Ukraine > The Maidan Revolution, Corruption, and the Illusion of Independence

 

Maidan Revolution protesters lament enduring

corruption in Ukraine, 10 years on

Ukraine is marking the 10th anniversary of the shooting of dozens of protesters in Kyiv during the Maidan Revolution, which toppled the country's Moscow-backed president Viktor Yanukovych and led to Russia's annexation of Crimea and a pro-Russian separatist movement in the east. FRANCE 24's Gulliver Cragg spoke with Denys Tarakhkotelik, a protest leader during the revolution who runs Yanukovych’s former estate as a museum, and Oleh Symoroz, an activist and war veteran, about how Ukraine is tackling corruption a decade after Maidan.

Issued on: 22/02/2024 - 09:47

1 min

By:FRANCE 24Follow|FRANCE 24

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Tarakhkotelik is not impressed with Ukraine’s effort to tackle corruption. "The sums involved are not as large as during Yanukovych’s time, but to be honest, if you look at the recent case of embezzlement from the defence ministry, to me that’s an even worse crime because now we’re at war."

Symoroz is also concerned about corruption in Ukraine. But he doesn’t feel that the Maidan Revolution was a failure. "We chose freedom of speech, we prevented our country from being turned into another Belarus or Russia. We see how all opposition there were shut down. We’re still able to speak out when things go wrong."

Amid Russia's heightened offensive in Ukraine's east and south, President Volodymyr Zelensky posted a message on Facebook on Tuesday to commemorate the 10th anniversary of Maidan.

"It has been 10 years since the attempts to destroy us and our independence," he said. "But we stood firm 10 years ago and continue to do so today." 

Your independence is an illusion, sir. You are thoroughly dependent upon NATO and America to survive even another day. And you survive another day in order to use up NATO made armaments at the cost of thousands of Ukrainian lives. Ukraine will be bombed back into the Middle Ages if this continues and NATO and American munitions oligarchs will laugh all the way to the bank. 

Kiev Proclaims Its Own Orthodox Church, Hails ‘Unification’ After Holding ‘Schismatic’ Council

©  Global Look Press

Ukraine has created an Orthodox church of its own, proclaiming “independence from Moscow.” While the majority of its hierarchs represented schismatic “churches,” Kiev authorities have hailed a supposed “unity” they have achieved.

The so-called “unity council” took place on Saturday in Kiev, with the country’s president Petro Poroshenko and other top officials in attendance. The overwhelming majority of participants represented two non-canonical entities – the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the self-styled ‘Kiev Patriarchy’ and the so-called Ukrainian autocephalous Orthodox Church. The two unrecognized entities have announced voluntary dissolution ahead of the event.

Just two hierarchs from the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchy participated in event, metropolitan bishops Simeon and Aleksandr. The Church as a whole refused to partake in the gathering, denouncing it as schismatic.

Metropolitan bishop Simeon even ran for the post of the head of the new entity, yet lost to ‘metropolitan’ Epiphany, who had been a hierarch within the unrecognized Kiev Patriarchate.

The head of the schismatic entity –self-styled ‘patriarch’ Filaret– has received the lifetime title of ‘Honorary Patriarch’ within the new structure. The title appears to be not without clout, since it’s established in the charter of the new church, which was adopted at the gathering as well.

It was not immediately clear what exact wording the document contains, since it was reportedly being actively negotiated until the last minute. The draft variant, however, which was unveiled earlier this month, made the new church fully subordinate to the Constantinople Patriarchate, regardless of all the talk about “independence.”

Constantinople has already expressed its support for the new religious entity, confirming it will recognize it officially in early January, which likely means the adopted charter suits Patriarch Bartholomew well.

The Russian Orthodox Church had, consequently, cut ties with Constantinople in the biggest split in modern Orthodox history.

The gathering, however, was swiftly denounced by the Russian Orthodox Church, which branded its decisions to be “void.”

“The non-canonical gathering … under general the guidance of a layman and the country’s head, as well as a foreigner, who doesn’t know the local language, has picked a non-canonical ‘bishop’ to become an equally non-canonical ‘primate,’” deputy head of the Moscow Patriarchate, Protoiereus Nikolay Balashov, said, adding that the whole event meant “nothing” to the Church.

A similar opinion was voiced by the Belarusian Orthodox Church – subordinate to the Moscow Patriarchate – which ruled out any official contacts with the new Ukrainian entity, calling it “evidently schismatic.”

Biggest Split in Modern Orthodox History: Russian Orthodox Church Breaks Ties With Constantinople

There is certainly more of politics than religion happening here.

An extraordinary meeting of the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church is held in Moscow, on September 14, 2018. © Sputnik / Russian Orthodox Church

In the biggest rift in modern Orthodox history, the Russian Orthodox Church has cut all ties with the Constantinople Patriarchate, effectively splitting from it after it granted independence to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.

The Holy Synod, the governing body of the Russian Orthodox Church, has ruled that any further clerical relations with Constantinople are impossible, Metropolitan Hilarion, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church’s External Relations Department, told journalists, de facto announcing the breach of relations between the two churches.

