WHO STOLE AND WHO HELPED?

“The Lazarenko case is just one chapter in a book called Leonid Kuchma,” People's Deputy Oleksandr Yeliashkevych once said (and so did others). The President contributed another page to this book last week. Meeting with the electorate in Konotop (Sumy oblast), he declared that Ukrainian law enforcement authorities are in possession of information saying that Pavlo Lazarenko holds a 33% interest in a firm registered in one of Great Britain's offshore colonies, reports Interfax Ukraine.

On hearing this, one of the voters demanded that the President return to Ukraine the $72 million owned by Lazarenko and use this money to pay back pensions. To this Mr. Kuchma replied that the actual amount (i.e., money owned by Pavlo Lazarenko — Ed. ] differs drastically from the one cited. He further reminded those present that the prosecutor's office made public information to the effect that Pavlo Lazarenko remitted some $200 million to foreign bank accounts. And this was not all, the President assured the audience. “Considering that he bought a villa worth almost $7 million from a US movie star, compared to Bill Clinton's house that cost him $1 million, one can figure how much he must really have,” our President stated indignantly.

The existence of so much money is denied by Lazarenko's right hand man, Volodymyr Takhtai, deputy chairman of Hromada. In a telephone interview with a Center for Journalistic Research reporter, he pointed out that media stories about Lazarenko's money-laundering activities “do not reflect reality.” “I do not trust Anserme (the Swiss investigating officer handling the Lazarenko case — Ed .). All the information about Lazarenko in the media is ordered from above and is absurd,” he stressed.

One can easily understand the outraged electorate. As for the President's indignation, that is a different story. After all, it was before his very eyes that the Premier he had himself appointed managed to transfer his alleged $200 million abroad, which is yet another reason to wonder about the chief executive's professional capacity. Either he had no idea about what was actually going on in Ukraine, or there were reasons why he could do nothing about the Premier. If the latter is true, his complaining about law enforcement being unable to arrest Pavlo Lazarenko because “he was immune from every standpoint” sounds a bit dubious. The main question, however, remains why Pavlo Lazarenko was immune from the President's standpoint. Most likely this can be answered only by Pavlo Lazarenko, if and when Parliament grants his request to delete the arrest clause from the resolution in his case so that he can face Ukrainian justice.