UKRAINE/BELARUS: PLANNING A POSSIBLE PRESIDENTIAL

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 KYIV 004647

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPT ALSO FOR EUR/UMB

E.O. 12958: DECL: 12/22/2016
TAGS: PREL PBTS MNUC PINR BO UP
SUBJECT: UKRAINE/BELARUS: PLANNING A POSSIBLE PRESIDENTIAL
MEETING

REF: A. KIEV 2039

B. KIEV 1444

C. KIEV 1062

D. 05 KIEV 4302

Classified By: The Ambassador for reasons 1.4(b,d)


1. (C) Summary/comment: According to the MFA, Ukrainian
Presidential Secretariat Chief of Staff Baloha's December 14
visit to Minsk was intended to maintain momentum toward a
possible meeting between the Ukrainian and Belarusan
presidents in the February-March 2007 timeframe. The
meeting, if it occurs, would take place in the
Ukraine-Belarus border region near Chornobyl, confirming DFM
Veselovskiy's comment to us that there were no plans for "a
major bilateral state visit." In exchange for the meeting,
Ukraine hopes to obtain an agreement to facilitate the
transfer of workers across a strip of Belarusan territory as
they commute from Slavutych to the Chornobyl nuclear power
plant. The MFA official cited the cost savings from an
agreement and the growing importance of trade with Belarus,
with trade turn-over reaching U.S. $2 billion and growing.
The renewed impetus to hold the meeting reflects the
Ukrainian government's emphasis on economic and trade factors
rather than a reversal of foreign policy views vis-a-vis the
government in Minsk. End summary/comment.

An Uptick in Contacts
--------------


2. (U) A range of Ukrainian and Belarusan officials have
recently met, generally in a Commonwealth of Independent
States (CIS) context, after a period of minimal contact.
According to the Ukrainian Presidential press service,
Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko, Belarusan President
Aleksandr Lukashenko, and Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev
met on the margins of the November 28 CIS heads of state
summit in Minsk and agreed to create a working group of the
three countries' ministers of economy to consider
transportation of Caspian petroleum to Europe. Earlier,
Prime Minister Yanukovych met with his Belarusan counterpart,
Prime Minister Sergey Sidorsky, and Lukashenko during the
November 24 CIS heads of government summit in Minsk. On
November 23, Ukrainian Defense Minister Hrytsenko and
Belarusan Defense Minister Leonid Maltsev signed a memorandum
for military cooperation in 2007 in Brest, Belarus, on the
margins of the CIS Defense Ministers' council.


3. (U) There was also a recent trilateral meeting involving
Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia. New Ukrainian Interior
Minister Vasily Tsushko met December 7 with his Russian and
Belarusan counterparts in Minsk to discuss law enforcement
cooperation.

Presidential Administration Meetings
--------------


4. (U) Meetings between Presidential Secretariat Chief of
Staff Viktor Baloha and Belarusan Presidential Administration
head Gennadiy Neviglas, however, have been strictly
bilateral. Neviglas first traveled to Kyiv to meet with
Baloha November 30, then Baloha met with Neviglas in Minsk
December 14. According to press reports, Baloha indicated
that "a new agenda for Ukrainian-Belarusan relations" needed
to be formed on the basis of openness and pragmatism. He
also said Ukraine was ready to cooperate with Belarus to
strengthen both countries' energy security. One news article
implied that Baloha's meeting with Neviglas had been prompted
by Yushchenko's November 28 meeting in Minsk. Both sides
were planning to hold a Yushchenko-Lukashenko meeting
sometime in February or March of 2007.

A New Opening?
--------------


5. (C) When asked whether the Baloha meetings were intended
to pave the way for a policy change and a major state visit,
DFM Veselovskiy told us that the Ukrainian focus was on
border issues. There was no plan to change Ukrainian policy
toward Belarus. MFA Desk officer for Belarus Ihor Kavetski
echoed Veselovskiy's comments, noting that Ukraine had two
primary items on its agenda with Belarus: ratification of the
Ukraine-Belarus border demarcation agreement and facilitation
of workers' transit across Belarus territory from the town of
Slavutych to Chornobyl. Ukrainian officials believe that
they need to engage Lukashenko to obtain Belarusan
cooperation on the two issues and now see an opening.
Belarus was locked in contentious negotiations with Russia on

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gas supply arrangements and Lukashenko appears to be seeking
reinforcements against Russia. In particular (during a
November 23 interview with representatives of 30 Ukrainian
media outlets),Lukashenko had suggested that a
Ukraine-Belarus union state might be preferable to one with
Russia and that Ukraine and Belarus might coordinate their
gas-supply and transit negotiations with Russia.


6. (C) In Kavetski's view, the border agreement took second
place to arrangements to facilitate transit of Chornobyl
workers. The current set-up, in which some workers are
required to make a lengthy detour around Belarusan territory,
was costly, and would get even more costly once the Chornobyl
workforce ramped up to build a new shelter over the existing
Chornobyl sarcophagus. (Note: Even if existing pre-contract
negotiations with the French consortium proceed as planned,
actual construction would take at least a year to start,
although the workforce could begin to increase in the run-up
to actual construction. An agreement with Belarus might also
include provisions to facilitate transfer of equipment and
construction material from the customs warehouse in Slavutych
across the Belarusan border.) If Minsk agreed to facilitate
the worker transit, then Yushchenko could agree to meet with
Lukashenko. As with previous plans, the meeting would be a
low-profile event near the Ukraine-Belarus border around
Chornobyl.


7. (C) Ukraine was also prepared to act as a mediator between
Belarus and "international society," according to Kavetski
(note: presumably along the lines of former Ukrainian
National Security and Defense Council Secretary Anatoliy
Kinakh's sponsoring of a trilateral meeting with his Polish
and Belarusan counterparts to ease Polish-Belarusan tensions,
ref E). Nevyglas had agreed in principle to hold the
presidential meeting in the proposed timeframe and so the
actual details would be worked out through "diplomatic
channels." Kavetski added Baloha had been scheduled to meet
with Lukashenko, but the Belarusan president canceled at the
last minute in order to fly to Moscow for a meeting with
Russian President Putin on gas supply arrangements.


8. (C) Kavetski claimed not to know anything about the
details of Ukrainian energy agreements with Belarus, except
to note that the Ukrainian Ministry of Energy had recently
signed a contract specifying the price for electricity that
Ukraine would supply to Belarus. He repeated a statistic
carried in media stories of Baloha's visit that
Ukraine-Belarus trade turn-over was approaching U.S. $2
billion per year, and growing.

The Earlier Failed Attempt
--------------


9. (C) Note: As reported reftels, the Ukrainian MFA tried
once before to set up a Yushchenko-Lukashenko meeting along
the same lines in conjunction with the April 26, 2006, 20th
anniversary of the Chornobyl disaster. The earlier attempt
foundered, however, due to the Belarusan government's
egregious violations during the March 19 Belarusan
presidential election, including detentions and arrests of
Ukrainian citizens and impeding the movements of Ukrainian
journalists. In ref C, MFA 2nd Territorial Department
Director Andriy Ponomarenko said that, in addition to a
Belarusan commitment in writing to simplify the transit
arrangements, the Ukrainian government was considering
pressing for a Belarusan commitment to improve the domestic
political climate. Ponomarenko noted another possible
condition might be the opening of a Ukrainian cultural center
in Minsk (to which the Belarusan government subsequently
agreed).


10. (U) Visit Embassy Kyiv's classified website:
www.state.sgov.gov/p/eur/kiev.
Taylor