The meeting was attended by the delegation of the NATO PA members, members of the Permanent Delegation of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine to NATO PA, people’s deputies of Ukraine, ministries and departments representatives, and public figures.
When opening the meeting, Co-Chairman of the Ukraine-NATO Interparliamentary Council, Deputy Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine Ruslan Koshulynskyi stated that cooperation between Ukrainian and European parliamentarians is being renewed after a while. He reminded that its basic tool has for six years been the Ukraine-NATO National Programme, the lion's share of which concerns civil and not military part. “The Programme’s principles stipulate such internal tasks of Ukraine as: strengthening of democratic institutes, protection of person’s freedoms and rights, fight against corruption, fight against financial crimes, which now is a quite acute issue for Ukraine,” he stressed.
R.Koshulynskyi also congratulated members of the Interparliamentary Council with the 10th establishment anniversary and called participants of the meeting to a fruitful dialogue.
Co-Chairman of the Interparliamentary Council – Chairman of the NATO PA Hugh Bayley claimed that this is the first meeting since July 2012. “The latest dramatic developments in Ukraine have moved us all deeply. After over twenty years of independence, the Ukrainian people are still choosing their future. Unfortunately, this process is painful, sometimes even violent. I would not want to call you to choose between the East and the West, it should be rather a choice between the past and the future,” he stressed.
Hugh Bayley also noted that Ukrainian people, its representatives from different political parties, and the government have clearly said that the future of Ukraine is in Europe.
The Chairman of the NATO PA claimed that the European community is ready to support any leaders who are ready to lead Ukrainian people to a better future, “We, in the Assembly, believe in a dialogue, because absence of a dialogue leads to confrontation, even to hostility, intensifies polarity and division in the society. Absence of a dialogue is the main factor underlying the crisis in Ukraine,” stressed Hugh Bayley.
The Co-Chairman of the Interparliamentary Council also stated that using force and derogation of peaceful protestors in settling this crisis is absolutely unacceptable. “We call the President and the Government to conduct investigation of these events and bring to responsibility those who has broken basic principles of freedom of assembly and freedom of speech,” he claimed.
According to Hugh Bayley, “the crisis is not yet resolved and possibility of the worst scenario has not disappeared, but there are positive features: the Ukrainian Parliament cancelled some laws and voted for the amnesty.”
The Co-Chairman of the Interparliamentary Council expressed his hope that representatives of the government and the society would come to an understanding, find a compromise in order for the country to follow a normal democratic way.
Hugh Bayley noted that European parliamentarians will be meeting with leading participants of the political crisis, amd they also will be considering Ukraine-NATO relations. “At the interparliamentary level, Ukraine-NATO cooperation is complex and productive, in this regard, the Ukraine-NATO Interparliamentary Council is a great forum for exchanging thoughts regarding priorities and further development of our cooperation,” he stressed.
Chairman of the Committee of the Verkhovna Rada on European Integration Hryhorii Nemyria said that Ukraine is in the middle of a crisis, the biggest crisis in the contemporary Ukrainian history. “Crisis is not only political, it is gaining features of a social revolt, the reason of which is not only an unsatisfactory work of governmental institutes,” he stressed.
H.Nemyria noted that Ukraine has a reputation of a reliable partner of the Alliance. “Although, this reputation can be at risk, as the partner can not be reliable when its governance system does not function – people come out to the streets and for the first time in history of Ukraine peaceful people die,” he claimed.
The Chairman of the Committee of the Verkhovna Rada also stressed that the political crisis is unprecedented, thus, it requires an unprecedented resolving. According to him, to settle the crisis it is necessary not to use any violence, also measures aimed at strengthening the trust are needed. In his opinion, the Government should make the first step forward.
H.Nemyria thinks that after cancellation of “draconian” laws, release of political prisoners, creation of political instrument, which could ensure a system of redistribution of powers in the country, change of electoral legislation and calling early elections are particularly important.
Chairman of the Permanent Delegation of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine to NATO PA Volodymyr Oliinyk claimed that the Verkhovna Rada appreciates cooperation with NATO in all directions, and also appreciates all pieces of advice. At the same time, he noted that cooperation should be based on European standards, and on avoidance of double standards in approaches and estimations. “When we are told that it is necessary to reform economy, legal system of the country and we are given assistance, we appreciate this. However, it is unlikely that you would appreciate a direct interference into internal affairs of Ukraine or any other European country, particularly, regarding forming the government. Unfortunately, we should state that lately such attempts of interference have happened. We are strongly against such interference on the part of the EU, the USA or Russia,” he stressed.
V.Oliinyk noted that reasons for political crisis in Ukraine are considerably deeper that it has been known about. According to him, there has been nothing reformed or changed in Ukraine for 22 years. “People have come out to the Maidan not for the opposition, people have come out not even for the European vector, they have come out for changes that would correspond to European standards,” the people’s deputy stressed.
Chairman of the Permanent Delegation also claimed that “not reformed Ukraine, particularly in the social dimension, has come to the Maidan and demands changes, not reloading of surnames but significant changes.”
V.Oliinyk stated the considerable distrust both to the opposition and the government. According to him, it is necessary to make everything to move towards each other. “We support every citizen’s constitutional right to peaceful assembly and freedom of speech, but we need to dissociate ourselves from attempts of settling problems in Ukraine in an extremist manner,” he said.
V.Oliinyk supported his colleagues in their opinions on the necessity to stop attempts connected with violent ways of settling all issues, i.e. introducing a moratorium. “Even re-elections will give us the same government, just the other faces. Seven times the Ukrainians have chosen the Parliament and for seven times we have not been happy. We will not do without a valuable constitutional reform. We should not return to anything, returning to something will not help. There are reasonable suggestions of the Constitutional Assembly which can become a basis of the constitutional reform,” he said.
Chairman of the Permanent Delegation thinks that the next step can be a change in the mechanism of appointing and dismissing judges. According to him, Ukrainian society should participate in settling some separate issues of overcoming the political crisis. “We favour re-consideration of the law on referendum, we are ready to return to the issue on the Central Election Commission. Obviously, we advocate calling re-elections then and by new rules that should be changed in a legitimate way. The crisis should give a serious signal to the government to fight against corruption, fight for equal competitive conditions in the economy to finally stop destroying small and medium business, and all issues of justice that are connected with judicial power should be settled,” concluded V.Oliinyk.
European parliamentarians in their speeches claimed that they came here to see and hear more, and not to moralize. They said they also have conflicts in their countries connected with redistribution of power, as well as other problems requiring dialogue and cooperation of different branches of power.
Members of the NATO parliamentary delegation stressed that they are interested in underlying causes of Ukrainian political crisis, since they have not been considered or discussed enough. This can give a clear answer and help establish necessary steps for overcoming the crisis.
Participants of the meeting emphasized that Ukraine’s fate is important for them and they are ready to discuss this situation as friends without teaching anybody any lessons. According to them, it is urgent to jointly look for ways of overcoming this situation.
Members of the NATO parliamentary delegation will participate in other events where they will particularly consider political, military and defense aspects of fulfilling the Annual National Programme Ukraine-NATO for 2013, etc.