Ukrainian president Poroshenko’s electoral warmongering

This January 2018 video says about itself:

Why Ukrainian workers are flocking to Poland

At least one million Ukrainians are currently working in Poland, according to estimates. The economy in Ukraine, still hampered by war and corruption, is sluggish, while across the border, there’s been uninterrupted growth and even a labour shortage – partly because so many Poles have moved further west. Ukrainian businesses, meanwhile, are finding it increasingly hard to hold on to their workers. Our correspondent Gulliver Cragg reports from Ukraine and Poland.

So, poverty for most people in Ukraine, the second poorest country in Europe. Meanwhile, their president Petro Poroshenko is one of the richest people in the world, because of corruption, Panama Papers tax dodging, and his corporations, including warship shipyards and other weapons production.

Like United States President Donald Trump made midterm election propaganda by raising military tensions at the US-Mexican border, his Ukrainian colleague, both as a billionaire profiting from wars and as president, Petro Poroshenko makes election propaganda by raising military tensions at the Ukrainian-Russian border.

In that, Poroshenko has the support of the United States establishment; both of the Trump administration and of corporate Democrats.

However, according to Dutch daily Trouw, 30 November 2018 (translated), not all of Trump’s NATO allies in Europe are enthusiastic about that:

Ukrainians especially want peace, but President Poroshenko moves towards war

By Janne Chaudron

The contours of the state of emergency in Ukraine become visible. Russian men between the ages of sixteen and sixty years are no longer allowed to enter the country. According to the Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, they constitute a danger, because there is a risk that they join private armies in the Donbass, the region where pro-Russian rebels have been fighting against the Ukrainian army for five years.

The measure has quite some consequences, because many Ukrainians have Russian family members. This may have unpleasant consequences for the coming holidays.

State of emergency

Petro Poroshenko plays a risky game. He uses the recent confrontation with Russia to proclaim measures that have not yet been shown since the outbreak of the war in the east and the annexation of Crimea. The promulgation of the state of siege at the beginning of this week also caused resistance in his own country.

Poroshenko proposed to declare a state of emergency throughout the country for 60 days in response to Russian shelling of Ukrainian patrol ships in the Sea of ​​Azov last week. The opposition did not feel like it, because it would obstruct the election campaigns – this spring there are elections. There was a compromise: state of emergency for thirty days …

“Poroshenko takes advantage of the situation”, says Balazs Jarabik, Ukraine specialist at the Carnegie Center. “In recent months there were 7,000 incidents in the Donbass, these were dismissed as “normal warfare”. It is clear that we are in election mode.” The Ukrainian president hopes with a patriotic campaign with the slogan “Army, religion and language’, to win the elections after all. He is trailing badly in the polls.

The question is whether this strongman strategy will work. As Poroshenko entered office four years ago, his main election promise was peace in all of Ukraine. That did not work. The Minsk agreement from 2015 meant that there was less intense fighting in Eastern Ukraine, but peace is still far away. “With the promulgation of martial law Poroshenko now does the opposite of what he promised, he provoked a war“, says Jarabik.

Corruption

All opinion polls show what Ukrainians really want: peace and economic prosperity. Poroshenko does not succeed in that either,

Yes, he does succeed. But only for himself and a small clique of his friends.

the economy is faltering. The International Monetary Fund came to the aid of the country, but also imposed conditions: it was necessary to cut costs and combat corruption. Analysts are downright negative about the fight against corruption. In many regions, there are still mafia-linked corrupt governors in power.

The European Union has left Ukraine alone for years now. The Russian annexation of the Crimea in 2014 was a reason for European government leaders to introduce sanctions against Russia, but after that time it remained silent. After the recent confrontation with Russia, Poroshenko demanded that Western leaders take new steps and asked NATO for support in the Sea of ​​Azov. German Chancellor Angela Merkel does not feel at all like that.

Also, Europe does not seem to meet Poroshenko’s desire to take economic punitive measures. Though the President of the European Council, Donald Tusk, on Friday promised that there will be talk about extending the sanctions against Russia in time, an extension in harshness is not on the agenda. Let alone that there would be consent to Poroshenko’s request to scrap the gas pipeline Nord Stream 2 which will connect Russia must via the Baltic Sea to Germany.

A different view: Merkel backs Ukrainian provocations against Russia.

Ukraine: Poroshenko declares martial law to crack down on political and social opposition: here.

Former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko is facing a range of criminal corruption charges opened by the country’s State Bureau of Investigation (SBI) last month: here.

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