Happy 20th Ukraine!
It may have a very long and interesting history, but ironically, this great country we live in is one of the youngest in the world. Later this month, Ukraine turns 20, and we here at What’s On would like to wish the country and every one in it, a very happy birthday. As part of this issue dedicated to this great celebration, we’re taking a look back at the last 20 years, noting the most important events in the country’s young life as it comes of age.

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The great London spy poisoning scandal rumbled on all last week, drawing the attention of the Western media and sparking a major debate about what is really going on in Putin’s Russia. The irony here is that after years of dubious behaviour peppered with quotes bemoaning the collapse of the Soviet empire, Putin should come in for his biggest media cross-examination for something as laughably innocuous as the alleged murder of an unknown and apparently unimportant KGB defector. That’s the West for you, I suppose. Openly show your support for the theft of a presidential election and they will display mild interest. Pass disgusting laws banning foreigners from working in certain sectors of the Russian economy and the outcry is negligible. Cut heating supplies to a neighbour in midwinter when the temperature is minus ten and you’ll only get a response in so far as European countries further down the line are effected. Send the police out on the hunt for ethnic Georgian schoolchildren and there is no reaction. Push through legislation making it all but impossible for most human rights groups to operate in Russia and it barely warrants a paragraph. Allow skinheads free reign throughout the land and you might get the odd letter to the editor. But suspicion of involvement in the poisoning of a self-appointed opposition figure right on the West’s doorstep? Hold the front page! Now all of a sudden the internet forums are alive with debate about Putin, the FSB, Russia, the return of the Cold War, America’s plans for world hegemony and so forth. It has been something of a deluge, and highly entertaining to watch from a Ukrainian vantage point. The impression so far is that the West seems to be living in utter delusion as to what Russia is all about. Let’s hope that the end result will be a better understanding of the forces at work in the former USSR, and the challenges facing pro-democracy movements in this part of the world. It may not be as glamorous as international espionage, but it effects the lives of rather more people. Cheers, Peter Dickinson, Editor

Last week Britain’s media went into a frenzy over the alleged poisoning plot behind the death of former spook turned arch Putin critic Alexander Litvinenko, a man regarded as by many Russians a traitor who defected to the West and published a book in 2001 accusing Russian special forces of being behind the 1999 apartment bombings that were the immediate cause of the Second Chechen War. The suspected poisoning was being talked up in Britain as the work of the euphemistic-sounding Operational and Technical Directorate, which succeeded Kamera, the Cold War poison factory created by Stalin. ODT is said to supply its lethal produce for Department 12 of Directorate S of the SVR (Russian Foreign Intelligence Service). According to fellow defector Oleg Kalugin, who spent 32 years working within the old KGB, the laboratory invents poisons that can be administered in drink and food and jellies which can be rubbed on a person to induce a heart attack. These masters of the black arts are renowned for constantly revising their formulas and searching for the most mysterious and undetectable poisons. Tests on Litvinenko have so far been unable to identify the type of poison administered, while those close to the case have stated that they are not hopeful of isolating the exact nature of the poison used in the alleged assassination. The Kremlin has a long history of involvement in poison plots, with recent scandals including the high profile poisoning of then-opposition leader Viktor Yuschenko in 2004 and the rumoured poisoned letter assassination of a Saudi Arabian jihadi leader in Chechnya part of a grand tradition which also includes Cold War murders all over Europe and attempts like the 1955 incident when KGB defector Nikolai Khokhlov had radioactive thallium slipped into his coffee in Berlin. He survived, but Bulgarian dissident Georgi Markov was not so lucky when he was famously injected with a ricin pellet shot into his leg from a modified umbrella on Waterloo Bridge in 1978. This latest poisoning has reminded the British of that colourful Cold War episode and brought home the very real dangers posed by Putin’s operatives, who have recently been given the green light to operate internationally again after a post-Soviet lull that saw missions largely restricted to the ‘Near Abroad’. Litvinenko was a British citizen at the time of his death, making this a potentially awkward diplomatic issue, but it is unlikely that the Blair government will probe too deeply into what is widely regarded as a fairly ordinary Russian affair. In Russia, meanwhile, the incident received the customary minimal coverage in the state-controlled media, with the Kremlin dsimissing allegations as ‘sheer nonsense’.

Russian cosmonaut has entered the record books after striking the longest golf drive in history while perched on a spaceship orbiting the earth. Mikhail Tyurbin did not hit the ball perfectly, but that did not stop the shot from flying off into outer space, although scientists from America and Russia could not agree on how far it is expected to travel. NASA boffins expect the ball to travel 2.2 billion yards while orbiting the earth before burning up in the atmosphere after a few days, but Russian scientists think it could go as far as 810 billion yards and travel for up to three years!

Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) used recently declassified documents to issue a claim last week that the Soviet UNI0N was well within its rights to annex the Baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia in the summer of 1940. The move has long been seen as Stalinist agression and has caused considerable tension in the Baltics in recent years over legislation targetting Russian immigrants in the newly independent states. The Russian claims are based on evidence that the Baltic states were poised to serve as a gateway to a German invasion of the USSR. ‘The declassified SVR archives serve as a comprehensive addition to historical knowledge about the situation in the Baltic region during WWII and its role as a crossroads of geopolitical interests and confrontation between the Axis and the allies,’ explained an SVR spokesman. Russia has a contrary relationship with the Soviet past, at times disowning any responsibililty for the regime’s crimes against humanity while trying to hold onto the geopolitical clout and material wealth of the old empire.

