Greetings from Novorossiya

3. IN NOVOROSSIYA, OR WHERE?

WHEN THE RUSSIAN SPRING began, Russians started pressing for constitutional changes that would “respect the interests of the people in all Ukrainian regions.” It was at that time the term “Southeastern Ukraine” was coined. It comprises eight Ukrainian regions. On the map they look like a croissant, and they are respectively the regions of Kharkiv, Dnipropetrovsk, Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporozhia, Kherson, Mykolaiv, and Odessa. They were all calling for independence. The Kremlin propaganda began to dub them “Novorossiya” in order to stress that this territory was historically close to Russia and lacked any ties with Ukraine.

The term “Novorossiya” originated in the eighteenth century. On the territory of what is now eight regions of present-day Ukraine (including Crimea, but without the Kharkiv region) the New Russia Governorate (gubernia) was founded. It was part of the Russian Empire. The name Novorossiya was not used since the Bolshevik Revolution until the year 2014.

However, the expansion of the Russian Spring was met with unexpected opposition.

“Novorossiya? But no such thing exists. I haven’t seen their passports,” says Oleksij from Dnipropetrovsk. “Here we support Ukraine,” he adds.

Before the Maidan, the annexation of Crimea, and the pro-Russian demonstrations in Donbas, such opinions were hardly heard. Instead of mobilizing Ukrainian society against the authorities, the Russian Spring only reinforced their sense of being Ukrainian.

Every year on May 9, on the anniversary of the Third Reich’s surrender, Ukraine celebrates its National Day of Victory and Freedom, commonly known as Victory over Fascism Day. Every year there are grand parades during which in many Ukrainian towns the achievements of Soviet ancestors are remembered.

On May 9, 2014, in Kharkiv the commemorations began at Glory Memorial. Mykhailo Dobkin, at that time a regional governor known for his anti-Ukrainian views, laid flowers there to pay tribute to the veterans of the Great Patriotic War. There were speeches and a parade. At Glory Memorial a crowd of several thousand people were commemorating veterans’ heroic struggles and were not embracing the Russian Spring (as some tried to depict it). Communist flags were not in the majority, and I could see only one that was Russian. The representatives of pro-Russian organizations—the Party of Regions, Borotba, and the Progressive Socialist Party of Ukraine—pushed their way toward the front rows. However, Ukrainian symbols predominated. The soldiers were marching. These were the veterans of the Second World War. Many of them were invalids with tons of medals and some had them hanging from their entire torso. Bystanders were handing them flowers. Although this holiday is celebrated every year, many had tears in their eyes and almost all of them were bursting with pride.

It is only after the official celebrations that several hundred people lined up again in front of the Memorial and unrolled a huge ribbon of Saint George. This is a symbol commemorating Victory Day and is used currently by pro-Russian demonstrators who want to prove that they are fighting fascism like their grandfathers. Every now and then the demonstrators were shouting “I thank Grandpa for victory!” The veterans showed up, too, but it was only a small number from among those who gathered around Glory Memorial during the official festivities. There were about twenty of them. They carried portraits of Stalin and General Zhukov, a brilliant strategist who was widely revered in the Soviet Union.

The march headed toward Freedom Square, one of the largest squares in Europe, to end up at the monument of Lenin, a traditional site of pro-Russian demonstrations. Nobody interfered and there were very few police.

Numerous security forces had gathered near the State Regional Administration building. The police standing in front of the entrance had shields. Inside the building you could see people with shotguns. Not so long ago the mayor of Kharkiv, Hennadiy Kernes, was leading the pro-Russian demonstrations. During one of them, on March 1, an angry crowd entered the building and brutally assaulted almost one hundred participants from the local Maidan. One of the most popular Ukrainian writers, Serhiy Zhadan, was injured. He is an anarchist, but he didn’t have any doubts which side of the barricade he should stand on.

Now Kernes has changed sides and was doing everything he could to discourage the crowd from taking over the building or inciting a riot. Although along the march route there were very few police, there were many on the square. Several thousand had been summoned to the city.

