Ukrainians shelter

Ukrainians shelter in soviet era metro / air raid shelter. Photo: AP

We, the NCW editorial team, welcome back Halyna, who, as 1 of the earliest contributors to NCW, returns to share her thoughts and insights on current events in Ukraine.

Past Halyna Mokrushyna

I see pictures of my fellow Ukrainians sleeping in subway stations in Kyiv and Kharkiv, with their kids, pets, blankets, warm apparel. These subway stations were built equally flop shelters during Soviet times, to protect civilians in example of state of war. They were built in the country in which Ukrainians and Russians were brotherly peoples, and the vast bulk did not divide friends and family by ethnic origin.

Now Ukrainians are running to these bomb shelters because Russian troops are advancing towards Kyiv, as I write this, and Russians are already in Kharkiv/Kharkov, and I see videos of local people greeting Russian soldiers equally liberators. I also watch videos of a Russian soldier captured by Ukrainians. He is standing with his hands tied backside his dorsum and I hear a male voice ordering him to say: 'Glory to Ukraine'. He refuses and says instead: "Glory to Russia".

In one of his addresses to the Ukrainian nation, the one-time comedian turned president of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky, responding to Vladimir Putin'southward words about the pro-Nazi power holders in Ukraine, said that there are no Nazis in Ukraine. Zelensky said that he himself is a chiliad son of a Soviet soldier who saved the world from Nazis. And he said this in Russian.

Yet it is under his presidency that Ukraine became a monolingual country when, co-ordinate to the new police force on languages, the Russian language was banned from schools, universities, public spaces. The Russian linguistic communication that is a mother tongue for millions of Ukrainians. And it is under Zelensky's presidency that official ceremonies honoring the Nazi collaborator, nationalist leader Bandera were held throughout Ukraine.

Most Ukrainians voted for Zelensky in 2019 considering he promised to stop the war against Donbass and bring piece to Ukraine. The merely way to achieve this was through the implementation of the Minsk agreements, signed in February 2015 between Ukraine and the break-away republics of Donetsk and Lugansk after difficult and tense negotiations between the Chancellor of Germany Angela Merkel, President of French republic François Hollande, President of Russia Vladimir Putin, and the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko. Essentially, these agreements provided for an democratic status of Donbass within Ukraine, with Donbass' right to continue Russian equally the official language, to develop close economic ties with neighbouring Russian regions, to have their ain judges and local forces of guild. The Minsk agreements were signed by the OSCE] Ambassador Heidi Tagliavini, 2nd President of Ukraine Leonid Kuchma, the Administrator of the Russian Federation to Ukraine Mikhail Zurabov, and the leaders of Donetsk People's Republic Alexander Zakharchenko and the leader of the Lugansk People'due south Republic Igor Plotnitsky.

Information technology was a compromise, and as any compromise, nobody was totally satisfied with information technology. Only these agreements were a route map to end the ceremonious war in Ukraine, where the fighting sides were supported by the Westward, on one side, and by Russia, on the other, to forbid the escalation of the conflict on the global level between the collective West and Russian federation. Yet Ukraine did not keep its role of the agreement. Year after year, Russia has been waiting on Ukraine watching how Ukrainian army shelled Donetsk and Lugansk, killing thousands of civilians, watching how in Kyiv the mail-Euromaidan authorities was adopting laws glorifying Nazi collaborators, condemning the Soviet past and Soviet achievements, banning the Russian linguistic communication.

Moscow has appealed many times to Paris and Berlin to put pressure level on Kyiv. Goose egg but evasive promises and false assurances came from the high offices in Europe and Washington.