Pageantry and colour has always played an important part in military life and the Ukrainian armed forces are no exception, with the defenders of the motherland modeling all manner of awards and crests while marching under numerous banners. Anastasiya Skorina looks at the history of heraldry in Ukraine and talks to the army’s head of insignia, who also provides coats-of-arms for wealthy locals looking to add a little pedigree to their family name.

“Foreign and domestic policy with Yanukovich looks like Kuchma-light. It is similar to Kuchma but not as dangerous. We are doing all we can not to let Kuchma-light turn into Kuchma full strength.” Yulia Timoshenko explains to EU bureaucrats just what is going on in Ukrainian politics during her Orange Revolution anniversary trip to Brussels. The EU responded with moderation, commenting ‘there is understanding, especially in the new member states, that it is hard to cut ties with the old administration too quickly.’

Trukhaniv Island
This island is a popular summer resort with thousand of Kyiv’s citizens descending on it for sun, sand and shashlik. However during the winter Trukhaniv is virtually deserted making for a quiet and peaceful romantic retreat. Covered in greenery, Trukhaniv is an excellent location for an outdoor picnic and the views it offers of Lavra, Podil and the city centre are quite spectacular both during the day and night. Romance truly blossoms in a historic setting (it must have something to do with the continuity of time or something) and Trukhaniv certainly has plenty to offer. During the 11th century the island was the summer residence of the daughter of Khan Tugorkahn. The Kahn’s daughter was married to Prince Svyatopolk of Kyiv who slayed the Kahn during an epic battle and buried him on the riverbank opposite the island. The village of Olzhychy was erected on the island by Princess Olga of Kyiv Rus and up until the Second World War was home to a yacht club and restaurant.
How to get there: Take the Pedestrian Bridge which begins at Khreschatyk-Naberezhne.

Thousands of Kyivites placed candles on the capital’s central squares over the course 25 and 26 November in act of remembrance to those who died during the Holodomor. Millions starved to death during 1932-33 as a direct result of Stalin’s forced collectivisation programme, an atrocity which President Yuschenko is campaigning to be officially recognised as genocide both at home and abroad. Those interested in learning more about this often overlooked holocaust should visit Ukraine House, which is holding a major exhibition dedicated to the Holodomor until the end of December, featuring recently released Soviet files documenting the famine and video archive footage of survivor accounts.

PHOTO: Maria Bykova

As if it wasn’t confusing enough having two languages to deal with, in Kyiv it is often the case that you need to know the old and new names of any given street if you wish to navigate your way around the Ukrainian capital! This somewhat bizarre trend reflects the confused attitudes to both national identity and to the Soviet past that continues to divide contemporary Ukrainians.

EVENTS ACROSS TOWN Thousands of candles glittered in the night on Mykhaylivska Square last weekend as Ukraine remembered those who died during the Holodomor, the Soviet manmade famine responsible for the death of millions of Ukrainians throughout 1932-1933. A series of events took place throughout the capital 25 and 26 November; President Yuschenko together with his family and religious figures, cultural figures and senior politicians including Verkhovna Rada Speaker Oleksandr Moroz, Kyiv Mayor Leonid Chernovetskyi, Chief of Staff Viktor Baloha, and Foreign Minister Borys Tarasyuk attended a ceremony which saw the laying of a cornerstone for the future Holodomor Memorial in Sichnevoho Povstannya Street. The memorial will consist of black plates inscribed with those villages and regions which were affected by the Holodomor, which devastated almost all of rural Ukraine. On Saturday afternoon Kyivites joined the President and officials on a Walk of Sorrow from Sofiyivska Square to Mykhaylivska Square. Flowers were laid at the Holodomor Memorial outside the monastic complex by President Viktor Yushchenko and Kyiv Mayor Leonid Chernovetskyi amongst others, while candles were lit and placed all around the square in an act of remembrance. Addressing the large crowd, including Holodomor survivors and the nation as a whole, Yuschenko once more expressed his determination to have the Holodomor recognized as genocide by the international community and the Rada in particular; “I do not ask but demand that the Verkhovna Rada recognises the Holodomor as genocide. This is their duty and the inevitable requirement of history,” said the President. Yuschenko’s comments follow the Rada’s recent decision to delay the debate on recognising the Holodomor as genocide, a decision which sparked great anger among many. At 16.00 a minute’s silence was observed throughout the country, with Ukrainians stopping to pay their respects to the victims of one of the worst manmade atrocities in history. Prime Minister Yanukovich meanwhile missed the official memorials as he was away in Belarus, according to some reports on a hunting trip.

A Man of Many Words
Young, good-looking and successful. But enough about me – let’s talk about Andriy Danilevych. At the tender age of 30, this baby-faced assassin is an editor at TRK Ukraina. He hosts political debates and interviews VIPs, up to and including presidents. He’s just finished for the summer, and What’s On caught up with him before he jetted off to New York.