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AUGUST 16, 2018 ISSUE No. 42 (1174)
Tel.: +38(044) 303-96-19,
fax: +38(044) 303-94-20
е-mail: time@day.kiev.ua;
http://www.day.kiev.ua
Dear readers, our next issue will be published on August 23, 2018
Photo by Ruslan KANIUKA, The Day
Canadians need
more content
re Ukraine
Canadian Ambassador
to Ukraine Roman
Waschuk comments on
FTA advantages, cultural
heritage, and realism
Continued on page 4
Photo by Anatolii STEPANOV
Photos that
produce new
meanings
Anatolii Stepanov, who
has photographed
Ukrainian defenders
since the beginning of
the war in the east,
speaks about his heroes
Continued on page 5
“Not to act is to let
Oleh Sentsov die”
On August 16, the “prisoner of the Kremlin” will mark
the 95th day of his hunger strike. Artists all over
the world keep up their efforts to save him
Continued on page 2

2
No.42 AUGUST 16, 2018
“Not to act is to let Oleh Sentsov die”
On August 16, the “prisoner of the Kremlin” will mark
the 95th day of his hunger strike. Artists all over
the world keep up their efforts to save him
By Mariia PROKOPENKO, The Day
The cult film director Jean-Luc
Godard, classic maker of poignant
social cinema Ken Loach, French
Culture Minister Francoise
Nyssen as well as other artists and
cultural figures sent an open letter
calling for the release of Oleh Sentsov and
international mobilization in order to
accelerate this process, reports the
Ukrinform news agency. The letter was
published by the French newspaper Le
Monde recently.
“Since art recognizes no borders,
because it is universal, the rights of
those who create it should be just as limitless.
The freedom of speech and the freedom
of creativity should not stop where
dissent begins. Still, a director is dying
as we speak because he is a dissident. His
life is in danger because of his ideas, just
like it was with Vasily Grossman, Alexander
Solzhenitsyn and others under the
communist regime,” the letter is quoted
on the Ukrinform website.
The letter’s signatories urge quick
action because the director’s condition is
deteriorating and ask the entire international
community “from the EU to the
UN” to join the support campaign for the
“prisoner of the Kremlin.”
“Not to act is to let Oleh Sentsov die.
It means abandoning our values and our
principles, abandoning what we stand for
and what we are. It means agreeing with
the claim that people may be killed over
their ideas, thoughts, positions,” the
signatories emphasize.
By the way, President of France
Emmanuel Macron had a phone call with
President of the Russian Federation
Vladimir Putin this past weekend, the latter
having power to order Sentsov’s release.
According to the Elysee Palace’s
statement, the French president expressed
concern over Sentsov’s condition,
urged Russia to immediately find a humanitarian
solution to the situation and
made several relevant proposals. Putin’s
administration was less inclined to comment.
The website of the Russian president
reported that the two leaders had
discussed the current situation in Syria
and “some other topics.”
Ukrainian artists keep supporting
Sentsov as well. For example, the Dukat
Gallery of Kyiv hosted the art event
“Freedom or Death,” created jointly
with the creative association Babylon’13.
It exhibited posters, installations, and
videos devoted to the “prisoner of the
Kremlin.” Matvii Vaisberg, Kseniia Hnylytska,
and Andrii Yermolenko were
among authors of these works.
Everyone can make a small and somewhat
artistic gesture in support of
Sentsov. An open-ended flashmob called
#FREESENTSOV! #YOUCANDOIT has
started recently outside the embassies of
the G7 countries. As reported on the
event’s Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/groups/251125322385673/ab
out/), its purpose is to put pressure on
influential countries to make them impose
tougher sanctions on the Russian
Federation.
“Approach the embassy of one of the
G7 countries (the G7 countries include
Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan,
Britain, the US, and the EU) or other influential
country. Take a picture of yourself
holding a poster reading ‘Free
Sentsov’ with the embassy in the background.
Tag the embassy in the photo.
Spread the photo over social networks
with tags #FreeSentsov #YouCanDoIt.
Also, invite to the event friends in
Ukraine and abroad, let them join the effort
where they can. Then e-mail the photo
to the embassy, asking the official representatives
of that country to help us get
the political prisoner Oleh Sentsov released,”
they describe the action plan on
the social network.
One can download posters and find
addresses of Kyiv-based embassies on the
Facebook page. The initiative has no
specific organizer and is run in a spontaneous
manner.
DAY AFTER DAY
ACTOR DMYTRO YAROSHENKO (VASYL STUS, THE PROTAGONIST OF THE FILM
STUS, ORIGINALLY TITLED THE BIRD OF SOUL) WITH DIRECTOR ROMAN
BROVKO (RIGHT)
#Film or no film?
By Olesia SHUTKEVYCH, The Day,
Vinnytsia
According to the announcement,
the film about Vasyl
Stus, which won the Ukrainian
State Film Agency’s
(Derzhkino’s) 10th competitive
selection, deals with bright pages
in the life and a Sixtier poet and his
mysterious death. As the authors noted,
events “unfold during the KGB’s last
attempt to tempt the poet with
‘freedom.’” Quite logically, Ukrainian
audiences expected to see a truthful
story of Stus’ arrest, a false “accusation
of anti-Soviet propaganda,” and,
finally, the trial after which the poet
was sent into exile which was
tantamount to a death sentence because
he never came back. But, according to
actor Hennadii Popenko, the authors
did not shoot all the scenes and offered
spectators half-truth, concealing
inactivity of Viktor Medvedchuk, Stus’
lawyer at that time and an oligarch now.
● THE PREMIER’S DISSERVICE
The film’s shooting ended in late
July. It is planned to premiere it in
Photo by Mykola TYMCHENKO, The Day
On the causes and effects
of a scandal around
the film about Vasyl Stus,
or when the truth “does
not fit the runtime”
February 2019. Everything would be
OK if Prime Minister Volodymyr Hroisman
had not posted a video clip on hid
Facebook page on August 8. He announced
joyously that a full-length
film had been made about Vasyl Stus,
with about half of the picture’s budget
(20 million hryvnias) coming from
Ukrainian state coffers. Readers inquired
in comments about who was to
play the role of Stus’ lawyer Medvedchuk.
“He is a tragically significant
figure in the life of Vasyl Stus. It is
Medvedchuk who defended in court the
Ukrainian poet who was eventually
sentenced to exile from which he never
came back,” Natalie Sedletska commented.
But Alexander Derkach writes
that “there will be no such character in
the film.” In other words, this antihero
was in the script, an actor was cast to
WWW.DAY.KIEV.UA
play him, but the scene was cut out.
Actor Hennadii Popenko confirmed
this fact on August 10. He
wrote in Facebook that, according to
those who take part in the making of
the full-length film The Bird of Soul,
directed by Roman Brovko and written
by Serhii Dziuba and Artemii Kirsanov,
the trial scene had really been
deleted. “It was withdrawn from the
shooting schedule without prior notice.
There is no longer such a character
as Medvedchuk in the film. But an
actor was cast for this role. He was
preparing to play,” Popenko wrote.
The actor added that, in all probability,
what caused the mysterious disappearance
was the fact that “producers
received a call from Medvedchuk’s inner
circle and told to remove the scene
of Stus’ trial if they wanted to shoot
the film to the end and didn’t want
provocations.”
● REACTION TO SELECTIVE
SUPPRESSION
Popenko’s post gathered thousands
of likes in 24 hours, causing
quite a stir. On the whole, 13,000
users reposted and more than 950
commented on it.
“The situation with the Vasyl Stus
film is shameful. The public must not
leave this intact – not only because a
half of the film’s budget (20 million
hryvnias) is money from Ukraine’s national
budget but, above all, because
Medvedchuk is a significant figure in
the life of Stus (as well as in the life of
Lytvyn). And even if – just in theory –
nobody phoned from him, the story of
the Poet cannot be told without this
tragic episode in which Medvedchuk
was involved because this amounts to
a selectively suppressed story, and
doesn’t matter whether it was suppressed
intentionally or through stupidity.
You don’t have to be a serious
analyst to understand who stands to
gain,” poet Serhii Tatchyn said in a
comment on the situation, as did a lot
of other Ukrainian writers and cultural
figures.
Donetsk National University,
which is named after Vasyl Stus,
chose not to comment, while Stus’ son
Dmytro said in a video clip posted in
the film’s official Facebook page that
the 1980s situation is being absolu-
By Ruslan HARBAR
The media continue to discuss the
killing of three Russian journalists
in the Central African
Republic (CAR). What sort of
a country is this? What is
going on there? Why did they go
there? What is the reason why they
were killed? What is Russia’s
interest in the CAR?
The CAR, a former colony of
France, is a small African country
with a population of almost five million,
of which Christians (50 percent
of them are Protestants) account for
80 percent and Muslims for 20 percent.
Christians are mainly engaged in
crop farming and Muslims in nomadic
cattle-raising. It is one of Africa’s
poorest countries with a per capita
GDP of about 700 dollars. One dollar
a day is considered not so bad. Seventy
percent of children are illiterate.
Like almost all the countries of Africa,
the CAR is rich in mineral resources –
gold, diamonds, uranium, oil, etc.
The CAR was a problem country
from the very moment of gaining independence.
