 We're speaking with Irina Starov-Hert from Ukraine, from the city of Lviv. She's here at the Penn International Writers' Conference in Bled, Slovenia. She's very graciously given us a few minutes to speak, because there's not a lot of people coming out of Ukraine right now to another country in the West to talk about the situation there. So you told me earlier that you could not take a flight from Kiev, so you had to take a bus, is that right? Yes, because several aviation now is just closed, because our sky is not safe. Right. So you were able to get out of the board. Was there any trouble getting out of the country over the board? No, not at all. You went through Poland and then Bulgaria? Went through Poland. No, it was like through Czechia, Austria, and I'm here in Slovenia. 36 hours. Did you sleep on the bus? I did the second night. The first night I couldn't sleep on the bus, but the second night I was quite exhausted. So I guess I slept. Oh, that's amazing that you got here. What is the situation above now? There have been, what's happening on the ground is very difficult for me to assess, not being in Ukraine, and both sides telling different stories all the time. So it's very unclear to me being objective to say, for example, when the ship was sunk, the Russian ship, the first Ukraine said they sunk it. I said, OK, and then the Russian said they sunk it. So now I knew the ship was sunk. But Ukraine says they hit it with missiles, and Russia says it was an accident. So I'm asking you, since you lived there and you can tell me or I witness, there have been a few attacks by the Russians of outside the city at military depots, or has it been more than that? Yeah, of course, I didn't witness the Moscow ship thinking. But I live in Lviv. It's a western part of Ukraine and unlike in other parts, which were close to the Belarusian border or across the Russian border, we were not approached by Russian soldiers on the ground. We are far away from the front lines now. But yes, I think every second of the third day we have at least one air raid attack alarm. And as far as our anti-missile defense report, there were 62 air raids on the city of Lviv since the start of the war, and seven missiles were successfully hitting the Ames. But these Ames were not particularly military. In Lviv, they hit it three sub-electropower stations. They hit it railway and they hit it with a petroleum deposit and an STO, the place where you repair your cars. How do you call it? Service, auto car. Right, yeah. Autopart service, yeah. Were any civilians killed inside? We have like seven casualties and I believe more than 20 people wounded or injured. I see. Well, it's little in comparison with what's happening in different parts of Ukraine. It's just a tiny thing. Right. Do you think that it will become a focus of the war in your city? And there's been talk that Poland might be interested in regaining their territory. What do you think about that? You know, we have a very entangled history with Poland through many centuries. But I must say that when Ukraine announced its independence after the referendum of 1991, Poland was one of the two first countries to recognize Ukraine in its current borders. And it never changed through the 30 years. And I believe now Poles are really sisters and brothers because not like him opened their homes, opened their hearts, opened their pockets for Ukrainian refugees. So that's not a statuary. So what, from your poet, do you write about politics or what do you write about? Well, I did not plan to write about politics when I was 16 or 18, just starting my writing. But I think that the longer I live, the more political I get. And it's hard to be just lyrical in the situation like this. It's an existential situation. But even such a dangerous situation or probably particularly such situation, demands some creativity and demands some articulation. So I think, yes, it's a toll on our authors to have something to speak, to have something to say on the subject. But at the same time, there is a responsibility to say something. Now under the conditions that you're living, are you able to write new poems and what subjects would you be writing about? For me, this war did not start in February 24th this year because annexation of Crimea has started quite early. And friends of mine, particularly Crimean Tatars, were fleeing Crimea and they settled within Ukraine. And some of my friends from Donetsk and Luhansk fleeing into Ukraine. Some other were fleeing into Russia. And again, the refugees, like we had more than a million of internal refugees since 2014 already. So for many people now, it's like a second refuge. And all that time, I was a war, the war is at my doorsteps. And probably people tended to live in Ukraine, keeping the war somehow at the back of their minds. But it never was at the back of my mind. So yes, I was writing all that time through and I was trying to