Leonid Kuchma

Leonid Kuchma Danylowytsch ( born August 9, 1938 in Tschajkino, Chernigov Oblast, Ukrainian SSR ) is a Ukrainian politician. He was from October 1992 to September 1993 and Prime Minister from July 1994 to January 2005 President of Ukraine.

Life

Kuchma attended the University of Dnepropetrovsk and got a degree in rocket science. He was a leading engineer in Baikonur and got into management positions as well as in the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine.

From 1990 to 1992 he was a member of the Ukrainian Parliament on 13 October 1992 and became Prime Minister. He resigned from this function back on 21 September 1993 in order to run for the presidential election in 1994. On July 19, 1994, he was President of Ukraine. In 1999 he was re-elected, with his election campaign was supported and co-financed by influential networks Ukrainian industrialist. His term as president ended in 2004, a third term is not legally possible.

Some of his political opponents accused him of being responsible for the assassination of the Georgian- Ukrainian journalist Gongadze Heorhiy in 2000, which Kuchma always denied. The chairman of the Socialist Party of Ukraine Olexandr Moroz published in 2001 sound recordings of, among others, a conversation between Kuchma, the head of the presidential administration Volodymyr Lytvyn and Interior Minister Yuriy Kravchenko about the disappearance of Gongadze Heorhiy want to hear. However, the authenticity of this recording has never been officially confirmed.

With the release of the recording, the so-called cassette scandal, initiated the opposition to Ukraine without Kuchma action ( Ukr Ukraine Corporation bes Kutschmy ) that the Kuchma's resignation called for mass protests. Several distrust votes against Kuchma in the Verkhovna Rada failed. In addition to involvement in the murder of Gongadze Kuchma was accused also significant restrictions on press freedom.

For the 2004 presidential elections Kuchma supported the then reigning Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych, who was initially declared the winner of the election. However, the election result was after weeks of peaceful protests, the so-called " Orange Revolution ," explained because of electoral fraud by the Supreme Court of Ukraine invalid. In the repetition of the runoff on 26 December 2004 Viktor Yushchenko won. Kuchma called before the end of his tenure on the two bearings for reconciliation and congratulated his successor.

A few days before the swearing in of the new president, Viktor Yushchenko, Kuchma in January 2005 was awarded numerous of the old government retirement privileges. The new government recognized the ex-president, some of these privileges again.

In 2007, Kuchma published a book on the period after the "Orange Revolution", titled after the Maidan. Records of the President. From 2005 to 2006. In 2008, he publicly lamented the unstable political situation in his view, in the Ukraine, will be maintained this for a long time. He envy Russia to its stability under President Putin.

In March 2011, the Prosecutor General's Office in Kiev announced that against Kuchma initiated investigations into the murder of journalist Gongadze is out in 2000. Kuchma denied the allegations of his involvement in the murder case continues. On 14 December 2011, the case was closed against him on the grounds that the prosecution was based on impermissible evidence and thus wrongly initiated.

Kuchma's writings

  • Leonid Kučma: Posle majdana. Zapiski prezidenta. From 2005 to 2006. Dovira, Kiev, 2007. ISBN 978-5-9691-0094-7.
  • Leonid Kučma: svoim šljachom: rozdumy per ekonomični reformy v Ukrainy. In Jure, Kiev, 2004. ISBN 966-313-198-5.
  • Leonid Kučma: Ukraina - ne Rossiya. Vremya, Moscow 2003. ISBN 5-94117-075-0.
  • Leonid Kučma: Naciju zveličujut ' veliki cili i dila. Presa Ukrainy, Kiev 2000.
  • Leonid Kučma: ljudyna i prezydent - personality and president. Mystectvo, Kiev 1998.
  • Leonid Kučma: Ekonomičnyj i social'nyj rozvytok Ukrainy u 1995 roci: ščorična dopovid ' Prezidenta Ukrainy per vnutrišnju ta zovnišnju polityku Ukrainy. Kiev 1996. ISBN 966-524-001-3.
  • Leonid Kučma: Ekonomična dopovid prezydenta Ukrainy: 1994 rik. Ukraina, Kiev 1995. ISBN 5-319-01357-4.

Literature on Kuchma

  • Taras Kuzio: Ukraine under Kuchma: political reform, economic transformation and security policy in independent Ukraine. Macmillan, Basingstoke 1997. ISBN 0-333-65414-5, ISBN 0-312-17625-2.
  • Kuzio, Taras ( eds.), Democratic Revolution in Ukraine: from Kuchmagate to Orange Revolution ( The journal of communist studies and transition politics, Vol 23, No. 1 ), pp. 30-56.
Transcription (linguistics) Chernihiv Oblast Leonid Kravchuk Yevhen Marchuk Anatoliy Kinakh Mykola Azarov Serhiy Arbuzov Arseniy Yatsenyuk Integrated Authority File
507216
de