Everybody is Sieg Heiling

Dear readers, I can’t believe my ears…

I was watching a video of Anatoly Shariy, (posted below this article, it has German subtitles, suggesting Shariy wants the German speakers to watch it) which features a phone monologue of a female journalist from ATR (a Ukrainian government funded Crimean Tarar television), Viktoria Ablyazova complaining about a video being leaked to Shariy. That video in question shows Ablyazova being offered a birthday cake with candles arranged into a swastika, the gentleman offering her this cake throws a Roman salute. I translate her takes from the phone monologue:

It’s OK (that is throwing sieg heils) for all Kievites of my generation. Not for your generation but for my generation, it is OK to all. Because it does not have the meaning that you put into it. (really, I have heard something like this before). You look at the volunteers of the ATO (military operation in the East) from the “Right Sector”, they are all sieg heiling.

For my generation, who have served in the “Azov”, it’s the norm. It’s OK, I have plenty of friends, even from Lugansk and Donetsk, ultras, and for them it is OK, they will watch it and laugh, they will say: “What a cool video!”

Yes, if you send it to Russian media they could blow it out of proportion. You think that’s a serious video? A boy … giving his girl a cake, he talks complete bollocks, you can see that he is drunk…

You are not a journalist, you are working for vata (pro-Russian forces), you pervert everything, if those are your friends. such as Shariy, who links to Russian media, which tell about nazis here, I can only hold bad opinions about you…

I will call my superiors and will talk about this situation because it’s fucked up…

You will likely cause me to stop working in the media, with your Anatoly Shariy, don’t send him the original video, please be humane.

Listen, you are engaging in a Hybrid War, I don’t know what else to call it, and you it turns out work for Russian secret services. I will call my friend, who works in the Police, and will ask him what to do now, when you are doing this…

Don’t doubt this! Because you want to bring shame on our TV station, or our country. The TV station is not threatened.

You are a small man, with bad acquaintances, that stir shit everywhere, like Shariy. Why doesn’t he show the country that attacked us…

You say you don’t see money but you are ready to send a video to some idiot.

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Have you never seen a VK page of an “Azovite”, they consider this normal, they consider it a greeting, they consider it as a joke. They did it before all the events, Maidan etc…

Anyway here is the original video:

Why Donetsk Antimaidan Could, and Kharkov Couldn’t

While the Right Sector was openly killing Antimaidan protesters in Kharkov and several months later in Odessa, Donetsk looked something like this:

Note that the Right Sector thugs seem organised, as if they had training and experience in street violence, they are equipped with facial masks and pepper spray. Meanwhile, the mob of Donetsk protesters seems unequipped and unorganised. Nevertheless, the angry mob is overwhelming. I have found this map of the intensity of Antimaidan protest in spring of 2014 at the Euromaidan Press, it appears to be legit.

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And here you have it folks, the Kharkov or the Odessa protests were much less intense compared to what we have seen in the Donbass. Only the city of Sevastopol compares. The Kharkov protest featured Russian flags next to Ukrainian flags, and Odessa was basically supporters of federalisation. The disparity has to do with ethnolinguistic differences between the regions.

14-15 March, 2014, the Antimaidan Suffered A Deadly Blow in Kharkov

Five years ago, an attack of Antimaidan activists on neonazis left two Antimaidan activists dead…

Yesterday (I began writing this post on 14 March), I have read an account of the events by Konstantin Kevorkyan. I translate (my translation has been a little adopted from the original):

On 8 March 2014, on the Freedom Square in Kharkov, next to the Regional Administration Building, another demonstration of the citizens against the antigovernment putsch (that is the Euromaidan) occurred; the theme of which was traditionally federalisation and the Russian language as the second state. After a similar demonstration on 1 March, the “Right Sector” louts were kicked out of the Regional Administration Building, which they occupied. The very atmosphere of a holiday (8 March, International Women’s Day; in former USSR it is a day off; it has a “special” effect on local men) created a peaceful mood among the citizens…

After the demonstration, several thousands of citizens marched through the central street of the city, and in the evening of the same day, when the demonstrators who were about to leave, they were attacked by “Right Sector” goons with metal fittings and baseball bats; three people received shooting wounds. In the following days, and finally on 14 March,  the “Right Sector” goons, arriving on a van with Dnepropetrovsk license plates, have again attacked the Antimaidan camp near the statue of Lenin, and have immediately attempted to hide.

