Originally posted by the Voice of America.
Voice of America content is produced by the Voice of America,
a United States federal government-sponsored entity, and is in
the public domain.


Ukraine's Zelenskiy Plays Hot and Cold With Trump Team

Associated Press

   KYIV, UKRAINE - Ukraine's president appears to be playing to both sides
   of the American political divide, hedging his bets to ensure U.S.
   financial and military aid keeps flowing no matter who wins next year's
   election.

   First, a point for U.S. President Donald Trump's team: Ukraine's top
   prosecutor agreed to revisit past investigations into a gas company
   executive who recruited Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden's
   son to his board.

   And now, a nod to the anti-Trump camp: Ukraine has appointed a man who
   exposed under-the-table payments to Trump's onetime campaign chairman
   Paul Manafort as a senior prosecutor.

   So which team is Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on? He's not
   taking that bait -- not at a time when he needs American support to
   fend off pro-Russia separatists but also prove himself an independent
   leader to his own people. Instead, he insists that he's maintaining
   separation of powers and not interfering in prosecutors' decisions.

   Analysts say the Ukrainian leadership is trying to keep its options
   open, by showing that Zelenskiy is not Trump's yes-man, and not his
   enemy either. Zelenskiy is central to the impeachment inquiry against
   Trump, who pressed the Ukrainian president in a July phone call to
   investigate Democratic political rivals.
   The appointment of Viktor Trepak as deputy national prosecutor Tuesday
   was Ukraine's latest chess move.

   Anti-corruption campaigners -- whose cause Zelenskiy championed when
   seeking the presidency -- welcomed the news.

   Viktor Trepak
   Trepak has never worked as prosecutor before, but he's got the chops
   for the job. As first deputy chief of the SBU, a security agency that's
   like Ukraine's CIA and FBI combined, he pursued two senior prosecutors
   accused of corruption in what's dubbed the "diamond prosecutors' case"
   because of jewels found in one of the prosecutor's homes.

.