By Andrey Kortunov, Russian International Affairs Council, 4/14/22

Kortunov has a Ph.D. in History and is Director General of the Russian International Affairs Council, RIAC member

The interim results of the Russian-Ukrainian talks in Istanbul unsurprisingly produced a surge of optimism among all those in Moscow who consider diplomacy the main tool for achieving peace and solving the “Ukrainian issue”. Within the expert community, they started exploring the prospects for an early Putin-Zelensky meeting, trying to envisage appropriate mechanisms for multilateral security guarantees to Ukraine (as much as to Russia), agreeing on potential compromises on territorial issues and even about blueprints for the post-conflict reconstruction of Ukraine.

However, adherents of diplomatic solutions were immediately confronted by numerous implicit and explicit opponents. Champions of the ‘military solution’ started accusing Russian negotiators of unforgivable credulity, excessive softness and almost of an outright betrayal of Russia’s national interests. In the public space, statements poured in, suggesting that the Ukrainian side is “non-negotiable” in principle, that Kiev needs negotiations only in order to create the appearance of moving forward, and that, therefore, Russia’s special operation must be brought “to a victorious end” in any case, even if it is accompanied by large-scale losses and costs.

Emphasis on diplomacy

These mixed reactions to the results of the Istanbul round of negotiations can hardly be considered accidental. They reflect the two fundamentally different understandings of the desirable and even of the plausible resolution of the ongoing conflict that currently coexist in the Russian society. Part of the society firmly believes that the current conflict can only be ended with a political compromise—for this compromise to be achieved, both sides must demonstrate willingness to make significant concessions. The other part of the society apparently sticks to the vision of the conflict ending with a complete and unconditional surrender of Kiev. Therefore, any significant concessions or compromises on the part of Moscow should not even be considered.

It would be tempting to offer some general explaining the diversion in public positions regarding the special military operation. For example, claiming that the Russian establishment is in favor of a military solution, while ordinary people want peace. Or saying that the military experts tend to focus on the continuation of the special operation, while their civilian colleagues prefer to discuss diplomacy. Or arguing that the older generation demands the unconditional surrender of Kiev, with young Russians tending to look for political compromises.

However, it seems that the lines of divergence have more emerged within various professional, social and age groups rather than between them. Let us recall, for instance, a public appeal to the President and citizens of Russia, by Colonel-General Leonid Ivashov, published on the eve of the special operation, warning against attempts at a military solution to the “Ukrainian issue”. It is difficult to associate someone like General Ivashov with political dissidents, or armchair experts who have never sniffed gunpowder, or with yellow-haired chicks with no life experience. The conflict in Ukraine has produced completely new coalitions and alliances cutting across traditional partisan groupings and old political preferences.

What are the main disagreements in the assessments of the Ukrainian crisis? First of all, proponents of a diplomatic solution perceive Vladimir Zelensky as the legitimate leader of a large European country—an indispensable, even if not the most convenient partner for negotiations. Those who endorse a military solution would like to present Zelensky and his negotiating team as puppets of the West with no political ‘subjectivity’, which is why they claim it makes no sense to seriously discuss anything with them but the terms of surrender.

The diplomatic approach implies an intention to treat Ukraine as a young and not fully matured, but an unquestionably sovereign state that has an inalienable right to make an independent choice on the vector of its economic, social and political development. The rejection of the diplomatic approach reduces Ukraine to an unenviable position of a platform for geopolitical confrontation between Russia and the West, a “no man’s land”, an eternal “Wild Field”, which possesses no destiny of its own and has neither national sovereignty nor national identity.

Hawk’s peck

The emphasis on diplomacy means Russia’s readiness to limit itself to the already well-known set of specific and generally negotiable demands on Kiev, including Ukraine’s abstention from attempts to join NATO, certain restrictions imposed on the offensive capabilities of the Ukrainian armed forces, legislative measures taken to counter radical ethnic nationalism and other forms of political extremism, ensuring the security of the proclaimed Donbass republics, etc. The rejection of diplomacy suggests that Russia has to insist on a complete reset of the “Ukrainian project” as such, including a change of the currently existing political regime in the country and a subsequent revision of the fundamental principles of the Ukrainian statehood.

