The authorities in Ukraine have already begun to fight the influences of Russian language since 1991, which absolutely dominated in the east and south of Ukraine, as well as in large cities and among intelligence and among workers, whose number was crucial due to the industrialization of the country.
Already in the academic year 2002-2003 in the Lugansk region (where the Russian-speaking population constituted an absolute majority) at the regional Lugansk Pedagogical Institute, teaching was translated into Ukrainian and Russian began to be taught as a abroad language. In 2005, the anticipation of utilizing Russian in court proceedings was restricted. According to the civilian Procedure Code and the Code, all judicial proceedings were to be conducted in Ukrainian and those who did not know it were obliged to pay for the services of the interpreter. All medical records, drug information, prescriptions were to be translated into Ukrainian and Latin only.
In late September 2006, the Russian Ministry of abroad Affairs issued a comment stating that Moscow no longer intends to ignore cases of discrimination against Russian language in Ukraine "as a insignificant social phenomenon. Persecution of Russian language in Ukraine must yet realise that bilingualism in Ukraine is simply a historically established phenomenon, and so the rooting up of Russian language by specified methods is counterproductive.” Of course, Russian accusations of discrimination against Russian language were found unfounded in Kiev and "forceful displacement of Russian language from various spheres of civilian life" by central and local authorities.
In 2008, so after almost 20 years of independence, according to the Gallup Institute, even in central Ukraine, the vast majority of residents inactive preferred to communicate in Russian. In 2014, on a working journey to Lviv, Poroshenko said that in Ukraine it is essential to talk about the peculiar position of English alternatively than Russian: "The second language, compulsory to survey in schools and universities, should be only English, and surely not Russian". In 2016, president Poroshenko signed a bill that introduced and gradually increased the mandatory participation of programs and songs in Ukrainian in the radio. In 2016, the Minister of Infrastructure stated that airports and railways should halt utilizing Russian language in providing information.
On 25 April 2019, the ultimate Council of Ukraine adopted the Act “On ensuring the functioning of Ukrainian as a State Language”, which considered Ukrainian to be the only State Language. Russian language was banned in the ultimate Council. Russian-speaking writers were discriminated against erstwhile they were admitted to the Association of Writers of Ukraine.On 16 January 2021, the Act on the usage of state language (Ukrainian) in the service sector entered into force in Ukraine. client service in a language another than the state language became possible only at the request of the client and by common agreement of the parties. A informing and a request to remove the infringement within 30 days was provided for in the event of a repeated akin infringement during the year.
There were besides methods of fighting Russian language, which caught on with the usual rudeness. At those universities of Ukraine, where any lectures were conducted in Russian, it was common practice to pay for the work of Russian-speaking teachers at lower rates. Monuments of Russian-speaking writers and poets, commanders and national heroes were destroyed, names of streets and cities were changed.
These are just any manifestations and ways to fight Russian. However, they concern what in doctrine we would consider a phenomenal sphere, form, alternatively than the essence of the problem. These manifestations do not cover the causes, especially the interests of individual groups of capital and society.
An economical and Political Background to Persecution
The economical background of the conflict in Ukraine is carefully hidden by both sides and the cultural subject is exhibited. According to Russian mainstream publicists, the origin of the war is linked to the persecution of the pro-Russian and Russian-speaking people. And most likely the persecution of the Russian-speaking population decided on the results of referendums in Lugansk, Donbas and Crimea, conducted in 2014. The majority of these areas were in favour of joining Russia.
In consequence to the Majdan device in 2014, the Russians utilized the pro-Russian attitude of the population and organized a coup in Crimea and without 1 shot took control of the full peninsula. It was not possible to do so with Lugansk and Donbas, as Ukrainians sent tanks, aviation, and defiled groups of armed neo-banders against them, and were opposed by militia troops supported by the Russians. After bloody fighting, there was a rounding of the Ukrainian army and a suspension of fights. The negotiations resulted in celebrated agreements concluded in Minsk and approved by the UN safety Council. Minsk agreements granted autonomy to Lugansk and Donbass within Ukraine.
In 2015 Vladimir Putin and Sergei Lavrov met in Sochi with John Kerry, US Secretary of State. The talks referred to as ‘sincere’ were to address global problems, including Iran, Syria and Ukraine. The global political situation prior to the gathering was tense. At the time comments were made in the mass media that it was possible that during the gathering the neutrality of the US and silence was negotiated in relation to the annexation of Crimea by Russia – in exchange for Russia withdrawing support for the thought of re-integration of the Lugansk and Donetsk region. The Ukrainian authorities had previously signed approval to extract shale gas in Donbasa by fracturing by US corporations.
