COMM Minister of Defence Yevgen Marchuk on the government bench after his speech in the session room of Ukrainian Verkhovna Rada in Kiev on Tuesday, June 22, 2004. That day Verkhovna Rada passed the law of reduction of the Ukrainian Military Forces staff and considered the work of Cabinet Council in the sphere of defence as insufficient. Mr. Marchuk noted that Ukrainian Military Forces were utterly burdensome for the state economics. By its strength Ukrainian Army takes 13-th place in the world, but by the level of the maintenance per a soldier only the 126-th one. Mr. Marchuk declared for the reduction of the quantity of generals from 300 to 120 ones in Ukraine also as for the reduction of service for a fixed period from 18 to 12 months in the context of the army professionalism. Photo by Viktor Pobedinsky / UNIAN