Regions Lukewarm On Ex-PM Overseas Trip

KIEV, Ukraine -- President Viktor Yanukovych’s Regions Party is lukewarm to approving legislation that would allow jailed opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko to receive medical treatment abroad, a senior party official said Thursday. Without the support of the Regions Party, the bill, recently submitted to Parliament by an independent lawmaker, will fail and the government will most likely continue to face political pressure from the European Union. Oleksandr Yefremov, the leader of the Regions Party in Parliament, said his allies will not back the bill because it has been tailored to fit only “one person.” He said the party would back the bill only in case of a serious medical emergency. “Today, we do not have such a problem,’ Yefremov told reporters. The comment dashed hopes of opposition lawmakers that the authorities – responding to the pressure from the EU - may have decided to let Tymoshenko leave Ukraine for medical treatment in Germany. The hopes were fueled earlier this week after a key committee in Parliament – unusually quickly - had given its green light to the bill, which was immediately put into agenda by Parliamentary Speaker Volodymyr Lytvyn The EU has condemned the sentencing of Tymoshenko to seven years in prison last October as politically motivated. Tymoshenko, who was found guilty of abusing her powers as prime minister in forcing through a 2009 gas deal with Russia, has denied any wrongdoing and said Yanukovych was pursuing a personal vendetta against her. The European Union has urged Tymoshenko's release and warned Ukraine its 27 members would otherwise refuse to ratify landmark agreements on political association and free trade with Kiev. EU leaders also warned about the possible boycott of next month’s Euro 2012 soccer matches in Ukraine. EU commissioners have said they will not attend games in Ukraine, and several EU leaders are considering similar action in protest of Kiev’s treatment of Tymoshenko. The bill was prepared by Taras Chornovil, an independent lawmaker, and is supported by opposition groups. Valeria Lutkovska, a Yanukovych ally who was recently appointed as Ukraine’s human rights envoy, said sending Tymoshenko for treatment overseas would violate the constitution. “The problem with the constitution emerges,” Lutkovska said. Later in the day, Lutkovska explained that relocation of a Ukrainian prisoner for treatment overseas would also require an agreement between Ukraine and the government of a country that has agreed to treat the prisoner. Senior officials from Germany and Ukraine have been over the past month discussing the possibility of relocating Tymoshenko for treatment to a German hospital Charite, people familiar with the issue have said. Meanwhile, Yefremov, underscoring his skepticism over the bill, said that an entire detention facility in Sevastopol has recently asked to be relocated to Germany for medical treatment. “You know, I think in Sevastopol, the entire detention facility has asked to be treated in Charite of Germany,” Yefremov said. “So, if any country gives us an opportunity and treats 300,000 people that are currently kept in detention facilities, I think we would be ready to consider such a bill.”

Opinion: Who Will Win Ukraine's 'Political Football Match Without Rules'?