I was wearing a light bulletproof vest under my sweatshirt. After the events in Kiev, Donetsk, or Odessa I knew I could expect anything. Clashes can begin at any moment. “You don’t need it here. Everything is under our control,” a policeman reassured me. As it turned out, he was right.

As soon as that march was approaching the Lenin monument, a new one was forming, this time organized by the Communist Party of Ukraine (CPU). Like its equivalents on the former Soviet Union’s territory, the CPU combines chauvinism, conservatism, and anti-Western sentiments with nostalgia for the Soviet Union. Before the Maidan protesters in Ukraine began their action of mass demolition of statues of Lenin, it had been the CPU members who were putting up tents around them to make sure that the Comrade was sleeping peacefully. From way back they have been organizing all the holiday celebrations associated with the past before 1991. They have been the loudest in opposing integration with NATO and the European Union. Although at the same time that they present themselves as the closest friends of “the proletariat,” without batting an eye they have accepted laws that can be described with many phrases but “in the interest of ordinary people” is not among them. During the Russian Spring they chose “the proletariat,” too. Their tents are standing in Donetsk, Luhansk, and other Donbas cities. Frequently, their activists have become involved personally in the actions of the separatist governments. Right after Victory Day, on the orders of the Parliament, the Prosecutor’s Office looked into their activity. May 9 was their last day to show off.

Several thousand people have joined their march. When security forces refuse to let a motorcade into a closed street, a light shoving match with the police takes place. Dozens of men are charging, as a result of which a police officer falls to the ground, and the cars drive through.

When the demonstrators get to the German Honorary Consulate, a group of people are screaming: “We will burn Berlin again.” They are joined by a musical band and the parade is led by people with the banner: “No to fascism and nationalism.”

Despite apparent success the demonstrators are dispersing in a hurry. They are announcing that there won’t be any referendum in two days (as in Donbas), nor ever. Since that day nobody has seen any federalists or separatists in Kharkiv. Clearly, you can’t get anything more out of the “defenders of the Russian-speaking population.” Thus the pro-Russian demonstrators have lost a crucial piece of their southeastern puzzle.

Dnipropetrovsk. It is an important arms, space, and business center (the majority of Ukrainian banks have their headquarters right here). According to Maryna, a local activist, taking over the southeastern Ukrainian territories will be profitable for Russia only if they include the Dnipropetrovsk region. Unlike Donbas, for example, it is a net contributor to the Ukrainian budget. However, the pro-Russian demonstrators had to forget quickly about Dnipropetrovsk being their banking capital.

Demonstrations against the new government and for integration with Russia started here at the beginning of March. On March 1 a meeting of several thousand people took place. Its participants placed flags of Soviet Ukraine and Russia on the City Council building. One of the meeting’s organizers was the Union of Soviet Officers, whose members showed up with a banner: “In memory of those who died for the motherland and the Soviet government—be worthy of them.” There were no incidents. Just one man began to destroy candles and flowers laid by Euromaidanists on the pedestal of the statue of Lenin—only his shoes were left after the monument was sawed off—to commemorate those who died during the protests.

During this and subsequent demonstrations people expressed their approval of Crimea’s annexation to Russia (but not in such numbers anymore). There were no attempts to take over any administration buildings. Unlike in Donbas, here both the police and the new regional authorities acted decisively. Oligarch Igor Kolomoyskiy immediately and forthrightly declared himself on the united Ukraine side and together with his coworkers did his best to keep the situation under control. It is interesting that before the Maidan, Kolomoyskiy was regarded as an opportunist. Now he became a national hero. On the Internet you can find an altered poster of Captain America showing Kolomoyskiy holding a shield with a trident. The poster is titled “The First Avenger.”