understand something to myself. As a scholar, as a cultural studies researcher, I was interested about the historical and cultural memory of catastrophic events of the 20th century in my part of the world. So I have been reading intensively about the trauma of war, about the Holocaust, about civilian suffering, about refuge, about deportations, about all kinds of things which happen to people which are in the situation of extreme violence. And now that extreme violence came for me. In February 2014, when you go to the capital, during the uprisings, they got kicked out, the mind on events that kicked out. When it was 2014, I was just coming from the Netherlands where I was spending a previous year and unfortunately I have broken my leg. So I was in a special treatment. So it was not possible for me. Individually to come there or to be helpful there. But many of my friends, students and relatives, yes, they were there. And do you believe that the departure of Yanukovych was a constitutional change of government? Well, as probably you remember, on February 22, 2014, Yanukovych as a president fled from Ukraine. After that, the elections were called. There was an intermediary government which went on only through May 20 something of that year. And on that day, there were all national elections. And in the first round of that election, Poroshenko was elected a new president. And then there were new elections of the parliament and Yanukovych's party actually was dissolved. But many of his party colleagues created a new opposition party and they entered into parliament. Not with the majority. Not as a majority. But you have to remember that part of their electorate base was already distant from Ukraine. Like Crimea was always supporting them and on bus as well. Yeah, they lost. The party regions lost. Yes. Many votes it dissolved. Yes. But the parliament functioned without these seats. So these seats were just not distributed. But I mean the day he left, there was violence in Maidan. I'm sure that most of the people were peaceful protest without questions. A hundred people died, as we know. They were snipers sitting on the top of the room. There was a lot of question about who they were shooting and maybe both people. But Yanukovych had agreed to, I think with the Germans in the French, a new elections. And he was announcing that. And then he fled violence in the entering of government buildings. And the next day there was a vote to impeach you. But he had already left it. Yeah. So Yanukovych would say, and I think a lot of Russian-speaking Ukrainians that that was a under-constitutional change of government. Because he was fairly elected. The OSCE said so in 2010. Yes, I agree. So was that a revolution or a coup, is what I'm asking. No, I think and I believe majority of Ukrainians think that was a revolution. He fled, so actually he left the position open. And somebody has to fill in. And there were normal elections with no violence after the three months of his absence. And there was a new president elected, a new parliament elected. You know anything about American involvement in those events of February 2014? In shooting? No, not in shooting. I'm referring to the now very famous conversation between Victoria Nuland, the Secretary of State, and Jeffrey Piot, who is the American ambassador, in which they're discussing who is going to be in the new government. Way before there was a new government. Yanukovych was still the president. And they talked about Yatsenuk being the prime minister. Not Klitschko. Nuland didn't want Klitschko. And they talked about midwifing this change and that Joe Biden would have, the vice president, have a big role there. And he subsequently did have a big role in Ukraine as the representative of Obama in Ukraine. So there's a lot of questions raised that the US had a hand in some way in changing the government, not through a new election that Yanukovych agreed to, but through what turned out to be violent means. What do you think? I think we're in play. The Klitschko piece is obviously the complicated electron here, especially the announcement of him as deputy prime minister. And you've seen some of my notes on the troubles in the marriage right now. So we're trying to get a read really fast on where he is on this stuff. But I think your argument to him, which you'll need to make, I think that's the next phone call we want to set up, is exactly the one you made to Yatsenuk. And I'm glad you sort of put him on the spot on where he fits in this scenario. And I'm very glad he said what he said in response. Good. So I don't think Klitschko go into the government. I don't think it's necessary. I don't think it's a good idea. Yeah, I mean, I guess you think in terms of him not going into the government, just let him sort of stay out and do his political homework and stuff. I'm just thinking in terms of sort of the process moving ahead, we want to keep the