DISINFO: The coup has driven Ukraine to an inevitable failure of the state
SUMMARY
… The coup that occurred in Ukraine in 2014 [occured] by American and European hands...
Western Ukraine, which is pro-European, is an agricultural country, whose residents dream of travelling without visas to the Polish farms and the European Union countries to take care of pigs there. As for Eastern and Southern Ukraine, the people.. feed the entire country.
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The West does not need Ukrainian industry, on the contrary, the West seeks to liquidate this industry and empty the Ukrainian market to make space for Western goods.
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And every time the pro-Western forces came to power in Kyiv, .. the Ukrainian economy collapsed as a result.
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However, after the 2014 coup organised by the USA and the European Union, everything changed...and the reunification of Crimea with Russia, [Ukraine] cut economic ties with Russia, and entire industries began to collapse, but this time forever.
As a result, Ukraine’s failure becomes inevitable, and the Ukrainian state and its economy lost its chances of survival.
RESPONSE
A longstanding pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about Ukraine, its statehood and its Euromaidan protests, consistent with the recurring pro-Kremlin narrative on doomed Ukraine failing to survive without Russia and on Ukrainian economic relations with the European Union.
Ukraine is a sovereign country. It is not falling apart. It has a functioning government, embassies in other countries, judicial, law enforcement, and other authorities. It is a democratic country where people can choose the president, the parliament, and local administration. For instance, in 2019, it held presidential and parliamentary elections, and in 2020 - local elections.
Euromaidan was neither a coup nor a colour revolution, but a nation-wide civil protest against former President Yanukovych’s sudden departure from the promised Association Agreement with the European Union and subsequent violation of constitutional rights, such as freedom of expression, the right to protest, and others. See the full debunk of this disinformation claim here.
The war in eastern Ukraine was not caused by the Euromaidan. Protests in favour of EU association and reforms were held in all major cities of Donbas. The war is not a civil conflict but a well-documented act of aggression by Russian armed forces, ongoing since February 2014.
On another point pro-Kremlin outlets often repeat the claim that the West seeks to liquidate Ukrainian industry, while in fact American and European businessman are still investing in the country, with direct European investment in 2019 reaching $1.4 billion, accounting for almost 80% of investments in Ukraine.
As for the annexation, or the “re-unification”, no international body recognises the so-called referendum in Crimea. The UN General Assembly adopted a resolution entitled “Territorial integrity of Ukraine”, stating that the referendum in Crimea was not valid and could not serve as a basis for any change in the status of the peninsula. On 17 December 2018, the UN General Assembly confirmed its non-recognition of the illegal annexation of Crimea, and the same was echoed by the EU, as the referendum was conducted hastily and at gunpoint and impartial observers were barred from entering the peninsula.
See previous disinformation narratives in our database alleging that the EU has accepted Crimea's incorporation into Russia and that the Crimean people chose to be with Russia through the democratic procedure, that Crimea never belonged to Ukraine, that Crimea’s reunification with Russia was legal and that Crimea is a Russian sovereign region; or that since the coup Ukraine became a failed American colony; or that the establishment of external control by the west was the real goal of the 2014 revolution in Ukraine.