UKRAINE: BAPTISTS CAUGHT IN MIDDLE OF RADA

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 KIEV 001663 SIPDIS SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 04/27/2016 TAGS: PHUM PGOV PINR SOCI SCUL UP SUBJECT: UKRAINE: BAPTISTS CAUGHT IN MIDDLE OF RADA COALITION FORMATION STRUGGLE? REF: A. KIEV 1587 ¶B. KIEV 1531 Classified By: Ambassador for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d). Summary -------------- ¶1. (C) In an April 27 meeting with Ambassador, the longtime head of the All-Ukraine Baptist Union, Gregoriy Komendant, asked for help in stopping the Prosecutor General's Office from seizing the Union's downtown Kiev headquarters building. Beginning in November 2005, the PGO has accused the Union, and Komendant personally, of "wrongfully acquiring" the facility, which the Baptists have documents showing they legally own and have used since Soviet times. Komendant characterized the PGO charges as "absurd." Komendant said he could not rule out the possibility that the Union's difficulties were linked to Ukraine's contentious political infighting, including the ongoing post-election parliamentary majority coalition formation process. He acknowledged that this move by Prosecutor General Medvedko (a crony of presidential Our Ukraine insider and Tymoshenko rival Petro Poroshenko) to seize the Union's headquarters was quite possibly an attempt to put pressure on Tymoshenko lieutenant Oleksandr Turchynov, a prominent Baptist minister and key player in the coalition talks. End summary. Baptist Union Leader: Help! -------------- ¶2. (SBU) The longtime President of the All-Ukraine Baptist Union, Gregoriy Komendant, called on Ambassador April 27 to ask for assistance in fending off a stepped-up effort by the Prosecutor General's Office (PGO) to seize the Union's downtown Kiev headquarters building. Komendant related that the PGO had opened a criminal case against him for allegedly "wrongfully acquiring the headquarters building...by means of misusing an official position." Komendant said the charge was absurd; the Union, the largest Baptist organization in Europe, had occupied its headquarters building since Soviet times and legally owned the property. Yushchenko Promises To Help, But No Sign That He Has -------------- -------------- ¶3. (C) Komendant related that several weeks earlier he had spoken with President Yushchenko about what the PGO was doing and had given Yushchenko a packet of Union documents about the case. Yushchenko had asked Komendant "for three of four days" to resolve the issue. An exasperated Komendant, noting that it was now late April, averred that Yushchenko had "done nothing." Pressuring Turchynov -------------- ¶4. (C) In a letter that he gave Ambassador, Komendant wrote that "we do no know who ordered this attack...or whether it is due to religious prejudice, political motivation or a corrupt attempt to steal a tiny plot of land in central Kiev without offering to pay fair market or replacement value. Whatever the cause...it is a contemptible abuse of government power." In response to a question from Ambassador, Komendant said he could not rule out the possibility that Prosecutor General Oleksandr Medvedko, a crony of Our Ukraine insider and Tymoshenko rival Petro Poroshenko, was attempting to seize the Union's headquarters to put pressure on Tymoshenko lieutenant Oleksandr Turchynov, a prominent Baptist minister and key player in the bruising coalition formation talks (ref A). According to press reports, Turchynov remains hospitalized in Kiev with hepatitis. Comment: Collateral Damage -------------- ¶5. (C) Like the PGO's arrest warrant for Turchynov (ref B), it is quite possible that Petro Poroshenko is behind the Baptist Union's current difficulties, which only began after the September 2005 Yushchenko-Tymoshenko split, in which Poroshenko and Turchynov were key players. If so, this incident further highlights the lengths to which Poroshenko will go in his rivalry with Tymoshenko, who, along with Turchynov, publicly tarred him as corrupt during the September 2005 struggle that led to Tymoshenko's ouster as prime minister and Poroshenko's resignation as National Security and Defense Council Secretary. ¶6. (SBU) Ambassador promised to raise this property dispute with the Prosecutor General. KIEV 00001663 002 OF 002 ¶7. (U) Visit Embassy Kiev's classified website at www.state.sgov.gov/p/eur/kiev. Herbst