Pursuing them, [the Antimaidan] people have caught up with the attackers at the Rymarskaya Street, where the headquarters of the “Patriot of Ukraine” was located. The leader of [this organisation] was Andriy Biletsky, who was just released from jail. The organisation was infamous among the Kharkovites; several years prior to the events in question her members marched through the streets of Kharkov with neonazi banners…

In those days, the “Patriot of Ukraine” found haven at the building of local “Prosvita”, and have turned their office into a real fortress. As one of Biletsky buddies describes: “They began building a fortress at Rymarskaya, they have boarded the windows with sandbags. We have place “cocktail bars” (Molotow cocktail preparation spots) on the roof from both sides. Imagine, the centre of the city, there is a Russian flag on the Kharkov Regional Administration Building. We gathered arms, traumatic, hunting, shovels, pickaxes, Molotow cocktails. We have organised a mobilisation centre, small headquarters.”

A Russian flag flying over the city is common Maidanite lie. A Russian flag was raised on 1 May but was immediately changed to a state flag. Not only Biletsky was present at the headquarters but also Vadim Troyan (Biletsky’s future depute in the “Azov”, today First Depute Head of the National Police of Ukraine), and Ihor Mykhailenko (has taken over the command of Azov, when Biletsky entered parliament, and now leads “Natsionalni Druzhyny”, the “National Squad”, a civilian branch of Azov).

On 14 March, the attempt by the Antimaidan to approach the headquarters were met with lethal fire. The “Right Sector” goons were texting about the event. “Today 4 March, the Antimaidan plague has been preparing provocations and measures against the Social-National Assembly (SNA), and the Right Sector in the city of Kharkov. Around 20:00, on the Freedom Square, the anti-Ukrainian masses have attacked a car with members of the SNA and the Leader (Biletsky); stones and bottles were thrown at them, the attack was repulsed, and after the car went to the SNA office. Around 21:00, the pro-Russian masses have approached the office of the SNA and have been throwing stones, bottles and other, and have made the first attempt to storm the building, which was repulsed by our boys. During the first attack, the assailants attacked the police to cause a provocation (according to unverified information there are dead). Later, the untermenschen (as per text) have attempted another attack on the office in which Molotow cocktails and firearms were used. Even though they been reinforced with people and arguments, our fighters were able to hold, and have not suffered any losses. Several thousand gopniks are besieging our boys, and we will fight to the victorious end. Glory to Heroes! …. Cocktails are flying at us from the yard, and we are receiving rounds from an AK … We will not surrender, our Fuhrer is awaiting us in Valhalla (Is the Fuhrer in Valhalla? I thought he dishonourably committed suicide) … We have been visited by Kernes for talks (the mayor), we have shown, who is the boss in Kharkov))”

But now, [we will talk] not about Fuhrer, who awaits his supporters in Valhalla, and not about the “untermenschen”, whom they cynically killed, and not about the ecstatic comments of the Maidan wenches under each comment of the “Right Sector” goons. The first point, they have lied shamelessly about the thousands of attackers. The Kharkov Antimaidan simply didn’t have such a force, not to mention the adequate weapons. In the end, the dead victims were from the Antifascist camp. The second moment is the very mention of the SAN, an openly neonazi and racist organisation, the leader of which was Andriy Biletsky, who had the title among his subjects: “White Leader.”