KIEV, Ukraine -- If democracy had existed in ancient Egypt, then not a single pyramid would not have been built. All because free people in democratic countries will only agree to build pyramids for good wages, and good wages are incompatible with a luxurious lifestyle of the Pharaohnic family. But if the country has no Pharaoh then it will not cross anybody's mind to build pyramids. If "Ukrainian democracy" had existed in ancient Egypt then the pyramids would not have been built, not only because of a lack of money for salaries but also because of the ordinary theft of half of the funds allocated for their construction. I'm not actually a big proponent of building pyramids. But "Ukrainian democracy", I like it. What is more, it feeds me. Not in the sense that it provides some kind of social security and promises a good retirement. No! With enviable regularity "Ukrainian democracy" feeds me with plots for novels, as well as offering so many potential fictional heroes that no one writer could fit it all in even if he writes two thick novels in a year. Therefore because of a lack of enough lifetime to write hundreds of novels, I have to write some of the real-life stories just like this, in short articles. Ukrainian democracy feeds me with plots for novels and so many potential fictional heroes that no one writer could fit it all in. The presidency of Viktor Yanukovych started in 2010 with a slogan: "We are building a new country". Billboards with the slogan decorated all the country's cities, villages and roads. So, everyone understands that major construction work is starting, which means that smaller signs of the kind that adorn building sites will soon appear, reading: "Sorry for the inconvenience." Anyway the construction boom first started in the capital, Kiev. On the hills overlooking the Dnieper River work began on a presidential helipad and overpass leading to the government quarter in the city. At the same time work began on a helipad near the mountain at the summit of which is buried national Ukrainian poet Taras Shevchenko, a hundred kilometers from Kiev. They said that from now on for the effective use of time of the head of state the president will only go and see the grave of the great poet by helicopter. The helipads having not been completed the country set about building stadiums for Euro 2012 to be held in just a month, new airport terminals in the cities where matches will take place and, of course, set about the repair of the roads on which hundreds of thousands of fans from Western Europe will doubtless travel on when they come to Ukraine. Stadiums seem to have been built and officials from UEFA were very pleased, roads are still under construction but the helipads they just can't manage to sort out. It would be a pity if fans arrive in Kiev or elsewhere in their helicopters and they have nowhere to land. Of course international VIPs might arrive by helicopter to Kiev, Donetsk and Lviv to support their national teams. Yet there is currently a big question mark over the arrival of presidents and prime ministers. They first call for Viktor Yanukovych, or to be exact, the state of Ukraine, to release Yulia Tymoshenko. First for treatment and then completely. But in a normal country the president cannot simply release a person from prison! Wasn't it the judge who put her there and not the president? There was an investigation, there was a trial. The court sentenced her to seven years in prison, but the investigation continues and will soon add one or two other sentences to her first making her a permanent resident of Kachanovskaya female penal colony. Therefore it would make more sense for the heads of state and presidents to send their request directly to the judge Rodion Kireev who announced the verdict, and not to president Yanukovych who does not deal directly with such matters as there are more important things in the state than Tymoshenko. For example the literary process. But more about that a bit later. The paradox of the current political situation is the fact that Yulia Tymoshenko is getting in the way of Viktor Yanukovych from "building a new country". He hoped that while in detention she would not bother him, but as it turned out, while in prison she disturbs him and the building of a new country even more. Hundreds of government officials from former Soviet states and other foreign countries require and request a meeting with her, distracting the "builders of a new country" -- a large and active clan of businessmen representing the eastern regions of Ukraine. And for some reason no one wants to meet Viktor Yanukovych! He organized a summit for heads of state of central and eastern Europe in Yalta and presidents simply refused to come to it in a sign of protest. However it is not all bad. A few days ago the president of Moldova finally arrived to visit President Yanukovych. The Ukrainian president pleased with the respect shown to him by the president of the neighboring country relaxed and talked, which seldom happens to him. He said to the Moldovan president, but loud enough so the whole world heard, that for both Ukraine and Europe it would be useful to take a break from their relationship and to forget about each other for a while. Clearly Europe is tired of Ukraine but president Yanukovych has made it clear that Ukraine is sick of Europe, too. Moreover, neither Russia nor the United States are behaving in a humane way and also call for the release of the above mentioned Yulia Tymoshenko as if she was a common victim of judicial abuse. Vladimir Putin has somehow also forgotten that a criminal case was opened against her in Russia ten years ago and several Russian defense ministry officials were sent to prison involved in the fraud of United Energy Systems of Ukraine, which at that time was overseen by Yulia Tymoshenko. Looking for Ukrainian politicians and officials who have never broken the law is a tedious and thankless task. Among political analysts there is an idea that if you want to put people in jail then you should imprison not just political rivals but all those guilty of something. However, the Minister of Internal Affairs recently announced that among all the people arrested for corruption the majority are members of the ruling party - the Party of Regions - and not the opposition. He immediately added that this is completely logical, as the Party of Regions is the largest in Ukraine and almost all government officials are members of it. Don't think that I am defending someone or standing up for Yulia Timoshenko or Angela Merkel who was also criticized by the Party of Regions for her public statements. I just think that if the Party of Regions would spend five year putting in prison all the corrupt members of the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc, and then, cleansed from corruption, Yulia Tymoshenko would come to power and spend five years imprisoning those corrupt members of the Party of Regions, the situation would clearly improve and the parties themselves would be reduced to a human scale. This would be a big positive. Yes, the country is looking forward to Euro 2012, but this political "football" without rules has been going on in Ukraine for two years already and during this time the two major political parties have simply trampled the "football field", which is Ukraine itself. At the moment it's a one-sided game and it's clear that the ruling party is winning. Meanwhile the president has somehow hidden from public view behind the very high and well-protected fence of his country residence. Near to it a new building with an office for the president was constructed. Strange, but when completed this new building immediately became the property of some Cypriot off-shore company that the government now pays monthly rent to. It means he will only visit his official office in Kiev when absolutely necessary. For example when presidents of western countries come to their senses and stop their boycott of him. Until that moment he may remain alone in his "Cypriot" forest - land of the former state residence "Mezhygorye" that as it turned out now, too, belongs to the Cypriot off-shore company. He is secluding himself, I think, to sit down at a large, multi-volume novel. Indeed in a tax return this year he wrote that he had received an advance of $2 million for not-yet-written literary work. The authors of real best-sellers in Ukraine get no more than $4,000 to $5,000 per book. So count how many best-sellers he will have to write. At least one of these books should be devoted to a woman. That is, to Yulia Tymoshenko. But first there is the question of genre. The novel will probably start as a drama and end up as a black comedy. By the way, ten years ago one of Yulia Tymoshenko's political aides contacted me and asked me to write a novel about her with the title "Kill Yulia". For money of course. The plot, a conspiracy against Yulia Tymoshenko. I refused. But soon three novels were released in Ukraine with a similar plot and one of the books was called "Kill Yulia". She wanted to become a literary heroine and she has become one. She wanted and still wants to be the president of Ukraine. In her life, Yulia Tymoshenko has always achieved what she wanted. By any means. And if Viktor Yanukovych loses his grip on power and doesn't pass it to his heir she will pick it up and then the "black comedy" will continue and become both "horror" and "action".