moderate Democrats together. The problem is going to be Tony Boke and his guys. And I'm sure that's part of what Yanukovych is calculating on all of this. I think Yats is the guy who's got the economic experience, the governing experience. What he needs is Klitsch and Tony Boke on the outside. He needs to be talking to them four times a week. I just think Klitsch going in, he's going to be at that level working for Yatsenuk. It's just not going to work. Yeah, no, I think that's right. OK, good. Would you want us to try to set up a call with him? Here's the next step. My understanding from that call, but you tell me, was that the big three were going into their own meeting and that Yats was going to offer in that context a three-way, you know, three-plus-one conversation or three-plus-two with you. Is that not how you understood it? No, I think that's what he proposed. But I think just knowing the dynamics that's been with them where Klitschko's been the top dog, he's going to take a while to show up for whatever meeting they've got. And he's probably talking to his guys at this point. So I think you reaching out directly to him helps with the personality management among the three. And it gives you also a chance to move fast on all of this stuff and put us behind it before they all sit down. And he explains why he doesn't like it. OK, good. I'm happy. Why don't you reach out to him and see if he wants to talk before or after? OK, we'll do. Thanks. OK, I've now written one more wrinkle for you, Jeff. I can't remember if I told you this or if I only told Washington this, that when I talked to Jeff Feldman this morning, he had a new name for the UN guy, Robert Ceri. Did I write you that this morning? Yeah, I saw that. He's now gotten both Ceri and Ban Ki-moon to agree that Ceri could come in Monday or Tuesday. So that would be great, I think, to help glue this thing and have the UN help glue it. And, you know, fuck the EU. No, exactly. And I think we've got to do something to make it stick together because you can be pretty sure that if it does start to gain altitude, the Russians will be working behind the scenes to try to torpedo it. And again, the fact that this is out there right now, I'm still trying to figure out in my mind why Yanukovych did that. But in the meantime, there's a party of regions faction meeting going on right now. And I'm sure there's a lively argument going on in that group at this point. But anyway, we could lend jelly set up on this one if we move fast. So let me work on Klitschko. And if you can just keep, I think we want to try to get somebody with an international personality to come out here and help to mid-wise this thing. And then the other issue is some kind of outreach to Yanukovych, but we probably regroup on that tomorrow as we see how things start to fall into place. So on that piece, Jeff, when I wrote the note, Sullivan's come back to me, VFR, saying you need Biden. And I said, probably tomorrow for an Ataboya and get the deets to stick. So Biden's willing. Well, I don't know about exact this recording or exact this conversation, but what I can say that, yes, Yanukovych was on the top of their intermediate government, but since the elections to the parliament, there was a new government established and Groysmann was on the top of that government. So Yanukovych was just a transitional figure anyway. So I believe Ukrainians were those who decided who will be the government. What do you think the Russian motives are for their invasion? I believe the motives are very complex, but I don't know and probably nobody knows exactly who actually made the final decision except Putin. Because as far as I understand as far as the rumors come from the Kremlin, even the wider circle of Putin people, they didn't know the war will start as a total war and it will be so brutal. It seems for me that it's not in Russian interest. And I know for sure that people who before were Russian oriented or let's say Russophiles, they since now on will be, I can say forever against anything Russian. Even Russian speaking Ukrainians that you might know? I believe they will choose another language for their children. Now Putin made clear on that speech before the 21st that he started talking about Lenin having made a mistake to give the Soviet republics the right to secede, et cetera. And there's no question that he had in his mind maybe some day taking back Novorossia, that Catherine the Great established and making it either independent or part of Russia. However, go back to the events of February, 2014, had Yanukovych who agreed with the Russian deal rather than the EU association grim. This was really the spark I think that made, in my view, the Americans more intent to get rid of Yanukovych. Therefore, by kicking him out that way and by the Donbas Russian speakers then resisting that what they see as a coup and then declaring their independence from Ukraine, not