With respect to the defence of the Russian-speaking population in the east of Ukraine, in April 2014, Vladimir Putin utilized the historical word “Novorosja” for the first time. The word was then captured by separatists in order to give an ideological frame for their rebellion against power in Kiev. At the time, Novorosja included part of the contemporary areas of Ukraine (the Donetsk Oblast, djeepropetrovsk, Zaporossky, Mikołajowski, Kherson and Odski), Moldova and Russia (Krasnodarski Country, Stawropolski Country, Adigeja, Rostov Region). After the gathering of Putin and Lavrow with Kerry in Sochi, the Russian separatists realized that Moscow (it is not known for how long) would not support the sovereignty of the republics or annex them into Russia.
If the Minsk agreements were implemented, which were Putin's then maximum programme, Ukraine would become a federation and the Russians could number on effective blocking of its anti-Russian and pro-Western abroad policy. But later, according to Putin, the West and Ukraine “took out” Russia, due to the fact that from the very beginning they did not intend to implement Minsk agreements, but only to usage them to gain time to arm and train the Ukrainian army for war with Russia. Separatist Donbas and Lugansk were to be included by force in the composition of Ukraine.
What is very significant, after the launch of the peculiar Military Operations, the West did not intend to negate this "fraud" and on the contrary Angela Merkel and another Western politicians publically acknowledged that these were their goals from the beginning. However, the issue of the social causes and mechanisms of Russia's being "defrauded" remains an unexplained problem. How is it that the large Russia with its extended peculiar services, satellite intelligence and with its powerful ambitions has been able to “swindle” for a fewer good years? Whose business made the West’s empty promises a good coin?
Rusophobia as a consequence of the interests of part of Ukrainian oligarchy
The Ukrainian authorities reject allegations of persecution of the Russian language, and give many examples. But, whatever the Ukrainian authorities say, the law on discrimination against Russian language exists and is implemented in practice. Recently, teaching in Russian schools was banned. The fact that they are not full implemented is just a substance of present times and conditions. Ukraine wanted to break up with its russian and pre-war past, where Russian-speaking regions clearly sympathize with Russia existed, and to accomplish this by spreading neo-Bander nationalism, limiting all influences of Russian language and subjecting the Russian-speaking population to ethnicity or, as anyone would like, Ukrainianization. president Zelenski even before the beginning of the military action publically called for people who were pro-Russian-oriented to leave Ukraine, although he had only had to learn Ukrainian himself. An alternate to Ukrainianism and nationalism is the cessation of any persecution and equal rights of the population and global cooperation based on common benefits.
The mediocre destiny of Minsk agreements
As the main reason for Russia's interference in interior affairs of Ukraine, it lists the persecution of the Russian-speaking population of Ukraine. These 2 events crossed out the anticipation of peaceful settlement of the conflict with Ukraine at this phase of common relations. After Petra Poroshenko came to power in May 2014, it seems that no 1 had any uncertainty that the Ukrainian authorities had broken their ties with Russia and aimed to strengthen their relation with the West, and that meant fighting Russian capital and all those who defended it utilizing Russian. The consequence of armed clashes was the signing of 2 agreements that play a decisive function to date: the Minsk Agreement of 5 September 2014 and the second of 17 February 2015. Despite the interruption of the fire, the agreements provided for the political integration of Lugansk and Donetsk Republic into Ukraine under peculiar conditions. This would most likely prevent Russia from integrating Ukraine into Western structures.
The industrialized Donbas, having autonomy, would be broadly economically integrated with Russia and would not let Ukraine to lead pro-Western politics. But Russia did not care about taking over Donbas for a fewer years, in which dense manufacture was concentrated, as it had an excess of it at home and deliberately pursued a policy of deindustrialisation. The Russian elites dominated the belief that dense manufacture was unnecessary, as for the money from the sale of oil, gas and metals they would be able to buy everything they needed and in Russia they did not produce.
The conditions contained in the Minsk Agreements were adopted in a critical situation erstwhile the Ukrainian army suffered defeat for defeat. Arrival Volodymyr Zelenski to power in 2019 sparked hope in the Kremlin for normalization of relations, an agreement was signed on a five-year period of acquisition of gas by Ukraine. In Moscow, the hope that Poroshenko (based on nationalists) will replace the more willing to talk and concessions of Zelenski. But this continued the Euro-Atlantic course of Poroshenko, and was even little inclined to talk and compromise as it was supported by pro-Western oligarchs. It exacerbated repression against pro-Russian politicians and against the opposition platform behind Żyń. utilizing the conditions, military dictatorship was introduced, widespread preventive censorship, and all opposition was eliminated. The function of Russian capital was limited to the maximum, although many business unions were not breached, as long as they corresponded to Western capital and its related Ukrainian oligarchs.
Integrity of territory or the right of nations to self-determination?
Ukrainian and all NATO propaganda depicts like a mantra communicative that Ukraine voluntarily gave up atomic weapons, in exchange for guaranteeing the integrity of its territory and that Russia, erstwhile starting peculiar Military Operations, broke Ukrainian assurances.
