UKRAINE INVADED BY THE US
PART 1
Bipartisan Group Will Meet With
Ukraine's Interim Government....led by Sen. John McCain
Kristina Peterson & Siobhan
Hughes, The Wall Street Journal, NY, NY, Wed, Mar 12, 2014
Published by U.S.-Ukraine Business
Council (USUBC),
Washington, D.C., Wed, March 12, 2014
Washington, D.C., Wed, March 12, 2014
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WASHINGTON --- A bipartisan group of eight senators will visit Ukraine
this week for meetings with the interim government, Senate aides said
Wednesday. Led by Sen. John McCain (R., Ariz.), a group including three
Democrats and four other Republicans will leave Washington Thursday for
meetings with government officials and other stakeholders, an aide to Mr.
McCain said Wednesday. The delegation is expected to remain in Ukraine until
Sunday morning.
Mr. McCain said three Ukrainian
leaders had requested the senators' visit. "They just called me and said,
'We'd like you to come out,'" Mr. McCain said. He said the Ukrainian
leaders "wanted to talk to us about elections and what the U.S. can do to
assist them in this type of crisis," as well as actions Congress
specifically could take, including authorizing sanctions.
Mr. McCain said he has a
long-standing relationship with some of the Ukrainian leaders, including
protest leader Vitali Klitschko, a former world heavyweight boxer. "I know
Vitali because I'm a big boxing fan and I've known him for years," Mr.
McCain said. The eight senators will visit Kiev and may travel to other cities,
the lawmaker said.
Most of the lawmakers going on the
trip are on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the panel involved in
drafting a comprehensive package of aid for Ukraine expected to be unveiled
Wednesday.
SENATORS MCCAIN, BARRASSO, FLAKE,
JOHNSON, DURBIN, MURPHY, HOEVEN, WHITEHOUSE
Senators on the panel who are traveling to Ukraine include Mr. McCain, GOP Sens. John Barrasso of Wyoming, Jeff Flake of Arizona and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, as well as Democratic Sens. Richard Durbin of Illinois and Christopher Murphy of Connecticut. Also joining the trip are Sens. John Hoeven (R., N.D.) and Sheldon Whitehouse (D., R.I.), who aren't on the committee.
The panel's chairman, Sen. Bob
Menendez (D., N.J.) is expected to release legislation later Wednesday that
would provide loan guarantees to Ukraine and strengthen the Obama
administration's ability to impose sanctions on Russia. The bill also includes
language designed to overhaul and strengthen the International Monetary Fund.
Democrats say the IMF provisions
will boost the amount of money the West can loan to Kiev, but many Republicans
have balked at the measure and its inclusion in the Senate package could make
it harder to pass the GOP-led House. Last week the House overwhelmingly
passed a narrower bill enabling Ukraine to receive loan guarantees.
CLOSE TIES BETWEEN NORTH DAKOTA AND
UKRAINE
Mr. Hoeven said he wanted to join the congressional delegation because of the close ties between North Dakota and Ukraine, and that agriculture and energy interests were his main focus heading into the trip. "We have very similar climates and soils so the farming techniques we use in North Dakota work very well there, so a lot of our businessmen do business in Ukraine," Mr. Hoeven told reporters.
He said North Dakota exports agriculture equipment to Ukraine, and noted that John Deere has a dealership there. When he was the state's governor, North Dakota sent two trade missions to Ukraine and the state trade office has an employee in Kiev, he said.
"Russia supplies so much of the energy to the EU [European Union] and their pipelines go through the Ukraine so one of the ways to push back on a longer-term basis is through energy," he said. North Dakota has become a major producer of oil and natural gas.
Mr. Hoeven said he would be focused on making sure "whatever sanctions we take we get right, because they can have an impact on our businesses."
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SOURCE: http://www.usubc.org/site/
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