On September 28, 1989, Shcherbytsky, long rumoured to be ill, resigned as first secretary of the CPU. His successor, Volodymyr Ivashko, while praising his predecessor and reaffirming the CPU’s basic policy line, made the first cautious references to new political realities and the need for the Communist Party to take these into account. These realities included a rapid institutionalization of national, civic, and religious life that outpaced legal recognition.
The most significant development of 1990 was the beginning of parliamentary democracy. The first competitive elections to the Ukrainian parliament (which replaced the old-style Supreme Soviet), held on March 4, broke the Communist Party’s monopoly on political power in Ukraine. The parliament that met in mid-May had a substantial democratic bloc that, with the defection of numerous communist deputies from strict party discipline on particular issues, reduced the CPU’s core majority to 239 of the 450 members. Changes in the political leadership proceeded rapidly and culminated in the parliament’s election of the recent CPU secretary for ideology, Leonid Kravchuk, as its chairman. On July 16 sovereignty (though not yet independence) was claimed in the name of the “people of Ukraine”—the entirety of Ukraine’s resident population without regard to nationality or ethnicity; the declaration marked the onset of a gradual convergence of views on key issues between the communist majority and the democratic opposition, whose agenda was increasingly adopted by the pragmatic Kravchuk.
Gorbachev, faced with a rising tide of nationalism, had already proposed a renegotiated new union treaty that would extend broad autonomy to the Soviet republics while preserving central control of foreign policy, the military, and the financial system. To forestall the cession of newly asserted sovereign rights to Moscow, student-led mass demonstrations and a hunger strike were held in Kiev in October 1990; the protests extracted concessions that included the resignation of the premier. In the same month, Rukh, whose membership was growing rapidly, proclaimed as its ultimate goal the total independence of Ukraine. Only the CPU declared its support for Gorbachev’s plans of a new union treaty.
A coup d’état organized in August 1991 by hard-line members of Gorbachev’s government in Moscow collapsed within two days. In its wake the Ukrainian parliament, in emergency session, declared the full independence of Ukraine on August 24. The declaration was made subject to popular ratification by a referendum on December 1.
Independent Ukraine
The population of Ukraine voted overwhelmingly for independence in the referendum of December 1, 1991. (About 84 percent of eligible voters turned out for the referendum, and about 90 percent of them endorsed independence.) In an election coinciding with the referendum, Kravchuk was chosen as president. By this time, several important developments had taken place in Ukraine, including the dissolution of the Communist Party and the development (under the newly appointed Minister of Defense Kostiantyn Morozov) of the infrastructure for separate Ukrainian armed forces. Ukraine also had withstood political pressure from Moscow to reconsider its course toward independence and enter into a restructured Soviet Union. A week after the independence referendum, the leaders of Ukraine, Russia, and Belarus agreed to establish the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). Shortly thereafter the U.S.S.R. was formally disbanded.
Postindependence issues
Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Ukraine was commonly regarded as the former Soviet republic (outside of those in the Baltic region) with the best chance of achieving economic prosperity and integration with Europe as a whole. But by the end of the 20th century, the Ukrainian economy had faltered badly, and social and political change fell short of transforming Ukraine into a wholly European state. Nevertheless, Ukraine registered some important gains in this period. It consolidated its independence and developed its state structure, regularized relations with neighbouring countries (in spite of some contentious issues), made some important steps in the process of democratization, and established itself as a member in good standing of the international community.
State building and diplomacy
President Kravchuk’s immediate priority was state building. Under his stewardship, Ukraine quickly established its armed forces and the infrastructure of an independent state. Citizenship was extended to the people of Ukraine on an inclusive (rather than ethnic or linguistic) basis. Ukraine received widespread international recognition and developed its diplomatic service. A pro-Western foreign policy was instituted, and official pronouncements stressed that Ukraine was a “European” rather than a “Eurasian” country. The state symbols and national anthem of the post-World War I Ukrainian National Republic were reinstituted. Yet at the same time that independent Ukraine was acquiring the attributes of statehood, it faced a number of contentious issues that severely strained the fledgling country: the nature of its participation in the CIS, nuclear disarmament, the status of Crimea, and control of the Black Sea Fleet and its port city of Sevastopol. While inflaming passions on both sides of the border, these issues also helped to define Ukraine’s new relationship with Russia.
Ukrainian leaders perceived the CIS to be no more than a loose association of former Soviet republics and a means of assisting in a “civilized divorce” from the union. In contrast, Russia regarded it as a means of retaining some degree of regional integration (under Moscow’s political domination) and sought to establish it as a supranational body that would succeed the U.S.S.R. These differing views were not clear at the meeting that created the CIS, but within several weeks they had become very evident. Disagreements between Russia and Ukraine ensued as the latter repudiated proposals for a CIS army under unified command, a common CIS citizenship, and the guarding of “external” rather than national borders. Remaining vigilant that involvement with the CIS not compromise its sovereignty, Ukraine participated only as an associate member. However, after more than seven years of independence, with the CIS no longer a real threat to the country’s sovereignty, Ukraine finally agreed to join the CIS Interparliamentary Assembly in March 1999.
The issue of nuclear disarmament proved a vexing one. In the wake of the Chernobyl disaster, antinuclear popular sentiment ran high in Ukraine; even prior to independence, Ukrainian leaders had committed themselves to divesting the country of nuclear weapons. But throughout this period, Ukrainians had not been aware of the size of the nuclear arsenal on their soil—Ukraine was effectively the third largest nuclear power in the world at the time—nor had they considered the high costs and logistical problems of nuclear divestment. After approximately half of the arsenal had been transferred to Russia early in 1992, the leaders of independent Ukraine began to question the wisdom of blindly handing over the weapons to a potential adversary that was now claiming portions of Ukraine’s territory (i.e., Crimea). Ukraine then expressed reservations about the complete removal of the weapons from the country before it could obtain some guarantees for its security as well as financial compensation for the dismantling and transportation of the warheads. This apparent backtracking caused major concern in the West (particularly in the United States) and Russia. Intense diplomatic pressure followed, and Ukraine began to be portrayed as something of a rogue state in the Western media. Finally, in May 1992 Ukraine signed the Lisbon Protocol, which marked Ukraine’s accession to the START I treaty (see Strategic Arms Reduction Talks). Subsequent negotiations, brokered by the United States, resulted in a trilateral statement (between the United States, Russia, and Ukraine) in January 1994, which outlined a timetable for disarmament and dealt with the financial and security issues that Ukraine had raised.