The Untold Story: Ukraine and Russia

The news keeps flashing with different headlines,

everyday something sparks between these two
countries. Once a big family under the name of the
Soviet Union, things have fallen out for Russia and
Ukraine. But is Ukraine as innocent as they seem, or is
Vladimir the one firing the cannons (quite literally!!).
Lets go back in time. Ukraine and Russia were a part of
the Russian Empire in 1694, both being born from
Kievan Rus', which in now presently called Kiev, the
current capital of Ukraine. This empire disintegrated in
1921 because of the February Revolution (The first
revolution in Russia, which lasted a week and involved
mass demonstrations and armed clashes with the
police in the capital and its vicinity). This gave rise to
the brief existence of Soviet Russia, and then in 1922,
the unification of Soviet Russia, Ukraine and many more
countries gave birth to the Union of Soviet Socialist
Republics, USSR, or simply the Soviet Union. This world
power played a huge role in the world wars, powerful
enough to defeat Hitlers armies in the Second World
War. However the collapse of the USSR led to a huge
impact, affecting its constituent countries and the
world, from changing foreign policies to USA becoming
the most powerful country in the world. The collapse
was due to various reasons, but two main reasons
would be the unstable economy which was not
sustainable, and constituting countries wanting to
become independent.
After the split, relations between Ukraine and Russia
were neutral. The strained relations now was more of a
domino effect of various problems and disputes
between these two countries between the years 1990

and 2014. Initial problems in the 1990s included

disputes over cities like Crimea and Sevastopol, the
Black Sea Fleet, energy supply problems due to gas
pipelines passing through Ukraine, and so on. In the
2000s these countries saw issues like the dispute over
Tuzla islands, the Orange Revolution in the year 200405 (which was a series of protests in Ukraine over the
supposed unfair elections of the year 2004), and so on.
The Ukrainian peoples mixed feelings towards their
motherlands linking with Russia also started making
rounds. While south and east Ukraine were looking
forward to closer relationships with Russia, the northern
and western parts were loathing the same. While all
this was going on, Russia on the other hand felt that
Ukraine was becoming anti-Russia because of the
latters interest in joining the European Union and NATO
(North Atlantic Treaty Organization). The entry of
Georgia in the picture was also another igniting factor
in the Russia-Ukraine disputes, with the former trying to
annex Georgia, where Ukraine was defending her.
Georgia and Ukraine eventually joined the NATO, which
Russia didnt take so well. Things didnt get serious
until February 2014, which was when Ukrainian
elections took place. Viktor Yanukovych, the proRussian president was ousted, following a series of
protests in Kiev by anti-Russian citizens. This led to the
uprising of pro-Russian demonstrations, more
prominently in the eastern and southern part of
Ukraine.
To sum it up, Ukraines fault is her internal chaos,
between East and West Ukraine (pro and anti-Russian
groups). Russia is basically taking advantage of this.
Perhaps Vladimir Putin is a nostalgic Russian, who

wants to see his country back to her former pride as

USSR. The story unfortunately is still anyones guess.
The oil situation is another story altogether. Without
going into much detail, we can safely assume that
these political instabilities did affect the oil business in
these two countries, Russia specifically. Owning the
largest natural gas reserves, and the eighth largest oil
reserves in the world, Russia basically exports to a lot
of nations, including her neighbour Ukraine. Russia,
however, is no more transporting gas to Ukraine, as of
June 2014. What brought matters to this state, is
another extended history altogether, which is tagged as
the Russian-Ukrainian gas disputes( refers to a
number of disputes between Ukraines Naftohaz
Ukrayiny and Russias Gazprom over natural gas
supplies, prices and debts).
The various gas-disputes between these two countries,
and the strained relations pose a threat to world peace,
and the sooner these issues are resolved, the better it
is to everyone, especially the innocent civilians who are

caught up in this racket.

Pro-Russian Protest Sites in Ukraine

References:
http://csis.org/ukraine/index.htm
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-26248275
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russia%E2%80%93Ukraine_relations
http://abcnews.go.com/International/refresher-happening-ukrainerussia/story?id=24605042
http://www.nytimes.com