The diplomatic approach is set up to reach peace agreements “here and now”. With the full understanding that any agreements will not be perfect at all, they will leave many sensitive issues unresolved to face inevitably stiff resistance not only in Kiev but also in Moscow. It is not difficult to predict the emergence of multiple problems related to the practical implementation of agreements, to their interpretation by each of the two sides, to the subsequent clarification of specific provisions and to politically driven attempts to revise the latter.

Abandoning the diplomatic approach suggests the course of actions under the slogan “victory at any cost”. This means a further continuation—rather than a downscaling—of the special military operation, including the most difficult and potentially disastrous tasks of capturing all major Ukrainian cities. Further, it involves establishing Russian military administrations and ensuring control of the entire territory of Ukraine for a long term, the country’s entire perimeter of borders, as well as long-term fight against very likely guerrilla warfare and terrorist acts on this territory (possibly on the territory of Russia, too).

To find a diplomatic solution, all the necessary and sufficient preconditions are already in place. There are two negotiating teams, an unlimited choice of external mediators, numerous proposals of experts and the already emerging convergence of the positions of the parties on a number of important matters. Proceeding with a military solution will require a further horizontal and vertical escalation of the conflict, not excluding a general mobilization in Russia. In this case, new combat losses and new civilian casualties are unavoidable, not to mention the risks of the Russian special operation escalating into a major European war.

Today, the Russian society is in a state of extreme excitement and even exaltation. From the pages of newspapers and from TV screens, hawkish pecking is heard much louder than pigeon cooing. Public sentiments, however, can and should be managed. Otherwise, when (and if) the country’s leadership does make a choice in favor of a political solution, the central topic of public discussions in Russia will inevitably be the sacramental question: “Who stole our victory?”. Then, it will be very difficult for the authorities to prove to an agitated society that the desire for compromise is better than the demands for unconditional surrender, and the bickering of diplomats is better than the exchange of missile strikes.

This provided a good chronology of the history of Ukraine’s attempt at independence between 1917 and 1922, during which time it underwent numerous changes of governance.

If this is true as reported – and it’s also been reported in NYT along with stories of a few other Russians who’ve experienced similar problems – it is sad and distressing. This is not the Russia I saw when I visited in 2015 and 2017. On those trips, I talked to a range of Russians and no one seemed afraid to say what they thought about politics. And, despite western media distortions, there had been diversity of opinion represented in print media. It appears that has all changed now. – Natylie

By Kelsey Vlamis, Business Insider, 4/9/22

A teacher in Russia said she was fired and fined after being turned into the authorities for comments she made to students about Russia’s war in Ukraine.

Marina Dubrova told The New York Times she showed her eighth-grade class a YouTube video with an anti-war message. Afterwards a group of girls asked her about the war.

Dubrova, an English teacher on the Russian island Sakhalin, told the girls: “Ukraine is a separate country.” One of the girls responded: “No longer.”

Russian police arrived at her school days later, The Times reported, and a recording of her comments, apparently taken by a student, was presented at court.

She was fined $400 for “publicly discrediting” Russian forces and fired by the school for “amoral behavior,” she told The Times. When speaking about Russians in favor of the war, Dubrova said: “It’s as though they’ve all plunged into some kind of madness.”

There have been various reports of Russians turning each other in for speaking out against the war, which Russia calls a “special military operation,” though it’s unclear how widespread an occurrence it is.

Russian President Vladimir Putin last month indicated Russia must undergo a purging of society to root out those who are anti-war or align with the West.

“The collective West is attempting to splinter our society, speculating on military losses, on socioeconomic effects of sanctions, in order to provoke a people’s rebellion in Russia,” Putin said in a video address.

“But any people, the Russian people, especially, are able to distinguish true patriots from bastards and traitors and will spit them out,” he said, referring to people who do not support the Kremlin.