Kolomoyskiy likes to parade in a black T-shirt decorated with red lettering that spells out “Yido-Bandera” and a menorah combined with a trident. In this way he refers to his Jewish roots and his patriotism, and he makes fun of Russian propaganda that depicts Ukrainian nationalism as frightening. This oligarch is the biggest sponsor of the Jewish community in Ukraine. He is well connected in Israel, thanks to which, according to some sources, he has access to consultants from its intelligence agency.

When I arrived in Dnipropetrovsk in May I had the impression that I had come back to Kiev at the times of the Maidan. Many residents were wearing blue-and-yellow ribbons. I am walking through the city. Some kids are riding bicycles with blue-and-yellow Ukrainian flags. They are circling around the fallen Lenin. Above their heads, among the ads on the outside walls of the shopping center, a jumbotron is flashing Ukrainian and European flags. Every now and then the anthem is played. A little further there are three boys—two with drums, one with bagpipes. When they finish the anthem, the passersby are shouting, “Glory to Ukraine.” Nobody is booing, nobody is making sarcastic comments.

Here life takes its usual course. Dozens of residents and visitors spend their free time walking along the river. “It is peaceful here and I hope it will stay this way,” says Vitalij. Like other residents, he is afraid that the military conflict will arrive here, too, but he unambiguously opts for Ukraine. He is grateful to the oligarch who has seriously protected the region from the conflict.

In Dnipropetrovsk they found a unique way to to “disarm” the separatists: they were invited to join in. “If we work with the separatists, they won’t unite and they won’t reach for arms,” says the vice governor and businessman Boris Filatov, closely associated with Kolomoyskiy. The Union of Soviet Officers even got an office in one of the administration buildings. Other groups were neutralized in a very simple way: they don’t have time for political activity because they are involved in practical and useful causes. Some take care of the monuments, others get access to athletic facilities and run sports classes. In the end, the pro-Russian organizations lost their enthusiasm for fighting to join Russia.

But while promoting collaboration, they didn’t ignore real defense. Thanks to Kolomoyskiy’s backing and financial support (reluctantly acknowledged by the authorities), the infrastructure necessary for newly formed units was created very quickly. “Patriots were guaranteed the best conditions,” claims Filatov. The National Defense Headquarters was established in the administration building. That’s where people who are interested can find out how and what to join: the Defense Ministry (the army) or the Interior Ministry (National Guard and police). As a result, volunteer battalion Dnipro-1 and territorial defense units were formed. What is more, volunteer battalion Donbas is carrying out exercises on the border of the Dnipropetrovsk and Donetsk regions. The volunteer battalions have been dubbed “little men in black” in response to the Russian “greens.”

Apart from supporting these units, Kolomoyskiy is in charge of other activities. Taking advantage of his eccentric image, the oligarch offered a ten-thousand-dollar reward for delivering “a Muscovite”—a “green man” captured on Ukrainian territory. The money is paid by his PrywatBank. The vice governor explains that this is not about people but about illegal arms. There are also cash rewards for any kind of weapons. These rewards are higher than the market price of an ordinary automatic rifle. Since the separatists started to rob arms warehouses, you can find guns everywhere and get them without any problems. A stack of dollars is presumed to persuade chance owners to part with military equipment. “If some people are willing to pay for war, we will pay for peace,” says Filatov.

From Donetsk to Dnipropetrovsk, I was going by train. My journey lasted more or less two hours. However, I had the sensation that I had crossed hundreds of kilometers only to find myself in a different country. I don’t know if I can find anything in common between these two cities. This demonstrates, according to Filatov, that “Novorossiya” is just an invention of the Russian Federation. Each of the eight regions that supposedly belong to it is completely different. If you can compare Dnipropetrovsk to any other Ukrainian city, it would be to Odessa, both ethnically and economically. “That’s why a repetition of events from Odessa, and never from Luhansk, was possible here,” Filatov explains.

Although the separatists made themselves at home in only two of the eight regions in southeastern Ukraine, Russia and its supporters have not changed their rhetoric. Commenting on Ukrainian events, Vladimir Putin would refer in his speeches to the entire territory. Then he would talk directly about Novorossiya, demonstrating thereby how little he cares about Ukrainian statehood.

