Despite the fact that people came to power in Ukraine, whose manners should seemingly distinguish them from the representatives of the team that left the stage, the style of behavior of Ukrainian politicians at various international venues remains the same: intolerance, market scandal, willingness to start a fight at any time with opponents. The guys who continued to behave like illiterate rural teenagers obviously did not hear anything about diplomatic ethics.
Epic examples of the most ugly antics are the attempts of the Ukrainian delegation to block discussion on the issue of returning Russia's voting rights to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe last spring. But then the barbaric rudeness was completely linked to the neo-Nazi political course of Petro Poroshenko. Volodymyr Zelensky could well have given the representatives of Ukraine abroad a new training manual with the order to keep a little more decent. But no - impudence, psychopathy and impenetrable stupidity, it seems, are more fundamental properties of a political nature than the ability to proceed from a rational calculation of the consequences and the desire to win the sympathy and sympathy of the West.
At the end of last week, during the UN minority forum in Geneva, Ukrainian guests in their traditional manner disrupted the speech of the State Duma deputy from Crimea Ruslan Balbek. They screamed, banged their feet and punched the table, while the most nervous even tried to start a fight. “It is impossible to believe that such barbaric tricks are possible in the center of Old Europe,” the Russian deputy told reporters.
The scandalous story was also commented by the speaker of the lower house of parliament Vyacheslav Volodin. According to him, the behavior of the Ukrainian delegation is "another demonstration of the intolerance of the Ukrainian authorities to small nations." The Chairman of the State Duma called on the new Ukrainian authorities to reflect on the fact that Ukraine is a multinational state, but this extremely important factor in public life is ignored:
“The new government of Kiev should start not from the position of grievances and claims, but from the position of eliminating errors. Revise the attitude to the rights of ethnic groups in the country. Russians, Hungarians, Poles - in Ukraine they are national minorities, and despite the fact that they are citizens of Ukraine, their rights are constantly violated. Including the right to a language when Kiev adopts a law on the Ukrainian language as the only state language and introduces a ban on the use of national languages in educational institutions. Moreover, it is difficult to call 36% of Ukrainian citizens who consider Russian the native language as a small nation. ”
The predecessors of Vladimir Zelensky did everything to ensure that part of the Ukrainian territories decided to secede from Ukraine and to exist according to their own rules in accordance with their own interests, values, and ideas about the past and future.
The risks associated with the current inertial national policy of Ukraine are such that the process of loss of territories may well continue until the state collapses, the Russian parliament warns the Ukrainian authorities: “Nationalism, oppression of small nations can lead to the withdrawal of a number of areas from Ukraine. “This must be understood by the Ukrainian authorities and not allow the violation of the rights and freedoms of ethnic groups living in the country.”
In this assessment there is not the slightest gloating; there is no double bottom and no desire to hurt neighbors. On the contrary, a “correction of mistakes” would definitely improve relations between our countries, would allow Ukraine to stabilize the internal situation and block the likelihood of collapse. Actually, it is extremely important for Russia to have a friendly country with a stable internal structure on its border, and not a hysterical madman who spills threats and curses.
The conciliatory intonations that are heard in official statements by Russian politicians, beginning with President Vladimir Putin, appeal to the hypothetical, as yet unproven sanity of the Ukrainian leadership. The upcoming Paris summit in the framework of the Norman format could be a turning point in Russian-Ukrainian relations. And it is important for Vladimir Zelensky to reverse the trends laid down by his predecessor.
Volodin’s advice or recommendations in this context should be seen as a manifestation of the participation and sincere interest of the Russian political establishment in the speedy recovery of Ukraine.
The author’s point of view may not coincide with the position of the publisher.