It has seen never-ending
coups (as a rule, incited by France) and
intertribal clashes. It is here that the
notorious “emperor” Jean-Bedel
Bokassa, who liked to relish human
flesh, ruled. Incidentally, French
President Giscard d’Estaign called
him his relative and friend. In 2012 or
so, the clashes began to show the
clear signs of an interdenominational
conflict between Christians and
Muslims. Muslims and Christians
Central African Republic, Wagner, and diamonds
How Russia is establishing a “new world order” in Africa
formed the Seleka and the Antibalaka
organizations, respectively, which are
constantly fighting for power. France
and the UN moved in their peacekeeping
forces which reduced violence a little.
Yet a million people had to leave their
homes. The year 2016 saw the election
of a neutral Faustin-Archange Touadera
as president. But his government controls
the capital and its suburbs only. After
several French soldiers were killed,
France withdrew almost all of its troops.
The 12,000-strong UN peacekeeping
force is only busy ensuring its own security.
Two battalions of the local army
(1,300 men) have no modern arms and
equipment. The capital is surrounded by
Selaka detachments.
REUTERS photo
THE CAR HAS ALWAYS BEEN A PROBLEM COUNTRY SINCE IT GAINED
INDEPENDENCE – NEVER-ENDING COUPS (AS A RULE, INCITED BY FRANCE),
TRIBAL CLASHES, ETC. IN 2012 OR SO, THE CLASHES BEGAN TO SHOW THE
CLEAR SIGNS OF AN INTERDENOMINATIONAL CONFLICT BETWEEN
CHRISTIANS AND MUSLIMS
Who can the president rely upon in
his desire to establish order in the
country? He requested the president of
France to bring back the troops. Emmanuel
Macron refused to do so. In October
2017 Touadera met with Sergey
Lavrov in Sochi. As soon as in March
2018 Moscow announced rendering
free military aid to the CAR. The UN
Security Council approved this, although
there has been an embargo on
weapon supplies to the CAR since
2013. Touadera met with Vladimir
Putin in late May 2018 in St. Petersburg.
Russia sent 5 military and
170 civilian instructors to teach local
soldiers to use the supplies weapons.
Thus the CAR saw some young polite
“little men” (not to be confused with
“green little men”) with military bearing.
In addition to their main occupation,
they undertook to provide the
president’s security. Touadera has also
appointed a Russian, Valery Zakharov,
as his national security adviser.
They are all associated with the private
military firm Wagner run by the
well-known Russian billionaire Yevgeny
Prigozhin who is close to Putin. The
Wagner commander Dmitry Utkin, a
former military intelligence officer, is
subordinate to Prigozhin.
Formally, everything is clear and
open here – the president’s invitation
and a UN SC approval. The experienced
Russian journalists were apparently
interested in something else, while
Wagner’s activity was just a not so reliable
cover. This is why they did not
insist much when they were refused
entry to the Wagner base at the former
residency of “emperor” Bokassa.
Instead, they went north, to the place
of Lobaya Invest diamond mines.
This firm is a subsidiary of M-Invest
which belongs to the abovementioned
Prigozhin. Although considered in
Russia to “specialize” in African gold
(Sudan, CAR), he does not shun diamonds,
of course. It is risky and dangerous
to do such cost-effective business
in such as troubled country, all
the more so that there are already
about 1,400 Russians in the CAR.
There are also journalists among
them, who are engaged in anti-French
propaganda. The fact that 175 Russian
military instructors came with
UN SC permission shows Russia’s
professionalism in combining high
diplomacy (at the UN level) with
business interests of its oligarchs. The
Russian embassy is also working in
Bangui and, as events show, they
are quite worth their salt. The Russian
journalists must have intended to
trace the “Wagner-business-diplomacy”
connection. And who will allow
somebody to poke their nose into
the holy of holies – into oligarchic
deals? The punishment was quick
and harsh. I am sure nobody will
ever know the truth. The most “ironclad”
version Russia’s Foreign Ministry
supports is robbery. A total of
8,500 dollars the journalists had is
big money in the CAR.
Continued on page 5 ➤

WWW.DAY.KIEV.UA
CULT URE No.42 AUGUST 16, 2018 3
tized. “Undoubtedly, the defense
attorney behaved inadequately.
But many people behaved inadequately
in those conditions. And if
the point had been in the lawyer only,
this wouldn’t have had any impact.
Let us then recall investigators
and the people who worked in
ideological institutions. Let us
then speak about all the other
things if we are prepared for a conversation
like this,” he says.
● THE TRIAL SCENE WILL BE
LEFT INTACT
The public heatedly debated
about the film scandal for several
days, demanding explanations from
Minister Nyshchuk, Derzhkino, and
a response from the prime minister.
The latter did it quickly. Hroisman
wrote on his Facebook page on August
11 that he had instructed the
Ministry of Culture and the Ukrainian
State Film Agency to urgently
gather this film’s makers and the
public and do their best to avoid any
distortions in the film about the
Ukrainian poet and dissident Vasyl
Stus – the picture should be shown
truthfully and completely.
On the same day, a few hours later,
the film’s authors made an official
statement, promising to re-shoot
the scene of the Stus trial, including
the dissident’s lawyer Medvedchuk,
in the immediate future. The film
crew also admitted that, removing,
among other things, this scene from
the latest draft script, they “took an
insufficiently serious approach to
analyzing its importance for society.”
Earlier, film director Brovko had
explained to the media that the decision
to remove Medvedchuk was
made “in order to keep the dissident’s
family emotionally calm and
reduce the runtime,” as well as because
the film crew was afraid that
Medvedchuk might sue them in case
some scenes were not true to fact.
● “A BITTER SYMPTOM
FOR SOCIETY”
Olha Koliastruk, Doctor of Sciences
(History), a professor at Vinnytsia
State Pedagogical University,
believes that this situation must
not be ignored even if the conflict is
resolved and the film crew resumes
shooting the film, particularly the
trial scene. For we have another
Stus now – Oleh Sentsov who has already
turned from a political prisoner
into a dissident. If you compare
their life stories, you can find many
points of contact. Therefore, if we
forgive the system for maltreating
Stus, we will thus repudiate
Sentsov, displaying Soviet slavish
obedience again.
“This situation is a bitter symptom
for Ukrainian society. We are
reading our history just nominally
again, we do not plumb its depths,
and we are not learning the ethic and
moral lesson we need in order to
hold out. If a director cuts out a
scene that is supposed to show opposition
to the system in a court of law
and thinks that it can be deleted in order
to reduce runtime, why then he
took up this hard work, the truth?”
Koliastruk asks. “Stus is a poet of
enormous height, and he is not easy
to read because this requires one to
show the philosophy of thought and
the ability to rise to him. He cannot
be read for several hours in a row.
You should read a few lines and analyze.
He demands being prepared to
reach his level. And the question is:
are we all prepared to be at the same
height with him?”
The situation around the Stus
film shows that there are still people
in Ukraine, who influence not only
political and business processes, but
also journalism, art, and cinema. In
other words, they are dictating what
should be shown and who to. So, the
question remains open: what are we
going to see at the premiere of the
film about Vasyl Stus – truth or
half-truth?
By Mariia PROKOPENKO, photos
by Mykola TYMCHENKO, The Day
What do the giant Kalevipoeg
from the eponymous
Estonian epic
and the hero of Oles
Honchar’s novel Perekop
about the war of 1917-20 Danko
Yaresko have in common? Both works
were illustrated by Serhii Yakutovych
in the 1980s. In both cases, the artist,
who was a scion of a famous creative
dynasty, was creating a powerful
image of the hero. Now these series of
illustrations can be seen at the
exhibition “Serhii Yakutovych. Idols”
at the art center “Ya Gallery” in Kyiv.
● THE EPIC CONFLICT
“The theme of heroes, which is
raised in the exhibition, is always
highly ambiguous, and it is so now
too. Actually, who is the hero?” the
curator of the exhibition Polina Limina
asked. “Two series, dissimilar in
stylistics and significance, are on display
here. Honchar’s Perekop is an agitprop
Soviet fiction book dealing
with revolutionary topics. Kalevipoeg
is an Estonian epic, which needed to be
made relevant again in the Soviet
Union in order to insert the Estonian
culture into the general context. The
two are quite different, but both turn
to the theme of heroes. When they are
shown in the same space, it can create
a kind of conflict, a collision, which
helps to demonstrate additional meanings
involved in the concept.”
A total of 44 works are presented
at the exhibition, accompanied by the
books Kalevipoeg and Perekop. The
graphic works come from the Yakutovych
archive, which is currently
studied by the Ya Gallery team, led by
the founder of the art center Pavlo
Hudimov. Limina remarked that
these works had not been exhibited
since the late 1980s if not longer, and
very few people had ever seen them.
● HERO, ENVIRONMENT, LOVE,
ENEMIES
The debate around the heroes is
reflected also in the fact that the
works of the two series are “mixedup.”
Kalevipoeg on horseback with a
sword raised over his head can be seen
next to Yaresko, also on horseback
and looking at the viewer with piercing
eyes. Love stories and images of
enemies from both books are also exhibited
next to each other.
As Limina noted, the exhibition is
notionally divided into four parts.
One room houses works featuring
both heroes and the environments in
which they live and fight. The second
room reveals the relationship between
the hero and his woman, love stories,
as well as the theme of enemies.
“It all started with Kalevipoeg,”
Limina recalled how the idea of the exhibition
appeared. “This is not a very
prominent position among Yakutovych’s
works. I looked at the book,
and when I thought of displaying
Kalevipoeg alone, it seemed to me that
it might fail to reflect the artist’s impetuous
nature. It does not have its
own internal conflict, it needs to be
confronted with something, provided
with a contrast, so that it becomes
more than just a very well-made legend.