autonomy as the Minsk Accords led. And Russia did not accept or recognize that independence, they did of course were happening in Crimea. That without that events of the February 24th getting rid of Yanukovych, would Putin have ever had an opportunity to do what he's done now, including his statements that he's protecting the people. Donbas, there was a war launched against them. I'm sorry for saying that, but was in Georgia Yanukovych? Was in Georgia? In Georgia. Was in Georgia president fleeing or whatever? Was in Georgia some particular violence in the capital? No, but the invasion happened anyway. Well, if you look at the European Parliament did a study and they blamed Georgia for that. The European Parliament blamed Georgia for what happened in Abkhazia and South Ossetia. I'm sorry to say that, but yeah. Don't you think there is a kind of discourse which I can call blame on the victim? I believe Georgia was a victim. As same as I believe till today that Moldova was a victim of the events in Transnistria. So actually you know that no border is clear and clear cut. There is always ethnicity minority, language minority, religious minority, cultural minority, which is across the border. And it's only Stalin who was deporting people in multiple who made more or less the borders which were creating homogeneous community. But it could not stay forever. And Ukraine is now more homogeneous than it was. But it will be complex again. It was complex and it will be complex again. Back to Russia's motive. What do you think, why do you think did it? And what do you think is end game might be here? Well, there are many explanations and I think they are floating and changing from week to week because at the beginning there was an explanation that he just want to protect Russian speaking population. But the Russian speaking population of Ukraine was very clear that they don't want him to come with tanks, bombs, shells and missiles to protect them. And Odessa or Harkiv, they are almost 100% Russian speaking cities which are now under big threat. And I believe that it is important to have a kind of insight, civilian discussion about how will we live together and do we have a common purpose. And in my opinion and in opinion of my generation and many generations after me in Ukraine, we have a common purpose. And we want to be one country even so we are quite different. And under circumstances like ours now, we thought that probably in his speech on the night of February 21, 2022, Sputnik clearly said that Ukraine does not exist, that Ukrainian language and culture does not exist or if it even exists, it should not exist. And it is a failed state and so on and so forth. And so actually he was trying to explain or to motivate his logic why Ukraine will cease to exist in a couple of next days. But Ukraine proved to be and Ukraine proved to be functional state because in my city but even in the city of Kiev which was under siege, that all the processes are going, healthcare is there, social security is there, senior citizens receive their pensions, we work and go to our works and even the garbage is taken away every second day from my house. So everything is functional. What did the Russians say? They never intended to take the captive Kiev, that they were not stalled there, that that was a diversion to pin down Ukrainian troops so that they could concentrate on Mariupol. What happened there? You weren't, you're not in Kiev. Well, I have friends and I have relatives there. And probably you saw reports from Irpin, Ucha, Borodyanka and many other places. And there will be more coming from her son which is now occupied and from Mariupol. I don't know what actually has happened but as much as I can reconstruct, this is the soldiers, the Russian soldiers who we are told by their officers, they can do everything with civilians. And it depends on the capacity of your imagination. What will you do with other people if you are said that you can do anything? Right. Happens everything except cannibalism. So I think you mentioned, maybe I'm wrong, but I thought I heard you mention something about statues to Stalin that are being erected in Russian speaking here. Yes, or resurrected or erected in Russian speaking. Since the invasion? No, no, no. Before that? Yes, I believe across Russia, the cult of Stalin was there. Oh, Russia, not in Ukraine. Not in Ukraine. They were coming back year by year and, yes, and it's not me who will interpret that but I know that they were even collecting those old statues which were destroyed somewhere else and they were trying to resurrect them somewhere. And we all know that there is not one functioning museum devoted to Stalin in Russia. And Putin himself has said that Stalin was an effective manager. Right. And I know that some of the nationalist, even extreme groups in Ukraine get very small numbers of votes in parliament, two percent of them. That's true. Less than