Wikipedia

User:Jr8825/sandbox 2

< User:Jr8825
Talkpage • Workspace • Sandbox 1

Background since Ukrainian independence

edit
Further information: Russia–Ukraine relations and Russo-Ukrainian War
 
Protesters in Independence Square in Kyiv during the Orange Revolution, November 2004

After the Soviet Union (USSR) dissolved in 1991, Ukraine and Russia maintained ties. Ukraine agreed in 1994 to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and dismantle the nuclear weapons in Ukraine left by the USSR.[1] In return, Russia, the United Kingdom (UK), and the United States (US) agreed in the Budapest Memorandum to uphold the territorial integrity of Ukraine.[2][3] In 1999, Russia signed the Charter for European Security, which "reaffirmed the inherent right of each and every participating state to be free to choose or change its security arrangements, including treaties of alliance".[4] After the Soviet Union collapsed, several former Eastern Bloc countries joined NATO, partly due to regional security threats such as the 1993 Russian constitutional crisis, the War in Abkhazia (1992–1993) and the First Chechen War (1994–1996). Russian leaders claimed Western powers pledged that NATO would not expand eastward, although this is disputed.[5][6][7]

 
Ukraine, with the annexed Crimea at bottom and two self-proclaimed separatist republics in Donbas at right

Following the 2004 Ukrainian presidential election, in which the pro-European integration candidate Viktor Yushchenko was poisoned with TCDD dioxin,[8] allegedly with Russian involvement,[9] Viktor Yanukovych was declared the president-elect despite widespread claims of vote-rigging. Large, peaceful protests challenged the outcome over a two-month period, which became known as the Orange Revolution. The Supreme Court of Ukraine annulled the result due to electoral fraud, and a re-run brought Yushchenko to power as president.[10] Russian president Vladimir Putin and senior Russian military officers opposed these events, as well as other pro-democracy colour revolutions in the post-Soviet states, which they saw as being instigated by Western countries.[11][12][13]

At the 2008 Bucharest summit, Ukraine and Georgia sought to join NATO. NATO refused to offer Membership Action Plans, but also issued a statement agreeing that "these countries will become members of NATO".[14] Putin voiced strong opposition to Georgia and Ukraine's NATO membership bids.[15] Yanukovych ran again in the 2010 Ukrainian presidential election and won.[16] In November 2013, he refused to sign the EU–Ukraine Association Agreement, overruling the Verkhovna Rada and instead choosing closer ties with the Russian-led Eurasian Economic Union.[17] Russia had pressured Ukraine to reject the agreement.[18] This triggered a wave of pro-EU protests known as Euromaidan, which widened in scope to oppose widespread government corruption, police brutality, and repressive anti-protest laws.[19] In February 2014, clashes in Kyiv between protesters and Berkut special police resulted in the deaths of 100 protesters and 13 policemen; most of the victims were shot by police snipers.[20] On 22 February 2014, Yanukovych fled Kyiv, and later Ukraine;[21] parliament subsequently voted to remove him from office.[22]

Leaders in Russian-speaking eastern Ukraine declared loyalty to Yanukovych,[23] leading to pro-Russian unrest,[24] which was amplified by Russian propaganda.[25] In March 2014, Russia annexed Crimea. The War in Donbas began in April, with the formation of two Russia-backed separatist quasi-states: the Donetsk People's Republic and the Luhansk People's Republic.[26][27] Russian troops were involved in the fighting.[28][29] The Minsk agreements signed in September 2014 and February 2015 were a bid to stop the fighting, but ceasefires repeatedly failed.[30] A dispute emerged over the role of Russia: Normandy Format members France, Germany, and Ukraine saw Minsk as an agreement between Russia and Ukraine, whereas Russia insisted Ukraine should negotiate directly with the two separatist republics.[31] In 2021, Putin refused offers from Zelenskyy to hold high-level talks on the basis that it was pointless to deal with Ukraine while it remained a "vassal" of the US.[32] The annexation of Crimea led to a new wave of Russian nationalism, with the Russian neo-imperial movement aspiring to annex more Ukrainian land, including the unrecognised Novorossiya.[33] Analyst Vladimir Socor argued that a 2014 speech by Putin was a de facto "manifesto of Greater-Russia Irredentism".[34] In July 2021, Putin published an essay titled "On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians", claiming that Russians and Ukrainians were "one people".[35]