“I am certain that this necessary and natural self-cleansing of society will only strengthen our country, our solidarity, togetherness, and our readiness to answer any calls to action,” he added.

More than 4,300 anti-war demonstrators in Russia had been detained at protests across the country as of early March.

By Alan MacLeod, MintPress News, 4/8/22

While Staff Members Of The Kyiv Independent Grandstand About How “Independent Journalism Is The Cornerstone Of Democracy,” They Are Quietly Being Funded By Western Governments – A Fact That Should Ring Alarm Bells With Critical Media Consumers.

Kiev, Ukraine – As the Russian attack on Ukraine has come to dominate global news feeds, so has a previously little-known outlet called The Kyiv Independent. Since its inception in November of last year, the Independent’s profile has risen rapidly and has been promoted and endorsed by both social media giants and the corporate press.

The Kyiv Independent has become the toast of the town. It seems virtually impossible to turn on cable news without seeing its reporters on CNN, Fox News, MSNBC, ABC, CBS, or other networks. Its staff has been given the opportunity to write multiple op-eds in the pages of The New York Times and The Washington Post, something considered the ultimate seal of approval by many journalists. NPR listeners might also have heard interviews with reporters from the Independent.

But, while almost universally presented as a collective of unbiased journalists producing credible content, the Independent’s history, funding sources, and the proximity of many of its key staff to Western governments suggest that the news organization is not nearly as independent as its name implies.

Since November, the outlet has amassed over two million Twitter followers, up from around just 20,000 one week before the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24. Twitter also constantly promotes its content on its homepage, encouraging hundreds of millions of people to read and follow them.

The Independent has also managed to raise more than $3.2 million from two separate crowdfunding campaigns on GoFundMe and rakes in more than $72,000 per month from supporters on Patreon. This is partially down to ringing endorsements from the likes of The Washington Post, CBS News and PBS, who endorsed their funding drives as the perfect way to do something to help Ukrainians.

“Journalists with The Kyiv Independent have done tremendous work covering the war, offering the world constant updates as they fear for themselves, their families, and their homes,” the Post wrote. Meanwhile, the Times has regularly signal-boosted its coverage as well, recommending it to readers as a way to “avoid drowning in an ocean of information.”  Another article instructing teachers on how to discuss the war states that “Ukrainian sources like The Kyiv Independent” are a “good starting point” as “reliable news sources.”

In short, there has been nothing short of a ringing, wall-to-wall endorsement of the startup news organization. However, few, if any, of these reports and appearances hint at how close The Kyiv Independent and many of its staff members are to Western governmental power.

A Newborn Raised On The Milk Of Regime Change

The Kyiv Independent was born in November when dozens of staff members from The Kyiv Post clashed with ownership on that paper’s political coverage. New Post owner Adnan Kivan reportedly wished his employees to be more deferential to the administration of President Volodymyr Zelensky, leading to an acrimonious split whereby dozens of Post employees were fired and began their own outlet. While some have pointed to this as an example of the Independent’s credibility and unwillingness to be controlled, others are not so sure.

Commenting on the split, journalist Mark Ames remarked that, “Ukraine’s western-backed civil society (along with the hardline Ukrainian diaspora) loathed Zelensky right up to the invasion, suspecting him of being insufficiently nationalist.” Ames’ Moscow-based newspaper, The eXile, was closed down by Vladimir Putin in 2008. His analysis seems to have been proven correct by the Independent’s editor-in-chief, Olga Rudenko, who wrote in the pages of The New York Times that, “Mr. Zelensky, the showman and performer, has been unmasked by reality. And it has revealed him to be dispiritingly mediocre.”

The 30 Kyiv Post staff members were immediately able to fund their new venture, thanks to more than CA $200,000 in cash from the Canadian government, which made the donation through the European Endowment for Democracy. Outside of Russia, Canada has the largest Ukrainian diaspora in the world and has taken an active role in trying to shape the country’s political trajectory.

