Ukraine is a post-Soviet, semi-presidential republic that has struggled with its democratic transition. Second to Russia, it is the largest country in Europe.
While several peoples have laid claim to Ukraine over its centuries-long history, it wasn’t until 1772 that part of Ukraine came under Russian control for the first time. Modern-day Ukraine was split in half, with the Russian Empire gaining control of Eastern Ukraine, and the Austro-Hungarian Empire taking control of Western Ukraine.[1]
Eastern Ukraine remained a part of the Russian Empire until the end of World War I in 1918, when the Russian and Austro-Hungarian Empires collapsed. Ukrainians took advantage of this changing landscape to unify both halves of Ukraine and establish an independent state – the Ukrainian People’s Republic in November of 1917.[2] The Russian Empire was brought down by the Russian Revolution in 1917, led by the Bolshevik Party under Vladimir Lenin. The Bolsheviks, later called the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, established the Soviet Union as a Communist country. The Soviet Union expanded to encompass several other territories, including, in 1921, Ukraine.[3] This ended Ukraine’s short-lived independence after the fall of the Russian Empire.[4]
In 1929, Joseph Stalin succeeded Lenin as leader of the Communist Party. Ukraine suffered greatly under Stalin. Stalin established the Gulag, labor camps that spanned the expanse of the Soviet Union.[5] Stalin also put in place the policies of collectivization and procurement quotas. Collectivization effectively abolished private property in land, with peasants made to work on “collected” farms controlled by the Communist Party.[6] Procurement quotas determined the amount of grain, or other food, that party officials needed to collect from each farmer. Given its fertile soil, Stalin sought to make Ukraine the breadbasket of the Soviet Union.[7]
1932 and 1933 saw a poor harvest in Ukraine. Procurement quotas were set at levels that exceeded the capacity of most farms. The party nonetheless collected what they could, sometimes taking everything that a village had to fulfil the quotas. This led to a devastating famine across the Soviet Union. The famine was particularly terrible in Ukraine. In Ukrainian, this famine is known as “Holodomor,” which fuses the Ukrainian words for starvation and inflicting death.[8] Approximately 3.9 million Ukrainians died because of the famine.[9]
Two decades into Soviet rule over Ukraine, characterized by the Gulag and famine, Hitler invaded the Soviet Union. While some Ukrainians took up arms against the invading Nazi Army in the Soviet Armed Forces, the conditions of Soviet rule prompted “some Ukrainian independence fighters [to align] themselves with the Nazis, whom they viewed as saviors from Soviet oppression” and allies in their fight for Ukrainian independence. This connection between Ukrainian independence-fighters and the Nazis is still used by Putin today to equate support for Ukrainian independence to Nazism.[10]
Ukraine became independent on December 8th, 1991, after the dissolution of the Soviet Union.[11] This democratic transition was neither immediate nor smooth. In 2004, Ukrainians took to the streets in mass peaceful protests, known as the “Orange Revolution.” This was in response to the perceived illegitimacy of the 2004 presidential elections. The Orange Revolution lasted three weeks and forced a new, internationally monitored vote, which Yushchenko won. He proved to be a disappointment, and, in February 2010, Yanukovych was elected president in a relatively free and fair presidential election.[12]
In November 2013, Yanukovych backed out of a trade deal with the European Union. This was perceived as a pivot towards Russia and caused great backlash among younger Ukrainian adults. Scores of protesters occupied Kyiv’s central square, the Maidan, chanting “Ukraine is Europe.” The protest grew to be a few hundred-thousand people strong despite increasing violence, enforced disappearances, freezing temperatures, and snipers.[13] Under international pressure, the Yanukovych administration agreed to early elections, and in June 2014, Petro Poroshenko would be elected president.