For me, Perekop has always been
like Kalevipoeg’s opposite number in
the legacy of the same artist. Therefore,
the book with the Estonian epic
was the initial impulse, but Perekop
came to join it later.”
● TOPICAL “BEASTS”
Yakutovych depicted Nestor
Makhno very much like an ape in
Perekop. “It deserves a separate discussion
– why the enemies were commonly
reduced to beastly images.
Speaking of the late 1970s and the
1980s, it was often used to portray the
‘American enemy’ as well. For example,
a capitalist was depicted in the
form of an ape or a pig, since precisely
these animals were considered the
MAKHNO. AN ILLUSTRATION TO THE BOOK PEREKOP, 1987 AN ILLUSTRATION TO THE BOOK PEREKOP, 1987
The battle of our dreams
The project “Serhii Yakutovych. Idols” is showing
almost unknown works of the iconic painter
AN ILLUSTRATION TO THE BOOK KALEVIPOEG, 1981, DONE IN THE ARTIST’S
OWN TECHNIQUE
personification of hostility in the collective
public opinion. Here, it is
transposed into more distant historical
stories with a certain irony,” Limina
commented. By the way, something
beastly, wolfish is present in
Yaresko’s depiction as well. It brings
to one’s mind totems, which were actually
heroes for the primitive people
“at the beginning of time.”
Regarding the opportunistic nature
of Perekop, Limina said: “Of
course, there is always the financial
aspect to the commission, but Honchar’s
Perekop differed from other opportunistic
works. Also, this is the only
book work of Yakutovych done in
the period when he turned to more
modern themes and away from depicting
the Cossacks and epic stories. It
seems to me that it also played a role,
as he wanted to try his hand in a more
contemporary-themed project.”
Illustrations in Perekop are special
in that they contain colored fragments.
“While working on Perekop,
Yakutovych experimented with color,
it is one of the few book series of those
years which he also painted with watercolors,”
Limina remarked. Blue,
red, and green ribbons designate different
political forces, so the reader
can determine which side this or that
figure represents.
● LOOKING BACK AT AN IDOL
Finding the name for the project
was an issue in itself. “Were we to call
the exhibition ‘Serhii Yakutovych. A
Hero,’ it would have immediately created
an association with the artist. Although
I consider him to be one of the
best in the 20th and 21st centuries, I
do not want to predispose the viewer
from the start to thinking that they
are going to the exhibition of, let us
say, a heroic artist. I try to avoid ascribing
to artists clear traits of prominence,
fame, heroics or something like
that,” Limina thought aloud. “Another
issue is that the word ‘hero’ immediately
associates in one’s mind with
something close and not distant in
time, while here we turn to history, to
events we can look back at from a certain
distance. As for me, this is a fairly
convenient division, as speaking of
an idol, we speak about something
that has already been relegated to the
past, and now we can analyze it.”
This idea is reflected in the curatorial
text accompanying the exhibition:
“An idol has already firmed up,
taken a certain shape, just as a visual
work is completed; meanwhile, a hero
appears to be more dynamic, indeterminate,
and variable. The first one is
easier to analyze, the second one is
easier to take inspiration from.”
● TO MEET KALEVIPOEG
In a sense, Yakutovych met his
Kalevipoeg on a Tallinn street. The
artist mentioned this in his autobiographical
records. “Heorhii Yakutovych
[Serhii’s father, an iconic
graphic artist. – Ed.] suggested that he
needed to enter this culture, to see
these people. Serhii went to Tallinn for
that very purpose and actually saw this
type on the streets of the city, meeting
a very tall, athletic blond young man,”
Limina said. By the way, Kalevipoeg’s
plot originated with ancient folk tales,
and it emerged as a literary work in the
mid-19th century, when it was shaped
as one by the educator and physician
Friedrich Reinhold Kreutzwald, while
his friend Friedrich Robert Fahlmann
was the author of the idea. The work
was presented as a reconstruction of
the oral epic. Estonia was then part of
the Russian Empire, and the first version
of Kalevipoeg failed to obtain a
censor’s approval.
● A MIRROR OF SOCIETY
The images of Kalevipoeg and
Yaresko have a certain kind of exaltation
in common. It is clear that the author
tries to downplay negative traits
in the figure who is claimed to be a
hero, while positive ones are put to the
forefront. “Also, the hero’s traits
seem to be a reflection of what their
society wants to see. So, another
shared feature of both works is their
use of a laconic dream image of one’s
own people,” Limina said.
The search for a hero is very relevant
for the contemporary Ukrainian
society as well. “This exhibition can
help anyone who thinks about the
modern hero-making. First of all, it
helps to understand for oneself that
the hero is often somewhat artificial.
Traits which we ascribe to the hero do
not come from nowhere, they often do
not belong to a particular person either.
It is said that beauty is in the eye
of the beholder, and in the same way,
the image of a hero can tell more about
us,” Limina said. “Perhaps even our
contemporary notion of heroism,
which we ascribe to different people,
is more likely to show what we lack.”
Those trying to understand what
we lack and get acquainted with Yakutovych’s
Idols can visit the Ya Gallery
till August 28. Also, one can read
about the theme of heroes in the
artist’s legacy in a story which has recently
been published on the Yakutovych
Academy website, it being a
media project on art and society as
seen through the prism of the history
of the Yakutovych dynasty.
***
One can find a concise retelling of
the Estonian epic on the Internet. After
a series of adventures, Kalevipoeg
became king of Estonia, and was quite
a successful one before eventually succumbing
to the curse of the blacksmith,
whose son he had killed at the
beginning of the story. A magical
sword cut off the hero’s legs. The god
Taara revived him and sent him to
guard the gate of hell. Having been removed
from the pedestal, the hero
now guards antiheroes. Still, the
pedestal is never empty.

4
No.42 AUGUST 16, 2018
TOPIC OF THE DAY
WWW.DAY.KIEV.UA
By Yana KHROMIAK, Den’s Summer
School of Journalism, 2018
The Ukrainian Diaspora was
founded in Canada 127 years
ago. A significant part of the
Canadian multiethnic community,
it is an intermediary between
two powerful nations, Ukraine
and Canada. Canadian Ambassador to
Ukraine Roman WASCHUK says
Ukraine provides Canada with
proactive energetic people who are
helping to develop Canada. More on
Canada-Ukraine partnership and better
communications in the following
interview.
● “IT’S AN OPPORTUNITY FOR
UKRAINE’S PARTNERS IN
THE WEST TO COMBINE
EFFORTS IN COMBATING
THE OCCUPATION OF
CRIMEA”
Sofiia POSTOLATII, Sumy State
University: “Hanna Hopko wrote on
Facebook that the Crimea Declaration
is doubtlessly a historic document,
and that the consolidated stand
taken by the West in regard to
Ukraine is extremely important. The
document reads that the United
States rejects Russia’s annexation of
Crimea and reaffirms Ukraine’s territorial
integrity and sovereignty.
Mr. Ambassador, how do you personally
assess the Declaration and its advantages
for Ukraine?”
“The Declaration was adopted
timely, making the stand taken by the
United States in the matter clear. It’s
an opportunity for other [NATO]
member countries to reaffirm their
non-recognition stand, following in
the footsteps of many countries, including
Germany and Great Britain.
Canada is still sleeping on it, but it
will follow suit before long. It’s an opportunity
for Ukraine’s partners in
the West to combine efforts in combating
the occupation of Crimea. Interestingly,
it [the Declaration] was
issued to coincide with [the anniversary
of] the 1940 Welles Declaration
[condemning the occupation by the Soviet
Union of the three Baltic states of
Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, and
refusing to recognize their annexation
as Soviet republics]. This adds more
international weight to the [Crimea]
Declaration.”
● MORE INVESTMENTS
IN THE GRAY ZONE NEEDED
Yana KHROMIAK, Borys Hrinchenko
University, Kyiv: “Minister of
International Development Marie-
Claude Bibeau was shown Donbas as
part of her visit to Ukraine (July 18-
23). She saw Kramatorsk, Bakhmut
(former Artemivsk), Kurdiumivtsi,
and the Maiorske Checkpoint. How
would you describe your minister’s
visit to the so-called Gray Zone of
Ukraine? Who came up with the initiative,
considering that few Ukrainian
politicians have dared visit the
conflict zone?”
“We elect only brave individuals
as ministers. It was our initiative and
it was wholeheartedly supported by
the Joint Forces Command. I can tell
you that much has been accomplished
and that we’re trying to keep up the
good job. That five-day-long trip
through Ukraine would have been incomplete
without her seeing, with her
own eyes, what was happening in that
crisis area and how our and our partners’
money was being spent to help
stabilize the region and keep it under
control. I must say that the Maiorske
Checkpoint has shown great progress.
From what I know, it is being completely
rebuilt and will be significantly
improved. The Ukrainian side
should be credited with better organization
and follow-through. We also
have Project International Organiza-
Canadians need more content re Ukraine
Canadian Ambassador to Ukraine Roman Waschuk
comments on FTA advantages, cultural heritage, and realism
fer, what with its ‘suspended’ status.
Such situations should be avoided.”
Mykola SIRUK: “Does Ms. Bibeau
have other initiatives?”
“She has announced two big initiatives.
One is a new call for 30 million
CAD preliminary proposals [entitled
‘Growth that Works for Everyone
– Inclusive and Shared Prosperity
in Ukraine’]. This project is aimed at
aiding Ukraine’s problem areas, the
role of women in the rural areas, and
other groups that aren’t adequately
represented economically. The second
one is support [worth $4.75 million]
of a Women’s Voice and Leadership
initiative in Ukraine. Ms. Bibeau said
Canada will continue funding our development
and security programs in
Ukraine, without a military component,
and that amounts to some
50 million CAD.”
