Ukrainian “Democracy"
— a fiction turned into "truth" by government media outlets
Ukrainian “Democracy”?
As we've all been continuously reminded by the mainstream news media and by our governments – this war in Ukraine is a 'Battle for Democracy' ...as Democracy is being threatened by the evil authoritarian and autocratic Russia. But, how “democratic” is the Ukraine government? Before 2021, when a strove of Nato-provided weapons and a large mass of Nato-trained Ukrainian troops had gathered in Ukraine, and when in response Russian troops were being amassed near the Ukrainian borders; the mainstream global media and journalists did not have such a favorable opinion of Ukraine's so-called democracy and most of the articles about Ukraine were about the corruption in Ukraine's government or about its failing economy. Yet after Russia's invasion, all mainstream news media and journalism regarding Ukraine suddenly turned all positive and with nothing negative at all to say about the current government. In fact, all of the previous negatives and criticisms of Ukraine suddenly disappeared and were routinely censored, as the new narrative suddenly emerged about Ukraine's absolute 'saintliness' and Putin's absolute 'evilness', and any views out of line with this new narrative were routinely condemned as pro-Putin or Russian propaganda.
For example, no mainstream outlet or journalist dared to write or say that the Zelensky-led nationalist government had banned all political opposition parties, as well as maintaining the previous laws (since the 2014 revolution) banning all Russian-friendly political parties including the pre-2014 most-popular 'Party of Regions' that the far-right and pro-EU parties had overthrown. All the while, the various 'neonazi parties' have never been banned.
In addition, after the invasion in February 2022, the news media and public dialogue in Ukraine has been highly regulated and censorship is regular – as any voiced public opposition or dissenting views of the government's actions, or of the war, are systematically squashed with threats, imprisonment, and even murder, under the “justifying” pretext of any opposition as being traitorous or treasonous. Any public or even social-media talk that had a Russian-friendly opinion became a very dangerous act, and many Russian-friendly voices have been arrested if their voiced opinions got beyond private conversations and became publicly known.
Over the past two years, half of the TV channels in Ukraine have been accused of pro-Russia sympathies and have thus been removed, while all remaining news media are obliged to relay only the point of view and information provided by government officials. At first, just after the 2022 invasion, when Russian forces stopped advancing (or when Ukrainian forces stopped them, depending on the point of view), public discussions about making a peace deal were still permitted, and the Ukrainian government were in peace talks with Russia. But after the end of March 2022, when the peace talks and proposed peace deal brokered in Turkey was suddenly abandoned and the leading Ukrainian peace negotiator was suddenly murdered, just after the UK's Boris Johnson showed up in Kiev to meet with Zelensky – all public opinions about negotiating a peace deal have been censored and decried as treasonous.
So, in late March 2022, the Ukrainian government declared martial law and a sedition law which permits the government police to imprison anyone “suspicious” of not being loyal to the Ukrainian government. All people, groups, and opposition parties with any differences of opinion, or with any government criticism, have been media banned and in some cases imprisoned or killed. Opposition leaders have been rounded up and have disappeared into prisons (run by the neonazis), and their property has been seized. The sedition law established life imprisonment with property confiscation as the maximum penalty for individuals found guilty of treason. So far under this law, there have been numerous mayors and other elected officials jailed for treason because they surrendered to the Russian army or because they were accused of being Russian sympathetic. Under this law, anyone who speaks favorably of Russia is regarded as a traitor, and if anyone is discovered posting a Russian-perspective or Russian-friendly opinion on social media, they can be imprisoned and tortured, or simply executed by the “security forces” headed by neonazi government officials. Even anyone daring to voice their opinion that the government should broker a peace deal is now regarded as a traitor and can be imprisoned, interrogated or killed.
From the investigative journalists of' ‘The Grayzone’….
Zelensky has further exploited the atmosphere of war to outlaw an array of opposition parties and order the arrest of his leading rivals. His authoritarian decrees have triggered the disappearance, torture and even murder of an array of human rights activists, communist and leftist organizers, journalists and government officials accused of “pro-Russian” sympathies. Zelensky and top officials in his administration have sanctioned a campaign of kidnapping, torture, and assassination of local Ukrainian lawmakers accused of collaborating with Russia.