Tymoshenko Daughter To US Congress: Don't Abandon Us

KIEV, Ukraine -- The daughter of Ukraine's detained former prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko told US lawmakers Thursday she still feared for her mother's life, and implored them to "keep the pressure" on Kiev to help free political dissidents.
Speaking via live video link from Kiev to a House of Representatives hearing in Washington, Yevgenia Tymoshenko also warned that Ukraine's powerful current rulers will do "anything possible" to manipulate results of the country's upcoming October election.

"I am very afraid for my mother's life now in the hospital," where she is surrounded by medical personnel who are under intense pressure from the regime, Yevgenia told the so-called Helsinki Commission on security and cooperation in Europe.

The opposition leader has been struggling with medical problems and complained over rough handling by her guards.

She briefly went on a hunger strike to protest her detention.

"We are just asking you please to keep the pressure on," Yevgenia said.

"Please don't leave us alone, because in Ukraine there's not enough power in people, not strong enough to fight against this injustice."

Tymoshenko has been imprisoned since August, when she was given a seven-year sentence for abuse of power.

The case has drawn international outrage with observers saying her prosecution was politically motivated.

President Viktor Yanukovych said Tymoshenko and 13 former senior officials from her government had been accused of various crimes.

Yevgenia said a Ukrainian court recently delayed hearing her mother's prison sentence appeal, so her lawyer was now presenting the case to the European Court of Human Rights.

"Those who have been imprisoned absolutely must be released," said Republican Chris Smith, the commission's chairman and a fierce human rights defender.

He told Yevgenia that he was hoping to soon bring a congressional delegation to Kiev, and that he was expecting the United Nations to "robustly" weigh in on Tymoshenko's detention.

The former premier recently had a chance to speak with US officials, her daughter said.

"My mother outlined the critical situation that she is in, legally, politically, medically and in a humanitarian way," Yevgenia said.

She added that her mother had strong worries about the upcoming election.

"The regime has accumulated so much financial power via different schemes (and) they will use this financial resource to do anything possible to falsify the elections," she said.

Also testifying at the hearing was David Kramer, president of democracy advocacy group Freedom House, who led a delegation to Ukraine last month and met with Yanukovych and other officials.

Kramer said the October polls will be "a critical test" of Ukraine's ability to conduct elections which meet the criteria of international monitors.