● UKRAINIAN CANADIAN
COMMUNITY, PART AND
PARCEL OF UKRAINE
tion for Migration. It is meant to help
keep the transition points better informed.
We saw that the Ukrainian
authorities and their partners had upgraded
and simplified the procedures
for Ukrainians who side with Ukraine.
“The villages in the Gray Zone –
those we saw – left us depressed. I
think they need more attention on the
part of the Ukrainian authorities. The
Budget Code imposes restrictions on
capital investments in the Gray Zone.
On the one hand, with reason, considering
that the business/facility you
invest in may well be destroyed by artillery
fire. On the other hand, how
can such investments be audited to
prevent corruption? Lack of investments
makes the local community sufspect
their language and culture. Is
he right or wrong? I mean considering
that you have your annual event Miss
Ukraine Canada?”
“I’ll never object to what the
Ukrainian ambassador to Canada has
to say on the matter. As a media man
[by profession], he accurately conveys
these trends. People – among
them individuals of non-Ukrainian
parentage – are being very active,
supporting and showing empathy for
Ukraine and what’s happening there.
A festival was recently held in Ottawa,
one of the local Top 3 annual
events. A similar event took place in
Toronto as one of Canada’s most expensive
public projects. I think that
this is proof of Ukrainian heritage
Ya.Kh.: “Ukrainian Ambassador
to Canada Andrii Shevchenko said in
an interview that the Ukrainian Diaspora
is changing its attitude to
Ukrainian realities, particularly
stressing that Ukrainians actually rebeing
actively shared with fellow
Canadians, rather than merely trying
to preserve it or share one’s nostalgia.
The reason is that the Ukrainian
Canadian community boasts a
long 125-year-old-plus history, being
part and parcel of our state.”
Ya.Kh.: “Is it true that the
Ukrainian embassy in Canada is an
initiator and/or co-organizer of such
events?”
“It is an active co-organizer. I
think that the ambassador and his
wife, both media people, understand
the role played by culture. It is necessary
to combine diplomacy with other
activities, such as addressing the Canadian
public as broadly as possible.”
● FTA – MORE ADVANTAGES
FOR UKRAINE, COMPARED
TO PREVIOUS YEARS
Khrystyna SAVCHUK, Taras
Shevchenko National University,
Kyiv: “August 1 marks one year since
the signing of the Canada-Ukraine
Free Trade Agreement. What are the
CUFTA advantages and shortcomings,
in your opinion?”
“CUFTA has certain advantages
for Ukraine, compared to previous
years. Canadian statistics point to 27-
30 percent growth in Ukraine’s exports
to Canada. This is a tangible increment.
Our exports last year were down
in terms of coal and steel products, but
the statistics are lower this year. In
contrast, non-coal and resources exports
are on an upward curve, with the
lists of goods being extended by both
sides. Businessmen hear about exports
opportunities, so they give it a try, one
or two shipments. We’ve launched a pilot
Ukraine-Canada export project. Together
with Ukrainian experts, we selected
five sectors: furnishing,
footwear, textiles, confectionery industry,
and IT.
“IT is actually an invisible sector
whose scope is superior to that of all
exports put together. It is categorized
Photo by Ruslan KANIUKA, The Day
as ‘Services,’ but this fails to embrace
the freelancers and firms that keep
operating on the market. I mean, it
has a great development potential.”
● LOOKING FOR UNITS
WISHING TO EVOLVE
Olha KRYSA, Ivan Franko National
University, Lviv: “This year
Ukraine and Canada signed a military
cooperation agreement. What does it
spell for both countries?”
“It provides for combined military
training and cooperation in the
military and technological spheres.
Such training continues and keeps
expanding. Three years back, it was
just the Yavoriv Training Center, located
not far from Lviv. Today,
Canadian servicemen are stationed in
12 localities across Ukraine. The contingent
remains the same, though reorganized.
We’re looking for
units/institutions that want to
strengthen. We don’t look at a
map/chart and point to a locality at
random, to send personnel there. We
want commanding officers who will
support the reform effort – like
those at the Military Academy of
Odesa and the Desna Training
Ground where our [joint] exercises
took place. We’re very glad to have
Lieutenant-General Michael Rouleau
in charge of the Canadian Joint Operations
Command and Outdoor
Troops. He’s acquainting himself
with the new command. Apart from
the agreement on military and technological
cooperation, there was the
decision on weapons exports to
Ukraine, made in December. Currently,
this matter is being negotiated
by companies and institutions.
With any luck we hope to see some
positive results later this year.”
● CULTURAL CONTACTS
INCREASINGLY ACTIVE
Anastasiia KOROL, Vasyl Stus
Donetsk National University: “Canada
was among the first to recognize
independent Ukraine. Your country
has been upholding cultural projects,
including documentaries reflecting
the early phase of our national independence
effort. What about the current
cultural cooperation between
Ukraine and Canada?”
“That’s a very good question, but
may I pose one in return? Who is there
[in the audience] prepared to write a
review on a literary work? I have four
books on me and I’ll be happy to leave
them for you to keep after the interview.
There is a noticeable growth in
the [bilateral] cultural contacts, and
some of them are nonstandard – I
mean, they do not necessarily involve
the Diaspora, but have to do with contemporary
culture. We’ve started negotiating
an agreement on filmmaking
and audio/video cooperation that
will be signed before long.”
O.K.: “What is Ukraine as seen
through the eyes of the Canadian in
the street? Does the Canadian public
at large know what is happening
here?”
“Let me answer the last one,
whether Canadians know about what’s
happening in Ukraine. I always tell
people who’re visiting Ukraine that it
is sometimes difficult to figure out
what’s actually happening here, considering
that it’s hard for the Ukrainians,
too. It’s a process in the course of
which each is trying to figure out the
situation. Canada is one of the few
countries where practically no one
needs to be told who Ukrainians are
and what they’re all about. Various
delegations have seen this, saying in
the end: ‘We don’t need any further
education forums.’ The Ukrainian
Canadian community is made up of
people whose family roots are in
Ukraine. People have a positive attitude
to this community and [appreciate]
its contribution [to Canada], but
this attitude doesn’t necessarily extend
to Ukraine. The Ukrainian embassy
is doing well, lending a hand to
the construction of this ‘Acceptance
Bridge.’ There is a great deal of sympathy
for Ukraine, but one must work
to add current realities to Ukraine’s
image as seen by Canadians. Their attitude
is positive, but they need more
content re Ukraine. Historically, immigrants
from the west of Ukraine
were numerically superior, so that
people now have a vague idea about
the Hutsul or Kherson regions. This is
where the Ukrainian embassy steps in.
Our Canadian embassy is working for
the good of all of Ukraine, just as our
Ukrainian counterpart in Canada is
working for the good of the Diaspora
and the rest of the country.”
Project Summer School of
Journalism was carried out
with support from the NATO
Information and Documentation
Center in Ukraine

WWW.DAY.KIEV.UA
TOPIC OF THE DAY No.42 AUGUST 16, 2018 5
By Volodymyr KOSTYRIN, The Day
The exhibit “Warriors” at the “Kyivan Fortress”
museum caused quite a stir recently. The project
featured selected works by the photographer
Anatolii STEPANOV. Emphasis is put on the
soldiers born after Ukraine had gained
independence. The youngest of them is only 18. Courage,
experience, childish naivety in their faces, confidence
and recklessness are conveyed so masterfully that
visitors find themselves eye on eye with the horrors and
heroism of the frontline routine, which a certain part of
society is, frankly speaking, trying to abstract away
from. Bu the war is on.
Earlier, Stepanov worked for Reuters and Associated
Press, but when the Russian-Ukrainian war broke out in
the Donbas, he went there and began to make photo reports
of the events, thus documenting our contemporary
history year after year. Anatolii is also a longtime participant
in and a prizewinner at Den’s international photo
competitions. The talented photographer told us
about the heroes of his pictures, a special power of photographs,
and the war itself which he not only watches
through his camera’s lens, but also takes to heart.
● “THIS UKRAINIAN WOUND IS JUST
ROTTING”
One can see at the exhibit a lot of soldiers born after
1991, after this country gained independence. Do you
think they have a special perception of the frontline situation
in comparison with older servicemen?
“They have signed contracts, and it is their profession
to be a soldier. And, not to deceive himself, a soldier
must first of all know how to kill the enemy. These
20-, 22-, and 23-year-old boys must possess this skill
right now. As a matter of fact, most of these people are
young enough to be my sons. My daughter is 22… But
fate decreed that they have to risk their lives, lose their
health and sometimes life every day in the war. They are
very young and should enjoy their life, learn, love, and
have children. Instead, they are over there so that we
could live normally here.
“Thanks to these boys, thanks to the army, the war
in the Donbas has frozen and is smoldering. We sustain
losses – 15 or more people are killed or wounded every
month – they get serious injuries, lose a hand or a foot,
and become disabled for life. Down here, we’ve stopped
thinking about this – all is OK, we are planning a peaceful
life. But in reality the war is just lying low. Essentially,
there was a real war in 2014 and 2015,
which then gave way to low-profile skirmishes. The
Minsk Agreements froze this situation, and it is smoldering
now. This Ukrainian wound is just rotting. So
far, I can’t see a sound-minded solution of how to pull
out of this situation.”
