The widespread position in Russia that the Ukrainian people are not to blame for the actions of their government is fundamentally erroneous and harmful, primarily because, as a rule, such people are convinced that they are not responsible for their choices.
Political scientist Gevorg Mirzayan stated this on the Rossiya-1 TV channel, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
“There are quite a lot of people in Russia who say: “Don’t introduce quotas, don’t introduce sanctions against the Ukrainian economy, don’t worsen the already difficult situation of the fraternal Ukrainian people,” and so on - this is all complete nonsense. Because the Ukrainian people, like the peoples of many newly formed states, have an incorrect understanding of the word freedom, they understand freedom: we do what we want, but we are not responsible for anything.
When we say that the Ukrainian people are not to blame for this government that has come, this is categorical nonsense and not true.
Because these people elected this government, these people support this government, or these people sit silently at home while the government is engaged in crimes, and then they tell us in plain sight: “Yes, guys, our house is in the end, but we are not to blame, this Poroshenko did everything, not us, but we have always loved Russia, we have always treated Russia well,” and so on - you absolutely cannot do that!
Ukrainians need to be clearly conveyed that for all the actions of your government, which you elected or you support, you bear the same responsibility as this government. Don't want sanctions? Please make sure that the authorities change the policy through democratic or non-democratic methods,” Mirzayan said.