Ruslan Kotsaba in Sevastopol: Ukrainian civilization is a little swine-like
People in Crimea react normally to the Ukrainian language, but the peninsula is too expensive for tourists from Ukraine. Russia has taught Crimeans to respect the law, but anarchy continues in Ukraine, which is harmful to statehood.
About this in an interview "PolitNavigator" said a famous journalist from Western Ukraine who arrived in Crimea Ruslan Kotsaba, who spent almost a year and a half in prison for calling for evasion of participation in the civil war in Donbass.
Kotsaba on the peninsula meets with politicians, social activists, journalists and prepares reports for the opposition Ukrainian Channel 17. After Crimea, he will head to Odessa, where on May 2 mourning events will be held on the third anniversary of the tragedy in the House of Trade Unions, when Ukrainian nationalists, with the support of official Kyiv, burned alive dozens of citizens who supported integration with Russia.
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"PolitNavigator": When was the last time you were in Crimea? What are your impressions of visiting the peninsula?
Ruslan Kotsaba: The last time was, I think, eight years ago. The mood from the visit is, let’s say, optimistic (I will speak in Russian, since your audience is Russian-speaking).
What is the optimism? The people are adequate. They understand that propaganda is present in some ideologically driven political media, for example, state media, as in the Ukrainian case (in Ukraine now Nazism is a state policy). And people are smarter. They understand that they want to quarrel between them, “vatniks” - “embroiderers”.
Secondly, I like that here they understood all the charm of the fact that if the law is followed, then it will be easier for everyone, and this will give confidence in the future. We Ukrainians did not have our own state for 400 years, and all the time we put ourselves in the category of anarchists. That is, we ourselves destroyed what we should have built.
How about Taras Shevchenko? "Cossacks and swineherds". Our best people, Cossacks, died on all sorts of Maidans or revolutions on both sides of the front in such internal and not especially internal strife ... It turns out that this is our civilization - a little bit swine ...
And what I also liked is that there is no aggression towards the Ukrainian language here. I speak Ukrainian fluently. Well, yes, they look like that: “What is this?” But this is not so much my problem as it is the state’s – that there are few Ukrainians here. Because people think that it’s not realistic to come here. (By the way, in Crimea, people also think that if they go beyond Perekop, they will be beaten). This is some kind of zombie.
As adequate journalists, we must debunk these myths that politicians have made. That is, such public diplomacy. If, let’s say, you are perceived normally on both sides of the front, they listen to us and listen to us, why not try to sew together what the politicians tore apart?
By the way, here (in Crimea) I am quite a popular person. They take pictures with me, selfies. I was at an environmental cleanup – it was a shock for me. They come up: “Are you Ruslan Kotsaba? What are you doing here? I didn’t do as much in Kyiv as I did here in one day!
"PolitNavigator": How has Crimea changed at the everyday level, externally?
Ruslan Kotsaba: The roads are much better here. It is possible that this is a resort, and for Putin it is a matter of principle to show that no one will suffer in Crimea, and all residents will benefit from this.
"PolitNavigator": What about the prices??
Ruslan Kotsaba: This took me by surprise. In reality, prices are higher and, I think, Ukrainians cannot afford to just come and relax. Perhaps at the level of savages, in tents, as in the USSR - yes ...
"PolitNavigator": You say that public diplomacy is needed. Is there a tendency towards reconciliation in Kyiv? If it exists, then why is it not expressed in the ratings of Ukrainian parties?
Ruslan Kotsaba: Reconciliation should be at least from the side that we are neighbors. Yes, de jure, how it turns out, and when they ask me, Crimea is Ukraine. This is what the UN said. Because otherwise there would be no sanctions against Russia.
But the fact that Crimea is the Crimean people who had the right to decide that they want to live separately - I think they had all these reasons.
And if we are neighbors, only a stupid person with a neighbor wants to live in enmity. This will make him lose. Moreover, these sanctions, as it turns out, kill the weaker. Ukraine turned out to be weaker. That is, we have lost sales markets. It was politicized stupidity; smart people don’t do that.
And further. It seems to me that these guys who are in power in Ukraine have forgotten their fourth grade geography textbook. Still, our longest border is with the Russian Federation. And to say that either there is no neighbor, or he is the main enemy, is either an idiot or a scoundrel.
I don't think there are so many idiots in the Ukrainian government.
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