In an opinion piece written earlier this week, Jiri Bata says that Yatsenyuk, his government having "surrendered" Ukraine to the interests of Western politicians, makes outrageous commentary like that about the Soviets invading Germany in the Second World War in order "to justify all the negative and tragic 'achievements' of the Ukrainian government and the president."
Bata notes that today's Ukraine is, without any exaggeration, "in ruins, totally helpless, dependent on foreign subsidies and aid." For the present Ukrainian government, he says, "it is far easier to invent nonsense, falsehoods, lies and slander than to stick to argumentation, to facts and reality."
Bata notes that Ukrainian authorities, under US pressure, have no interest in ending the war in the east, or in the normalization of relations with Russia, all the while continuing to search for reasons to blame Russia and Putin for the present crisis and claiming that Russia wants to conquer Ukraine. Bata says that Ukrainian authorities continue to make the accusations even though they "have not had, do not have, and will not have any proof that Russia intends to conquer Ukraine."
Bata says that ultimately, in the case of the Ukrainian prime minister, it's worth taking into consideration "the opinion of President Zeman that Yatsenyuk is a person whose aim is war. Few can understand however what Ukraine would [stand to] receive out of this war."
Last week, Yatsenyuk gave an interview for the German television channel ARD, where he appeared to claim that the USSR had launched the Second World War by invading Germany. "All of us still clearly remember the Soviet invasion of Ukraine and Germany," he noted. Even more absurdly, the prime minister added that "nobody has the right to rewrite the results of the Second World War," and that "Russia's President Putin is trying to do exactly this."
Russia's Foreign Ministry has since asked Germany to clarify its official position on the Ukrainian prime minister's remarks, to which Berlin replied that the Russian ministry should address its questions to Yatsenyuk himself. Stating that "Nazi Germany during World War II led a terrible war of aggression against the Soviet Union," the German Foreign Ministry noted that Yatsenyuk nevertheless had a right to his opinion as an expression of free speech.
A spokesperson for Yatsenyuk has since said that Yatsenyuk was supposedly referring to the Soviet Union's occupation of and alleged responsibility for the division of Germany following the Second World War.
