Ukraine Can’t Shake Off Its Old Regime
Five years after the Revolution of Dignity, there’s still no accountability for the killings of demonstrators that led to Viktor Yanukovych’s ouster.
A grim anniversary.
Photographer: Matthew Hatcher/SOPA Images/LightRocket/Getty Images
On Feb. 21, 2014, Ukraine’s then-president, Viktor Yanukovych, fled his residence near Kiev on a helicopter. A new Ukrainian state emerged after his escape to Russia, but, five years later, the many remaining questions about the dramatic events that led to his downfall raise doubts about whether the country has fundamentally changed.
Yanukovych took flight even though he had reached a deal with pro-European politicians who took part in the Euromaidan protests of the previous four months. The agreement, witnessed by top German, Polish and French officials, allowed Yanukovych to stay on as president, with curtailed powers, until an early election to be held by the end of 2014. But the Ukrainian opposition politicians who signed the compromise hadn’t been authorized to conclude it by the hundreds of thousands or rank-and-file protesters who wanted Yanukovych out immediately: They held him responsible for the shooting deaths of 75 people during demonstrations between Feb. 18 and Feb. 20. The 106 people who died throughout the 2014 revolution came to be known as the “Heavenly Hundred.” For anti-Yanukovych forces, their deaths are considered the founding act of the power transfer that Ukrainians call the Revolution of Dignity and that the Kremlin calls a violent coup d’etat.