Ukraine’s prosecutor general dismissed amid govt turmoil

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MOSCOW — Ukraine’s parliament on Tuesday accepted the resignation of the prosecutor general who has been accused of failing to deal with the country’s endemic corruption.

The parliament voted overwhelmingly to dismiss Viktor Shokin who tended his resignation a month ago. An hour earlier, Shokin had fired his deputy — a reformist prosecutor and member of the team of former Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili, who serves as governor of the Odessa region. The deputy had accused Shokin of maintaining ties with corrupt officials and lawmakers.

Shokin’s perceived unwillingness to clamp down on corruption and go after the lawmakers suspected of murky deals has caused public outcry and repeated calls for his resignation from Ukraine’s pro-Western reformist wing. Several hundred people rallied outside the Ukrainian parliament on Monday, calling for the prosecutor’s resignation.

Testifying to the deep divisions inside Ukraine’s governing coalition, Economic Development Minister Aivaras Abromavicius, who has been outspoken about the role of corrupt elites in politics, said on Twitter after Shokin’s dismissal: “Hallelujah! Finally!”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/ukraines-prosecutor-general-dismissed-amid-govt-turmoil/2016/03/29/2ec8d622-f588-11e5-958d-d038dac6e718_story.html

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1. The Race to Be Ukraine’s Next Prime Minister Is Heating Up

It’s been a rough two months for Ukraine’s shaky government. In early February, the country’s economy minister resigned in protest amid accusations of high-level corruption in the ruling coalition. Later, a public feud between Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk and President Petro Poroshenko prompted a no-confidence vote against the premier, which he barely survived. Since then, the government has been plagued by infighting and behind-the-scenes jostling that has eroded public trust and left the future of a vital International Monetary Fund loan hanging in limbo.

But with a vote planned for later this week in the Ukrainian parliament, the bitter standoff may come to an end, leaving the country with a new cabinet and prime minister for the first time since October 2014 elections following the ouster of former President Viktor Yanukovych.

After the no-confidence vote against Yatsenyuk, Poroshenko’s allies have been maneuvering in parliament to oust the prime minister in favor of two influential candidates: U.S.-born Finance Minister Natalie Jaresko, trusted by Ukraine’s western creditors, and Parliamentary Speaker Volodymyr Groysman, a close ally of the president.

Last Thursday, Groysman emerged as the leading contender to replace Yatsenyuk after he was formally endorsed as prime minister by the Poroshenko Bloc, the president’s party and largest in the legislature. Since then, Groysman has been building support among the fractured pro-Western coalition in Ukraine’s parliament ahead of a crucial legislative session slated for Tuesday. Groysman’s nomination came two days after Jaresko officially threw her hat in the ring to be prime minister, announcing that she would aim to push reforms in a “technocratic government.”

http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/03/28/the-race-to-be-ukraines-next-prime-minister-is-heating-up/

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2. Kiev fears Gazprom will completely bypass Ukraine

Kiev is concerned that Russian-backed pipelines will completely bypass Ukraine as a transit country of Russian gas to Europe in the long run, Igor Mantsurov, director of the Scientific Research Institute of Economics at Ukraine’s Ministry of Economic Development and Trade, told New Europe.

“During the recent 10 years, we observe the extremely resolute politics of Russian Federation to reduce the gas transit volumes via Ukrainian territory. This is Moscow’s firm purely political decision to bypass Ukraine to increase political and economic pressure on our country,” Mantsurov said in an interview on March 28.

Russian gas monopoly Gazprom has stated that it plans to stop shipping gas through Ukraine after 2019.

European Commission Vice-President for Energy Union Maroš Šefčovič has repeatedly said that Ukraine should remain an important transit country for gas supplies from Russia to Europe.

http://neurope.eu/article/kiev-fears-gazprom-will-completely-bypass-ukraine/