James Miller

A Most Violent Year

February 27, 2015
Spotlight
The Bell
Ukraine
Fireworks in Maidan, February 19, 2014.

Updated — Our list of articles marking the one year anniversary of the Euromaidan Revolution:

One year ago today Viktor Yanukovych offered the people of Ukraine a deal: the government would give the protesters amnesty if they would abandon their positions in Maidan Square and elsewhere across Kiev. The protesters, who had nearly frozen in the months spent in the cold city squares, saw the deal as a way to subvert the protest. They did not leave. The government, believing that they had given the protesters a final chance to avoid bloodshed, deployed its infamous Berkut riot police to the streets. Chaos erupted, and instead of ending the crisis, the actions of the Yanukovych government on February 17-18 shook the regime to its knees.

365 days ago today, seeing the chaos in the street, we made a decision — to launch a liveblog on the events in Kiev (read it here). Ukraine was an important story for the world then not because the West would gain an ally or an economic partner, although it had sought to do both those things. The story was important because the actions of the Yanukovych government were heavily influenced by the desires of Moscow, which was bullying friends and opponents alike across eastern Europe. The crisis has continued for a year not because of political instability in Ukraine but because of the revanchist imperialism of Putin, as demonstrated by the Anschluss of Crimea and then the Russian invasion of the Donbass. Unfortunately, the crisis will continue for as long as those factors remain unchanged, but our coverage will also continue.

With three full-time writers and a small budget, The Interpreter has covered this story, and many others, relentlessly. With your continued support we will continue to do so.

Our latest live coverage of the Ukraine crisis can be found here.

In the meantime, we will be marking the one year anniversary of the Euromaidan revolution and our own coverage throughout the week with a series of reflections, analysis, and editorials, written by colleagues, experts, soldiers, activists, and other distinguished guests.

We are honored to carry an editorial written by the President of Estonia, Toomas Hendrik Ilves, who is alarmed by the amount of international agreements Russia has broken in just one year:

 

The Interpreter’s Catherine A. Fitzpatrick has written an overview and analysis of how the Russian opposition movement has responded to the crisis in Ukraine — A Year of Russian Opposition Over the War in Ukraine: From ‘Crimea is Ours’ to ‘Crisis is Ours’

The Intepreter’s managing editor James Miller has written a reflection on the events in Maidan Square, the launching point of the chaotic year that has followed.

Paul Goble writes that what happened last year was the birth of a nation, Ukraine, which is ultimately a threat to Russia because despite being an empire and a state, Russia never truly developed a national identity:

The last twelve months have seen something remarkable in European history: the birth of a new nation not defined by blood or language or passport nationality, as so many are, but rather by a common political faith in democracy and freedom and a common set of aspirations to join other European nations so constituted and defined. That nation is Ukraine, and its emergence as a self-confident civic nation represents both the greatest triumph in its history and the greatest threat it has ever posed to Russia, a country that has had a state for far longer but that to this day has not managed to be a nation.
Lilia Shevtsova, of the Brookings Institute, writes that Ukraine’s quest for democracy came at a time where the West is unwilling or unable to support it while Russia, entering into an “advanced state of decay,” is trying “to re-energize itself and test the readiness of the West to defend its principles.”

Read the article here:

Lilia Shevtsova, of the Brookings Institute, writes that Ukraine’s quest for democracy came at a time where the West is unwilling or unable to support it while Russia, entering into an “advanced state of decay,” is trying “to re-energize itself and test the readiness of the West to defend its principles.”

But at the same time the threat to [Ukraine’s] statehood has become a powerful mechanism that galvanizes the birth of the new, European national identity and the building of a new Ukrainian nation. In some sense Ukrainians with their longing for dignity are already more Europeans than many old Europeans!

Read the entire article here.

Field journalist David Patrikarakos has written a reflection on the last year of war and upheaval in Ukraine:

If you wanted to sum up the war in a single image it would be this: artillery firing at the precise moment that politicians grandly announce at a “cessation in hostilities.” I was there last April when separatists (helped by ‘little green men’) first took over government buildings in the eastern towns of Donetsk, Lugansk and Slavyansk.

Read the entire article here:

Our first article in this series is a media analysis, written by Matt Sienkiewicz, Assistant Professor of Communication and International Studies at Boston College, on the importance of our “Ukraine Live” coverage and liveblogging in general. Read it here:

We have also launched a podcast about what we have learned in a year of covering this crisis:

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