As Bush visits Ukraine, Kievites gripe at guest gridlock

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DPA POLITICS NATO Politics Ukraine FEATURE: As Bush visits Ukraine, Kievites gripe at guest gridlock Stefan Korshak, dpa Kiev
US President George W. Bush and his entourage
descended on the usually peaceful Ukrainian capital Kiev on Monday,
for a state visit devoted mostly to photo opportunities.

The US leader's 18-hour presence paralysed whole urban districts,
inconvenienced tens of thousands of Kievites, and gained the already
unpopular US leader more enemies in the former Soviet republic.

"It's just like during Communism - the police are going nuts over
some big shot, and we Kiev citizens are locked out of our own city,"
street vendor Serhy Povorotnik griped.

"Don't forget, (former Soviet leader Leonid) Brezhnev started a
war in Afghanistan, and so did Bush. Big countries are all alike!" he
added, repeating a common Ukrainian criticism of Bush.

The security precautions required by the 43rd US president for his
short stay were for Ukraine unprecedented, rivalling and at times
exceeding precautions demanded by Soviet leaders of the once-feared
KGB.

The Bush motorcade - a column of SUVs, sedans, darkened windows
and flashing lights numbering 50 vehicles including Ukrainian cop
escorts - received total control of the country's only high-grade
highway, the road from Kiev's Borispil airport to Kiev, for a full
three hours, twice.

Bush and his subordinates made the Borispil road "absolutely
impossible" on Monday evening while roadway serves as a key lorry
thoroughfare between Kiev and Moscow; and were set to do so again
during Tuesday afternoon rush hour, preventing residents of high-rent
suburbs near Borispol village from returning home from work.

Restrictions in Kiev's centre were even more severe, with a White
House "security bubble" encompassing a roughly a half-kilometre
circle around the Hyatt Hotel, where Bush and his wife Laura were
scheduled to spend the night.

Non-official vehicle movement within the zone was banned in the
vicinity for duration of the Bushes' stay. The order made
inaccessible by car thousands of homes and businesses in Kiev's old
city, Ukraine's highest-rent district. (Real estate in Kiev prices
rival Paris these days.)

"We Ukrainians, we have a tradition of tolerance of foreigners,
and hospitality to guests," said Anastasia Tsimbaleva, a waitress
without orders or tips at the usually busy Kava cafe. "But the guest
has to be polite, and taking over Kiev centre isn't."

Kiev city police prior to Bush's visit warned citizens, quite
seriously, not to venture onto the roofs of buildings in the city
centre because "the Americans are arriving with their own snipers,
and they will shoot any one near the president, who has anything
resembling a weapon in his hands," Korrespondent magazine reported.

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