President Obama to welcome Ukrainian PM, in affront to Russia

http://www.france24.com/

US President Barack Obama welcomes Ukraine’s interim prime minister at the White House on Wednesday, a high-profile diplomatic gesture aimed at emphasising Western recognition of Ukraine’s fledgling government.

Prime Minister Arseny Yatseniuk will be greeted at the White House with all of the grandeur of a state visit, including an Oval Office meeting with Obama. The two men are expected to make comments to the media following their discussions. White House spokesman Jay Carney said Yatseniuk’s visit is meant to signal “that we strongly support Ukraine, the Ukrainian people and the legitimacy of the new Ukrainian government”. Ukraine’s parliament installed Yatseniuk as head of the country’s interim leadership after pro-Kremlin president Viktor Yanukovich fled the capital Kiev following three months of popular protests against his decision to reject an economic agreement with the European Union in favour of pursuing closer ties with Moscow. Vice President Joe Biden, who has served as a primary administration contact with Ukraine’s old and new governments, will also attend the meeting. Secretary of State John Kerry, who met with Yatseniuk in Kiev last week, is expected to have a separate meeting with the prime minister. Yatseniuk will, above all, be seeking financial assistance when he arrives in Washington to help Ukraine defend itself against Russia, which he has described as being “armed to the teeth”. The United States has so far promised Ukraine $1 billion in loan guarantees, as well as technical support as it moves towards elections. The European Union has pledged $15 billion in assistance to Ukraine, though that falls well short of the $35 billion in international rescue loans that Kiev says it will need over the next two years. Ukraine’s acting president, Oleksandr Turchynov, said Tuesday that Russian leaders were “rejecting a diplomatic solution” by rebuffing dialogue with their Ukrainian counterparts.

"They are refusing all contact at foreign ministry and top government levels," he told AFP.

He told the parliament in Kiev that he wanted the United States and Britain, as guarantors of a 1994 treaty that saw Ukraine give up its Soviet-era nuclear weapons, to intervene to fend off Russian "military aggression". "The US and the European Union must force Russia to stop this military aggression and these provocations against Ukraine," Turchynov said. But despite NATO air patrols of the Polish and Romanian borders, and US naval forces preparing for exercises in the Black Sea, the West has made clear that – as when Russia annexed parts of Georgia in 2008 – it has no intention of risking a military conflict with Moscow over Ukraine.

An ‘illegitimate’ referendum

Yatseniuk’s talks with the Obama administration come as the largely Russian-speaking region of Crimea prepares for a referendum Sunday on whether to become a part of Russia or remain a semi-autonomous enclave of Ukraine.

Russia sent troops to occupy the enclave last week after Ukraine’s pro-Kremlin government was ousted. Russian President Vladimir Putin has so far ignored threats from the West to impose visa bans, economic sanctions and halt an international economic summit Russia is scheduled to host in June. The United States and Europe have declared the Crimea referendum illegitimate, saying that Ukraine’s central government must be involved in decisions about its territory. But Russia does not recognise Ukraine’s new government, nor the presidential elections Ukraine has planned for May. Yanukovich, for his part, declared in a televised appearance Tuesday that he remained Ukraine’s rightful ruler. Crimea’s parliament declared the same day that if the public votes to become part of Russia, the peninsula will declare itself independent and seek to become a Russian state. The Russian parliament has already approved the accession, in principle, of Crimea, which was given to Ukraine by Soviet rulers nearly 60 years ago. A poll released this week showed that two-thirds of Russians support the Kremlin's moves in Crimea. But it is not clear whether or how soon Russia would formalise an annexation as it remains engaged in a complex confrontation with the West over the Black Sea territory.