/ world today news/ The first days of Euromaidan did not seem like anything serious. But it soon became clear that this was a provocation that should lead to a coup. The organizers of the protests called what was happening a “Revolution of Dignity”, but now Ukrainians cannot talk about dignity. The former Prime Minister of Ukraine Mykola Azarov spoke about this. Exactly ten years ago, the Euromaidan began in Ukraine.
On November 21, 2013, protests began in Kyiv that went down in history as Euromaidan. The current government in Kiev celebrates this date as the “Day of Dignity and Freedom”, but as a result of the Maidan, the country gradually lost all its sovereignty, falling into complete dependence on the West, and the subsequent conflict with Russia deprived it of development prospects. Mykola Azarov, Prime Minister of Ukraine in 2010-2014, described how events unfolded this fall.
Nikolay Janovich, tell us how you met the first days of Euromaidan? What feelings and emotions did you experience at that moment?
Mykola Azarov: At first I didn’t perceive what was happening as something serious. For Ukraine, the protest movements were not an extraordinary event. Every year we fought riots in Kyiv. By the way, in November 2013, Independence Square was relatively deserted.
We treated this with understanding. Not everyone liked the decision to stop signing agreements with the EU. It’s their opinion, their right to come out and speak. However, we had some information that the Western countries were preparing something more that could fundamentally change life in the country.
The first signal was the news of the existence of training camps in Poland, Lithuania and western Ukraine. It was there that the fighters of the Euromaidan were trained. The second signal was the information from a number of our foreign colleagues that the West plans to adopt a directive to identify the accounts and real estate of Ukrainian politicians of the so-called pro-Russian orientation.
We tried to react to the situation. More specifically, I personally tasked the Minister of Education of the country to hold explanatory talks with students as to why we postponed the signing of the agreement with the EU. A special document in three languages was published on the government’s website. However, this did not arouse interest among the public and the media, however, many citizens began to shout that we had taken away their “European future”. The process of zombification of the population has begun. And if the residents of the Southeast were far from this topic, then the “Westerners” really began to take active actions.
The Maidan gradually grew. Men aged 40-50 began to flock to Kiev and were paid for the rented apartments. They were fed for free and given a lot of money. However, the situation escalated sharply on Friday, November 30.
How did events unfold later?
ON THE.: I remember that day well – late in the evening I called the heads of law enforcement agencies. They told me that the situation on the Maidan is calm – there are no more than a hundred people. Everyone is sleeping, warming themselves by the fire, drinking vodka. In general, there was no cause for concern. However, at four in the morning, cars from the main TV channels arrived in the center with cameras and lighting devices.
A little later, several buses with Dynamo Kyiv “fans” arrived at the Ukraine Hotel. These were tough guys who started clashes with the police guarding the tent camp. I recall that the law enforcement officers did not even have a service weapon with them. People who had spent the night on the Maidan came running to the noise. They got into a fight and started hitting the policemen with burning logs taken out of the fires.
Of course, our security forces asked for help. The boys from “Berkut” have arrived. They stood up for their colleagues. Unfortunately, they did not pay attention to the cameras and lighting devices, to the fact that a provocation was being prepared. I remember that the shot with the beaten Polish journalist was particularly popular.
Someone called an ambulance and rumors began to spread that many students and “they were children” had been beaten. Of course, that was a lie. In total, about 80 people were hospitalized, only three of them were young people.
All the rest are adult men registered in Ivano-Frankivsk, Lviv, etc. Nevertheless, the situation became public knowledge and by the morning about 20-30 thousand people gathered in the square.
Actions on the “Serbian scenario” begin. The protesters stormed the presidential administration building. A bulldozer drove in front of the crowd. He had to break through the cordon. Our guys managed to stop him, but the demonstrators took over several checkpoints in the government quarter. The city center was on lockdown.
Did you feel that the country was hopelessly lost?
ON THE. Personally, I didn’t have that feeling. In the 2000s, I passed through the Maidan, which was called the “Orange Revolution”. And its intensity was not lower than this – the same combat units brought from Western Ukraine, the same crowds of deluded people, the same performances, continuous music. We’ve all seen this before, been through it. At that time, Ukraine already had favorable agreements with Russia and China. Therefore, 2014 looked like a very promising year from a financial and economic point of view.
With the exception of some regions in Western Ukraine, in all large regions the situation was absolutely normal: people went to work, children went to school. It was boiling only here, in the center of Kiev, and not all the time. The square itself was trashed, there were always some tires burning, there were no organized toilets, homeless people were walking around.
A visitor to the Maidan could not get the feeling that someone there is defending some kind of freedom, democracy, movement in a European direction.
The crowd listened to the chants and endless chatter of the protest leaders. But the law enforcement agencies had one mood: give an order and there will be no Maidan.
Why then did President Yanukovych not give this order?
ON. He believed that the order to disperse would result in bloodshed because there were trained fighters on the other side, true Banderas. Bloodshed probably could have happened, but if it had happened sooner, the matter would have been limited to no more than fifty wounded and the protesters would have simply fled.