“A decision about the full break of relations with the Constantinople Patriarchate has been taken at a Synod meeting” that is currently been held in the Belarusian capital of Minsk, Hilarion said, as cited by TASS.

The move comes days after the Synod of the Constantinople Patriarchate decided to eventually grant the so-called autocephaly to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, thus making the clerical organization, which earlier enjoyed a broad autonomy within the Moscow Patriarchate, fully independent.

The Moscow Patriarchate also said that it would not abide by any decisions taken by Constantinople and related to the status of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. “All these decisions are unlawful and canonically void,” Hilarion said, adding that “the Russian Orthodox Church does not recognize these decisions and will not follow them.”

At the same time, the Russian Church expressed its hope that “a common sense will prevail” and Constantinople will change its decision. However, it still accused the Ecumenical Patriarch of initiating the “schism.”

Kiev Pechersk Lavra

The move taken by Moscow marks arguably the greatest split in the history of the Orthodox Church since the Great Schism of 1054, which separated Catholics and Orthodox Christians, as it involves a break of communion between the biggest existing Orthodox Church – the Moscow Patriarchate – and Constantinople Patriarch, who is widely regarded as a spiritual leader of world’s Orthodox Christians, even though his status is nothing like that of the Pope in the Roman Catholic Church.

Constantinople’s decision seems to be serving the interests of the Ukrainian leadership rather than the Orthodox Christians living there. While most Orthodox clerics in Ukraine still pledge loyalty to the head of the Russian church, Patriarch Kirill, and consider themselves to be part of the Russian Orthodox Church, Kiev actively supports a schismatic force, which has been unrecognized by any other Churches until now.

This religious movement led by the former Metropolitan of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate, who is now called Patriarch Filaret in Ukraine, has sought to gain the status of an independent Orthodox Church, “equal” to the Moscow Patriarchate, since 1990s. Meanwhile, it did not hesitate to seize Moscow Patriarchate’s churches by force.

According to TASS, 40 churches have been forcefully seized by the Kiev Patriarchate between 2014 and 2016. In the first half of 2018 alone, Ukraine witnessed 10 new attacks on Russian Orthodox Churches. Now, as Constantinople is launched a procedure of granting independence to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, such attacks might further intensify, some experts warn.

Ukraine Celebrates National Heroes and Mass Murderers of Jews

Ukraine opens monument to nationalist icon Petliura

blamed for anti-Jewish pogroms

Ataman Simon Petlyura (С) and his staff © Sputnik

A monument to Symon Petliura, who fought for Ukrainian independence after the 1917 Russian Revolution, and under whose leadership thousands of Jews were killed in pogroms, has been opened in the city of Vinnitsa in western Ukraine.

The sculpture was erected in the courtyard of the building that formerly hosted the Ministry of Post and Telegraph of the self-proclaimed Ukrainian People’s Republic, which was headed by Petliura in 1917-1921. The Ukrainian nationalist icon is portrayed sitting on a bench with a map of the country in his hands.

The Vinnitsa authorities unveiled the monument on Saturday, when the country marked the Defender of Ukraine Day – a new holiday ordered by President Petro Poroshenko in 2014.

“He was a man who sincerely loved his country, his native language, who tried to be honest with his own people,” Valery Korovy, the chairman of the Vinnitsa Region administration, said of Petliura, claiming that the Soviets did everything to “malign this honest man,” as cited by Ukraina.ru.

It is the first monument to Petliura in Ukraine, which previously only had a bust erected in the capital, Kiev, and a memorial sign in Poltava.

35,000 - 50,000 Jews killed

Petliura fought for Ukraine’s independence from Soviet Russia, following the October Revolution of 1917. During his time as the head of the Ukrainian People's Republic, between 35,000 and 50,000 Jews were killed in a string of pogroms.

This, apparently, occurred in just 4 years and had nothing to do with the Holocaust.

After his cause failed Petliura fled to Paris, where he was killed in 1926 by a Ukrainian-born Jewish watchmaker, Sholom Schwartzbard. Despite Schwartzbard being caught red-handed, he was later acquitted by a French court, which ruled that he was acting in the heat of the moment after 15 of his relatives were killed in the pogroms.

Petliura’s apologists claimed he was personally against the pogroms, but lost control of his armed forces who engaged in killing Jews. Schwartzbard’s defense and some historians, however, hold Petliura directly responsible as the head of the government who did nothing to prevent them as he wanted to avoid a spat with his forces.

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Ukrainian authorities have been facing criticism over their attempts to glorify controversial nationalist figures, including those who openly sided with the Nazis.

In 2000, they awarded ‘Hero of Ukraine’ titles to Stepan Bandera and Roman Shukhevych, who collaborated with the Nazis during World War II and were involved in mass killings of Jews and Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia. 

The decision was later annulled under condemnation from the European Parliament, but Bandera and Shukhevych still have monuments and streets named after them across Ukraine.