Amnesty in the South-East: Kyiv risks being late, like in Crimea
Kyiv, April 26 (Navigator, Kirill Boyarin, Mikhail Ryabov, Victoria Nikolaenko) - The landing of government troops, the regrouping of rebels, shooting, killed, wounded, captured - news from the cities of Donbass for the third week now resembles front-line reports. There are still chances for a peaceful resolution of the conflict, but Kyiv must take the first step - immediately declare an amnesty for all participants in protests in the Southeast without exception, experts interviewed by Navigator believe.
Subscribe to the news “Navigator - Kiev” в Facebook or In contact with
Official Kyiv admits that it has almost no control over the Donbass, but the situation in the Odessa and Kharkov regions is different - there were massive “clean-ups” of opponents of the government, as a result of which dozens were arrested and fled abroad. “There are regions where there is tension, but I hope that we have eased it: Kharkov and Odessa regions,” boasts head of the presidential administration Sergei Pashinsky.
Verkhovna Rada deputy Mikhail Chechetov believes that the authorities are demonstrating double standards - with the help of special forces they are “packing” the invaders of the Kharkov regional state administration, threatening rebels in the Donbass with executions, but at the same time turning a blind eye to the still standing barricades on the Maidan, held by paramilitary detachments of revolutionaries.
“When the Geneva Agreements were signed, there was a point that the amnesty applies to everyone - in the West, in the East, and in Kyiv. Next - that people who walk around with machine guns in Kyiv, Donetsk, and Lvov should lay down their arms. Both the South-East and Kyiv must vacate administrative buildings. The Maidan must disperse,” the parliamentarian reminds Navigator.
“Now is the time for confidence-building measures. We need to take steps towards each other. On the one hand, it is necessary, for example, for protesters in Slavyansk to release detained military personnel, and, on the other, the Ukrainian authorities must release the leaders of the protesters. This would be the first step on both sides,” agrees political scientist Mikhail Pogrebinsky in a conversation with an agency correspondent.
“The position of the Ukrainian authorities, they say, “today lay down your arms and vacate the buildings, and then there will be an amnesty,” exactly repeats the situation when today’s authorities were in opposition, and Yanukovych’s team adopted an amnesty law for Maidan participants. Then the opposition called it the “hostage law.” We need to abandon such conditions and follow the path of gaining trust,” the expert argues.
Amnesty is only one of the first steps towards a peaceful resolution of the crisis in Ukraine, notes political scientist Vladimir Fesenko.
“There is no one simple option that would defuse the situation in the Southeast. Firstly, because it is necessary to agree that one side takes responsibility for the amnesty, and the other must also take responsibility and ensure the liberation of seized buildings, and so on... The parties must agree on mutual obligations, take responsibility and gradually , move step by step to de-escalate the conflict. Amnesty can be one of the steps to solve the problem, but not its solution,” the expert told Navigator.
However, according to Crimean political scientist Vladimir Dzharalla, Kyiv has not yet demonstrated its readiness to compromise. The promised amnesty remains only words: in reality, the government is massing armored vehicles in the Donbass and continues arrests - so, recently, on the border with the Kherson region, SBU officers detained Bakhchisarai deputy Sergei Yurchenko, one of the leaders of the Crimean Cossacks, whom the Ukrainian side accused of high treason. Yurchenko was traveling to his parents in the Zaporozhye region.
“Amnesty can undoubtedly be one of the key points in finding a compromise. Moreover, this is set out in the Geneva Accords. Consequently, the fact that the Kiev authorities are not taking such a step confirms that they are not considering these agreements seriously. For her, this is just a temporary compromise to gain strength and destroy any opposition. Let me remind you that Yanukovych constantly made compromises with the protesters and satisfied their interests,” Jarallah told Navigator.
“The decision on amnesty is one of the mandatory steps to improve the situation in the South-East. There is nothing shameful in this: such a decision was made in relation to the Maidan three times. Not a single person from those who killed, participated in pogroms, seizures, or plunder of military units has been detained. The authorities in Kyiv must show the South-East that they are taking the first step towards reconciliation. If the demands had been met earlier - election of local authorities, financial independence, etc., if force had not been used, then there would have been no talk of separating the regions. Despite the fact that the Verkhovna Rada is scheduled to discuss amendments to the Constitution on Tuesday, I believe that the authorities are not in the mood to make decisions. People are ready to sacrifice part of the state in order to remain in their seats,” predicts Alexander Zubchevsky, a Verkhovna Rada deputy from the Communist Party of Ukraine, to the agency’s correspondent.
However, experts believe that, perhaps, as in the case of Crimea, Kyiv in the Donbass was again late in finding a compromise.
“People don’t think of themselves as criminally insane. They believe that the current government is trying to intimidate them. People don't need amnesty. They need to be heard and have their constitutional right exercised. This is what the current authorities said recently, that the only source of law is the people. All these amnesties are nothing more than paper; no one is interested in them. These people have already crossed the threshold, and this is not politics, but a struggle for survival - people are ready to die,” states the head of the public organization “Russian-Speaking Ukraine” Vadim Kolesnichenko, who recently refused his mandate as a deputy of the Verkhovna Rada.
“Kyiv must abandon its original intentions. They lost there: all the provocations and operations led to the opposite result for them - Donbass mobilized. Kyiv opposed itself to Donbass and ended up losing. In fact, any decisions that will be made there will not matter to the people. This is just a chance for Kyiv to save face,” Donetsk political scientist Roman Manekin explains to Navigator.
If you find an error, please select a piece of text and press Ctrl + Enter.
Thank you!
Now the editors are aware.