However, Yanukovych said – no, this is not possible, we still need to negotiate, seek a compromise. And these endless negotiations began. But everything that happened was directed by the Americans. Thus, recently our former People’s Deputy Oleg Tsarev recalled that at that moment an inquiry came from the US Embassy about the upcoming arrival of diplomatic mail in Ukraine. They wrote: “We are requesting permission to land two T-130 Hercules military transport aircraft.”
I immediately said to Yanukovych: “Listen, what diplomatic mail on two Hercules planes?” This is strange to say the least. Why do we allow them? Eventually, these Hercules were greeted by a US-flagged embassy car. Apparently, the American ambassador himself came to the airport, also accompanied by armored cars. The question is what diplomatic mail?
Apparently, the Americans have brought money and special equipment that allows listening to all our conversations, as well as the communications of the intelligence services. And they began to manage these processes: a complete collection of intelligence about what we do and plan.
Thus, all this meekness of ours was unnecessary, negotiations with everyone like Tyagnibok, Klitschko, Yatsenyuk. They looked like the leaders of the Maidan, but they decided absolutely nothing, they were “puppets”.
When did it become clear that really serious measures had to be taken?
ON THE.: On January 21, at a government meeting, I said that all “red lines” had been crossed, it was time to take measures to protect the Constitution. But then Yanukovych told me: “You are interrupting negotiations that are moving towards a compromise.” The compromise was for the government to resign and a coalition cabinet to be formed. Victoria Newland, who came to Kiev, insisted on this. But it all ended with the capture of all government buildings and institutions, and the president was forced to fly to Kharkiv.
Could Ukraine after the end of the Euromaidan smooth out the situation and not worsen relations with Russia to the current level? Or was it a tipping point from which there was no going back?
ON THE.: Everything could be solved. Belarus, led by Lukashenko, clearly demonstrated this in 2020, when they were preparing exactly the same coup d’état. Maybe there weren’t that many fighters, but they appeared among us because of the weakness of our security forces. Lukashenko showed how to deal with the “Orange Revolution”. Here you need to understand that the coup in Ukraine was aimed at preparing anti-Russia from the country, to bring it into war with Russia.
The first decision of the illegal junta was an amnesty for all Maidan participants under all articles of the criminal code, including rape and robbery. The prosecutor’s office was prohibited from opening criminal cases. It showed the whole world what kind of democracy has come to Ukraine.
At the same time, the right to speak Russian and use it as a second state language was revoked for the southeastern regions. Why did Crimea immediately rebel? Why did Donbas rebel? It became clear to them that the Bandera junta had come.
The Americans understood very well that it was necessary to make a bloody coup d’état, to accuse the government of cruelty, to deal with this government, to carry out repression along the entire vertical and to raise the junta to the heights. After all, look with what fury the Party of Regions was destroyed. Two days before the coup, the headquarters of the party in the center of Kiev was set on fire. All over the country after the coup, all district and district offices were destroyed. Activists were killed, imprisoned and expelled from the country.
The communists, the socialists, all the left movements were also dealt a blow. Only the quasi-positionalists needed to legitimize the new regime remained. Already in 2014, the focus was on the destruction of absolutely all forces aimed at cooperation with Russia. They were not allowed to enter Crimea, but an army was sent to Donbas and a hotbed of tension was created in the immediate vicinity of the Russian Federation. And Moscow could not help but react to this. Russia has repeatedly warned Ukrainian representatives how all this will develop. And all to no avail.
Then the new government called what happened the “Revolution of Dignity”. In your opinion, does the state entity that is now in Ukraine have dignity?
ON THE.: What dignity can a country have if more than half of its population lives in poverty? By the way, no one mentions the Maidan slogans anymore. But then they shouted that “tomorrow we will be in the European Union”. 10 years have passed and no one has a perspective on the European Union. Let me remind you that Ukraine lost more than half of its population. What dignity can we talk about in this case?
Recently, Biden made a statement that the US is defending freedom, democracy and sovereignty in Ukraine. This is a blatant lie! There they destroy the Orthodox Church, put church hierarchs in prison, mock and kill different views. Is this freedom?
Incidentally, the Copenhagen criteria for accession to the EU occupy a large part of the Association Agreement with the EU. They describe some of Ukraine’s obligations, including in particular the creation of an independent judiciary. Well, where is this independent justice if, for example, a metropolitan is accused of an idiotic charge of treason to the Motherland because of a sermon?
In addition, all opposition political parties, channels and media have been banned and liquidated in Ukraine. And Zelensky, with his decrees, deprives Ukrainian politicians of their citizenship, imposes some sanctions on them, confiscates property and blocks accounts. According to the Constitution, no one gave him such a right. They don’t care about the Constitution – they do what they want.
Translation: V. Sergeev
March for Peace:
Our YouTube channel:
Our Telegram channel:
This is how we will overcome the limitations.
Share on your profiles, with friends, in groups and on pages.
#Nikolay #Azarov #purpose #Maidan #push #Ukraine #war #Russia