Extending broadband’s reach in Russia

Rosnano, the state technology fund, has invested in Silicon Valley firm NeoPhotonics in a move to develop broadband Internet capacity in Russia. Tim Jenks, NeoPhotonics’ founder and CEO, said he had been watching the pace of development of the Russian and Eastern European broadband markets for several years. “Not only are these markets deploying high-speed, agile and fiberoptic networks, but also we are seeing more of our customers target service providers and invest locally in Russia and more broadly in Eastern Europe,” he said, Rosnano’s web site reported. Analysts agreed that the potential for rapid growth exists, not only domestically, but also in the use of the country’s territory as a transit region for signals between Europe and Asia. They cautioned, however, that climate and distance could pose problems for construction of an international signal network, as could Rosnano’s poor record of maintaining projects that were not immediately profitable. Rosnano paid $39.8 million in cash, 17 percent of its capital, to acquire newly issued common stock in NeoPhotonics, which designs and manufactures photonic integrated circuits, or PICs. PICs increase the functionality, agility and, most of all, speed of bandwidth-intensive networks, from 10 gigabits per second to 100. NeoPhotonics’ own PICs can also adjust bandwidth more easily for volatile traffic. Jenks founded NeoPhotonics in 1996, later inventing the PICs, which work without converting signals from light. “Essentially, light goes into the chip, is manipulated by the chip, and all the networks that provide voice, network data and video are really optical,” he said in an interview to the web TV channel SNNLive. “Keeping the light in the light domain is what our chips do.” Rosnano and NeoPhotonics announced the deal on April 30, when both companies published their investment communiques. Sergei Polikarpov, Rosnano’s managing director and now a member of NeoPhotonics’ board, said that his company will support expansion of NeoPhotonics’ market presence in Russia. In particular, Polikarpov said, Rosnano will build a research and development, production, and processing facility in Russia by July 31, 2014. “With our support in Russia, we can further enhance the company’s development cycles and shorten the time for broader adoption for Neo- Photonics’ products in Russia and in the global market,” Polikarpov said. Mikhail Bodyagin, Internet industry analyst at iKS-Consulting, told The Moscow News that Rosnano is trying to catch up with the fast-growing broadband market. According to their latest research, the share of broadband-connected households went up by 6 percent last year, reaching 40 percent penetration among all Internet-equipped residences in Russia, and 22 million Russians have broadband in their homes, of whom 16 percent live in Moscow. Apart from the big cities, however – where broadband providers are competing to increase speeds – there is a big gap in the market, said analyst Ismail Belov of international think tank IDC. Because of Russia’s unique geographical position, it is well-placed to serve as a transit point for broadband signals between Europe and Asia, as well as between the different regions of the country. “A short time ago, 3G was the main hope for broadband to bring such services as high-definition television and telemedicine to far, remote places, but it has since been proven that 3G has serious technical limitations,” Belov said. The 3G signal works poorly over long distances, a significant drawback in a country the size of Russia, so the technology can be used only at the so-called “last mile” proximity to the user. “This literally means that a high-density network of transmitters needs to be installed all over the country’s huge territory, while only voice and SMS exchanges can operate more or less well if the density isn’t achieved,” Belov said. While the market niche and technical elements give positive indications of the investment’s potential, analysts cautioned that financial aspects of broadband expansion should be scrutinized more thoroughly. Belov noted that the volume of the broadband market, including the potential for signal transit across Europe and Asia, could be twice as big as the whole Russian communications market’s current volume. He added, however, that the initial investment would be huge due to climate and distance, as companies would have to build transnational optical lines that would work with PICs, able to transmit hundreds of gigabits of information at one time without loss. “Scale-wise, I would compare such a project with the Baikal- Amur Railway,” he said, the train line extending from the Irkutsk region north of Mongolia to the Pacific coast, whose problematic construction stretched for nearly 60 years from the 1930s. Rosnano’s reputation for supporting projects that have not proven immediately profitable has also come into question. Dow Jones Newswires has reported that Neo- Photonics, which went public in 2011, has seen improving revenues in the past few quarters, but has been slow to turn a profit. In March, Rosnano’s directors closed 13 investment projects that the fund had been jointly supporting, which had been previously approved by the supervisory board of Rosnanotech, Rosnano’s predecessor until it became a joint-stock company in March 2011. Rosnano said that the main reasons for termination of the projects were “refusal of the applicant to carry out the project, usually because of a worsening financial position,” and “irreconcilable disagreement with Rosnano over financial obligations.” For more than half of the projects, the planners reported that they intended to continue with alternative sources of support. The fund emphasized, however, that the cancelled projects represented a minority of its support, 3.1 percent of its approved budgets. As of March of this year, Rosnano had approved 145 projects with budgets totaling 568.6 billion rubles ($19.3 billion), and had contributed a share of 239.8 billion rubles ($8.12 billion).

