UKRAINE: AMBASSADOR'S FAREWELL CALL ON EX-PM

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 KIEV 001996

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/24/2016
TAGS: PGOV PINR SOCI UP
SUBJECT: UKRAINE: AMBASSADOR'S FAREWELL CALL ON EX-PM
YANUKOVYCH


Classified By: Ambassador for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d).

Summary
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1. (C) During Ambassador's May 23 farewell call, Party of
Regions chief Viktor Yanukovych said he bore Ambassador "no
ill will" over the events of the Orange Revolution,
commenting that the two had "worked well together."
Yanukovych spoke in great detail about his "problems with the
law," explaining that he had been imprisoned twice on false
charges stemming from a property dispute with an alcoholic
police officer neighbor. The former prime minister related
that it took four years after his final release from prison,
and the intervention of Donetsk-born Soviet Cosmonaut/Supreme
Soviet member Georgi Beregovoy, to officially clear his name.
Reflecting on the 2004 presidential election campaign,
Yanukovych asserted that he had never really been "Kuchma's
man." Yanukovych described a contentious relationship with
Kuchma, and lamented that he should have resigned as prime
minister in April 2004 to focus solely on his presidential
bid. On current politics, Yanukovych boasted that he had
enough votes to block the formation of an Orange coalition
with Yuliya Tymoshenko as prime minister; President
Yushchenko's only real option was to cut a deal with Regions.
Yanukovych claimed that he and Yushchenko had a gentlemen's
agreement to work together to defeat Tymoshenko's expected
bid for the presidency in 2009. End summary.

No Hard Feelings
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2. (SBU) Ambassador paid a farewell call May 23 on Party of
Regions head Viktor Yanukovych. The former prime minister,
the 2004 presidential election/Orange Revolution loser,
commented that he "bore no ill will" toward Ambassador and
had "worked well together" with him.

Criminal Record: Setting Things Straight?
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3. (C) Yanukovych described what he called his "problems with
the law." Yanukovych had been very poor as a child, living
in a village with his grandmother until she died and then in
an orphanage until he turned 17; he had left the orphanage
"with a lot of money" as he had learned to "play cards well."
Yanukovych had returned to his grandmother's small house,
which he inherited, to renovate it and work the land, but had
immediately butted heads with an alcoholic neighbor, a police
officer, who had illegally taken over part of the Yanukovych
family spread. Yanukovych told the cop to get off his land;
in retaliation, the cop fabricated a criminal case against
him, and Yanukovych went to jail. After his release,
Yanukovych again asserted his right to his grandmother's
property, which prompted the cop to fabricate another
criminal case. Yanukovych said he was given no time to
prepare for his second trial and was actually informed of his
trial date as he was preparing to propose to his wife. The
trial last a cursory 45 minutes, after which he was again
sentenced to jail.


4. (C) Outraged about being railroaded a second time,
Yanukovych said that he became a difficult charge for his
jailers, refusing to eat prison food and subsisting only on
food packages sent to him by others. Yanukovych was punished
for his intransigence by being put in isolation 14 times, for
stints of 7 to 40 days. After being released from prison,
Yanukovych said it took him four years to get the local
courts to overturn his convictions and officially clear his
name -- something, he stressed, that rarely happened in
Soviet times. Yanukovych credited Donetsk-born Soviet
Cosmonaut Georgi Beregovoy, a longtime Donbas representative
in the Supreme Soviet, for taking an interest in his case and
getting him exonerated.

Never Really Kuchma's Man
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5. (C) Reflecting on the tumultuous 2004 presidential
election, Yanukovych claimed that he "never really was
Kuchma's man." Then President Kuchma had only tapped him to
serve as prime minister because he needed the support of
Donetsk clan politicians, and had actually tried to engineer
Yanukovych's ouster with a rigged Rada vote in April 2003 --
a blow that Yanukovych parried with the aid of
then-opposition leaders Yushchenko, Tymoshenko, and Moroz.
Yanukovych said his relationship with Kuchma worsened in
early 2004, when he suggested that the deeply unpopular
Kuchma distance himself from the Yanukovych presidential
campaign. Yanukovych said that, in retrospect, he should
have resigned as prime minister in April 2004 and hit the

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campaign trail; not resigning, he lamented, had been a "fatal
mistake." Kuchma had persuaded influential figures from the
Party of Regions (including Rinat Akhmetov) that Yanukovych
should stay on as PM. Yanukovych accepted the advice of his
party members and ran as "Kuchma's man."

Orange-Blue Coalition Means Stability
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6. (C) Shifting to the ongoing talks to form a Rada majority
coalition, Yanukovych argued that President Yushchenko should
cut a deal with the Party of Regions; only an "Orange-Blue"
coalition would be stable. Yanukovych claimed he had the
votes needed to block Yuliya Tymoshenko from again serving as
prime minister. Ticking off specific numbers, Yanukovych
asserted that 40 Our Ukraine MPs, 25 Tymoshenko Bloc MPs, and
5-6 Socialist MPs would vote with Regions and the Communists
against Tymoshenko. There were enough votes, he emphasized,
to block the formation of an Orange coalition with Tymoshenko
as prime minister. That left one real option for Yushchenko:
make a deal with Regions. Yanukovych claimed that he and
Yushchenko had a gentlemen's agreement with regard to the
2009 presidential election. The two would conduct polls in
2009 to see who stood the better chance of beating
Tymoshenko; if Yushchenko had the higher numbers, Yanukovych
would support him -- and vice-versa.
Herbst