It is worth remembering that Ukraine has been “divided” from the moment of its independence. Intellectuals were arguing about how many Ukraines actually exist, about a common history and language. Politicians were happy to stir up these discussions, because taking over “the largest Ukraine” makes electoral victory possible. It was particularly visible during the presidential elections when the fiercest battles were fought between the “representatives” of western and eastern Ukraine. When they wanted to provoke especially stormy discussions, they would bring up some question of language and history. These were the causes of protests, clashes, and assaults. It was always a perfect pretext to avoid a discussion about the oligarchs, for example.

The Kiev Maidan tried to go beyond this usual pattern. It has been stressed many times that some of its participants were Russian speakers. Nobody on the stage needed to point this out. It was enough to walk around a bit on that Kiev square to hear Russian. All this was destroyed. The question of language returned like a boomerang and is another weapon used to fight Ukraine. One of the first attempted parliamentary actions after Yanukovych’s flight was to cancel a controversial language law according to which some regions could apply for recognition of a second official language. This law, which had been adopted by the politicians from the Party of Regions in June 2012, stirred up some outrage in Ukraine. There was concern that it might lead to a total displacement of Ukrainian from the regions in which Russian was predominant.

It is mid-April 2014. I am standing in front of the occupied Regional Administration Building in Donetsk. It is not the first time that somebody is trying to convince me that Russian-speaking citizens are discriminated against locally. One man has just told me how the Parliament tried to cancel the regional language. “It proves that we are discriminated against here,” he claims. To him it doesn’t matter that the law voted for by the Party of Regions is still in force, since the acting president, Oleksandr Turchynov, has not signed its cancellation.

The federalists were thereby also joined by those to whom “federalization” meant equal language rights for the Russian-speaking citizens of Ukraine. Occasionally, this led to absurd situations. In some pro-Russian demonstrations, a crowd with Russian flags would be shouting: “Russia, Russia, Russia,” while a large number of participants only wanted Kiev “not to discriminate against” Russian speakers. “I don’t want to be in Russia at all,” a woman in the crowd tries to convince me.

The essential problem that both sides—pro-Ukrainian and pro-Russian—are struggling with is, first of all, the passivity and deep distrust felt by the Donbas residents. Those who go out and shout and sporadically get involved in some activity (from voluntary work to military actions) are just a tiny sliver of the six and a half million regional residents.

These sentiments were depicted by the Donbas writer Olexij Chupa in his book The Homeless of Donbas. When a homeless man who cannot cope with his life is asked what he believes in, he replies: “I only believe in a Kalashnikov. With it you can solve all the problems of government and society… . My own problems I’ll handle on my own.” Many residents of Donbas I have talked to convey the same message. Fortunately, it is just talk. Later on, they all go back to their everyday life and try to make both ends meet. Even the war doesn’t move them emotionally. If necessary, they don’t hesitate. They pack up their things and leave. They abandon their cities, towns, and villages to their fate. Their complaining begins during their wandering. “What can I do? I’m not interested in politics. I just want peace,” I hear in Mariupol from Taras, a refugee from Donetsk. If need be, he will pack up again and go somewhere else. What he hopes for most, however, is that his city will finally be peaceful and that he will be able to forget and go about his own business. One of the protagonists from Chupa’s book says: “It is not in the style of Donbas residents to define themselves as people of a particular nationality. They have other concerns, expectations, and therefore, other needs.” People have complained forever, and not only here. They have had reasons to do so. Oligarchization, corruption, and failing industry made their lives miserable. According to Chupa’s protagonist, people in Donbas describe themselves mainly by their occupations. They are electricians, plumbers, or drivers.

I met Larissa and Vasily in a suburban train, called an elektrichka. Larissa speaks surzhyk, a mix of Ukrainian and Russian. There are different versions of it. In her case, Ukrainian is dominant.