United Russia proposes tougher rally laws

In the name of a normal life for local residents, United Russia’s latest legislative initiative could see protest organizers have to fork over 1.5 million rubles if there is public disorder at their rallies. The United Russia faction in the State Duma suggested raising the fine for organizers of illegal demonstrations by 750 times. The bill, which proposes increasing fines for organizers of rallies where disorderly behavior takes place to 1.5 million rubles, was presented to the parliament by deputy chairman of housing politics and management committee, United Russia member Alexander Sidyakin. “Riots on the streets of Russian cities are unacceptable, no one can interfere with residents’ normal lives,” said head of faction Andrei Vorobyov. He argued that the move does not limit democracy. “Our colleague’s initiative does not deny citizens the right to express their civil position and take part in public campaigns, but introduces adequate responsibility for illegal, provocative actions,” He argued that the fines were nowhere near similar punishments in the United States and European countries, where organizers pay 100,000 and more in dollars and euro in case they cause disorders at mass events. Sidyakin also wants to stop using administrative arrests for violations, and replace it with 240 hours of community service as a punishment instead. “We must move away from administrative arrest – we are turning opposition members into martyrs, who are jailed for 15 days, and then they say that “the regime throws them behind bars,” Vorobyov said. The law would also have those who force people into taking part in rallies and marches fined 1 million rubles, and there would be a higher punishment for not allowing people take part in mass rallies. The law has been discussed in the State Duma since April, and the Communist Party has expressed dissatisfaction with it, arguing that it violated constitutional rights. The discussions restarted after the March of Millions on May 6 ended in public disorder and fights with police on Bolotnaya Ploshchad. Moscow City Hall supported the initiative. LDPR and A Just Russia deputies criticized the bill. The former said they considered existing punishment enough and noted that the All-Russia People’s Front also allowed violations at their rallies, not just the opposition. A Just Russia also did not like the bill, State Duma deputy speaker from the party Nikolai Levichev told Interfax. “Amid the events developing on the streets, this proposal looks provocative,” he said. However, one A Just Russia member voted for the bill – a member of the State Duma defense committee, Igor Zotov. Opposition figure Boris Nemtsov called the bill anti-constitutional. “He [Alexander Sidyakin] must understand that he wants to bankrupt all the people who disagree with the authorities. He has one aim – to bankrupt, make them lose their flat, their possessions. It is the right way, the North Korean way, the way of Lukashenko. Everything is clear,” he informed. The Public Chamber also criticized the proposals, calling them “absurd.” “It will not lead to anything but the radicalizing of the protest movement and outrage,” said chairman of the PC committee on social politics, labor relations and quality of life Elena Topoleva. Political analyst Mikhail Vinogradov called the step repressive, and said it was aimed at taking all responsibility off law enforcement officers who work at rallies. “This law could limit the constitutional right of citizens for freedom of assembly,” he said.

IPO postponement raises fears of more to come

.................. The delay of a long-awaited initial public offering by real estate giant O1 Properties has sparked fears of a repeat of the rash of IPO postponements that plagued Russian companies last year. The company, which develops elite office complexes in Moscow, announced in a statement late Thursday that it was postponing its planned issue in London due to “adverse market conditions.” The firm said it might consider returning to the market at some point in the future. The listing was slated to raise around $425 million on the London Stock Exchange, and would have been the largest IPO of a Russian company since last October, according to Bloomberg. It is now the first London offering to be pulled this year. The postponement echoes a string of similar IPO pull-outs from Russian companies this time last year, also due to rocky markets. The spring of 2011 saw the announcement of postponed offerings from several metals and mining companies, followed by Russian Helicopters and Domodedovo Airport. Many had planned to list this year instead, but analysts told The Moscow News that the current market conditions meant it was unlikely they would push forward with plans in the near future. “The same problems remain in place now as last year,” said Yulia Gardeyeva, an analyst at the Troika Dialog investment bank. “It is unlikely that market conditions will improve in the summer because there is still a lot of pressure in the euro zone.” A fresh wave of uncertainty over the peripheral euro zone economies has sent the Russian market tumbling 14 percent since March of this year, causing investors to shy from riskier assets, such as the Russian real estate sector. Tigran Ovanesyan, a real estate analyst at Uralsib investment bank, said the IPO postponement tendency was in part a result of a seasonal change in investor appetite for stocks, which leaves only a small window for companies to complete their offerings. “For a second consecutive year we are seeing an interest in stocks in the first half of the year and then the markets become more risk-averse, so there is a correction in the second half,” Ovanesyan told The Moscow News. “This is in part due to the fact that investors are not willing to buy high-risk stocks just before going on summer leave.” Another problem, analysts said, is that Russian companies have a tendency to value their stocks too high and then pull out of offerings when investors indicate that they are not prepared to cough up. Bucking the trend is the Etalon property group, which floated $500 million of shares at a discount to fund expansion last year, a strategy which Ovanesyan said served the company well, since it allowed it to reinvest the capital into the booming Russian property market. The IPO postponement trend does not bode well for the long list of flotations planned for this year, whose ranks include such giants as Russia’s biggest lender, Sberbank, and its largest cell phone operator, MegaFon. The companies plan to raise $6 billion and $4.7 billion, respectively. But Gardeyeva said the bigger companies will likely be on safer territory due to their size, while smaller firms, such as O1 Properties, are likely to suffer. “In periods of volatility, people usually look for liquidity, and in order for the stock to be liquid, it needs to be a relatively large company with a relatively large free float,” Gardeyeva said. “Most likely it will be the smaller deals that are going to be sidelined again.”

