Kuchma Comments On Ukrainian Political Situation

President Leonid Kuchma of Ukraine disagrees with statements to the effect that his country is now experiencing a political crisis. Kuchma made this statement, while talking to reporters in Veliky Novgorod today. (Veliky Novgorod is the administrative center of Russia's Novgorod region in the north-western federal district) Kuchma, who hopes for subsequent Ukrainian-Russian rapprochement, stressed that the pace of integration will depend on the policy of our common Slavic neighbor, i.e. Belarus. Kuchma paid a brief visit to Veliky Novgorod, also visiting a war memorial in the town of Novoselitsy where his father, senior sergeant Danila Kuchma, is buried; Kuchma Sr. died of his wounds in 1942, that is, during the Great Patriotic War.