one percent. Less than one percent. However, you talked about the statue of Stalin. I need to ask you about the statues. Of Bandera. In your city and elsewhere. Yeah, I believe that the cult of Bandera was created by Stalin. It was like the negative result of his efforts. He wanted Ukrainians to stop dreaming about independence, but he was so violent in crashing Ukrainian independent movement that Bandera, who actually was just one figure in this movement, became an icon of this movement because Stalin and Stalinists were naming Ukrainian fighters for independence being Banderits and supporting Bandera and that was going from generation to generation. To that extent, that even inside Ukraine, parts of Ukraine under Soviet rule thought that, for example, Western Ukraine is entirely Banderit. And I have been probably 16 years old girl when I first came out from the train on Kyiv's train station. That was the first time that I was called Galician and the first time in my life that I was called Banderit. I never felt neither one nor second. I was Ukrainian. And that was the fate in which I was raised. Just Ukrainian. Who called you that? Who called you that? Just people on the street because the train was coming from Lviv. So when did Stalin do this? Because during the war, of course, the OUN, they worked first with the Nazis, then they wanted independence and they fought the Nazis. You know probably, you know the story better than me, but in the interval period, there was no Ukrainian state as independent state. Part, the biggest part of Ukraine was inside the Soviet Union. It was Ukrainian Soviet Republic, but it was ruled from the Moscow, not from Harkiv. And another part, which is now integrated into Ukraine was the part of the Polish state. But it was so-called Eastern Galicia. And this Eastern Galicia was swallowed into Polish state under the Treaty of 1922 at a very special mentioning that in 10 years, there will be a referendum on the fate of this part of Poland because it's comprised rather on national and religious minority, which was Ukrainian minority and Greek Catholic minority, which was not Catholic, but rather, I don't know, the bluer of Orthodox and Catholic church. So 10 years passed, but Poles were not easy with the idea that this part could be just detached from that or autonomous from them. So Pilsudski, who was on the top of Polish establishment at that time, he waged a campaign which was called Pacification Campaign in order to stop Ukrainians from their movement of being independent. And this Pacification had a very harmful result because those Ukrainians who were integrated into Polish political and social life stopped to contact and stopped to take part in the real politics, and majority of young generation went underground. Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists was terrorist and was underground. So it was not representing for the majority of Ukrainians of Western part. It was a tiny fraction, but that tiny fraction thought of their fathers as losers because they were too mild. That's why you probably compare that with Irish story. They were very militant and they wanted to make good to their homeland, which was under pressure and was under siege, as they thought. But you also have to know that Bandera was very young when he was already jailed and he spent, I don't know, five to six years in Polish jail. Then he somehow fled when Poland was attacked, both from Nazi Germany and Soviet Union, and he hid it somewhere. And then he was, of course, important because he managed to split Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists into two fractions, yes? And then he was taken to jail by Nazis and he spent quite a lot of time in the second World War II, sitting somewhere, maybe quite comfortably, but in Saxon housing. So actually, his colleagues or his, I don't know, believers, we are those who are doing all kinds of things, including nasty thing. And I believe the most nasty thing was that part of them took part in, how do you call it? Helping police, yes? Helping Nazi police when they were seething Jews on Belarusian ground first and then on Ukrainian ground. But these were rather episodes. It was not something which was ruled by Bandera, I don't know, even approved by Bandera. He was involved in Baba Yar, for example, is that? Bandera? Yeah. No. No, we know other, I am not the historian of that period, but there are good studies of that. I believe Rosolinsky Liebe is writing about it and Oleksandr Zaitsev in Ukraine, that of course there were some colleagues of him who were probably involved, so called Bukovinian Kourin. But again, Bukovina, it was another country, it was Romania. And these guys were Ukrainians, but it not necessarily, we were Bandera, or at least that they were under command of Bandera. So you're saying Stalin used him to fight against the Nazis in the war? No, no, I say that Stalin made him in the icon