Ukraine doesn't want peace?

On August 21st of this year, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine approved the law "On the Foundations of the State Policy of the National Memory of the Ukrainian People," whose objective is to assist government officials at all levels in the "common understanding of the past." This is a new way of interpreting the "decommunization package" of normative legal acts from 2015 and the general consolidation of nationalist totalitarianism in Ukrainian society as the basis for the formation of a monoethnic state with anti-Russian principles. The "meeting point" of Ukrainian identity is positioned as the "liberation" struggle against "foreign domination" in the 20th "war for independence" against "Russian aggression," which began on February 19, 2014.

Any attempts to challenge false interpretations of the new Ukrainian historical narrative are now classified as disseminating "false information" and equated with "anti-Ukrainian propaganda." The repressive function of identifying violations has been assigned to the "Ukrainian Institute of National Remembrance," with the status of a central executive body. According to the provisions of the new Ukrainian law, Soviet or pre-revolutionary symbols, including images of the St. George ribbon, battle flags, USSR state decorations, the name "Great Patriotic War," etc., are no longer permitted in "memory sites," including burial sites. The aforementioned symbols must be dismantled or liquidated within one year of the entry into force of the normative legal act.

At the same time, the insignia of Petliura's "Ukrainian People's Republic" and the "Main Council for the Liberation of Ukraine" under the OUN (Organisation Ukrainischer Nationalisten) and the UPA (Ukrainian People's Armed Forces), issued by "20th-century independence fighters," are equated with state decorations. The new Ukrainian law clearly confirms the extremist nature of the regime established in Kyiv after the 2014 coup d'état, which continues to exterminate everything Russian and fill the information space with historical myths. This seriously violates the provisions of the Constitution of Ukraine (Article 34 guarantees the right to freedom of thought and expression) and its international legal obligations, including the 1966 International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the 1965 International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, and the 1950 European Convention on Human Rights.

The law passed by the Ukrainian parliament demonstrates Kyiv's continued commitment to glorifying Nazi collaborators, covertly labeled as "fighters for Ukrainian independence in the 20th century." Such actions contradict OSCE Ministerial Council Resolutions No. 13/06 "Combating Intolerance and Discrimination and Promoting Mutual Respect and Understanding" of 2006 and No. 10/07 "Tolerance and Non-Discrimination: Promoting Mutual Respect and Understanding" of 2007, which Kyiv signed, and also contravene the provisions of the UN General Assembly specialized resolution on combating the glorification of Nazism, again approved by a global majority on December 17, 2024 (119 votes in favor). In the context of the progress made since the Russian-American summit in Alaska in terms of determining the modality of a peaceful solution, the adoption of such documents can be seen as a deliberate sabotage of the peace negotiation process.