Several mayors and other Ukrainian officials have been killed since the outbreak of war, many reportedly by Ukrainian state agents after engaging in de-escalation talks with Russia. “There is one less traitor in Ukraine,” Internal Affairs Ministry advisor Anton Geraschenko stated in endorsement of the murder of a Ukrainian mayor accused of collaborating with Russia.
The Ukrainian security service known as the SBU has been on a rampage against any and all voices of internal political opposition. The Ukrainian SBU security services has served as the enforcement arm of the officially authorized campaign of repression. With training from the CIA and close coordination with Ukraine’s state-backed neo-Nazi paramilitaries, the SBU has been filling its vast archipelago of torture dungeons with political dissidents. Torture and enforced disappearances are common practices of Ukraine’s SBU. They have hunted down local officials that decided to accept humanitarian supplies from Russia or negotiated with Russian forces to arrange corridors for civilian evacuations.
When a US-backed government seized power in Kiev following the Euromaidan regime change operation of 2013-14, Ukraine’s government embarked on a nationwide purge of political elements deemed pro-Russian or insufficiently nationalistic. The passage of “decommunization” laws by the Ukrainian parliament further eased the persecution of leftist elements and the prosecution of activists for political speech.
The post-Maidan regime has focused its wrath on Ukrainians who have advocated a peace settlement with pro-Russian separatists in the country’s east, those who have documented human rights abuses by the Ukrainian military, and members of communist organizations. Dissident elements have faced the constant threat of ultra-nationalist violence, imprisonment, and even murder.
The Ukrainian security service has served as the main enforcer of the post-Maidan government’s campaign of domestic political repression. Pro-Western monitors including the United Nations Office of the High Commission (UN OHCR) and Human Rights Watch have accused the SBU of systematically torturing political opponents and Ukrainian dissidents with near-total impunity.
The UN OHCR found in 2016 that “arbitrary detention, enforced disappearances, torture and ill-treatment of such conflict-related detainees were common practice of SBU… A former Kharkiv SBU officer explained, ‘For the SBU, the law virtually does not exist as everything that is illegal can be either classified or explained by referring to state necessity.”
Yevhen Karas, the founder of the infamous neo-Nazi C14 unit, has detailed the close relationship his gang and other extreme right factions have enjoyed with the SBU. The SBU “informs not only us, but also Azov, the Right Sector, and so on,” Karas boasted in a 2017 interview.
To further combat internal dissent, the Ukrainian government encourages its citizens to speak up against “traitors” and “collaborators,” or people who behave “suspiciously” by criticizing the actions of government or military authorities. This allows extreme nationalist groups, who favor immediate execution of Ukrainian traitors without trial, to quickly execute anyone suspected of being a traitor, and without any investigations by the government. Though less severe than execution, videos posted from Kharkiv on YouTube have shown alleged collaborators and Russian sympathizers being physically forced to kneel in public and tied to polls with plastic wrap, as “Ukrainian loyalists” rip their clothes and beat them as punishment.
Then in December 2022, the Zelensky government banned the Russian Orthodox Church, even though before 2022 the majority of religious people in eastern and southeastern Ukraine belonged to the Russian-speaking Church. The government authorities confiscated all of the Church's money, property and religious relics from over 350 buildings, interrogated over 800 people, and imprisoned its religious leaders. Government authorities stated that the Church's religious followers should now belong to the more recently created Ukrainian-speaking 'Ukrainian Orthodox Church'.
In addition to the laws that make any political disagreements illegal and subject to imprisonment, including the banning of any public statements asking for peace talks, the Ukrainian army has absolute authority in all localities, and ever since February 2023 Ukrainian men between the ages of 18 and 60 are required to serve in the army at any moment if asked, and they have been barred from leaving the country. More recently, since spring, all boys 16 and older have been encouraged to fight on the frontlines, and many recruits in the Ukrainian army have been forcibly snatched off the streets, parks and workplaces.