Established in 2013 and directly modeled after the U.S. National Endowment for Democracy (NED), the European Endowment for Democracy is an EU organization that functions in much the same way as the NED does. Although it couches its actions in the language of “democracy promotion,” it exists to hand out large sums of money, support, and training to political groups, journalists, and NGOs in enemy countries with the goal of promoting EU interests, including the overthrow of hostile governments. It does not “promote democracy” inside the EU; its operations are limited to Eastern Europe and the Middle East-North Africa region. In recent years, it has backed anti-government movements in Belarus, Russia, Syria, and Lebanon.

None of this information, including any connection to Canada or the European Endowment for Democracy, is on The Kyiv Independent’s website. Indeed, the outlet presents itself as totally independent and supported by readers. In its “About” section, it proclaims that “The Kyiv Independent won’t be dependent on a rich owner or an oligarch. The publication will depend on fundraising from readers and donors and later on, commercial activities.” It does not expand on who these donors are. However, its staff presents its funding as above board: “We’re not taking dirty money,” said one reporter. MintPress asked both The Kyiv Independent and the Canadian Embassy in Ukraine for comment about their funding arrangement but has not received a response.

Read full article here.

By Fergie Chambers, Toward Freedom, 4/12/22

Since Russia began what they call the “special operation” on February 24 in Ukraine, the corporate media has reported the Ukrainian population is united in resistance against the Russian military offensive. Aside from reports of civilians volunteering in a variety of non-military support roles, Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelensky and other state officials have urged civilians to take up arms. Then, on March 9, Zelensky approved a law that allows Ukrainians to use weapons during wartime and negates legal responsibility for any attack on people perceived to be acting in aggression against Ukraine. The Ukrainian Ministry of Defense even posted a graphic online with instructions on how to launch Molotov cocktails at tanks.

A poll conducted in early March by the Ukrainian sociological group, “Rating,” indicated that, of those Ukrainians surveyed, over 90 percent supported their government’s war effort, and 80 percent claimed willingness to participate in armed resistance. However, this survey excluded people who live in the self-proclaimed independent republics of Donetsk and Lugansk in eastern Ukraine’s Donbass region. It also did not include the 1 million Ukrainians who had by then already fled the country. Since the survey, an additional 3.6 million have fled.

Beneath the façade of chest-beating patriotism, however, lies an anti-war movement. Just as it is diverse in its motivations to oppose the war, this movement is decentralized geographically and appears not unified enough to move as one force.

In post-Maidan Ukraine, opposition to militarism had already been a slippery slope, well before the current Russian incursion. The case of Ruslan Kotsaba, a Ukrainian journalist and conscientious objector, was perhaps the first such of state suppression under military law that had gained some degree of international attention, at least from human rights and pacifist organizations. Kotsaba was originally a proponent of the 2013-14 Euromaidan protests against the government of later-ousted President Viktor Yanukovych. But he began changing course when he spoke out against the 2014 violence in the majority ethnic Russian Ukrainian region of Donbass. He posted a now-notorious YouTube video in 2015, calling for a mass boycott against the mobilization in the far eastern region. After garnering hundreds of thousands of views, Youtube yanked it. For these statements, Kotsaba was arrested, detained, and charged with treason and “obstruction of the legitimate activities of the armed forces of Ukraine.” After being sentenced to 3-1/2 years on the latter charge, and spending more than a year in prison, his conviction was overturned on appeal. But, in 2017, a higher court reopened the case and his trial recommenced in 2021. Shortly before the recent escalation with Russia, the state prosecution was suspended, though not entirely concluded. This article provides a glimpse into the prevailing sentiments toward anti-war expressions in Ukraine. It comes from a Kharkiv-based “human rights protection group,” yet it describes the suspension of his prosecution as unjust, given his “active collaboration with the Russian state.”

‘Anyone Will Rat You Out’

This reporter spoke with someone who would only go by the name, “Pavel.” He belongs to a now-banned Kyiv-based Ukrainian Marxist group. Pavel recently moved from Ukraine to Bucharest, Romania, and declined to give his real name or the name of his group. In 2015, the Communist Party was outlawed in Ukraine, on grounds it promoted “separatism.” More recently, on March 22, a month into the Russian incursion, Zelensky banned 11 mostly left-wing opposition parties. Pavel cited these bans, and the well-being of his family remaining in Ukraine, as reasons for his anonymity.