  1. ^ Budjeryn, Mariana. "Issue Brief #3: The Breach: Ukraine's Territorial Integrity and the Budapest Memorandum" (PDF). Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. Retrieved 6 March 2022.
  2. ^ Vasylenko, Volodymyr (15 December 2009). "On assurances without guarantees in a 'shelved document'". The Day. Retrieved 7 March 2022.
  3. ^ Harahan, Joseph P. (2014). "With Courage and Persistence: Eliminating and Securing Weapons of Mass Destruction with the Nunn-Luger Cooperative Threat Reduction Programs" (PDF). DTRA History Series. Defense Threat Reduction Agency. ASIN B01LYEJ56H. Archived from the original (PDF) on 28 February 2022. Retrieved 7 March 2022.
  4. ^ "Istanbul Document 1999". Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe. 19 November 1999. Archived from the original on 1 June 2014. Retrieved 21 July 2015.
  5. ^ Cite error: The named reference Wiegrefe 2022 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ Hall, Gavin E. L. (14 February 2022). "Ukraine: the history behind Russia's claim that Nato promised not to expand to the east". The Conversation. Retrieved 14 March 2022.
  7. ^ Baker, Peter (9 January 2022). "In Ukraine Conflict, Putin Relies on a Promise That Ultimately Wasn't". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331.
  8. ^ "Study: Dioxin that poisoned Yushchenko made in lab". Kyiv Post. London: Businessgroup. Associated Press. 5 August 2009. Archived from the original on 31 January 2022. Retrieved 29 January 2022.
  9. ^ "Yushchenko to Russia: Hand over witnesses". Kyiv Post. Businessgroup. 28 October 2009. Archived from the original on 26 February 2022. Retrieved 11 February 2010.
  10. ^ "Ukrainian court annuls election result: Ukraine's supreme court has annulled the results of a disputed presidential election and ordered a new round of the run-off vote". Al Jazeera. 3 December 2004.
  11. ^ Cordesman, Anthony H. (28 May 2014). "Russia and the 'Color Revolution'". Center for Strategic and International Studies. Retrieved 4 March 2022.
  12. ^ Rachman, Gideon (9 April 2022). "Understanding Vladimir Putin, the man who fooled the world". The Guardian. Retrieved 9 April 2022.
  13. ^ "Putin calls 'color revolutions' an instrument of destabilization – Dec. 15, 2011". Kyiv Post. Interfax Ukraine. 15 December 2011. Retrieved 4 March 2022.
  14. ^ Brown, Colin (3 April 2008). "EU allies unite against Bush over Nato membership for Georgia and Ukraine". The Independent. p. 24. Archived from the original on 11 September 2012. Retrieved 28 May 2022.
  15. ^ Evans, Michael (5 April 2008). "President tells summit he wants security and friendship". The Times. p. 46.
  16. ^ Harding, Luke (8 February 2010). "Yanukovych set to become president as observers say Ukraine election was fair". The Guardian. Kyiv. OCLC 60623878. Archived from the original on 27 February 2022.
  17. ^ "Parliament passes statement on Ukraine's aspirations for European integration". Kyiv Post. 22 February 2013.
  18. ^ Dinan, Desmond; Nugent, Neil (eds.). The European Union in Crisis. Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 3, 274.
  19. ^ Marples, David; Mills, Frederick, eds. (2015). Ukraine's Euromaidan: Analyses of a Civil Revolution. Ibidem Press. pp. 9–14.
  20. ^ "Accountability for killings in Ukraine from January 2014 to May 2016" (PDF). Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. pp. 9, 21–25.
  21. ^ "Источники РБК: Виктор Янукович находится в Подмосковье". RosBusinessConsulting. 26 February 2014. Archived from the original on 27 February 2014. Retrieved 12 April 2015.
  22. ^ "Rada removes Yanukovych from office, schedules new elections for May 25". Interfax-Ukraine. 24 February 2014. Archived from the original on 10 February 2020. Retrieved 15 February 2015.
  23. ^ Polityuk, Pavel; Robinson, Matt; Baczynska, Gabriela; Goettig, Marcin; Graff, Peter; Elgood, Giles (22 February 2014). Roche, Andrew (ed.). "Ukraine parliament removes Yanukovich, who flees Kiev in 'coup'". Reuters. Kyiv. Archived from the original on 9 June 2016. Retrieved 18 November 2020.
  24. ^ Fisher, Max (3 September 2014). "Everything you need to know about the Ukraine crisis". Vox. Archived from the original on 22 January 2022. Retrieved 24 January 2022.
  25. ^ Hopquin, Benoît (23 April 2022). "In the Donbas region, 20 years of Russian propaganda led to war". Le Monde. Retrieved 13 June 2022.
  26. ^ Grytsenko, Oksana; Vlasova, Anastasia (12 April 2014). "Armed pro-Russian insurgents in Luhansk say they are ready for police raid". Kyiv Post. Luhansk: Businessgroup LLC. Archived from the original on 12 April 2014. Retrieved 1 February 2022.
  27. ^ Ragozin, Leonid (16 March 2019). "Annexation of Crimea: A masterclass in political manipulation". Al Jazeera. Archived from the original on 7 November 2020. Retrieved 24 May 2022.
  28. ^ Walker, Shaun; Grytsenko, Oksana; Ragozin, Leonid (3 September 2014). "Russian soldier: 'You're better clueless because the truth is horrible'". The Guardian. ISSN 1756-3224. OCLC 60623878. Archived from the original on 1 March 2022. Retrieved 28 February 2022.
  29. ^ "Exclusive: Charred tanks in Ukraine point to Russian involvement". Reuters. 23 October 2014. Archived from the original on 1 March 2022. Retrieved 28 February 2022.
  30. ^ "Ukraine ceasefire violated more than 100 times within days: OSCE". Al Jazeera. 29 July 2020. Archived from the original on 1 March 2022. Retrieved 28 February 2022.
  31. ^ "France says Russia refused to hold ministerial meeting on Ukraine". Reuters. 9 November 2021. Retrieved 26 January 2022.
  32. ^ "Russia Shouldn't Negotiate With 'Vassal' Ukraine, Ex-President Medvedev Says". Moscow Times. 11 October 2021. Retrieved 26 January 2022.
  33. ^ Michael, Casey (19 June 2015). "Pew Survey: Irredentism Alive and Well in Russia". The Diplomat.
  34. ^ Socor, Vladimir (24 March 2014). "Putin's Crimea Speech: A Manifesto of Greater-Russia Irredentism". Vol. 11, no. 56. Eurasia Daily Monitor.
  35. ^ Putin, Vladimir (12 July 2021). "Article by Vladimir Putin 'On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians'". The Kremlin. Government of Russia. Archived from the original on 25 January 2021. Retrieved 1 February 2022. {{cite web}}: |archive-date= / |archive-url= timestamp mismatch; 25 January 2022 suggested (help)
Retrieved from "https://en.wiki.x.io/w/index.php?title=User:Jr8825/sandbox_2&oldid=1142427071"