“I told her to stop talking like that, because it only causes problems,” says her husband, Vasily, in Russian.

“Once I was talking to somebody in front of the church and a woman shouted at me that I was a Banderite,” she laughs.

We traveled together most of the way, so I learned the entire history of their family since the tsarist era. They were talking like crazy, and I was thinking about current events, so I just pretended to listen. Finally, we came back to modern times. “Ukraine? No, I have nothing against it. It is important that they pay out our pensions and that there is peace,” asserts Vasily. However, if the Russian border suddenly moved two hundred kilometers, they wouldn’t pay any attention. Well, unless the new authorities stopped paying the welfare benefits or lowered their amount. Then they would get mad and sling mud at the new government while sitting in the kitchen. For the time being, Kiev is paying every penny, so they don’t worry.

For some a call for integration with Russia awakened nostalgia for the old days, when all the factories were working, a shared poverty didn’t arouse anger, and food was always to be found one way or another.

When in April 2014 I was going to the press conference organized by the self-proclaimed mayor of Slovyansk, Vyacheslav Ponomarev, I ended up by chance in a taxi with local journalists. All of them were grumbling about the present situation. There was an elderly woman next to the driver. It turned out during the conference that she had placed herself on the stage, instead of sitting together with the journalists, and nobody knew why. A man who was sitting next to me in the backseat would be recording the faces of all the participants on his phone, just in case, just to know whom you are dealing with. When he hasn’t liked a question from a Western journalist, he will laugh loudly so the entire audience can hear him. He will energetically react to Ponomarev’s every word.

For the time being, however, we are sitting in the taxi. My travel companions reflect on how it was before and how it is now. “In the past we lived in a big country and what is it now? Industry has been declining for many years and there are no jobs. A ‘worker’—this word used to carry pride and now it is despised,” a man in the backseat is almost shouting. It is not only people over fifty who miss the Soviet Union and trust Putin as they used to trust Stalin.

Not far away, in Kramatorsk, I talk to Vladimir. He is over thirty and comes from the Donetsk region. He used to serve in the army and now is a militant of the Donetsk People’s Republic. He came from Slovyansk to take over a police station because the residents “called” for help. Who exactly? We don’t know. A small group occupying the City Council building had not enjoyed great popularity. In this respect, Kramatorsk is very different from Slovyansk. Nevertheless, Vladimir is convinced that it is they who will save people from the “bloody junta” and its geopolitical yearning. “There is no place for me in the European Union. Our culture and mentality are closer to Russia. In my heart I am a Soviet man,” he says. Although he couldn’t have been in the Soviet army, his military jacket is decorated with a red star.

During the referendum in Donetsk I meet twenty-year-old Ira and her boyfriend. They are dressed in fashionable clothes. You can meet a couple like them in any European city. They have just left one of the very few polling stations where voting was taking place. “Have we voted? Sure thing,” declares Ira in a firm voice. They certainly voted for independence. The opponents of the illegal referendum didn’t participate. Staring at her smartphone screen, she says that life is better in Russia, with a real president, not like here. Putin is the epitome of goodness and a leader who takes care of his people. For her, the independence of the Donetsk People’s Republic is a step toward a better future, toward Russia.

The subject of the European Union pops up in many conversations. The Union is something incomprehensible, distant and hostile. That’s why they don’t want it. They are afraid that it will bring poverty to Ukraine.

“How are you doing in that Union? Very badly?” asks a taxi driver who was taking me around Slovyansk.

A series of questions follows: about prices, apartments, cars, gasoline, corruption, and life in general.

“Here it won’t work anyway. A different mentality,” the driver cuts it short.

First of all, Donbas feels it is ignored. Its residents are complaining that nobody cares about their problems and the politicians in power don’t represent them. They are not convinced by the argument that from 2010 to the beginning of 2014 Ukraine was actually ruled by a Donetsk clan.