Among your exhibited works, there is a photo of the
25-year-old Hero of Ukraine Vasyl Tarasiuk. Could you
tell us about him?
“I love Vasyl very much. I was invited to this position
[‘Eagle’ on the outskirts of Avdiivka. – Ed.] in April.
We’d just begun to launch the press – in fact for
24 hours. I had a very good relationship with the
Ukrainian army’s 72nd Independent Mechanized
Brigade. I like this brigade of the 2017 version very much
because I could visit those positions and work without
hindrance. The battalion commander with the nom de
guerre ‘Slav’ said I would stay there from lunchtime to
night but sleep over at the ‘Festival.’ ‘Festival’ is also
a position, but it is deep in the woods. There is a very
well-protected dugout there, which can withstand even
By Olesia SHUTKEVYCH, The Day, Vinnytsia
The nongovernmental organization Center of
Visual Projects is planning to reproduce thirty
architectural monuments and over a hundred
secondary objects in the 3D format. Ten
experienced designers and beginners from among
Vinnytsia senior school pupils will be working gratis on
mockups. The main goal is to make an interactive map
of the city’s historical part of the period of architect
Hryhorii Artynov – from the former girls’ high school
(now School No. 2) to the island of Kempa, from
Kumbary to St. Nicholas’ Church in the Old Town. It will
comprise both saved and destroyed objects. There will
be free access to the whole content, including graphic
images. The developers have already made trial mockups
of the Tower – the city’s main symbol, – the ruined Belle-
Vue hotel, and the railway station.
“The idea emerged because not all Vinnytsia residents
know well the history of their city. And it would be good
if, standing in a line at ‘Transparent Offices,’ one
could, for example, see the interactive map of Vinnytsia
of the period of Artynov or Ovodov, when it turned from
a small provincial town into a prosperous center of the
guberniya,” says Andrii CHERNENKO, a representative
of the NGO Center of Visual Projects. “The matter became
topical recently. A film is being made in Vinnytsia
about the reformer mayor Mykola Ovodov. Director Vasyl
Medianyi has come across a problem: Vinnytsia has
become too modern and has no authentic locations for
shooting historical films because there are renovations
and plastic windows everywhere. We have arranged that
Anatolii Stepanov, who has
photographed Ukrainian defenders
since the beginning of the war in
the east, speaks about his heroes
the hit of an artillery projectile. So I came to the ‘Eagle’
at lunchtime. There were young boys there – Roman
Chaika, Vasyl Tarasiuk, and a lot of other guys with
whom I am still in contact.
“It was clear even at that time that Vasyl was every
inch a military. You know, his composure, looks… His
subordinates held him in very high esteem. Nobody ever
said it out loud, but you could see it immediately. We approached
him, and I said: ‘Vasyl, can I take a picture of
you here and there?’ Then we began to make the round
of our positions, and I photographed him against the
background of badly cut trees. The impression was the
Apocalypse had come.
“Then somebody called me in late April and said Vasyl
was in a Kyiv hospital. Supposedly, he ‘butted’ with
a tank. I went to hospital, and we had a very warm meeting.
He said the tank had begun to pound the neighboring
position and hit the dugout. Some were killed and
wounded. And he jumped out and began to fight a oneon-one
duel with the tank. He hit the tank three times,
the tank smoked a little, but he failed to put it out action.
Vasyl says he saw a projectile flying over the head. In other
words, he was doing this deliberately. He drew fire to
make the tank stop shooting at the neighboring position.
The second projectile whizzed somewhere close by, and
the third landed on the position Vasyl was on. He was seriously
wounded and shell-shocked. But the enemy tank
no longer shelled that position because Vasyl drove it off
in this way – at the price of his health. I am proud to have
met him, for he is a superb soldier and officer. I think our
army has lost a nice officer due to his wounds.”
Photo by Anatolii STEPANOV
Photosthatproducenewmeanings
Over130objects
Vinnytsia IT specialists develop
a visual interactive map
of the city’s historical center
the railway station will resume its old appearance for one
scene. We are now actively working on this object, for
the film is to be shown on City Day.”
Andrii adds they continue to gather information,
photographs, and video files that depict the city’s historical
objects. The developers are receiving help from
historians, including Oleksandr Fedoryshen, director of
the Vinnytsia History Center. But the main problem is
that there is no technical documentation for the ruined
monuments, which makes a full-fledged process of reproduction
impossible. For example, the photo of the
Belle-Vue hotel shows its facade only, while it is not exactly
known how it looked from the sides or the back. For
this reason, not only historians, but also architects and
art experts work in the IT designers’ team.
The active phase of work will begin in September and
last for at least two years. The IT people are planning to
present the finished visual product as an interactive 3D
map which is likely to be displayed at the Vinnytsia City
Hall for public view.
● “ANIMALS ARE A DIVERSION
FOR SOLDIERS”
One of your photographs shows a soldier with a dog.
The photo seems to beam warmth. What is the story of
this snap?
“‘Wolf’ is the soldier’s nom de guerre, and Patron
is the puppy. Actually, when soldiers are at war, on the
battlefield, they are always under a strain. People die,
you are awaiting fire all the time, hide and shoot… But
a human cannot be always under stress, so tenderness
and warmth accumulate. If one is at home, he has a wife,
children, and human contacts. And here it is animals that
play the role of a relaxer of sorts, a consoler. You just
can’t imagine how much tenderness you show towards
these animals. Incidentally, both cats and dogs stick together
there. I’ve never seen a dog chase a cat, although
this may happen.
“I saw a puppy grow into a big fox at Butovka [a
coalmine on the outskirts of Donetsk, were the Ukrainian
military are stationed. – Ed.]. She was friendly to cats
and dogs and could eat out of your hands. This must have
destroyed her. She died in October because she used to
come too closely to people. As soldiers lurked at the listening
post at night, the fox began to rustle the dry fallen
leaves. You can’t see who is there and may think that
somebody is creeping towards you. So, they threw a
grenade and saw a dead fox in the morning. A wild animal
must not stay next to people – one way or another,
it is the law of nature. But I used to hold her in my hands
when she was a little cub, like a dog puppy. She liked to
be caressed, scratched behind the ear, play with other puppies
and cats. But, as she grew older, she began to show
a wild behavior, prowl somewhere, and seclude herself.
Although she no longer lived with people and roamed
somewhere, she would come over every evening. She ate
canned meat with pleasure and could even take food from
your hand. Animals are such a diversion for soldiers.”
Read more on our website
Photo courtesy of NGO Center of Visual Projects
Central African
Republic, Wagner,
and diamonds
Continued from page 2 ➤
Russia “kills several birds” at a
time in this story:
1. It gets rid of uncontrollable, inquisitive,
and oppositional journalists
who were friendly to Ukraine to boot.
2. There is an opportunity to “kick”
again the oppositionist Mikhail Khodorkovsky
who financed this trip.
3. This shows complete failure of
the French and UN “blue berets” to establish
order in the country the ostensibly
control.
4. This shows the Russian government’s
“concern” over the destiny of its
citizens all over the world, including the
faraway Africa.
The current events in the hitherto
uninteresting CAR spotlight quite essential
changes in global politics.
Lavrov said recently in Rwanda:
“Africa is an important cornerstone in
the formation of a new world order.” He
also promised to help African countries
increase their role in the UN. So far,
Russia is actively increasing its own
role in Africa. A Bangui-based UN official
said that “France, the US, and the
EU… did not expect the Russians to arrive.”
He described the mechanism of
their “arrival” quite correctly: “They
shamelessly bribe all those who open the
right door to them.” Another UN diplomat
concludes: “This may be a real
test of decisiveness, strength, and influence
for the West. If we surrender
the CAR, we will surrender all of
Africa.” Here is an interesting example.
To somewhat neutralize the impression
of the supply of Russian weapons, the
US handed over a few dozen Ford automobiles
to the CAR army. And now
Russian commandos are riding on them
across the capital. Ronak Gopaldas,
director of South Africa’s consulting
company Signal Risks, sums up Russian
policies in Africa as follows: Russia’s
strategy in Africa is a combination
of a hard governmental policy, first of
all, military operations, and energy
diplomacy. Russia already has sort of
an enclave of dependent countries in
Africa today. It is Sudan which suggests
that Russia build a naval base in the Red
Sea; Burundi, where, as a result of the
national public vote, the current president
will reign until 2034; and now the
CAR. The newspaper Den wrote more
in detail about Russia’s policy in Africa
on March 7-8, 2018.
Experts believe there is also a Chinese
link in the CAR events. It is unavoidable
in Africa. As part of the Big
Maritime Silk Road project, China
plans to connect Western African countries
with Eastern African ports. For
this purpose, they intend to build a major
West-East transport corridor centered
in the CAR. For China to implement
this idea, the CAR should be stable
and calm. Who can provide this?
There is little hope for the national government.
The US and Europe fall away,
for they are rivals. It is Russia that
meets all the demands of China as a
BRICS partner. This is why China supported
Russia’s steps in the CAR and
even tried, immediately after Russia,
to get permission for supplying
weapons and, accordingly, sending
Chinese instructors to the CAR. China
has even stockpiled arms on the border
with Cameroon. But the UN SC did not
like and rejected this idea of China.
The developments around the CAR
are only one example of the gradual
and, at the same time, very fast establishment
of a new world order based on
the right of force. The US and Europe
are gradually receding to the background,
for they are unable to counterpoise
China’s economic might, on the
one hand, and Russia’s cynicism and aggressiveness,
on the other. And Africa
is becoming the main field of this
geopolitical battle.
