Opinion Kievan halves

Of all that he bequeathed to Russia and Ukraine, Nikolai Gogol would have been most surprised by the rivalry between the two nations, in their post-Soviet days, to claim him. The fight over Gogol symptomises the love-hate relationship. When the matter came to a head in 2009, on the 200th anniversary of his birth, the casus belli was the dispute over gas transport to Europe. As Kiev’s Independence Square or Maidan burns now, with 25-plus people reported dead in the police crackdown on anti-government protesters, the strings are not just in the Kremlin’s hands.

Split into an eastern Russian-speaking and a western Ukrainian-speaking half, Ukraine is not a small country. But it’s tiny compared to Russia and to the power projection of the European Union — the entities currently pulling it apart. Since the protests began last November and intensified over December-January against President Viktor Yanukovich’s decision to junk a landmark trade deal with the EU and instead sign one with Russia, Ukraine has become a case study in how the geopolitical and geo-economic designs of big powers can overwhelm a state sitting at the point of convergence of those designs. That said, Ukraine has been fighting itself since its independence. The western half pulls Europe-wards, the eastern half Russia-wards. So much so that Russian and Western ambitions are actually given shape and reinforced by Ukraine’s divergent wishes.

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Yanukovich must take the blame for ignoring one half of the country’s population. His determination to survive is now unleashing fresh violence. But the protesters too have lost control over the movement. Nine of those killed on Tuesday were policemen. The EU, Washington and Moscow must calm tempers, but it’s not for them to bridge the great divide. Born of the same Slavic civilisation and proto-state (Kievan Rus) as modern Russia, Ukraine’s national consciousness was forged under big brother’s shadow. After all, Ukrainian-born Gogol wrote in Russian.