“Anyone who says anything against the military, protests against NATO, or really, opposes the government from any direction, is immediately labeled ‘pro-Russian,’” the 26-year-old told Toward Freedom. “Anyone is bound to rat you out as a Russian spy if they disagree with you: Nationalists or even other ‘leftists,’ like anarchists or progressives. Most of the country has joined forces with the nationalists. SBU [Ukrainian Secret Service] will catch wind of a protest, a meeting, or an article, and they’ll speak to their friends in the ‘civil society,’ who will send armed nationalists to ‘handle’ you.”

He spoke of a close comrade from the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, who had made statements on Facebook before February 24 against NATO interference in Ukraine and in support of the Minsk Agreements, the 7-year-old brokered cease-fire accords between the Ukrainian government and Donbass separatists, who had declared independence for two Ukrainian oblasts (states), Donetsk and Lugansk. Pavel said this person had gone into hiding in early March because nationalist groups had threatened their life. The person believed nationalists were still searching for them. Pavel and the person in hiding know of others who had disappeared in years prior.

Beyond this exchange, and a handful of correspondences on WhatsApp and Telegram, it has been next to impossible to find Ukrainian war resisters who had left the country to speak on the record. This is unsurprising given that one month ago, Zelensky issued a decree of martial law, banning most men ages 18 to 60 from leaving the country.

Military Service a ‘Form of Slavery’

Ukrainian pacifist leader Yurii Sheliazhenko told this reporter the pre-wartime penalty for evading military service had been up to three years in prison, but penalties have been increasing indefinitely since February 24. It’s impossible to verify what the exact penalties are, he said, as such hearings and verdicts are now closed to the public, ostensibly for the “safety of the judges” involved. As of April 10, Ukraine’s border guard reported roughly 2,200 detentions of “fighting age” men who were trying to escape the country. Many reportedly used forged documents or attempted to bribe officials, and others have been found dead in rural border areas.

The 31-year-old Sheliazhenko, on the other hand, has not left Kyiv. Instead, he is working tirelessly with his organization, the Ukrainian Pacifist Movement (UPM), to promote a message of worldwide non-violent resistance to all forms of armed conflict, including on behalf of his own country. His organization was founded in 2019, initially to oppose mandatory military service, which he calls a “form of slavery.”

Toward Freedom had the opportunity Sunday to speak by phone for two hours. He noted that he was equally opposed to the practice in Russia, or in any other country. But, in 2019, as the war raged on in the Donbass region, conscription in Ukraine began to take on an “especially cruel nature. Young men were being given military summonses off of the streets, out of night clubs and dormitories, or snatched for military service for minor infractions such as traffic violations, public drunkenness, or casual rudeness to police officers. In Ukraine, if you do not respond to such a summons, you will be detained.”

Sheliazhenko’s pacifism developed in childhood, where in the final days of the former Soviet Union, he immersed himself in the works of authors Ray Bradbury and Isaac Asimov at “peaceful” summer camps in the Ukrainian countryside. These were a contrast to today’s militarized, nationalist-themed summer camps springing up all over the country since the Euromaidan.

Now, he is a conscientious objector. “[There is] no exemption for conscientious objectors in Ukraine, even for clergy or religious organizations.” He noted that a 2016 UN Declaration on the Right to Peace failed to protect conscientious objection on the level of international law. Plus, transgender and gender-non-conforming people are caught in a Catch-22. “In Ukraine, because trans women are treated legally as men, they are not exempt from the martial law order,” Sheliazhenko said. “But then, they are also prohibited from fighting in the military. There are some horrible stories about LGBT people being abused both on the borders—attempting to leave—and within the military here in Ukraine.”

