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Author : Marc Sagnol
Political scientist
This article appeared in French in Les Temps Modernes (No. 678, April-June 2014) under the title "L'insurrection à Kiev: lieux et acteurs."
Since the end of November, Maidan remained the center of protests against the corrupt
government of former President Yanukovich and the struggle for human rights.
How can we explain this melee or even a symbiosis between the liberal and pro-Euro-
pean opposition, civil movements which are fighting corruption and present themselves
as left-wing and the extreme right paramilitary groups, ultra-nationalists and fascists
who organize columns of 10 to 12 people in Khreshchatyk ready to storm the barri-
cades?
No matter what, I am here, in the center of Maidan where there are flags of rebellious
paramilitary right-wing organizations, the rhetoric of which in France would have been
denounced as illegal.
I agree with my friend Sigov, my friend Kurkov and with all my friends who want civil
rights and democratic freedoms; who want to rid their country of corruption, the ter-
rible malady which destroys it, and of official jargon. I cannot accept that this civil
movement is supported and "protected" by masses of fighters of this type. The truth
is: the extreme right activists feel perfectly comfortable; they look like you and me and
they talk to people very much like you and me who are not shocked by their presence
and help and encourage them.
These organizations have clearly outlined their aims: they do not fight for more democracy and more openness in relations
with Europe, as the civil opposition describes its aims. They are talking about a "national-liberation" movement against Russia
and against those who allegedly represent it in Ukraine, that is, the Russian speakers. There are many of them in Kiev and in
the east and south of Ukraine.
Its haggling kept the democratic opposition in hostage; today, the Pravy Sektor refuses to evacuate Maidan to keep the new
government on a short leash and to increase its pressure on decision-makers.
The barricades at the Institutskaya Street cannot but impress. Those who built them had obviously read Instructions pour
une prise d'armes by Blanqui* or other similar works by theoreticians of armed struggle in cities. The barricades were obviously
not improvised constructions of peaceful demonstrators; they were built by professionals. Some of them were stone walls,
built of carefully shaped and cemented paving stones. There were barricades made of sandbags, benches and other objects
some of them captured in the House of Trade Unions or brought by common people: the rioters enjoy vast popular sup-
port.
We could see that people who several days earlier had been throwing stones at policemen got ministerial posts to the accom-
paniment of Maidan's loud approval, I knew that it would be hard to deny them these posts but I had never expected a ca-
tastrophe of this dimension. Five portfolios went to extremists, one of them to Alexander Sych, member of the Svoboda
Party, well-known for his violent opposition to abortions (even in case of rape victims) and to everything connected with
communism, was appointed vice premier.
Today, the paramilitary units in Kiev refuse to lay down arms; despite the Geneva agreements, they remain in the city's center
behind fortifications and are still well-armed. The government cannot disarm them: the Cabinet members owe these people
their posts. More than that, they have Americans on their side (they were trained in the well-organized training camps where
NATO taught them the methods of guerilla war in the cities). Leader of the Pravy Sektor Dmitry Yarosh tried to reorganize
his units, which fought valiantly in Maidan, into the Donbass Battalion to bring terror to the East of Ukraine in violation of
the Geneva agreements. No wonder, the "pro-Russian" forces defend themselves and "their land and their memory."
It is easy to accuse Vladimir Putin of imperialism and the desire to have revenge on NATO. In the last twenty years, despite
the officially declared end of the Cold War, NATO has been penetrating the countries into which it solemnly pledged to
Gorbachev not to enter. When an agreement on the unification of Germany was being signed the Atlantic Alliance promised
not to push into the East of the continent. Putin's response and that of Russian society, for that matter, is absolutely under-
standable. Since it is considered absolutely correct to support the peoples fighting for democracy, openness and against cor-
ruption, etc. it is much less natural to openly support and fund without qualms (as the EU is doing) the government the
ideological message of which do not correspond to European values.
Insurrection in Kiev: The Stage and the Actors