By Ruslan HARBAR, director
of the Center of African Studies

6
No.42 AUGUST 16, 2018
SOCIE T Y
WWW.DAY.KIEV.UA
Kuchmism and society
The Day’s experts comment on main stages
in Leonid Kuchma’s two consecutive presidencies
By Ivan KAPSAMUN, The Day
The second president of Ukraine marked
his 80th birthday on August 9. Much
has been said and written about his role
in Ukraine’s recent history by
politicians, public figures, and media
people. Whereas public opinion shows a
realistic attitude, the political community
apparently lacks it. Roman Bezsmertnyi
wrote on Facebook: “Leonid Kuchma’s first
presidency was aimed at rescuing the
economy, in the first place, and the second one
was meant to rescue the state.” Most responses
to his post proved negative.
Volodymyr Boiko wrote: “So Kuchma is a
hero? Human memory is short, indeed…” He
is echoed by Anatolii Mazurenko: “As an ordinary
Ukrainian, I remember Kuchma primarily
as the creator of a feudal-oligarchic system
in our country. He also made his son-inlaw
an oligarch after giving him state-owned
enterprises as a present. And his ‘privatization’
of the metallurgical complex in Kryvyi
Rih was a rip-off. Kuchma brought
Yanukovych to power and was rewarded by
Akhmetov. Medvedchuk, this enemy of the
Ukrainian state, was a snake cherished in
Kuchma’s bosom. There is a long list of political
self-serving acts.”
Some politicians, however, offered a different
view. MP Ihor Huz wrote on Facebook:
“[He was] the employer in the contract killing
of journalist Georgy Gongadze. [He was the]
politician during whose presidencies the main
oligarchic clans took shape. He is a ‘red director’
who preserved the Soviet system in independent
Ukraine. All who took part in the
campaign ‘Ukraine without Kuchma’ – among
them yours truly – have to admit with regret
that they had at best only limited success.”
As the years passed, despite the herculean
political, financial, and media efforts
of the Kuchma-Pinchuk Family to whitewash
the second president’s image, hiring authors
to write books, filmmakers to produce
documentaries, organizing projects and events
like “Tomorrow.UA,” “New Leaders” or YES,
there have been increasingly fewer illusions
about Leonid Kuchma’s “merits.” The results
of our poll, carried by Den/The Day, are
quite informative. The question was “How
should Ukrainians feel about the second president’s
anniversary of birth?” Greetings were
extended by 19 percent of respondents; 5 percent
scorned it (“The man doesn’t deserve being
mentioned…”); 15 percent wrote that the
Kuchma regime [aka Kuchmism. – Ed.] is a
lesson worth being learned and that no one
should cast a ballot for a single Kuchmist;
34 percent believed he should be in jail;
14 percent wrote it’s high time the servilityto-success
tradition were broken; 13 percent
didn’t care one way or another.
Ukrainian society remains reflective
while part of the political community – people
supposedly in possession of more accurate
and detailed information – continue singing
praises to Leonid Kuchma. Inna Bohoslovska
believes that he “built a Ukrainian state
that had never existed – and which no longer
exists. Kuchma marked the beginning of the
post-Soviet period when he introduced new
institutions…”
Why such political shortsightedness?
First, because some remain in the dark.
They stand a chance of correcting their eyesight
by using a vast data resource pertaining
to Leonid Kuchma’s career. All they
have to do is dig deeper, look up sources
(books, media reports, etc.) other than those
made to the Family’s order. Second, because
some are just pretending not to understand.
This is a far worse scenario as such pretenders
are playing into the hands of dark forces, de
facto turning traitor to their Fatherland,
telling lies to society and replacing truth with
propaganda. This is unacceptable. How can
such politicians run for president and conduct
other activities without seeing the
causal link between past actions and modern
realities?
Photo by Valerii MILOSERDOV
REUTERS photo
➤ In October 2004, prior to the presidential elections, Vladimir Putin met with
Leonid Kuchma, whose [second] term was drawing to a close, and asked him directly
whom Russia should back in the presidential campaign. The reply was as
direct: Viktor Yanukovych. The Russian president told this addressing the
Youth Forum Seliger-2014, ten years after the event. At the time, he wasn’t
sure it was Leonid Kuchma’s final choice. He asked him again as final arrangements
were being made for the presidential campaign. Leonid Kuchma replied
that the issue had been resolved and the final decision made, adding that he
would appreciate Russia’s assistance in terms of information and political resources.
Russia complied.
Photo by Dmytro AMIDOV (TABLOID.COM.UA)
➤ In 1994, Leonid Kuchma was elected President of Ukraine, aided by Moscow. The
following is an excerpt from Den’s interview with dissident Levko Lukianenko
(Aug. 26, 2011): “Kuchma was one of the ‘red directors.’ Under Kravchuk, managers
of industrial enterprises, heads of kolkhozes and state farms began to gain strength, so
they brought one of their own to power during the 1994 elections. Needless to say,
[President] Kuchma began serving the red directors who wanted to privatize their enterprises.
As a result, there began a privatization campaign that eventually turned into
one best described as grabadization. All this badly damaged our economic complex.
We should’ve used the economic potential left by the Soviet empire and adjust it to the
new conditions instead of destroying it. As it was, we kept tearing it apart and creating
nothing in its place, doing all this with Kuchma’s blessings and under his supervision.
Kuchma caused a great deal of damage by introducing an unethical and illegal
personnel selection system. It was under Kuchma that ministerial posts were put up
for sale (something never practiced during Kravchuk’s presidency). It got so, persons
of dubious character, often with CR, started receiving important executive positions.
High positions were handed out based upon greed rather than merit. Over the years in
office, Kuchmakcreated a system we can’t get over even now.”
➤ In April 2009, oligarch Viktor Pinchuk, son-in-law of the second president,
and the Pinchuk Center played the key role in implementing the Family’s interests,
using various projects and events, including the Yalta European Strategy
(YES). Journalist Otar Dovzhenko told Den (Sept. 18, 2017): “I’m outraged to
see politicians attend Pinchuk’s forum on a date marking the anniversary of
Gongadze’s murder. I’d be hard put to assess each of these politicians, just as
it’s difficult for me to evaluate [Yurii] Lutsenko’s conduct. I mean the degree of
these politicians’ innate hypocrisy and cynicism. The question which we all must
answer is: Why haven’t we worked out or found some viable alternative? Unlike
many fellow countrymen, my memory is pretty good. I remember only too well
what Kuchma is all about. However, the impression is that most Ukrainians have
started forgetting – much to the pleasure of the existing regime, considering
that Kuchma keeps officially representing Ukraine during the talks in Minsk,
and that the man keeps using this regime to his advantage. A pretty good compromise
for all those ‘upstairs.’ I think that it is the journalist’s task to keep reminding
his/her readers of who Kuchma really is – and not only in conjunction
with the Gongadze case. People used to come out against Kuchmism and shed
blood, got arrested and killed. Kuchmism is a multifaceted phenomenon that
haunts Ukraine to this day and prevents positive change.”

WWW.DAY.KIEV.UA
CLOSE UP No.42 AUGUST 16, 2018 7
By Viktoriia HONCHARENKO,
Den’s Summer School of Journalism, 2018
Mayor of Dnipro Borys Filatov, who came
to Kyiv specifically to meet with students
of Den’s Summer School of Journalism,
discussed how to restore citizens’ trust
in government, what issues worried
residents most, and what the real powers and resources
available to a mayor were. The students went to the
meeting well-prepared. The speaker intended to have
an interesting and productive conversation. The end
result was in line with expectations.
● “A LOT OF PROBLEMS HAVE BEEN
ACCUMULATING FOR DECADES”
Iryna LADYKA, Ivan Franko National University
of Lviv: “You stated in one of your interviews
that there was now a complete distrust for government.
Do you have a recipe for restoring this kind
of trust?”
“The recipe is very simple. One needs to talk less
and do more! We have an issue with the public. People
believe that full responsibility lies, firstly, with
the president, then with the governor, and lastly with
the mayor. People do not understand the separation
of powers and authority. The top leader is held personally
responsible for everything. It is under such
conditions that it becomes difficult to ascribe any
achievement or defeat to the individual responsible.
“In order to restore trust, one must first show
work done.
“When I entered the latest election campaign, only
5 percent of citizens aged over 50 trusted me. Now
the level of trust and satisfaction with the work of the
mayor in this age category is about 50 percent, that
is, it has increased tenfold. The share has changed because
people can have different general outlooks, but
when they see work done every day – in their courtyard,
on the street, on TV screens, on the pages of
newspapers – they change their attitudes, including
ones towards those leaders with whom they may be
in disagreement on certain political issues.
“We, I mean local communities, have received a
serious financial resource after decentralization,
which has allowed us to implement many projects.
But when people talk about it, they forget about the
hryvnia repeatedly and sharply falling against the
US dollar. When funding is set against prices of materials
and infrastructural projects, it becomes
clear that we do not have that much more money.
“A lot of problems have been accumulating for
decades. Even taking into account the ‘massive’
budget of ours, it is impossible to solve these problems
immediately, because despite the spending
amounting to 14 billion, 10 billion of it are protected
items: wages, welfare payments, etc. There are
huge problems with water supply and environment.
For example, nobody knows where and which communication
lines lie in this city. We begin to dig and
find pipes bearing Russian Imperial era emblems. To
conduct an audit of underground communications,
I need like 200 million hryvnias.
