Ukrainian Politics
Opponents of her husband Viktor Yushchenko criticized her for remaining a U.S. citizen. During the 2004 Ukrainian presidential election campaign, Yushchenko-Chumachenko was accused of exerting the influence of the U.S. government on her husband's decisions, as an employee of the U.S. government or even a Central Intelligence Agency agent. She had earlier been accused by Russian television journalist Mikhail Leontyev of leading a U.S. project to help Yushchenko seize power in Ukraine; in January 2002, she won a libel case against him.
Ukraine's pro-government Inter television channel repeated Leontyev's allegations in 2001, but in January 2003 she won a libel case against the channel as well.
On March 31, 2005, it was announced that Kateryna Yushchenko had become a naturalized Ukrainian citizen. Under Ukrainian law, this required her to renounce her prior U.S. citizenship within two years; however, she did not sign the Oath of Renunciation until August 2007, several months past the deadline.
Read more about this topic: Kateryna Yushchenko
Famous quotes containing the word politics:
“The average educated man in America has about as much knowledge of what a political idea is as he has of the principles of counterpoint. Each is a thing used in politics or music which those fellows who practise politics or music manipulate somehow. Show him one and he will deny that it is politics at all. It must be corrupt or he will not recognize it. He has only seen dried figs. He has only thought dried thoughts. A live thought or a real idea is against the rules of his mind.”
—John Jay Chapman (1862–1933)