When Ukraine’s President Petro Poroshenko and Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk came to lay flowers at the Memorial of the fallen victims of the EuroMaidan Revolution on Nov. 21, people booed them and shouted “Shame!”
The killings of more than 100 Ukrainians by the ousted president remain unpunished a year later, enraging those who took part in the Revolution of Dignity, which started on Nov. 21, 2013, when the government backed out of preparations for signing a major treaty with the European Union.
On Nov. 19 Ukraine’s Prosecutor’s office reported they have questioned more than 2,000 people and opened at least 1,167 criminal proceedings.
“Unfortunately we can’t prosecute all those involved into these serious crimes,” Oleh Zalisko, the deputy prosecutor said during the news conference in Kyiv. “We all know how (Viktor) Yanukovych, (Viktor) Pshonka, (Serhiy) Arbuzov fled Ukraine. Moreover, it’s the reason why we don’t see a number of organizers of crimes against humanity detained,” Zalisko added.
Earlier Anton Heraschenko, an adviser to the interior minister, said the police has figured out that the administration of fugitive President Yanukovuch worked out a plan of kidnapping, intimidation and killing of EuroMaidan activists.
More than 77 activists and at least 15 police officers were killed in Kyiv through Nov. 30 – Feb.20, also some 900 were wounded, prosecutors said.
Many participants of the revolution feel outraged over the lack of justice. On Nov. 21 at least 100 people gathered on Instutytska Street in Kyiv, were at least 49 activists were killed, allegedly by Berkut police unit on Feb. 20, to commemorate the victims, which are now called the Heavenly Hundred.
People demanded punishment for crimes, and the status of Heroes of Ukraine to the murdered patriots. Poroshenko promised to sign a decree to award them the honors on Nov. 21, he told people in the crowd.
But many feel it’s not enough. Diana Gebre, an active EuroMaidan Revolution participant, does not believe it was impossible for the officials to investigate and punish murders during such a long time.
“It’s been a year and they haven’t found those responsible for the abductions and killings,” Gebre said. “I think the list (of those people) is huge and they (police) know all of them by their names, but it’s just kept far from the public and that’s what makes me mad.” She also thinks investigations started too late, so valuable time was wasted at the beginning.
However, Gebre is still hopeful that those responsible will be punished.
Gebre was a close friend of 20-year-old Sergei Nigoyan, a passionate EuroMaidan activist from Dnipropetrovsk Oblast who became the first victim of murders on Maidan. They met in December, a month before his death, but managed to become soulmates, she says.
Nigoyan, an Armenian native, was killed on Hrushevskoho St. in Kyiv on Jan. 22. The prosecutor’s office is still investigating his case.
Despite frustrations, many of those who celebrate the revolution’s anniversary feel it was not it vain. Iryna Andreytsiv, a student from Lviv, spent most of her last winter traveling from Lviv to Kyiv’s Maidan Nezalezhnosti to take part in the protests. Andreytsiv confessed she was hoping the revolution would change the mindset of the nation.
“I don’t see the results. And all the evidence of crimes is gone with those responsible (who fled the country),” she says, adding that now she worries more about her friends fighting against Russia-backed separatists in Ukraine’s Donbas.
Since the cease-fire signed in Minsk on Sept. 5, some 13 people have been killed every day in the east of Ukraine, reads the latest United Nations survey, published on Nov. 20. Totally more than 1,100 servicemen and 4,132 civilians were killed since the start of the anti-terrorist operation, according to official figures.
“My friend from Aidar battalion recently was freed from captivity and came back without a hand,” Andreytsiv says. Now he’s raising money for an artificial limb, according to her, and also tries to find money to buy warm clothes for his comrades.
“I was critical about all those 18-20-year-old boys who were fighting in Kyiv then,” she explains. “I thought it’s better when older people are involved, but when it was time to go the war zone, they hid in their homes. And young boys again went to the east to fight.”
Kyiv Post staff writer Olena Goncharova can be reached at [email protected]