Viktor Yanukovych was born in Yenakiieve, sixty kilometers northeast of Donetsk, and he was attached to this region all his life. In the 2010 elections his mass support came from Donbas. In the first round in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions 76 percent and 71 percent of voters respectively chose him. In the second round, when he faced Yulia Tymoshenko, his results were even better—90 percent and 89 percent. The minute he took over he started supporting his own entourage. Those who were close to the “family,” in other words the group of young businessmen connected to Yanukovych’s son, Oleksandr, quickly received a lot of tasty morsels. Their wealth was growing enormously. Oleksandr Yanukovych himself is the best example. Since the beginning of 2010, in only two and a half years, the value of his bank’s assets went up by 1240 percent. The corporation he owns won an infinite number of bids organized by the state. Oleksandr Yanukovych, an unimportant businessman, began to be among the most influential.

On his estate of three hundred hectares in Mezhyhirya, Viktor Yanukovych has collected almost everything a human being can think of, and a few other things that nobody but he would imagine: antelopes, a breadloaf made of pure gold, and a restaurant in the form of a ship.

“They want ‘their own’? Nobody has ever robbed us like our own,” Valentina comments on the so-called federalists’ demands. For her and for many Ukrainian residents, the name Yanukovych still brings bad memories. For others he wasn’t that bad, because there was order under his rule. “He could have simply dispersed this entire Maidan, so we would be left alone,” explains Sasha, a young man from Kurakhove, several kilometers from Donetsk. He doesn’t support the separatists, but he doesn’t like the war either because prices are going up. “Look at the gas stations and the exchange rate for the hryvnia. Where should we get money for this? Yanukovych did a lot of bad things, but also some good things. When he was in power, I was earning money. Now I sometimes have nothing in the fridge.”

“Even if there weren’t any war, the economy would collapse anyway,” I try to convince him.

“Maybe,” he replies, but I can see that he hasn’t changed his opinion. So we change the subject to talk about the furrowed roads that even without the war look like they have been hit by missiles. On top of that, they were recently damaged by tanks. “You haven’t seen anything like that,” he says with a smile when we are hitting the bumps and bouncing.

For those who keep shouting about “hearing” what Donbas is saying, Yanukovych is a taboo subject. “What does Yanukovych have to do with this? ‘They’ are the ones who are in power,” says a man in Donetsk. I respond that they have been in power for a few months, and they have to deal with the war. How is it possible under such circumstances to stabilize the situation? “They should have thought about it before the Maidan,” he concludes.

It was the “voice of Donbas” that turned into the breeding ground for the so-called federalists. “We want the governors and the regional authorities to be elected by us,” says seventy-five-year-old Natalya from Donetsk. Gathering momentum, she throws in the judges. “We know these people better, so we know if they will be fit for the job. In Kiev they don’t have any idea about it,” she remarks. For several years who got named to power in Kiev was decided by representatives from Donbas, but she hardly pays any attention to this.

The myth that it is Donbas that feeds and supports Ukraine, that if it weren’t for them all the people would starve to death, makes this outrage even greater. Somehow, no one is asking what Ukrainians have been eating in recent months, when in many places in Donbas the harvest was impossible, transport was stalled, and the majority of the companies were closed by the separatists.

“Federalism” has become a slogan that somehow stuck to the residents, but nobody knew what was behind it. Usually, it was associated with Russia. “I am for federalization, that is—for Russia,” one man tells me, standing in front of the administration building in Donetsk. Others have seen a social question in it. Still others don’t know what to see in it, so they simply shouted. Yevhen Nasadyuk, a Donetsk journalist and theater director, tells me that during a pro-Russian demonstration in front of the administration building, some skirmishing with the police took place. The crowd started chanting: “Those in power have to respond” (Vłast k otvietu). The first time, the second time. By the third time it sounded like “Power to the cutlet” (Vłast kotletu). With smiles on their faces, the crowd kept chanting, unaware that they have just created one of the most interesting political slogans of the Russian Spring.