"Such a state of things is considered absolutely normal from their point of view as they are big and Ukraine is small," Mr Kuchma lamented. What is going on beneath the Chernobyl plant's sarcophagus is anybody's guess now and if a disaster occurs there, the international community will again point the finger of blame at the Ukrainians, he said.
The Ukrainian President reminded the media that out of the 700 million dollars needed for the construction of a new sarcophagus over the Chernobyl station's destroyed forth power unit, only $400 million has been allocated for the purpose thus far. Already, about $100 million of that money has gone to finance business trips and all sorts of paperwork, while no sarcophagus is still in place, he said.
President Kuchma called the reporters' attention to the fact that Western heavyweights had not yet recognized Ukraine as a market economy and that the discriminatory Jackson-Vanik amendment was still in effect. If these problems were solved somehow, the Ukrainian economy would be much better off, he said.
Long before the closure of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, the G7 committed itself to financing the construction of two power units at the Rovno and Kmelnitsky plants and also to contributing to the construction of a new sarcophagus over the destroyed unit at Chernobyl.