The ideology of the organisation suggests that SAN view as humans (Homo Sapiens) only the white race. (my note: there are many Jews present among the leadership and sponsors of the Right Sector, so I guess if this is a part of their ideology, it is there for the idiots) (they don’t include the Southern Europeans, such as the Italians and Spaniards, in this). Ukrainians are not considered to be Southerners, and other ethnic groups of Ukraine are to undergo Ukrainisation or deportation. “From a mass of individuals, a nation shall appear, and from the weak contemporary man -a “Superman” -say the Social Nationalists. We have seen this somewhere.

As a result of secret talks between the Maidan putschists and Social Nationalists, the government has received in its ranks a new division of disciplined fighters. And after the deadly events of the night of 14-15 March, the regime has happily used their services in Kharkov and elsewhere, for instance during the suppression of the citizen uprising and the murder of policemen in Mariupol on 6-9 May. Biletsky was in turn rewarded by the government and became a member of parliament. It ought to be mentioned that in his favour, Avakov’s advisor, Zoryan Shkyryak, has withdrawn from the race, and the current general prosecutor Yuriy Lutsenko called this vulgar nationalist a “hero”.

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WE HAVE ENTRUSTED OUR LIVES TO HIM AT THE FRONT, AND WE ASK YOU TO ENTRUST YOUR VOTE TO BILETSKY; In the 217th district of Kiev (Obolon’) there will not be a candidate from the “Block of Petro Poroshenko”. Our political force did not forward her candidate because a hero of the antiterrorist operation, commander of the volunteer battalion of special purpose “Azov”, Biletsky, is campaigning [for parliament]. I personally think that volunteer packs such as “Azov” have supplanted the state in a critical moment for Ukraine. Their contribution is underrated. I am convinced, that not just professional lawyers who can write laws but also representatives of the active citizenry should sit in the parliament. It will be them who will become the middlemen between the new political elite and the Ukrainian society. That’s why I personally support the campaign of Andriy Biletsky. THE CHOICE OF PATRIOTS

Biletsky, the Leader of Azov, once said Ukraine Needs a Confederacy with Russia

Yesterday, the National Corpus, a civilian branch of the National Guard Battalion “Azov”, that is widely reported to be made up of neo-nazis, protested at Bankova, the seat of the Presidential Administration in Kiev, and also attacked the police at a Poroshenko rally in Cherkasy…

Soon after, a video of a younger looking leader of Azov, (I see banners of the Patriot of Ukraine, an organisation that preceded Azov) Andriy Biletsky, surfaced and was carried by pro-Poroshenko media. I have uploaded it to my youtube channel and given it English subtitles:

His thesis basically boils down to, if Ukraine is to succeed, she needs Russia’s natural resources. Which is a no brainer! I have heard about Biletsky’s pan-Slavism before but I would not say he is happy with Putin and his regime in Russia, I think their ideology presupposes a neo-nazi revolution in Russia before there can be any unification with Ukraine. Anyway, recently he abstained from the vote on the changes to the Ukrainian constitution, which enshrined an EU and NATO geopolitical course.

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Strelkov Sells his Commemorative Crimea Medal

I saw this yesterday at Ukrainian accounts on Twitter, who were particularly overjoyed, and I did not believe this at first, but it appears to be true. The information comes from Mikhail Polynkov, a coordinator of volunteers for Novorossiya, (his blog) and appeared on his VK account…

The gold medal is being is being featured here for million rubles (guess that’s the starting price) and will go for auction on 13 April. It features a bust of Putin on the obverse side of the coin and a map of Crimea on the reverse side of the coin. And text in Latin on the obverse, and what appears to be Old Slavonic, and Russian (geographical names are in Russian, little lettering on the bottom are in Russia but in old orthography) on the reverse. t02pgRjBtxI.jpg

Obviously, Putin as emperor, and the linguistic chaos, suggests the medal is not very official. Polynkov offers Strelkov’s explanation:

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Yes Sergey, this is my medal, it is not a state issued medal. It was given to me by Malofeyev already in Spring 2014, before the Donbass campaign. I am selling it because I have material troubles, which I cannot cover by the funds available to me. I did not have particular fondness for this award because a) it is not a state award b) not a combat award c) featuring a person, whom I, with the exception of a short period of 2014, never respected, and whom I despise from 2015.

