Former Ukrainian Prime Minister and Batkivschyna Party leader Yulia Tymoshenko, in her letter of congratulations on the occasion of Freedom Day, has called for the reproduction of the feeling of freedom that the Ukrainians experienced during the Orange Revolutio and said she feels the guilt for for unfulfilled dreams.
"I just want to wish everyone on this day to remember the feeling of pride for our country, through which we wore orange every day, went to the Maidan and brought warm clothes and hot coffee in thermoses. Let us remember that feeling and try to reproduce it. Let’s try again to feel responsible for our own country and protect it," she said in a letter of congratulations posted on the Web site of the Batkivschyna Party on Tuesday.
Tymoshenko noted that Ukraine became "a part of Europe" seven years ago.
"Without any ceremonial signing and ratification, we instantly turned from a post-Soviet republic into the state of Ukraine, a European country," she said.
She said that the whole world envied those ordinary Ukrainians who came to Independence Square in Kyiv "to be cold and warm up together, sing and chant, rejoice and hope – love their country together."
"Such a nation was a definite reason for pride. Then the people won their right to be in Europe. And then the authorities dissolved this choice in their own ambitions and quarrels. And now, on Freedom Day, I have mixed feelings: of pride for our country and of guilt for unfulfilled dreams," Tymoshenko said.
She said that "a bunch of kleptomaniacs who have currently come to power" was the result of the shortsightedness of Ukrainians.
"They think they have come to power for a long time, forever. And therefore they are behaving as if the Ukrainians do not exist and there is no nation. But this cannot be so! It cannot be that honest, decent and historically freedom-loving Ukrainians silently swallow everything the authorities throw," Tymoshenko said.
She also added: "Sevastopol was given away – and we swallowed this. Taxes were levied on us – and we swallowed this. Pensions were cut – and we swallowed this. Fences were set up and fir-trees are being put up on the Maidan one-and-a-half months before the New Year… No, it’s not about Ukrainians! I know that freedom is inside. It doesn’t disappear even when you’re in prison. It cannot disappear from the whole nation, which in 2004 won its future, defended its dignity, squared its shoulders and made the whole world dream of the spirit of freedom that lived in Ukraine at that time," Tymoshenko said.