of anti-Soviet, Ukrainian nationalism. Bandera was one of the few leaders, they were more than just Bandera. But Stalin, who was fighting all the time against Bandera and looking for Bandera to be caught, and actually I believe- That's assassinated him in 1959 in Munich. In Munich. So yes, I believe that Stalin actually very much helped to put Bandera in this mental pedestal. I see. Well, he is there today. And how do you feel about the statues, the fact that he was made a hero of the Ukraine, maybe isn't now, I can't find out why they- I believe that I would never like to somehow excuse myself, before Russians now in this war, for example, that Bandera is standing here, because they don't excuse for Stalin standing somewhere else. Yes, I believe there is this fight of statues and the fight of extremes between us. But the people before which I would excuse and sometimes I accused are Poles. Because of course for Poles, Bandera is a symbol of another very murky episode in Ukrainian-Polish relationship, Volinian massacre. And nevertheless, again, Bandera was not there and Bandera probably was not even knowing about there in all details before it has unfolded. But they were those groups of Ukrainian nationalists who were taking advantage of a situation when Nazi already were departing and Soviets not yet arrived. They started to clean up as they thought the future, I don't know, poor, ethnically poor Ukraine. And of course I'm shocked by that and mainly all contemporary Ukrainians are in shock and grief about that. So you're troubled by this revival, forget about the Stalin revival, not just as the image that it creates for Ukraine. You're troubled by the torchlight marches and all that. Yes, I am, but I know that in this war Bandera will be resurrected again because everything which irritates Russians now is good. I see. No, Zelensky, I find him changing his mind every couple of minutes. I mean, he's given interviews to American television which he said, I'm ready to talk to the Russians about their deal about Donbass, about Crimea and about neutrality and the Constitution. And then five minutes later he says, is he under his own power or do you think he's under a lot of pressure from other forces and what might those forces be? Is he really being able to speak his own mind? Well, since we have elected him, I believe there was quite a big face in him because it was more than 70% of Ukrainians who actually voted him into the cabinet. They're in the war, the civil war, Donbass, isn't that? It's true and yes, please like revend and remind yourself that Zelensky was doing very many important steps in the direction to stop the war. And he was serious about that. But as much as I understand, the negotiations stuck and as much as I understand Putin was not very much into, I don't know, finding a solution. As I understand this now in the reverse, there were a lot of things on the Russian side. They were demanding knowing that the Ukrainians will not be able to implement that because very often they were asking, shoot your left leg, shoot your right leg. You mean that as I'm kind of an hour? Yes, yes, because like if you give Donbass the total autonomy and total last say in your international politics, then you are trapped. How would they get the last say in the international politics? Because it was said in the Minsk Agreement that without approval from Donbass, we could not be the part of European Union. I see, okay, so what did you agree when Poroshenko began what he called anti-terrorist operation against Donbass? How did you feel at that time? Yes, I think that we all know now there were Russian soldiers with no insignia which were coming from abroad and they were bringing also a lot of weapons. So to be true, as a poet I could be metaphorical but now I want to be very documentary. It was already hot war unfolding that time but we didn't call it the war. We didn't call the war the war for two reasons. First, because Russia would never admit that it is a war and it's at war with Ukraine. And secondly, because then we have to have a war with the Martial Law and the whole community, the whole society should live according to the Martial Law. It means no elections. It means a kind of possibility for dictatorship and Ukrainians are not those who would like to live into dictatorship. So in a way Poroshenko had not very much options. So he opted for this anti-terrorist. And do you think the Americans how much influence you think the United States government has in Ukraine? Well, it will be measured later but I believe that Ukraine had to ask for some help because there was the incoming force which was many times bigger than we are. So we are the minor and Russia was the major and it was intended to do harm to many Ukrainian regions. The idea which was announced by Putin at that time that he will create Novorossia. And Novorossia it means from Odessa up to Kharkiv. So that was his