In February 2014, after Yanukovych had left the country and ahead of the pending election, Russia annexed Crimea and began arming and abetting separatists in Ukraine’s Donbas region. Two weeks later, under Russian occupation, the Russian government held a referendum purportedly establishing Crimeans’ desire to be integrated into the Russian Federation.[14] The UN General Assembly passed a resolution calling on states to not recognize the change in Crimea’s status.[15] Later that year, Russian-backed separatists in Eastern Ukraine proclaimed the Donetsk People’s Republic and Luhansk People’s Republic as independent states, though they have not been recognized as such by the international community. Putin, however, expressed his support for “pro-Russian rebels who were protecting ethnic Russians and Russian speakers from ‘a rampage of Nazi, nationalist, and anti-Semitic forces’.”[16]
On 24 February 2022, Vladimir Putin announced “a ‘special military operation’ in Ukraine to seek its ‘demilitarization and de-Nazification’.”[17] Russian troops crossed into Ukraine and launched attacks by land, air, and sea.[18] By September of 2022, Russian forces had occupied parts of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions in addition to parts of Donetsk and Luhansk and Russian authorities held more so called referenda on these regions’ incorporation into the Russian Federation. On 30 September 2022, President Putin and the de facto authorities of the four regions signed treaties regarding their accession to the Russian Federation. These were denounced by the UN senior political and peacebuilding official.[19] The war spread to many Ukrainian cities and localities, with attacks on critical infrastructure having country-wide impacts.[20] By February 2024, over 10,000 civilians had been killed in the war, with millions displaced.[21]
Many authorities, including Ukrainian authorities, have opened investigations into war crimes committed in Ukraine. As they pursue prosecutions in their own courts, Ukraine has also campaigned for the creation of a special tribunal.[22] The EU backs Ukraine’s proposal. The Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court has opened an investigation,[23] and the UN Human Rights Council has also established an independent international commission of inquiry.[24]
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[1] Iryna Vushko, Historians at War: History, Politics and Memory in Ukraine, Contemporary European History, Vol. 27, 14 December 2017, p. 112.
[2] Timothy Snyder, “Kyiv’s ancient normality (redux),” Ukrainian Research Institute Harvard University (Feb 25, 2022), https://huri.harvard.edu/news/timothy-snyder-kyivs-ancient-normality-redux.
[3] Timothy Snyder, The Making of Modern Ukraine, Yale University, video lectures.
[4] Timothy Snyder, Kyiv’s ancient normality (redux), Ukrainian Research Institute Harvard University, 25 February 2022, available at https://huri.harvard.edu/news/timothy-snyder-kyivs-ancient-normality-redux.
[5] Anne Applebaum, Gulag: An Introduction, Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, available at https://web.archive.org/web/20170905220152/http://victimsofcommunism.org/gulag-an-introduction/.
[6] Robert Conquest, The Harvest of Sorrow: Soviet Collectivization and the Terror-Famine, 1986, at 4.
[7] David Patrikarakos, Why Stalin Starved Ukraine, The New Republic, November 2017, available at https://newrepublic.com/article/145953/stalin-starved-ukraine.
[8] Katya Cengel, “The 20th-Century History Behind Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine,” Smithsonian Magazine (March 4, 2022), https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-20th-century-history-behind-russias-invasion-of-ukraine-180979672/.
[9] Id.
[10] Id.
[11] Timothy Snyder, Kyiv’s ancient normality (redux), Ukrainian Research Institute Harvard University, 25 February 2022, available athttps://huri.harvard.edu/news/timothy-snyder-kyivs-ancient-normality-redux.
[12] Timothy Snyder: The Making of Modern Ukraine, Yale University, video lectures.
[13] Id.
[14] Jonathan Masters, Ukraine: Conflict at the Crossroads of Europe and Russia, Council on Foreign Relations, 5 February 2020.
[15] General Assembly Adopts Resolution Calling upon States Not To Recognize Changes in Status of Crimea Region, UN Department of Public Information, 27 March 2014, available at https://press.un.org/en/2014/ga11493.doc.htm.
[16] Ilya Nuzov, The Dynamics of Collective Memory in the Ukraine Crisis: A Transitional Justice Perspective, International Journal of Transitional Justice, 22 December 2016.
[17] Report of the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine, UN HRC, Doc. UN A/HRC/52/62, 15 March 2023.
[18] Id.
[19] So-Called Referenda during Armed Conflict in Ukraine ‘Illegal’, Not Expression of Popular Will, United Nations Political Affairs Chief Tells Security Council, UN Department of Public Information, 2022, available at https://press.un.org/en/2022/sc15039.doc.htm.
[20] Id.
[21] Ukraine: Turk deplores horrific human cost as Russia’s full-scale invasion enters third year, UN OHCHR, 22 February 2024, available athttps://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2024/02/ukraine-turk-deplores-horrific-human-cost-russias-full-scale-invasion-enters.
[22] Liz Sly, 66,000 war crimes have been reported in Ukraine. It vows to prosecute them all, The Washington Post, February 2023, available athttps://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/01/29/war-crimes-ukraine-prosecution/.
[23] Situation in Ukraine, ICC-01/22, available at https://www.icc-cpi.int/situations/ukraine
[24] Ann Neville, Russia’s War on Ukraine: Investigating and Prosecuting International Crimes, European Parliamentary Research Service, June 2022, available athttps://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2022/733525/EPRS_BRI(2022)733525_EN.pdf.