Yet, immediately after they ended an agreement was signed, which
clearly says what kind of loans, for how long, on what conditions, and
for what particular purchases the US is giving Russia. The first thing
coming to mind is that we do not know how to negotiate and persuade. We
do not know how to apply pressure the way both Russian and American diplomatic
heavy hitters do. We only know how to arrange friendly sit-downs over a
glass of vodka, resulting in no concrete actions (like the recent much-advertised
action in Kharkiv) and count on some political decisions that nobody will
ever implement, just like it was with the free trade agreement with Russia,
with our pipes for Gasprom, and our sugar. We know how to lose markets,
like we lost the markets for our sugar, grain, and shipbuilding. We know
how to complain about losses incurred from breakdowns of commercial and
technological ties, as if we had been forced to do it under the machine
gun. As a result, we are losing to the Americans (thank God, there may
still be some place for our products there now). We are losing our main
bases - Germany is now ahead of us in terms of trade volume with Russia.
We are not finding new markets because, according to the statistics, the
reduction of our foreign trade volume is over 13%.

European Commission representatives assure us that the disputes on canceling
Ukrainian export quotas are of theoretical nature since even the existing,
somewhat discriminatory quotas are not fulfilled in practice. As a result,
we are unable to prove to anyone that we are indeed a powerful, technologically
developed country with good economic grounds for meeting European Union
accession requirements (something Ukrainian diplomatic circles work so
hard on) and that, after all, our opinion should also be respected. We
are simply being pushed out of markets, which are admitting more energetic
and capable players.

On the success of tiny Lithuania President Kuchma said rather desperately,
"nobody is going to cross themselves here until they are struck by lightning."
It looks like he was right: while last year was a year of diplomatic victories,
this year can rightfully be called a year of lost opportunities and defeats
in markets and oil transport routes. As the song has it, "such people do
not make astronauts," that is, they do not make it into the club of the
affluent.

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