plan at that time. And Ukraine, it was 2014. And Ukrainians actually stopped him at the front line in Donbas. And from our point of view, it was a kind of victory. Wait a minute, they went without insignia. That's way different to what's happening now. Now they may take Novorossia, whatever happens after that is another question. So when people talked about the Russian invasion then when you compare it to now, they were helping the people in Donbas. From those people's point of view, they voted for Yanukovych. They saw him leave through violence. They saw him being replaced in their view unconstitutionally. They declared independence, particularly eight days after the fire in Odessa is when they declared autonomy or... But not in Irsan, not in Odessa, not in McLeive. Everybody was waiting for Russia to come. In waiting for... No, no, they were not waiting for Russia to come. Well, that's right. Well, they were fighting in Odessa, and you know about the fire... I saw a very important slogan. There was a meeting in Odessa back in May 2014 when there was this talk about Novorossia. And there were people, Russian-speaking people, standing in the middle of the old town of Odessa. And there was a young guy carrying a slogan, when Putin will come, we will not speak freely in Russian. We will be made keep silence in Russian. But I mean, in that case, there was right sector at that time, C-14. And of course, Azov, which is now part of the Ukrainian military. Now, you were troubled by Benderet. Is that trouble you, too, that Azov is part of the state military under the Interior Ministry? But you know what? I was not tracing the fate of Azov so closely. But what I know is that Azov itself has changed since 2014. So a lot of things has happened since it was announced it will be integrated into Ukrainian National Guard. And even those people who were most suspicious and who were doing research on far-right in Ukraine recently, like a year ago, a year and a half ago, they, not that they changed their mind, but they re-approach the topic. They researched for the second time with the battalion, Azov, and they changed their opinion, they changed their estimation, how much far-right the guys are. And... Well, they've been trained by NATO, some NATO countries, including Canada, I understand. That's what I understand, I don't know if it's true. But they still wear this... I don't think they would be trained somewhere in Canada if they would be far-right. No, they're Canadians inside there. Yeah, well, maybe that helped change them. But they're still wearing this wolf-sangle thing which troubles a lot of people. I mean, this is the SS. You know, we will know that later on, but people are now under siege for 78 days. They are dying for their country. They are dying as Russian-speaking Ukrainians. And I don't know... Even, you know, if you tattoo something, it's not that easy then to just erase it. Well, I'll talk about the patch on the uniform. No, no, there is no that wolf on the uniform anymore. I believe that. I see it's dangerous. When... In Buker, for example, during the massacre, the New York Times went in with Azov, and they took pictures of these guys, in Buker with that second-day butcher, the town where the massacre took place. But what Azov is doing in Buker? Well, there. That's what the New York Times reported. That's interesting, because Azov... With the picture on the wolf-sangle? As far as I understand, the real Azov is now in Mariupol. That's right. They were there as well. I was surprised, too. I thought they were all down in Mariupol. So you know more than me. I don't know that. And I'm asking myself, are there also some fake Azov's also? I don't know. Well, I want to ask you... You may have no opinion on this, because I spoke about what's happening in the United States now. There's some troubling developments. The government has developed a disinformation governance board. There's two organizations that are going after our reporting. We're very small. We have 10,000 readers. And during the war now, we went up to 40,000, but it's usually 10,000 to 20,000. So we now have a lot of influence. And yet this PayPal system has shut us out. And this other organization that is headed by former CIA, NSA director, top intelligence officials, are putting pressure on us to reveal stuff about our funding. And also demanding we make corrections to our reporting on Ukraine. And on another story, too, in Syria. Two of them on Ukraine. So it seems to me that there's been censorship before in the West, and it seems like it's coming back in the U.S. As a member of Penn, committed to freedom of speech, you may not know a lot about this, but would it trouble you to know that the U.S. government is directly involved in what looks like policing thought and writing? Well, I never experienced policing from the U.S., but I experienced policing from FSB. And my father experienced policing from KGB. So