In Kyiv, President Zelensky expressed unity with foreign partners, at the same time he criticized the mayor. This reveals nervousness in view of the worsening crisis.
Kiev families commemorate the victims of the famine ninety years ago.
With candles in windows and ears of corn on Holodomor memorials across the country, Ukrainians commemorated the famine ninety years ago on Saturday. The Soviet dictator Josef Stalin artificially brought about the catastrophe at the time and thus caused the deaths of several million people, primarily in Ukraine.
In one of the most difficult weeks since the beginning of the Russian war of aggression, the connection between the past and the present was particularly tangible: “Once they wanted to destroy us with hunger, now with darkness and cold,” wrote Volodymyr Zelensky. Even if the translation of historical events into the national categories of the present is problematic, the President should have captured the mood of the population well.
Wheat from Ukraine
Zelenski also used the anniversary to emphasize his country’s role as a leading food exporter, especially in the Global South. He launched flanked by foreign politicians the «Grain from Ukraine» program, which provides for increased deliveries to the poorest African countries with financial support from the West. In doing so, Kyiv wants to counter the rather successful Russian propaganda, which blames the resistance to Moscow’s invasion for high prices and the threat of famine.
The symbolic power of the fight against hunger is also suitable for marking unity: President Katalin Novak, for example, was the first political leader from Hungary to visit the Ukrainian capital since the beginning of the war. Your country and above all Viktor Orban have condemned Russia’s aggression and supported sanctions, but at the same time have always insisted on military neutrality. They used a rhetoric that at times came close to that of Moscow.
Hungarian President Katalin Novak together with Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki (centre) during a meeting with President Selenski.
Novak underscored support for neighboring Ukraine, noting that Hungary launched the Holodomor two decades ago recognized as genocide. Kyiv would like other countries to take such a step. The Ukraine war has given impetus to initiatives in various countries. For example, the German Bundestag is debating a corresponding resolution on Wednesday which is expected to be accepted.
Political nervousness
Continued foreign support – political as well as military – is particularly important for Kyiv in the current moment of insecurity. The Russian attacks on the electricity, water and heat supply brought the infrastructure to the brink of collapse on Wednesday. The authorities officially spoke of a blackout, the consequences of which are difficult to control. These are particularly sensitive for the nuclear power plants, which had to be completely taken off the grid for the first time in almost forty years.
The fact that large parts of Kiev only had electricity again after days leads to nervousness. So Selenski broke the internal political truce on Friday evening and scolded the capital for its crisis management. Mayor Vitaly Klitschko, a political opponent of the president before the war, warned of this about the “Bild” newspaper that sympathizes with him before a split: “The key to Ukraine’s success after Russia’s attack on our country is cohesion.”
Selenski’s criticism of the inadequately functioning heat rooms, which are intended to offer refuge to city dwellers cut off from supplies, seems justified. A lack of shelters was also a major issue at the beginning of the war, and many of the 400 officially operating “Points of Invincibility” only seem to exist on paper. Many in the capital doubt whether they would pass an endurance test.