For reference, Konstantine Malofeyev is a Russian businessman, who funds a variety of conservative causes.

This website already featured one other Crimea commemorative medal before.

Epiphanius Without an Office, The Kiev Patriarchate does not want to Merge with the Orthodox Church in Ukraine

Translated from the Union of Orthodox Journalists. It looks like OCU might not just have problems with gaining recognition outside but also internally. Read my other posts on the Church topic, please… 

Privileges, valuable real estate in the centre of Kiev, and the absence of faith in the viability of the newly created OCU are just some of the reasons why the Kiev Patriarchate doesn’t rush to transfer to the OCU.

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Epiphanius Dumenko and Filaret Denisenko

While the government undertakes whatever methods available to, it to “transfer” communities from the Ukrainian Orthodox Church to the newly created OCU, (the link talks about a takeover of a church in the Ternopol Region with the help of thugs from the Right Sector) the Kiev Patriarchate is dragging out the transfer process. The delay is not coincidental; expensive real estate in the possession of the Kiev Patriarchate, among others, an office block in central Kiev. So reported an investigation of the “Radar” project of the television channel NEWSONE.

The two founding Churches, that is the Kiev Patriarchate, and the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church (UAOC), took on the obligation to merge into the OCU at the “unification Council” on 15 December 2018. Back then, the “patriarch” Filaret Denisenko and the former head of the UAOC, Makarius Maletich, announced the dissolution of their organisations. This is confirmed by the official answer the journalists received from the Kiev Patriarchate.

However, as the journalists discovered, the Kiev Patriarchate still functions as a religious organisation, enjoys all the benefits (among others tax benefits and utility payment benefits). Among the properties still owned by the Kiev Patriarchate is the building of the eparchial administration, 36 Pushkin Street, at the very heart of Kiev. The head of the newly created OCU, Epiphanius, does not even have his own office, and shares space with the rector of the Kiev Ecclesiastical Academy right underneath the halls of residence of the seminarists.

Meanwhile, this is not the entire real estate which is in the ownership of the Kiev Patriarchate. The journalists also discovered a modern building in the historical part of Kiev, on the Desyatynnyi Ln., right next to the Mykhailovskyi Monastery. There are offices in this building, and the Kiev Patriarchate likely makes money on letting them out.

“According to the legal department of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, such a contradictory situation is linked to the Kiev Patriarchate still believing the situation could be reversed back to the situation before November-December 2018. The clergy do not have faith in the viability of the newly created OCU. The head of the department of religion in the Ministry of Culture, Andriy Yurash, says the ministry cannot influence the Kiev Patriarchate.”-says the report.

As the Union of Orthodox Journalists reported, the head of the UOC, Epiphanius Dumenko, said that there no longer are the Kiev Patriarchate, or the UAOC in Ukraine. Epiphanius explained that the charters of the Kiev Patriarchate and the UAOC have been deregistered, and a registration was filed for the Kiev Metropolia of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (OCU), which he calls the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, and the charter was adopted on 15 December on the “unification Council.” However, after transferring to the OCU, the parishes in fact transfer to the Kiev Patriarchate, and in Volhynia, there aren’t any official transfers of the Kiev Patriarchate parishes into OCU.

Pence Asked Merkel to send German Ships Through the Kerch Strait

Bloomberg reports…

At a Feb. 16 meeting at the Munich Security Conference, U.S. Vice President Mike Pence urged Merkel to send German warships through a narrow channel between the Crimean peninsula and mainland Russia to show Putin that Western powers won’t surrender their access to those waters, according to the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

10 Years in Jail for Bilingualism; How the Members of Parliament Changed the Total Ukrainisation Law

I still remember how we have been told that the language issue is not important. That was in 2012, when Yanukovych was in power and Kivalov and Kolesnichenko tried to give languages rights on the regional level. And lookey here, Poroshenko brings up the language question! Translated from Strana.ua (some elements of the original have been adapted).