I know something about this. Are you from Russia, your family? No, but KGB, yes. So it's really, for us, it's threatening that we know there are these lists for people who have to be shot as soon as Russian army was arrived. We know about people tortured and decapitated. We know about Sensov, who spent so many years in prison somewhere in Labentangi, over the Polar Circle. So we know that the censorship or some kind of harsh influence on the opinion was going from our Nossan neighbor. But inside Ukraine, we managed to keep quite a plurality. Sometimes its plurality was working against us. I mean that the enemy is at your door, but you're still quarreling. I think it's like a big Italian family. You have more important issues to quarrel about. But at the same time, I cherish this because Ukrainians, I believe, are very much about freedom of expression and freedom as such. We value that, and we're ready to fight for that. It's important. So does it trouble you, Zelensky, to shot all the television stations? Yes, it troubles me. And you shot down 11 political parties? That's troubling? Some of these parties, I believe, were just puppets. But some probably were a real opposition, that troubles me. But I believe there will be new opposition. And what I know for sure, there will be no cult of Zelensky in Ukraine. And Zelensky definitely will not be Putin number one or Putin of Ukraine, no. I see. Well, let's hope that the conflict ends soon in some way. But I fear that it will go on a long time. I think Putin would have annexed Crimea without the overthrow of Yanukovych in 2014. Of course, we will have more sources on that subject. But I will give you just one proof. There were medals stamped in advance for the liberation of Crimea. And the date on these medals, which are in metal, is February 22, 2014. But the Russian army actually approached Crimea only on the night of February 23, 2024. So they have prepared that in advance. And they even knew the date before. 2014. 2014. But Yanukovych was overthrown on which day? On 23. They had made these medals already? Yes, but they were already giving them away on that date. Okay, that still doesn't really answer my question. Suppose they anticipated that there would be a violent... But how did they know the date? Well, I don't know. And I don't know either. So actually, there were probably different scenarios. Either you take the whole Ukraine, and Yanukovych is not overthrown. But if there are suspicious things happening, then you just take Crimea. I was going to find a way. If Yanukovych had taken the Russian agreement and nothing happened to him, he wouldn't have taken Crimea. Because he would have been in the Russian camp. Well, when you... When was the referendum in Crimea? Was that earlier than the... It was beginning of March. And I believe that the day when the treaty between Crimea and Russia, the Russian Federation was signed, it was like March 7, when they adopted Crimea back into the proud family of the Russian Federation. Yanukovych had taken the Russian deal, and there was no rebellion. Putin had the geopolitical project of the Eurasian Union, and Ukraine had to become part of it. And that was what Yanukovych wanted to do, but could not do, because the people of Ukraine were opposing that. But his parliament, who led, voted in favor of it. Well... He had the majority in the parliament. Yeah, but we have reasons to believe that the MPs were bribed to vote like that. And the strong opposition on the street was like a direct democracy. People just went into the street because they were so strongly opposing that. That's one way to put it. But the extremists had a big role to play in Maidan, didn't they? From the start... People came from your city as a... went there. Yes, but from the start, it was called Evromaidan. It started as early as November 21, even before Yanukovych went to Vilnius, where actually he refused to sign the treaty. And these were just students, and these students were violently crushed, beaten and approached by the police. And when the students were beaten, the next day the big crowd of people actually came to streets with slogans that you have beaten our children. And then he tried to back off the police, but it was too late. Irene, thank you very much for talking to us. I appreciate you. Thank you for asking. Okay. Yeah, whatever you feel like is the best thing to do with it. And good luck. Good luck. Thank you. Interesting. That was a bit weird. Nice. So this was an American tourist here. Who was listening. Yes, he was. And he gave you money. That's amazing. American dollars. A bunch of American dollars. Show us, show us. She got a donation. How much did you get? I don't know. Let's see. He said... A couple of dollars? Well... He said it's not much, but... It was five times. You got a hundred dollars. It's not me. I will donate it further. Thank you. Thank you for talking and thank you for asking.