The other day, an important summit of NATO countries took place in Vilnius, from which there were many expectations in Ukraine. The expert of the International Expert Club, politician Mykhailo Pozhivanov, spoke about its results, the ongoing counteroffensive and the work of the Ukrainian authorities during the war.
The NATO summit took place. Did you expect global solutions for Ukraine from him?
First of all, I understood that there would be a lot of nice words, but I did not expect positive decisions for us, which would really open the way to joining the North Atlantic Alliance.
According to the NATO charter, each country of the alliance must agree to accept a new member. But we saw how Sweden was accepted, when Turkey and Hungary still did not agree on the decision to accept it. I thought that the leaders of Great Britain and the United States would hold some separate bilateral talks, give certain guarantees to Turkey in Hungary, but no, today the decision has still been made.
It would seem on the contrary, Sweden had a neutral status for about 20 years and here it is making a very responsible decision for itself, everyone should be interested in the strength of NATO. But as we can see, they are arguing and bargaining something for each other.
Regarding the issue of accepting into NATO countries with non-agreed territorial issues. At one time, in the early 70s, Turkey seized part of Cyprus, and to this day this territory is disputed. But Turkey is a full member of the Alliance, so we would really like to have double standards, but unfortunately they do exist.
Ukrainian counteroffensive - do you think everything is going according to plan, or slower than expected?
It's hard for me to say, since January 2023 there have been so many different experts talking about two weeks, another month and everything will be released. The only telethon on which people very close to the president constantly talked about the counteroffensive. And this was listened to by both Ukrainians and Western parterres, who surely hoped that it would be like that - in two weeks.
Regarding the partners and the speed of providing weapons, on the one hand, they can be understood, because they give us what they have in their arsenal, and this is a certain procedure. We remember how European and American companies started to take orders for some items, they said that it would be either during this year or even in the 24th year. This is what we see in public, moreover, they really understand that the security of their country is of primary importance to them.
In my opinion, General Zaluzhnyi very correctly said that the lives of our boys are the most important thing. We lack weapons, artillery and aviation. In the grand scheme of things, we also lack manpower, because boys are dying, many are wounded. But our soldiers are advancing, and it is not worth expecting that everything will happen very quickly. The main thing is to save the Armed Forces.
As luck would have it, my youngest son is currently in the Armed Forces in the Donetsk and Zaporizhzhia areas, sometimes when he leaves from scratch we talk, so I understand the real situation at the front and what is happening there.
About ZNPP. If Russia does go ahead with a terrorist attack on the ZNPP, what consequences will it have for Putin at the global level?
Most of the countries of the world have already expressed their opinion on this topic, that a terrorist attack on the ZNPP will be equivalent to a nuclear attack. Fortunately, today all countries except the Russian Federation that officially possess nuclear weapons are our partners.
We also remember how in March of this year, during his visit to Moscow, the leader of the People's Republic of China, Xi Jinping, also warned Putin against the use of nuclear weapons. In this situation, I want to remain optimistic and am convinced that this will not happen. But we all thought on February 24 last year that there would be no war.
The wave of information about a possible terrorist attack on the ZNPP incites a certain panic among the population, but people must know what to do in such a situation, what protection is needed, how and where to evacuate if necessary. Our scientists and relevant services must monitor the situation around the ZNPP in order to warn in time if there is a threat.
But I will point out that this is a threat to those who live in Crimea today, in the so-called DPR and LPR. The Rostov region, Krasnodar and Stavropol regions of the Russian Federation may also be under threat.
Questions about the situation with the mayor of Kyiv and the heads of district administrations of the capital, who were dismissed by order of the President. Does it feel like the political season has already begun?
Volodymyr Zelenskyi, talking about the democratic principles of state management, sometimes takes steps that are more similar to our northern neighbor. When the OP tries to completely control the central government and local self-government bodies.
I don't have much sympathy for Vitaliy Klitschko, I don't like a lot of things in his work, but local self-government should work within the limits of its own powers delegated by the state.
The same thing happened in Chernihiv and has been going on for a long time in Odessa. As for Odesa, if Mr. Trukhanov is guilty, please condemn him, remove him from office, because all these games, which have been going on for several years, are more like politicized showdowns than real accusations.
At one time in 96, I worked on Chapter 11 of the Constitution of Ukraine, which concerns local self-government bodies. Then Yatsenyuk and Groysman carried out the so-called decentralization, invented united territorial communities, which are not in our Constitution. Because we only have villages, towns and cities.
The same is the case with newly created districts, take Kharkiv district with one and a half million inhabitants or Odesa district, which also has more than a million inhabitants - how much does a person need to travel from one end of the district to another, for example, for a certificate.
As for the communities themselves, where certain villages were driven. Today, their funding is as disproportionate as possible, in the center of the community, where the entire leadership is doing a lot of improvement, and the outskirts of the villages are falling into disrepair. There should not be such things, because the construction defines the same rights and obligations for everyone.
On the eve of Constitution Day, I reflected on the change of status of Kyiv and Sevastopol in my blog on "Left Bank". Convinced that they should not be above subjects, in my opinion, these cities should become ordinary bodies of local self-government. And in such a case, no power at the level of the Government, the President or the Verkhovna Rada will be able to intervene.
People elected the mayor and he must work, fulfill his own powers delegated by the state.
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