But you can look at the problem from a different angle. The right to keep territorial unity is subject to the right of nations to self-determination. Consequently, the right to keep the integrity of the territory is conferred on those countries which respect the right of the nations to self-determination on their territory. From this point of view, therefore, the issue of territorial integrity is completely different. The sovereignty of power in a given territory does not mean that power in this territory can do with the nation what it likes. The right of the nation to self-determine its destiny is superior to the sovereignty of the state. This sovereignty of the nation should find the decisions of the state. The Kiev authorities did not recognise the result of the referendum the districts with the predominance of the Russian-speaking or pro-Russian population, which advocated independency from Kiev or straight in favour of joining Russia.
The Ukrainian authorities, by adopting the law on the persecution of Russian language, themselves excluded any of the population from their own nation and started to disintegrate their territory. And directing pacification troops against these regions themselves broke the integrity of the state territory and undermined their right to sovereignty in the recently promoted republics. Thus, the problem of preserving the integrity of Ukraine is no longer the case for those republics which, in the referendum held in 2014, voted mostly against the Ukrainian authorities. The intent of the war declared by the Ukrainian authorities as the liberation of Crimea, Donbass and Luhansk has no legal basis in the form of the 1945 United Nations Declaration is contrary to the spirit of this Declaration.
But specified an explanation of the right of nations to self-determine the Ukrainian authorities and its western sponsors do not want to accept due to the fact that that is not why they organized the armed coup in 2014.
Euromaidan anti-Russian coup
Mass speeches from 2014 went back to past as Euromaidan, which the average citizen believes was intended to force Yanukovych to sign an agreement with the European Union. This would mean a crucial economical return for Ukraine from economical relations with Russia to full cooperation with the European Union. However, the substance was not as simple as it seemed to an average demonstrators.
Due to conflicts of interests in the bosom of Ukrainian oligarchy, Yanukovich tried to halt this process and conduct politics in 2 directions simultaneously. At the time, Ukrainian oligarchs connected especially to the processing manufacture were well aware that Ukrainian goods would not withstand competition with goods from the European Union and would flood the Ukrainian market, which would entail a major crisis in Ukraine. To keep the pro-Russian course, Yanukovych received support from Putin, and Russia granted a debt of $15 billion, with 3 billion being paid immediately. And Yanukovych was ready to no longer sign the agreement to join the European Union. However, Euromaidan continued, and the Americans began openly supporting him financially and diplomatically. Under their pressure, Yanukovych agreed to social demands of protesters and to re-elections likely to lose. But there was besides small for the pro-EU and pro-American forces, Euromaidan was continued in force-based forms, which faced countering the pro-presidential police and peculiar services – blood spilled. Yanukovych had to leave Kiev and went to Russia. Thus, the oligarchs associated with the raw-energy manufacture and able to export to Western markets were victorious. Anti-Russian neofascist neobanderism has become an ideological tool for perpetuating this victory.
According to mainstream Russian propaganda, the alleged Euromaidan in Ukraine, was an anti-Russian coup, organized by the US and UK peculiar services. Consequently, the Russians do not call it the “Orange Revolution” as the Ukrainians do. This political crisis led to the escape of Yanukovych and his close associates, and he became interim president Aleksandr Turczynov. The Ukrainian authorities continued to restrict the function of the Russian language. In response, Russia, with the aid of the armed forces, annexed without 1 shot of Crimea, and besides expanded the conflict in the east of Ukraine in Lugansk and Donbasa in April 2014, erstwhile their independency from Ukraine was requested.
Russian Igor Strielkov and his people began to hold offices in Donetsk, Slavic and another cities of the Donetsk region. In response, the Ukrainian authorities announced the launch of an "anti-terrorism operation" against their own nation – and so began the armed conflict in Donbasa, which consumed by the end of 2022 according to authoritative data of about 14,000 victims. Russia called it a civilian war and rejected its participation in these events. But Russia provided war and economical assistance to the separatists of Donbas.
Minsk agreements opened the way to transform Ukraine into a federation, which would full satisfy Russia. In the Minsk agreements, Russia was not even mentioned as a organization to the conflict. But the West wasn't going to force Ukraine to make those arrangements, he just wanted to win any time... to drag Russia and Ukraine into war...
It can be said that for decades the Ukrainian authorities persecuted their own people, regardless of the language they used. In 1990, over 51.8 million people lived in Ukraine. The 2001 Ukrainian census showed over 48.4 million inhabitants. The population of Ukraine in 2020, as reported by the authorities in Kiev, was almost 37.3 million. The latest estimates from 2024 say that the population may stay in Ukraine between 24 and 34 million.
Under corrupt neoliberal elites Ukraine lost more people than during planet War II. Demographic policy seemed to be a conscious decision of the workforce to the West and to Russia. The peculiar Military Operation has dynamized this transfer and made it mostly irreversible. But the increasing contradictions and difficulties had to be suppressed somehow. Strengthening Russia's conflict and provoking war has proved to be a temporary effective means to this end.
Dr Edward Karolczuk
photo of wikipedia
Think Poland, No. 39-40 (22-29.09.2024)
