In my previous article,
I proposed to look at the Ukraine conflict from a scientific point of view.
And today I would like to analyze this conflict from a
legal point of view.
The protests that began in Ukraine in November 2013 –
which led to a change of power in that country in February 2014 – had nothing
to do with the violation of citizens’ rights: see the list of these rights in
the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on the official UN website. The
reason for the protests was announced to be the postponement of the signing of
the EU-Ukraine Association Agreement. But a deadline for signing an
international agreement has nothing to do with citizens’ rights; it is an
internal matter for the government of the respective country.
However, these protests were accompanied by
violence from the first days since
protesters threw stones at police etc. And subsequently, at some point the
protesters began to burn and kill.
The so-called Ukrainian revolution ended in violation
of the law too. In February 2014, the legally elected president of Ukraine V.
Yanukovych was unconstitutionally removed from power; see my article Did a coup d'état take place at the end
of February 2014 in Ukraine?
After all of the above-mentioned events, protests
began in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions in response, and as a result, in April
2014 the Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) and the Luhansk People's Republic (LPR)
were proclaimed, which were independent from the central Ukrainian government.
The Ukrainian authorities of course immediately
declared the creation of these Republics illegal, but the legal paradox is
that these authorities had been oppositionists just a few months ago, who
themselves had actively violated Ukrainian laws.
If the Ukrainian opposition members could throw stones
at the police, could burn, kill, and unconstitutionally remove a legally
elected President from power, why couldn't other people proclaim independent Republics
and separate from Ukraine?
The Ukrainian authorities accused Russia of
involvement in the creation of the above-mentioned Republics, but the heads of
these Republics were citizens of Ukraine – A. Zakharchenko and D. Pushilin in
the DPR and I. Plotnitsky and L. Pasechnik in the LPR.
Then, after a referendum in these Republics, their representatives asked the Russian Federation to accept these
Republics into the Russian Federation, which was done in September 2022. And
earlier, in February 2022, Russia began a Special Military Operation in Ukraine
to protect citizens of the DPR and LPR in accordance with the agreements
between the Russian Federation and these Republics.
In my opinion, this development of events can be
explained precisely by the violation of laws by Ukrainian oppositionists during
the Euromaidan.
It would have been possible to achieve a more rapid
signing of the Association Agreement between the EU and Ukraine by legal means,
for example, by electing a President of Ukraine in the next presidential
elections in March 2015 who would immediately sign this Agreement.
The assertion that Russia allegedly had complete
control over Ukraine before V. Yanukovych’s removal is completely untrue. For
example, V. Yushchenko, Yanukovych's predecessor in this post, pursued an
openly anti-Russian policy and even - despite the non-aligned status of this
country as recorded in the then Constitution of Ukraine - in 2008 appealed to
the NATO leadership with a request to accept Ukraine into this bloc. If Ukraine
had been a colony of Russia before 2014, as it is claimed in the West, a
politician like V. Yushchenko could never have become the Ukrainian President.
Therefore, the violations of laws by Ukrainian
oppositionists during the Euromaidan were completely unfounded and it was these
violations of laws that led to today's situation.
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