Ukrainian President Can't Win Struggle With Tymoshenko

BERLIN, Germany -- Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych wanted to take revenge on his arch-rival Yulia Tymoshenko. But locking up the former prime minister was the worst mistake of his presidency, say analysts. Tymoshenko has the upper hand in the battle for public opinion, while Yanukovych is ruining his presidency. The humiliation that Viktor Fedorovych Yanukovych experienced on March 27 couldn't have been worse. The Ukrainian president had traveled to the South Korean capital Seoul to attend an international summit on nuclear safety. On the day before the summit, he had handed over the last highly enriched uranium still in Ukraine's possession to nuclear power Russia, in keeping with its commitment to relinquish its stock of the material before the summit. And now he wanted to receive the praise he thought he deserved from US President Barack Obama, the most important guest at the Seoul meeting. The Foreign Ministry in Kiev had done everything in its power to arrange a private meeting with the America president. But the US president had no intention of enhancing the status of his Ukrainian counterpart with such a gesture. Instead, Obama spent only four minutes talking to Yanukovych while standing up in the conference center. It was clearly meant as a punishment for a political pariah. But one photographer did snap a picture when the two men shook hands, and the next day the mass-circulation Kiev newspaper Segodnya ("Today") published a photo of the two politicians that almost filled the front page. Above it was the headline: "Yanukovych Breaks Through Isolation -- Return to the Big Political Stage. Our President Spoke with Obama Longer than Expected in Seoul." The story even characterized Yanukovych as one of the "main protagonists of this Seoul summit." It may have been a trivial event in terms of global politics, but it says a lot about Yanukovych, about his inferiority complex and his dream of joining the big league and working alongside major world leaders -- and about how he lies to his people at home in Ukraine. Today, more than five weeks later, not even the government mouthpiece Segodnya would dare to perpetrate such a farce. By now, even the most remote shepherds in the Carpathian Mountains know that their president is isolated in the West. This can be chalked down as a success for Yulia Volodymyrivna Tymoshenko, who was imprisoned four months ago at Kharkiv Prison Number 54 after a trial that many Western observers saw as orchestrated by Yanukovych. There are many indications that Yanukovych's insatiable lust for revenge against the former prime minister, his worst political adversary, could spell his downfall. "The Tymoshenko case is the most egregious mistake the president has committed throughout his term in office. I don't know what came over him when he set this process into motion," says Yuri Romanenko, head of the Ukrainian think tank Center for Political Analysis. "Now that this affair has become international, he can no longer control it. It will bury him. The European Football Championship will be transformed from the longed-for triumph into a tragedy." How could Yanukovych have ruined his presidency in a mere two years? In the February 2010 election, he captured the votes of 12 million of the 36 million Ukrainians eligible to vote, in results that placed him clearly ahead of Tymoshenko and were not even questioned by the West. The Americans, the Germans and the French were the first to congratulate the new president. Yanukovych announced his intention to "completely modernize" the country and wage an uncompromising battle against corruption, and he promised that Ukraine would become a paradise for investors. But he failed to make good on any of his promises. Commenting on the current state of Ukraine, jailed former Prime Minister Tymoshenko likened her country to the H.G. Wells novel "The Island of Doctor Moreau" and George Orwell's "1984," calling it a republic of horror and "a nation of losers, without historical memory, without national pride, without positive economic prospects and a European future." Europe's largest country, she says, is now controlled by "one family -- a family with a large appetite or, rather, bulimia, a miserable IQ, and pretensions of eternal power." The statement is an allusion to the president's origins and to how he and his friends have hijacked the country that was entrusted to them. Even if one takes Tymoshenko's remarks with a grain of salt, given her resentment of Yanukovych, her conclusions are correct. They explain why, after two years, barely more than 10 percent of Ukrainians still support their president. Ironically, it was already clear in 2010 that the man who had captured the presidency lacked almost everything that was needed to govern a country that was aimlessly adrift, namely political intelligence, tact and the ability to compromise. But what else could be