Editor’s Note: This feature separates Ukraine’s friends from its enemies The Order of Yaroslav the Wise has been given since 1995 for distinguished service to the nation. It is named after the Kyivan Rus leader from 1019-1054, when the medieval empire reached its zenith. The Order of Lenin was the highest decoration bestowed by the Soviet Union, whose demise Russian President Vladimir Putin mourns. It is named after Vladimir Lenin, whose corpse still rots on the Kremlin’s Red Square, 100 years after the October Revolution he led.
Ukraine’s Friend Of The Week: Rebecca Harms
Rebecca Harms, a German member of the European Parliament, who has since 2010 been president of the GreensEuropean Free Alliance group in the parliament, and who is passionate about protecting the environment, is still by no means a one-issue politician.
While coming from Germany’s Greens party, and a firm believer in the need to move away from nuclear power towards sustainable and clean energy sources, the group she leads in parliament also includes regionalist and nationalist parties. The group lobbies for transparency, accountability, and fair representation in European national and EU government institutions.
So it’s not surprising that Harms has long been a foe of the authoritarian Russian leader Vladimir Putin, and a friend of Ukraine – the lingering problems of the Chornobyl nuclear disaster and the Ukrainian people’s struggle for greater independence from the Kremlin make it a territory of double interest to her.
This hasn’t gone unnoticed by the Kremlin: in September 2014, when Harms traveled to Moscow to attend the sham trial of Ukrainian hostage Nadiya Savchenko, she was denied entry to Russia and declared persona non grata. She is now on a blacklist of EU politicians who cannot enter Russia.
Harms has consistently supported Ukraine’s position on a range of issues, from the imposition of sanctions against Moscow for invading the Ukrainian territory of Crimea and fomenting a war in the Donbas, to decrying Russia’s repression of the Crimean Tatars.
As such, she has passed a test of political character that many other figures on the left, right, and green parts of the political spectrum have failed. One glaring example of failure is the leader of the U.S. Green Party, Dr. Jill Stein, who attended a dinner with Putin to celebrate the anniversary of the launch of his propaganda television channel RT, and videoed a gushing soliloquy of support for Russia on Red Square.
The contrast with Harms could not be clearer. So the German politician earns this week’s Order of Yaroslav the Wise for her steadfast support of Ukraine. If only more on the progressive left in the West would follow her example.
Ukraine’s Foe Of The Week: Gerhard Schroeder
One might be surprised, given the poor state of relations between the West and the Kremlin, caused by Russia’s illegal annexation of the Ukrainian territory of Crimea and subsequent fomenting of a war in Ukraine’s Donbas region, to learn that a former German chancellor had been nominated to the board of Rosneft, a Russian state oil company that is under sanctions.
Surprised — until one learned that the name of that former German chancellor was Gerhard Schroeder
Schroeder, even before leaving office in November 2005, has tended to take the side of the Kremlin, or expressed sympathy for its position, on practically every issue. He clashed with the present German chancellor, Angel Merkel (Ukraine’s Friend of the week, Issue 21, May 26) after describing Russian dictator Vladimir Putin as a “flawless democrat,” after Putin in November 2004 congratulated former Ukrainian Viktor Yanukovych on winning an election that was later found to have been rigged.
He counts Putin as a personal friend, and celebrated his 70th birthday with Putin in a palace in St. Petersburg in April 2014 — which earned him criticism in Germany and elsewhere in the West.
Even Russia’s unprovoked aggression against Ukraine — the theft of its territory and engendering of a vicious war in Ukraine’s east in 2014 — has not been enough to earn it a rebuke from the former chancellor.
As chancellor, Schroeder was also a strong advocate of the Nord Stream project — which pipes Russian gas to Germany via a pipeline under the Baltic Sea, bypassing transit countries like Ukraine and increasing Russia’s share of the European energy market.
Given that the latest round of U.S. sanctions, imposed in the wake of Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, could spell potential problems for the Nord Stream project, it comes as no surprise that Schroeder has criticized the sanctions against Russia too.
On top of that, he has absurdly described Putin’s fears about the enlargement of NATO as being justifiable.
Schroeder’s latest move of cozying up to Rosneft fits a pattern, and for this he earns the title of Ukraine’s Foe of the Week and the accompanying Order of Lenin.