“Decentralization is a success now, because the
communities have enough money, plus many young,
ambitious teams have come along with new mayors.
There are many regional politicians who want to show
a result and win public respect with it. We share experiences,
help each other. In general, I believe
that decentralization needs to be enhanced.”
Evelina KOTLIAROVA, Taras Shevchenko National
University of Kyiv: “You said in an interview
that the fight against corruption was a sixth- or even
seventh-placed priority for the public now, while improving
standards of living was all-important.
What else is important for the Ukrainians?”
“I see it when communicating with people, and
this is evidenced by opinion polls and a focus group
we had as well. In order to make adequate decisions,
one has to get down to earth. Unfortunately, the chattering
classes, various commentators and experts
quite often exist in a virtual world of sorts. Since you
are future journalists, I want to convince you to look
at the world not through the prism of social trends
that we are creating ourselves. Today, we have
many people getting involved with fighting corruption.
Probably this is a right thing to do. But as
soon as you get down a level, you know what issues
worry residents most? In the first place, it is utility
rates, followed by public transportation fares. People
do not have enough money. When they do not
know how to pay utility bills and feed their families,
they are not interested in political scandals.”
● “THE PRESENCE OF POLITICAL WILL IS
OF GREATEST IMPORTANCE”
Solomiia NYKOLAIEVYCH, Lesia Ukrainka
Eastern European National University: “You said
in an interview that you were awaiting the presidential
election with anxiety, because you were satisfied
with the status quo, and there might be
chaos after the election. I wonder if you have a list
of traits that a worthy president should have?”
“We will not allow a revanche”
Borys FILATOV discusses personnel issues,
paternalism, Viacheslav Lypynsky, and political will
“I await the election with dread because I am interested
in the status quo being preserved since I am
the leader of a local community, and I impartially
discuss and raise in communications with mayors of
other cities the fact that now the central government
does not intrude much into the affairs of local
communities. It is clear that the public opinion colors
all administrations as equally bad. However,
things are not the same as before at the level of the
regional councils, the prosecutor’s offices, the Security
Service of Ukraine, or the police. There are
no required vote quotas, nobody invents designs
aimed at getting mayors into a tight corner or
forcing them to promote someone. There are, of
course, many different speculations. I saw a TV
channel, for example, broadcasting a story about
Petro Poroshenko allegedly trying to force Filatov
to support him in the election. But this is not true.
When they begin to invent a conspiracy theory
(which is interesting at the first glance) stating that
Photo by Mykola TYMCHENKO, The Day
still sit on the city council, still live in this city, I
would never be able to send them to the Moon together
with the voters who vote for the Opposition
Bloc each time. Therefore, when one understands
that the situation cannot be resolved otherwise, one
begins to negotiate.”
● “I AM UPSET BY THE PATERNALISM
OF PEOPLE”
Olha KRYSA, Ivan Franko National University
of Lviv: “You are the head of a million-resident
city. Unfortunately, many people still have that
post-Soviet inertia. Who provides you with most
support in your work? And which group is the
most problematic?”
“I am upset by the paternalism of people. Many
of them feel that the nation ends on the doorstep of
their own home. They cannot agree who will mop the
staircase shared by four apartments, or clean it up
“
The city government has no priorities, we do everything. Speaking about
the required traits list, the presence of political will is, obviously, of greatest importance.
I believe that if there is will, a lot of problems can be solved.
”
Poroshenko came up with all that so that all mayors
become loyal to him, it is total idiocy.
“Therefore, we are satisfied with the status
quo, because nobody hinders our work. It is clear that
everyone has their difficulties: someone has quarreled
with the governor, someone with local security
forces, someone is disliked by the cabinet, so everyone
has their own story to tell. But the situation has
changed dramatically in comparison with the time
when city mayors spend weeks in Prime Minister
Mykola Azarov’s reception room, only to get him to
sign a piece of paper. Therefore, as leaders of local
communities, we sit and think: ‘And what if, after
another president comes to power, we will have to sit
in the reception room again?’ This is quite normal
logic. I, for example, do not know what Yuliia Tymoshenko,
or Anatolii Hrytsenko, or Oleh Liashko
think. Before the election, they are all tenderness incarnate,
they like mayors and the idea of self-government,
but we do not know what chimeras inhabit
their minds. We do know which chimeras inhabit
Poroshenko’s mind, and we can cope with them.
“The city government has no priorities, we do
everything. Speaking about the required traits list,
the presence of political will is, obviously, of greatest
importance. I believe that if there is will, a lot of
problems can be solved. We did some things in the
legally grey zone, but still saw them brought to conclusion.
With political will and determination, one
can do a lot.
“And the second trait is the ability to negotiate.
One should never cross red lines. The city council
was divided in half, with 32 councilors on either
side. The meeting room saw fights, attempts to occupy
the premises. But I understood that I would
never get rid of these people, because they would
and take out the rubbish. At the same time, they constantly
shout that the government has failed to provide
them with something.
“The second problem follows from the first one.
There are things that can be done through self-organization
of people. We already have embryonic
forms of self-organization, and we try to stimulate
it. There is a municipal program under which we have
started to provide people with wheelbarrows,
saplings, paint... People come to the city housing administration
and say they want to hold a volunteer
work day. To do this, we give them everything they
need: flower seedlings, brooms, shovels... And this
is done at the expense of the city. Thus, we stimulate
self-organization.
“Paternalism, passivity, disbelief are the most
important problems. Well, excessive optimism is
there too, because a lot of people think that they know
it all. People do not understand that manning the barricades
and flying flags is one thing, while cleaning
these Augean Stables hour after hour, day after day
is markedly different. Of course, institutional memory
is needed. That is, one just cannot come in
from the street and become director of the city
landscaping administration, without understanding
anything about the trimming of trees. One should understand
how it functions, how local government operates.
I have replaced all the city hall employees, dismissed
all deputy mayors, directors of departments,
almost all heads of administrations. I have replaced
most directors of utility companies. Here, for example,
we have one Valentyn Lazariev who will stay
on his job under every regime, because he knows
where and which communication line lies in the city,
and who owns it. We had one Yurii Lozovenko, who
offered advice on urban infrastructure. Then he took
offense at something and left for Ivano-Frankivsk.
He provided good advice, but where can I obtain hundreds
of millions euros, not hryvnias, which are needed
for its implementation?”
● “WE SELECTED PERSONNEL BY
CAREFULLY PICKING PEOPLE”
Ivan KAPSAMUN: “How did you select your
team?”
“We brought some people over from the regional
state administration, ones we worked with in 2014.
These were young lawyers, people who were engaged
in bureaucratic work. Another part of the team is
made of our party comrades who fought the election
campaign with me. But this does not mean that I took
people in because of personal or party loyalty, no,
they were people who showed professionalism, especially
in business operations and in public administration.
Thirdly, we also took in young, active
citizens and volunteers who were ready to work a lot
and work hard. In particular, we brought people from
Kyiv, for example Maksym Muzyka came here, and
the head of the city health care department came
from Volyn. We selected personnel by carefully
picking people. These were three main ways. Fourthly,
of course, I retained people who were not stained
with corruption scandals. There is one Olha Cherkas.
She was here during every mayor’s term, even in the
Soviet time. When I will leave office, she will keep
working, because she is a high-level financier.
“The personnel problem is the number one problem
for the country. People with business background
do not want to enter the civil service. For example,
we have the position of the city’s chief architect open,
and a famous young architect comes and says: ‘I am
ready to work for 10,000 dollars in monthly salary.’
He says so because he earns that much in business.
Why should he enter the civil service? We hired recently
a young progressive artist Serhii Bilyi. He gets
no salary at all. Bilyi says: ‘What use do I have for
your 5,000 or 15,000 hryvnias salary? I want to
change the city!’ He and his associates draw logos in
their bureau, sell them to businesspeople and make
good money from it.
“Moreover, we were the first in the country to
raise salaries for city officials. Our department
heads earn up to 20,000 hryvnias. Oh, I have heard
many people cursing me and saying that ‘while children
starve, Filatov pays these cannibal-like officials
exorbitant sums.’ However, I cannot demand anything
of people who earn 3,500 hryvnias.”
● “LIVING AMID UNENDING
NEGATIVITY IS JUST IMPOSSIBLE”
Khrystyna SAVCHUK, Taras Shevchenko National
University of Kyiv: “What specifically influenced
your switch from legal profession to journalism?”
“I am actually a creative person, and can be said
to have lived a few lives, so nobody except God can
say what will happen to me next. I did not intend to
become mayor either. I became mayor due to one person
in the world, and this person’s name is Oleksandr
Vilkul. I realized at one point that I would not surrender
my hometown to the ‘Kryvyi Rih gang.’
“When Maksim Kurochkin began his attempt to
capture the Ozerka Market, the city was totally horrified.
I then participated in the trial on the side of
the defense. And at that moment, I realized that it
was time to talk about it on TV. But nobody wanted
to deal with such things because it was dangerous.
Then I went to the Channel Nine, which then belonged
to Ihor Kolomoiskyi. I had one condition only
– nobody was to interfere in editorial policy. Kolomoiskyi
agreed, he never told me what to show and
what not to. I paid the editorial team with my own
money. In essence, they ‘sold’ airtime to me.
“We had sky-high ratings. To stop us from airing
a story, people offered up to 5,000 dollars. It was
a huge sum for the time. We gathered a good team and
created a great project. Viktor Yushchenko even
awarded me the title of Meritorious Journalist for it.