expected from someone who had grown up without parents, surrounded by the black slag heaps of the Donbas steel-producing and coal-mining region of eastern Ukraine, and had already tangled with the law twice as an adolescent? Yanukovych was born as the son of a locomotive engineer in Yenakiieve, in an area then known as Stalinsk. His mother died when he was two and his father was sent to a prison camp for 10 years for having collaborated with the Germans during the war. Yanukovych began working in the local steel mill at 19. Later he became an engineer and, naturally, a member of the Communist Party, which installed him as the head of a repair business. He has never been able to furnish proof to back up claims that he earned a degree from the Ukrainian Academy of Foreign Trade. Yanukovych was strongly influenced by the region surrounding the mining city of Donetsk. He was convicted of robbery at 17 and of assault at 20. He says today that he was rehabilitated, but it has since emerged that he later had the court records destroyed. His rise to power began after the collapse of the Soviet Union, when bandits and oligarchs used Kalashnikovs and explosives to divide up the Donbas coalmines and steel mills amongst themselves. Akhat Bragin, a businessman who controlled virtually everything in Donetsk, from the central market to the Shakhtar football club, became a godfather figure in the region. But his power was short-lived. In October 1995, a powerful bomb blew up Bragin while he was watching an FC Shakhtar Donetsk game. His body could only be identified with the help of his severed arm, to which his Rolex watch was still attached. Yanukovych, a down-to-earth giant of a man who likes to sing karaoke and can shoot a wild boar from a distance of 100 meters (330 feet), used to box with Bragin. He also boxed with Bragin's successor Rinat Akhmetov, who is now the head of the largest industrial group in Ukraine and the president's most important political donor. To the oligarchs, Yanukovych seemed to be the perfect man to help them safeguard their business deals. He became the head of the Donetsk regional administration in 1997. Five years later, then-President Leonid Kuchma brought him to Kiev and made him his prime minister. Kuchma also wanted to install Yanukovych as his successor in 2004, but then overt election fraud triggered the Orange Revolution, bringing Tymoshenko and her ally, Viktor Yushchenko, into power. Five years later, it was all over for Ukraine's democratic spring. The leaders of the Orange Revolution were hopelessly at odds, and Ukrainians felt that the only solution to their troubles was to vote Yanukovych into office as president. But it turned out that they had replaced one evil with another. The new president was more interested in promoting the well-being of the oligarchs, who had accumulated their wealth during the sale of public property in the 1990s. Whether the source of their profits was coal, steel, natural gas or titanium, Yanukovych made sure that they continued to flow. He reduced profit taxes on large companies while eliminating a low flat-rate tax on small businesses, driving them into the streets for protests lasting several weeks. At some point Yanukovych must have perceived the independence of the newly wealthy oligarchs as a threat, and he began to build his own empire, dubbed the family, a group of like-minded people in which hierarchical relationships are governed by blood ties and private dependencies. His son Oleksandr, a 38-year-old dentist and businessman, was suddenly in the game. Ukrainians were aware that the president's younger son Viktor was a member of parliament for his father's party, but hardly anyone knew anything about Yanukovych's eldest son. They were all the more astonished when his name appeared on the list of the 100 richest Ukrainians last year. Then it emerged that Oleksandr Yanukovych is the president of a firm called Management Assets Company, which builds office towers and hotels in Donetsk, and that he is a player in the gasoline market and owns 100 percent of shares in the All-Ukraine Development Bank, the Tonis television channel and four luxury yachts. It has now become known that Oleksandr Yanukovych is influencing the country's most important personnel decisions. In recent months, the top posts at the national bank, the tax authority, the Interior Ministry and the Finance Ministry were newly filled with friends of Oleksandr Yanukovych or family confidants. The intelligence service was entrusted to the previous head of the state security service, a former KGB agent. Now all key positions are under the Yanukovych family's control. The most influential oligarchs, with the exception of Akhmetov, Yanukovych's friend from his Donetsk days, saw their status downgraded. Now they are expected to pay hush money, which is referred to as donations for "social initiatives." In this manner, Yanukovych has brought the equivalent of about €800 million ($1.04 