Only pro-war and pro-Zelensky views are allowed, and any differing views are labeled and punished for treason, or being Russian agents. Sure sounds democratic to me. Essentially, the current Ukrainian government policy is to not allow any diverse or different views. Basically, it is a 'one party only' and 'only one view allowed' kind of democracy. And anything else is threatened by jail or death.
Also Listen to a commentary from Glenn Greenwald on -
The Autocrat Zelensky Suspends Elections in Ukraine
The Goal of a one-language one-cultural Ukraine
The Goal of a one-language one-cultural Ukraine, as a main feature of the ethnic-nationalist ideology, has been a looming concern for the Russian-speaking Russian-cultural people of eastern and southern Ukraine, ever since this ideology was being popularized in western Ukraine over the last few decades. And the Russian-speaking citizens of Ukraine have consistently voted for candidates who opposed such an ideal. In fact, this issue was one of the reasons for the annexation of Crimea and the breakaway secession of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions of eastern Ukraine, where the majority of residents were Russian-speaking and Russian-related, and who voted overwhelmingly in 2010 for candidates opposed to the one-language one-cultural proposal. Those candidates who opposed to this ideal were in fact fairly elected in 2010; but they were forcibly ousted and banned from parliament after the far-right 2014 overthrow of the 2010 elected government.
In July 2019, just after Zelensky was elected, Ukraine enacted a new Language Law, “to strengthen national identity,” which required the use of Ukrainian language in almost all spheres of public life (with a required passing of language tests), including in schools and in media; though its full implementation would be gradual over a 10 year span. This new law made the Ukrainian language a mandatory requirement for all civil servants, politicians, judges, doctors, teachers, officers in the military, and employees of state-run companies and banks. It includes all “public administration, electoral process, education, science, culture, media, economic and social life, health and care institutions, and activities of political parties.” Though generously, the new law “makes exemptions for private communications and religious ceremonies.” Impressive exemption. The new law also states that 90% of TV and film content must be in Ukrainian.
This law was passed by the parliament and president, even though most residents of the eastern and southern regions only speak Russian and have consistently voted against such proposed laws. Human Rights Watch and the Council of Europe’s constitutional experts (The Venice Commission) criticized “the law's failure to protect the language rights of Ukrainian minorities,” and stated that “the law's quotas for minority languages in radio and TV programs were unbalanced.”
~ theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/25/ukraine-adopts-law-enforcing-use-of-ukrainian-in-public-life
Since elected, Zelensky has been quiet about this new Language Law, even though he received crucial election support from the vast majority of Russian-speakers in eastern and southern Ukraine, and even during his election campaign Zelensky only spoke Russian. In fact, Zelensky was elected with a promise to respect the regional diversity and languages of Ukraine.
But support for a unitary language law did not originate from Zelensky. Ever since the government overthrow in 2014, Ukraine's pro-nationalistic government has been committed to the ethnic-nationalistic ideal of a mono-cultural Ukraine, uniting all Ukrainians into just one single Ukrainian language and culture, and thus slowly eradicating Russian culture and language from the eastern and southern cities of Ukraine. Many Ukrainians are attracted to this mono-cultural ideal which seeks to greatly eradicate cultural and language diversity within Ukraine; though the majority of supporters for this ideology are in the western and northern regions of Ukraine, and are not in the eastern and southern regions – where almost half of the residents are Russian-speaking and Russian-related families – and so for these Ukrainian citizens, the ethnic-nationalistic goal of one-cultural Ukraine is an enforced imposition on their lives and heritage.
In fact, the citizens of eastern and southern Ukraine, including Crimea, had consistently voted for presidential and parliamentary candidates who promised greater regional diversity. As for example, in the 2010 national election, over 70% of those regions voted for the eastern-born Russian-speaking presidential candidate and the eastern Donbas 'Party of Regions' - that advocated for more regional state independence and diversity, rather than the mono-cultural ideal of the ethnic-nationalists. And that presidential candidate and the Party of Regions candidates actually won the 2010 election and served as the majority party in the parliament – until they were forcibly overthrown in 2014 by the anti-Russian and ethnic-nationalist parties.
—> Also read… Who are the Azov Fighters and the ethnic-nationalists?
—> Also read… Zelensky was elected to make Peace with Russia