On Thursday, 28 February, the Ukrainian Parliament debated the scandalous law project “On ensuring the functioning of the Ukrainian language as a language of the state.”

Basically, the fact that the parliament bothers with debating the law now may have a more practical motivation, to deflect society’s attention from the scandal regarding the embezzlement in Ukroboronprom.

What innovations do the members of parliament propose?

  1. It is suggested, the Ukrainian language be made obligatory in pre-school, school, and after-school, and in colleges and universities. And while, in primary schools and kindergartens education in the languages of national minorities will be allowed (through the formation of separate groups or classes), this is not envisaged for universities. Education in universities will need to be conducted in Ukrainian only. One or several subjects could be taught in one of the languages of the EU, the Russian language is, of course, not on the list. (note: Russian is the most used language in Ukraine according to Google and Gallup). The indigenous nations of Ukraine (there is an absence of an extensive list of these nations in the law but the Crimean Tatars are named separately) (note: a 2014 law defines indigenous nations of Ukraine as Ukrainians, Crimean Tatars, Karaim, Krymchaks, and Azov Greeks) are guaranteed education in their native languages. Meanwhile, they want to postpone the transfer of external independent evaluations in the Ukrainian language to 2025. We should also mention, the education regulations in this law have been criticised by [Ukraine’s] neighbours for a long time. A law on education, which was adopted in 2017, and which contains literally the same point about the language of education as the law in question, became the cause of a protracted conflict with Hungary.
  2. All mass cultural events, according to the members of parliament must take place in Ukrainian. Theatre shows in other languages must be accompanied by Ukrainian language subtitles (it is not explained how this should be achieved technically).
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    Public execution of/or public showing of a theatre show in a language other than Ukrainian, in a state or communal theatre, must be accompanied by translation into Ukrainian with the help of subtitles, sound translation or by other methods.

    Also, the language of public events such as (workshops, round tables etc.) can be either Ukrainian or English.

  3. You will only be able to make films in Ukraine in the Ukrainian language, inclusion of separate segments in other languages is allowed but must be accompanied by subtitles.
  4. The Ukrainian language will be obligatory for all media. Programmes in other languages must have a Ukrainian dubbing. Television and radio companies must provide a synchronous interpretation into the Ukrainian language in case one of the participants speaks in a different language.
    By the way, the principal change in the law project, from time of the first reading, concerns the quotas reserved for the Ukrainian language on nation-wide television and radio broadcasts. Now a quota of 90% of Ukrainian language on nation-wide broadcasts is being proposed. Before the first reading, the quota was 75%  (and this quota is active now). Regional media are allowed 20% of daily broadcast in another language (earlier, 40% was proposed). Once again, the Crimean Tatars are being pampered, televisions broadcasting in Crimean Tatar are obliged to broadcast 40% of their content in Ukrainian.The innovations that directly hit the internet media. The members of parliament suggest to obligate every electronic media to maintain a website in Ukrainian which, to the user, should launch by default. And simultaneously the media can have an optional mirror website in another language if they so decide. The media will have 18 months to translate their websites into Ukrainian.

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    Internet representations  (including those websites, web pages at social media) of organs of the government, organs of the municipal government, companies, organisations of state and communal forms of ownership, the media, registered in Ukraine, and also subjects of industry that sells its products and services in Ukraine, and are registered in Ukraine, should be executed in the state language. Alongside the version of internet representations (including websites and web pages at social media), which are executed in the state language, there can be version in other languages. The version of the internet representation executed in the state language should not have less content or other information, than the version in another language, and should load by default to users in Ukraine.

    Information agencies retain the right “to distribute their product Ukrainian, and other languages but must tend to commonly held ethic and moral norms of word-usage.”
    What concerns the transfer period allocated to print media, it is set to 2-2.5 years. After this period all Ukrainian papers, except those published in English, or other EU languages, or Crimean Tatar.
    In practice, this would mean the end of Russian language press in Ukraine. Already, the newspapers are teetering on the brink of bankruptcy, and if they are additionally supposed to maintain a print in Ukrainian, it will kill them. The Ukrainian publishers have raised this issue several times but the members of parliament did not hear them.
    And finally the cherry on the top – the pages of the media on social media (without listing the social media) also have to be in Ukrainian. This also concerns mobile applications.