billion) into the government coffers in the midst of an ongoing financial crisis. And should anyone choose not to comply, the heads of the intelligence service and the tax authority have plenty of incriminating information against each of the oligarchs in their safes. The installation of the new economics minister at the end of March was an example of how politics works under the Yanukovych regime. The post was awarded to Petro Poroshenko, known as the "chocolate king" of Ukraine, who served as head of the security council and foreign minister under the Orange movement. Poroshenko, 46, who began his career selling cocoa beans, now owns the largest confectionary manufacturer in Ukraine, several auto plants and the Channel 5 television station. Poroshenko's defection to the opposite camp surprised the supporters of the Orange movement, but not those familiar with the Kiev power clique. By doing so, he was "apparently trying to save his property," says a member of parliament for Tymoshenko's Fatherland party. Poroshenko presented Yanukovych with a list of 12 items that he described as conditions for his entry into the government. The bold demands included the "elimination of the shadow economy" and the "defense of entrepreneurship against violent pressure." The canny Yanukovych rubber-stamped all of the items. But then, on the day Poroshenko was to take office, he sent the tax police to the chocolate king's factories. It was a clear warning to Poroshenko that, as minister, he was to abide by the rules set down by the president's family. The fact that Yanukovych is deceiving his voters just as he duped the oligarchs who brought him into power is something that rarely works for long in post-Soviet countries. People in circles close to the president "are already thinking about the time after Yanukovych," says political analyst Romanenko. That, he says, explains "the mind-boggling amount of security Yanukovych has: He fears an assassination." A review of the two years of Yanukovych's presidency quickly reveals why this man cannot make peace with Tymoshenko. Any form of pardon would only put her back into the game of winning political power in Ukraine. Her supporters are in the process of forming a united front with other opposition parties for the parliamentary election this fall. If they regained a parliamentary majority, they would immediately introduce impeachment proceedings against the president. Yanukovych fears this scenario more than upsetting Western Europeans over the European Football Championship, especially now that he realizes that he could wind up in prison if he loses power. The president is "somewhat resistant to advice" on the issue of Tymoshenko, says a German diplomat who served as ambassador to Ukraine and later worked as an adviser to Tymoshenko when she was prime minister. "He knows that there isn't much left for him to gain in Europe." He does have a dilemma, though: The prisoner in the Kharkiv women's prison is stronger than he is. Tymoshenko may have been a poor manager as head of the government, but she is fantastic as a PR strategist working on her own behalf. She, together with her daughter Yevhenia and attorney Serhiy Vlasenko, are the ones who are controlling public opinion, not Yanukovych. "Save my mother before it's too late," Yevhenia Tymoshenko says at her press conferences. Unfortunately, no one knows what is really happening behind the prison walls, and whether Tymoshenko was actually punched during her forced transfer to a hospital. The claims were voiced solely by her attorney, a member of parliament for Tymoshenko's party. Last Friday, when Professor Karl Max Einhäupl, the head of Berlin's Charité university hospital, made his way to see his patient once again, the former prime minister was in the 15th day of a hunger strike. Those who know Tymoshenko also know that she is capable of taking things to extremes. But appeals such as one by the Ukrainian World Congress, an international umbrella organization for Ukrainian communities around the world, to stop the campaign give her an opportunity to end the hunger strike. On Friday, she agreed to be treated in Kharkiv in the presence of a German doctor. This means that Tymoshenko is also not going to be treated in Germany. Perhaps her path will lead to Russia instead. President Vladimir Putin has announced that he would be "pleased to accept Tymoshenko for treatment." Yanukovych couldn't deny him such a wish, because he urgently needs a discount on Russian gas deliveries, and hopes to get it during Putin's state visit at the end of May. Eventually, however, after being treated for a herniated disk, Tymoshenko would be returned to Ukraine. "And what happens then?" asks the editor-in-chief of an independent Kiev newspaper. "Then everything starts all over again, just with a different emphasis. Hardly anyone wants to see a comeback by the former prime minister." Tymoshenko, he says, "is like Yanukovych: She obstructs our country."