He describes Ukrainian society as increasingly militarized and that Nazism has become a real issue: “Our country has created an existential enemy, and now they say all people should unite around a nationality and a leader! The country has generally shifted far to the right. There are of course Neo-Nazis. But then many of these people are not perceived as ‘Neo-Nazis,’ but as ‘defenders of the country.’” He noted that the cease fires in the Minsk Agreements had been violated on an almost daily basis, by both Ukrainian forces and separatist militants. That said, a perusal of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine’s camera logs in Donbass, especially in the days leading up to February 24, show that almost every day, the first strikes were recorded from “government-controlled” locations, meaning Ukrainian military territory. By the time the war escalated in February, the UPM’s mission expanded past its usual opposition to conscription, and into directly challenging the military mobilization in Ukraine and in Russia. Of particular concern to the UPM is the role of NATO, and the unlimited shipment of weapons coming from the West. “When the UN failed to become a true organization of global, peaceful law enforcement, the U.S. developed NATO to institute global violent governance,” Sheliazhenko said. “These NATO weapons are moving this war to escalation, and it’s very profitable to the weapons corporations, like Raytheon, Lockheed and Boeing. [U.S. Secretary of Defense] Lloyd Austin is a board member of Raytheon!” The latter claim is correct.

This reporter asked Sheliazhenko if he was concerned for his own safety and about the nature of the risk he takes in publicly opposing his government and the war. “I will not fight in a fratricidal war, and no one should. But luckily, I am a consistent pacifist,” he replied. “If my summons comes, I will not go. And I have taken some precautions.”

Sheliazhenko said he also speaks against Russian military actions. However, he went on to explain peace activists would put themselves in danger of being arrested if they suggested Ukraine give up the Donbass region to the self-proclaimed independent republics. Fortunately for him, because he does not discuss territorial concessions, he is not deemed a threat. “I am seen maybe more as a freak, a clown.”

‘Millions Don’t Support Authorities’

Another perspective came from Alexey Albu, 36, a self-described communist and anti-fascist from Borotba, a Ukrainian revolutionary union that was banned along with communist parties in 2015. Albu represented the anti-Maidan movement in 2014 mayoral elections in Odessa, his home city. But he was forced to flee after massacres that took place May 2, 2014. Dozens had been left dead.

“In the press, there began to appear some accusations that it was my demand to shelter in the trade union building, and so I was guilty in the deaths of 42 people. Of course, this was not true,” Albu explained in Russian to this reporter. “But I realized that the authorities were preparing public opinion. On the 8th of May, I got information that the SBU would arrest me and my comrades the next morning. After that, I was put on a most-wanted list, but I was already in Crimea.”

Albu is now in the city of Lugansk, in the Lugansk People’s Republic. From there, he remains in regular contact with comrades back in territory controlled by the Ukrainian government.

“I want to say that millions of people in Ukraine do not support the far-right authorities, but all of them are really frightened.” A similar sentiment was documented in Toward Freedom’s March 21 article. “They are afraid of arrests, tortures, kidnappings,” Albu added. “Many notable people in opposition have been kidnapped and disappeared since the beginning of the military operation.” Some of those include former leader of the Ukrainian Union of Left Forces, Vasiliy Volga, and political scientist Dmitriy Dzhangirov. “Worse, many people who were in opposition to Kiev were detained, and we still don’t know about their fate. For example, the Kononovich brothers, leaders of the Komsomol [Young Communist League], and hundreds of other people.” Accounts of the March 6 detention of the Konovich brothers, accused of being “pro-Russian,” were widespread in international left-wing circles, as were demands to set them free.

Albu reiterated the anti-war movement’s demand that the Ukrainian state demilitarize right-wing Ukrainian state forces. He also emphasized that, behind media narratives that show a nation of unified anti-Russian freedom fighters, much dissent can be found.

“You can see the real relation of so many of the people to the military operation in liberated zones, like Kherson or Melitopol,” Albu said, suggesting fear of state repression often veiled popular opinion until Russian forces would take control of an area. “Once the Kiev government is not in control, people [will] support the end of this right-wing occupation very widely.”