But at some moment, I realized that people had grown
bored with my ‘broadcasts from the basement.’ The
audience began to grow tired of all this pessimism and
horror. Then we created the section entitled ‘People
Talk about People’ and talked there about many interesting
things done by ordinary citizens.”
Viktoriia HONCHARENKO, Dnipro Law
School: “I am very pleased to meet you. As a Dnipro
resident, I can emphasize that our city is really getting
better. But there are people who find nothing
to their liking. How do you deal with this hostility,
what motivates you?”
“Skeptics can only be convinced by deeds. I do not
know how true it is, but political scientists and analysts
say that the index of happiness is increasing
in this country, after all. Living amid unending negativity
is just impossible. Often enough, I respond
to negative assessments with a suggestion to replace
me in the office. People immediately refuse. In order
to understand someone’s path, you need to get
into their shoes.”
Read more on our website

8
No.42 AUGUST 16, 2018
TIMEO U T
WWW.DAY.KIEV.UA
By Daria TRAPEZNIKOVA, photos
by Mykola TYMCHENKO, The Day
In our time of gadgets and social
media, any loud statement reaches
the other part of the world in a
matter of a second. Any one of us can
become friends with a foreigner and
learn how his compatriots view Ukraine.
However, several centuries ago the way
to any foreign country was long,
difficult, and costly. So the public
opinion about some or other territories
was shaped by the artists, writers, and
cartographers. The employees of the
National Museum of Ukrainian History
made a cross section of the ideas the
foreigners used to have about our
territory in a way of an exhibit “Through
the Eyes of Near and Far Neighbors:
Ukraine in Graphical Works of the 17th-
19th centuries.” It was compiled with the
assistance of Ukraine’s National Museum
of Art and the Vernadsky National
Library. The most of the items from the
funds of the abovementioned institutions
are on display for the first time.
The land of milk,
honey,and…captivity
■ IMPRESSION
Charles XII, which was published up to
100 times in different languages. In this
book the author describes the Cossacks and
Mazepa, Charles’s wandering across
Ukraine, he dwells on the reasons of
Swedes’ defeat in their war against Russia.”
At Napoleon Bonaparte’s order the
history of Zaporozhian Cossacks was researched
by French historian Charlesfrom
Moldavia and Valakhia are also on
display at the exhibit. Such descriptions
with accompanying illustrations and maps
were very popular among the travelers of
that time. For example, the exhibit features
the German travel notes dated 1855,
describing the climate, the soil, the natural
recourses, as well as the folkways of
the Ukrainian peasants.
The National Museum of Ukrainian History shows Ukraine
of the 17th-19th centuries through the eyes of foreigners
us. “On the verge of the 18th and 19th centuries
Ukraine was perceived like a not
enough civilized borderline territory with
patriarchal behaviors and rich history,
which was not completely cognized by the
population. The image of the Cossack nation
has been replaced by their descendants,
peasants suffering from the
Moscow despotism. The task of experi-
life, but they look more mundane. Dominique
Pierre de la Flise, the author of
the ethnographic description of the peasants
of Kyiv gubernia added to its huge
volume an album of five pages and pictures
of their costumes. One can see part of them
under the show-glass. This collection cannot
but include Taras Shevchenko’s landscapes
and several etchings, the frag-
● COSSACKS ON THE BOOK
PAGES AND MAPS
The curator of the exhibit, senior researcher
at the National Museum of
Ukrainian History Yaroslav ZATYLIUK
starts the exhibit tour with the first
sources of information about Ukraine
for Europeans. In 1517 a scholar from
Krakow Maciej Miechowita published
Tractatus de duabus Sarmatiis (“Treatise
on the Two Sarmatias”), which, in particular,
mentions the Ukrainian lands.
“It’s shaping the first stereotypes about
the fertile ‘land of milk and honey,’
which seems to be historically cursed, because
these borderline lands are all the
time facing the risk of invasion and ruinations,”
the curator of the exhibit explains.
The information from this treatise
and other Polish chronicles was used in
the famous European encyclopedia, The
Cosmographia (“Cosmography”) by Sebastian
Muenster in 1556. There is small
book from the “Republics” series with the
description of Polish, Lithuanian, and
Ukrainian lands lying next to these books
at the show-window.
The first more or less full description
of Ukraine in the 17th century was accomplished
by the French engineer and cartographer
Guillaume Levasseur de Beauplan.
During his 20-year-long work on our
territory he created the first general map
of Ukrainian lands and topographical
plans of some of its territories. These accomplishments
are still used in the European
atlases. The perception of Ukrainian
territory as a separate Cossack state is supplemented
by the maps created by outstanding
German cartographer Johann
Baptist Homann in the 18th century.
“The interest to our lands has significantly
increased during the Enlightenment,”
Zatyliuk continues, “It was stirred,
in particular, by Voltaire’s History of
Louis Lesur in his work The History of
Cossacks. Johann Christian Engel’s book
written somewhat earlier is one of the first
works on Ukrainian history. Interestingly,
they were used as a reference by European,
some Russian and Ukrainian historians,
in particular, Dmytro Bantysh-
Kamensky, whose notes about his journey
● A SEPARATE ETHNIC GROUP
The texts and several maps are rather
a supplement to the exhibit, its main
powerful and expressive visual element.
Yaroslav Zatyliuk tells about the perception
of Ukrainians and their settlements,
making references to the items in front of
enced Europeans is to bring here the
achievements of civilization,” the researcher
explains. “The Russian travelers
came to Ukrainian territory to see the historical
monuments from Rus’ time and research
their ancient roots. They thought
the Cossacks, and especially peasants,
were a separate ethnic group which had
nothing in common with the princes. In
fact it’s not something new to the world
history. In that time Europeans stuck to
the opinion that their contemporaries
from Greece had no relation to the ancient
heritage, considering that the French,
Italians, etc. had much more in common
with the heritage of the ancient state.”
The attitude to Ukrainian people as a
talented one, but lazy in terms of state
governing, hence captivated, can be
traced in the landscape engravings. No
matter where we find ourselves, when we
look at the pictures, whether in the Stryi
raion, Kyiv environs, or Poltava oblast,
everywhere the emphasis is made on the
incredible landscapes and impressive
monuments. Both Russian artists, and
Napoleon Orda, who considered himself
a Pole, depicted the meadows and woods,
churches, houses, and palaces, built by the
rulers. But every one of them focused on
what referred to the history of their empires,
the Russian empire and Rzeczpospolita,
correspondingly. The tiny figures
of the peasants busy with their
everyday chores are making the foreground
scene more detailed.
A separate wall in the exhibition is
dedicated to human portraits and depiction
of traditional Ukrainian clothes which
make up the image of the peasant nation.
Mykhailo Klodt’s works depict the life
plots and beautiful relaxed people wearing
bright clothing. The etchings and the portraits
of the peasants by Lev Zhemchuzhnykov
as well as the sketches by Kateryna
Haltseva depict the peasants in everyday
ments from Picturesque Ukraine. For him
this project was the means of presenting
Ukrainians in the best possible way. Unfortunately,
in spite of the big intentions
the project was never finished.
● MAKING THE MOMENT STOP
We should pay the due both to the
artists depicting the Ukrainian lands
and those who have managed to preserve
the treasures. For many items of this exhibits
show to us the monuments which
have already disappeared (for example,
the khan tombs in Bakhchysarai) or look
absolutely different (same old Podil and
the works by Ivan Hryhorovych-Barsky).
The exhibit includes also the Crimean
landscapes dated 19th century, such as
the Sudak Valley, Alushta, and Simeiz.
In the center of the museum hall
there is a huge photo of the Mykolaiv
chain bridge, the first capital passage
across the Dnipro in Kyiv, which existed
in 1863-1920. It was taken by John Cooke
Bourne. Bellow, for comparison, there are
lithograph postcards made at the turn of
the 19th and 20th centuries, with the same
cityscape. “The means of depicting reality
are changing with time,” Yaroslav
Zatyliuk finishes the tour, moving the stationary
magnifier on the glass. “Long
time ago this photo was very expensive. It
was difficult to make. Now nearly all of us
are carrying Smartphones with cameras
and several gigabytes of digital archives.”
So, every one of us has an opportunity to
create not only images of our own, but also
the image of our city and state in the
eyes of the foreigners. But this ease comes
with the additional responsibility. Of
course, Photoshop is powerful software,
but it’s a more complicated challenge to
bring the reality closer to an ideal image
rather than its imprint in the camera
matrix. And it’s much more interesting.
PHOTO FACT
Identity-asserting pictures
Photo by the author
Ukrainian American artist Ola Rondiak’s exhibit in Lviv
By Pavlo PALAMARCHUK
LVIV – Dzyha Gallery is hosting
Ola Rondiak’s Identity, Interrupted
exhibit. These pictures were made
as the artist revised her inner identity
under the impact from political
events in Ukraine.
Ola Rondiak was born to a Ukrainian
emigre family in the United States
and raised in a true ethnic Ukrainian
spirit. She resettled in Ukraine shortly
after the Soviet Union’s collapse.
She says that, ironically, she sought a
true Ukrainian identity in the land of
her forefathers, but found none. Back
in the 1990s, Russian was the language
she heard most on the streets of
Kyiv, and the traditions with which
she’d grown were considered provincial.
She had to re-examine the very
notion of being Ukrainian and found
her national identity interrupted.
This basically prompted her to
create a series of pictures currently on
display. Among them are iconic images
of Ukrainian women reminiscent
of the Byzantine period.
■ This art exhibit will close on
August 19.
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