20070605 - Jonathan Luxmoore
Warsaw (ENI). The president of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe has met religious leaders in Ukraine during a visit in which he urged dialogue to overcome a crisis that has pitted the country's president against the prime minister.
"For me, personally, intercultural and international communication is the main priority," the Religious Information Service of Ukraine quoted assembly president René van der Linden as saying, in remarks explaining his desire to meet church leaders during his 21-22 May visit.
President Viktor Yushchenko has for months been locked in conflict with Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich, and in April he ordered early parliamentary elections. Yanukovich, a long-standing rival of the president, resisted for weeks but eventually acquiesced, although the two have still not agreed on a date for the poll.
Van der Linden, a member of the upper house of the Dutch parliament, urged "a fully-fledged dialogue at the highest level in order to find a clear solution based on the rule of law", in a statement issued by the Council of Europe, which groups 46 European nations.
The situation escalated on 25 May after Yushchenko ordered 40 000 interior ministry troops to come under his command and away from that of Interior Minister Vasyl Tsushko who is an ally of the prime minister.
President Yushchenko favours a pro-Western strategy for the country that was once part of the Soviet Union, while Yanukovich is seen as being closer to Moscow.
In April, leaders of Ukraine's Greek Catholic, Latin-rite Catholic, Lutheran, Baptist, and Pentecostal churches, as well as the Orthodox Church-Kiev Patriarchate described the president's decree to dissolve parliament as "the best way out of the current situation".
The statement was not signed by the largest of Ukraine's three rival Orthodox churches, which is linked to the Moscow Patriarchate. It has previously accused President Yushchenko of attempting to undermine it by supporting the creation of a single national church.
Lawmakers supporting the prime minister said in a statement sent to Pope Benedict XVI they were "especially distressed" that Catholic Church leaders had backed the inter-church declaration.
"Active involvement of Christian congregations in Ukraine's political life is unfortunately nothing new," said the parliamentarians, whose letter was published by the Russian Interfax news agency.
But Cardinal Lubomyr Husar, the head of Ukraine's Greek Catholic church, has defended his decision to support the church statement, saying, "Our declaration didn't back any party - it merely recalled that the church hasn't forgotten people, nor has God."
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