  5. Ukrainian language is also used as the main language of book printing. The print in other languages cannot be larger than prints in Ukrainian.
  6. In the service sector, (shops, restaurants, beauty salons, hairdressers, car washes etc.) the staff must use the Ukrainian language.
    Using Ukrainian is made obligatory in the medical sphere. In contrast with the first reading, the demand for medical staff to undergo language examination was rejected, now they can prove their language skills by a high school certificate. In any case, the law says medical services need to be provided in the Ukrainian language.
  7. According to law, the members of parliament, will make state employees undergo language certification. A National Committee for Language Standards of Ukrainian will determine the appropriate level of proficiency people should achieve to occupy given positions. For instance, the candidates for president will have to provide a certificate of proficiency issued by this organisation. The regulation also concerns government employees, diplomats, judges, lawyers, notaries, workers of education and medical institutions, and staff of state and communal companies. The language commission is being created in order to watch over the fulfilment of the language policy. That is, it will watch and thwart the usage of Russian and other languages of national minorities where the law ordains the usage of Ukrainian.
    In other words, for the second reading, the members of parliament decided to resurrect the scandalous institution of “language inspectors” which was dropped after it raised an outrage at the time of the first reading.
    Curiously, to get Ukrainian citizenship, one ought to have a knowledge of Ukrainian. However, in the case of “outstanding service to the Ukrainian state” the candidates can receive citizenship even if they don’t know Ukrainian. Although, in this case they ought to learn Ukrainian within a year. The blind, the dumb, the mute and candidates for citizenship, who simply cannot pass the examination in a specialised centre for Ukrainian language, are exempt from the demand to know Ukrainian.
    The obligatory examinations will come into effect 2 years after the law comes into effect.
  8. In the sphere of electronic commerce, it will be obligatory to mark products in Ukrainian. Breaking this rule would carry a penalty of temporary suspension of commercial activity. The shop websites also ought to be in the Ukrainian language.
  9. In personal and geographical names, the original sound needs to be maintained. Also, the citizens will have the right to have their name and surname transcribed in accordance with national traditions. However, geographical and toponymic names are not to be translated and should be “presented with the help of a given alphabet in the accordance with how they sound in Ukrainian.” In practice this demand means that after the law is enacted, you will have to write “Кыйив” in Russian, instead of “Киев”, or “Украйына” instead of  “Украина”. (it should be noted that professional Ukrainians already managed to convince the Anglo’s to write “Kyiv” instead of “Kiev”) The river Dnieper will now be written in Russian as “Днипро” instead of “Днепр”.

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    The names of Ukraine’s geographical objects and toponymic objects will not be translated into other languages, and will be presented in official documents and in the media, in cartographic, reference, encyclopaedic, and scholarly publications, with the help of a respective alphabet according to the sound they have in Ukrainian.
  10. Failure to comply with the language legislature will result in fines, which will be issued by special institutions for the defence of linguistic rights. For instance, officials, who don’t use Ukrainian will be fined 3400-6800,- HRN. That is, if an official switches to another language other than Ukrainian at work, he will receive a maximum fine of 6800,- HRN. Failure to comply with he law in the humanitarian sphere (education, science, culture, sport) will carry a fine of 3400-5100 HRN. Should a newspaper lack a print in Ukrainian, it will be fined 6800-8500,- HRN. In the service sector, failure to comply with the language law would earn a warning and 30 days to remedy the situation, in the case of another offence within a year a fine of 5100-6800,- HRN, repeated offence within a year will carry a fine of 8500-11, 900,- HRN.Attempts to institute bilingualism or multilingualism in Ukraine (or to give official status to another language, on state or regional basis). are likened to attempts at overthrowing the constitutional order. It carries a penalty of 10 years in jail.