Ukraine's Viktor Yushchenko to receive Phila. Liberty Medal

This is a major smack to the Bush administration and what I think is a great choice after last year when they gave it to the puppet who is president of Afghanistan


http://www.philly.com/mld/dailynews/12010518.htm

Liberty Medal to Yushchenko

By BOB WARNER

warnerb@phillynews.com


This year's Philadelphia Liberty Medal is going to Viktor Yushchenko, who survived a mysterious dioxin poisoning and overcame massive election fraud to become president of Ukraine early this year.

The 51-year-old leader of the former Soviet republic will visit Philadelphia on Sept. 17 - America's Constitution Day - to accept the gold medal and a $100,000 prize in ceremonies at the National Constitution Center, organizers announced yester-day.

Former University of Pennsylvania President Martin Meyerson, chairman of the selection committee for the prestigious medal, praised Yushchenko's courage and leadership in challenging the results of Ukraine's national election last November.

A surge of suspicious absentee ballots gave a narrow victory to Prime Minister Victor Yanukovych, who had been strongly backed by the Kremlin.

But thousands of demonstrators wearing orange clothing or waving orange ribbons filled the streets of Kiev for weeks until the country's Supreme Court ordered a new election.

Despite a dioxin-poisoning incident last September that pockmarked his face and forced him to take spinal injections of a painkiller, Yushchenko won the December rematch by a solid eight-point margin.

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Taking office in January, Yushchenko promised to fight government corruption and has taken bold steps, domestically and internationally, including:

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• Starting to withdraw 1,650 Ukrainian troops from the U. S.-led coalition forces in Iraq, where 17 Ukrainian soldiers have died.