And notwithstanding the West ignited the flame in Ukraine by giving Ukrainians the same false promises to welcome them in the European Marriage, to take them in NATO, while knowing all too well that these promises will never be kept. And it is the Due west who said nothing when neo-Nazi paramilitary was driving the violence on Euromaidan, when multicultural bilingual Ukraine was burning in flames on Maidan, and when Kyiv sent troops in April 2014 to shell the Russian spring in Donetsk and Lugansk

And now Ukrainians are paying with blood and death for their naivety and the lack of understanding of the fundamental geopolitical forces that shape the world we alive in. They wanted a better life and European salaries. Who tin can blame them? But the road to that life leads through pluralism, tolerance, respect for police and the opinions of others. And all these democratic values that the West proclaims so loudly and proudly were not embraced past all in Ukraine.

There is then much to say near the causes of this tragedy. But I will just add together one comparison for my Canadian friends: Ukraine is the neighbor of one of the greatest political and military powers of the world, exactly as Canada has an elephant neighbour down south. And Canada almost ever follows in the footsteps of the US when information technology comes to foreign policy and military actions abroad. The US is as well the biggest merchandise partner of Canada. Tin y'all imagine all the repercussions if these ties were of a sudden cutting?

Everybody contributed to the eruption of the war in Ukraine. It will probably end by the victory of Russian troops. From what I have seen, they deploy all the efforts to spare civilians in Ukraine. Russians did not want this state of war. But the collective Westward, pb past Washington, cornered them. And they pushed back. For Russians, it is a defensive move, their terminal stand before NATO bombs would fall on the Russian territory. When the state of war in Ukraine will be over, Russia will take necessary steps to ensure that the new government of Ukraine volition swear neutrality, just equally it was before Euromaidan. And I hope that this time people who volition come to power in Ukraine will realize how important it is to be inclusive, tolerant, and democratic.

This is simply a simple outline of the factors that led to the tragedy nosotros are witnessing now. I could go on well-nigh the West's interventions in Great socialist people's libyan arab jamahiriya, Syria, Iraq. Just you get the pic. Right now, European countries, one after another, are sending weapons to Ukraine. They will non send troops. And the American war hawks will fight against Russian federation till the concluding Ukrainian. History has not taught them whatever lesson: Russians will fight till the end. Despite harsh economical sanctions, closure of air spaces, exclusion from sport events, despite any efforts to brand Russia a pariah state. They will fight because no matter what we think, they consider Ukrainians their brothers.

And the awakening volition come to Ukraine. Right now, I tin can only pray that it comes with minimal casualties and suffering. I am a Ukrainian, and it hurts. I am half-Russian as well, through my begetter. I take never lived in Russia, just I grew upwardly in the Soviet Union, reading dandy Ukrainian and Russian literature, learning past centre Ukrainian and Russian poetry. I dear Russian people and Russian culture. And I know for certain that one twenty-four hours, sooner than afterward, when canons autumn silent and the dust settles, Ukrainians and Russians will become expert neighbours once more. And peace will reign on my native land. And Ukraine will become once more a land where all are treated equally and respectfully, no matter the linguistic communication, where the Soviet history is rehabilitated, where Ukrainians have decent salaries and prosper on their own land and exercise hot have to leave to piece of work on strawberry fields in Poland or on construction sites in Italy, Greece, Spain. To build such a prosperous country, Ukrainians demand Russia's help, and good relations with the Westward. This is so obvious to anybody with a common sense and sober thinking. One time the war is over, it will exist upward to Ukrainians to understand information technology and make up one's mind for themselves what country they want to build.

***

Well-nigh: Halyna Mokrushyna, Ph.D., is an independent researcher and journalist. Her inquiry interests include the challenges of the postal service-Soviet transition in Ukraine; social and economical inequality in the post-Soviet context; historical and cultural divisions within Ukraine; social memory and politics of memory; relations between Russia and Canada and the broader context of the mail service-cold war world and relations betwixt the East and the Due west. Her articles on these subjects were published on Counterpunch, Truthdig, and Truthout websites.

Editors' Note: While we don't necessarily share the views we publish on New Cold War, we do attempt to provide readers with a range of views. This is considering your right to make your own heed up depends on your being fully informed.