The Rise And Fall (And Rise?) Of Arseniy Yatsenyuk | ECFR - Oct 19, 2009 |

Yatsenyuk was suddenly no longer omnipresent on the Inter TV channel then close to Firtash. Pinchuk became the more important sponsor, and replaced Yatsenyuk's Ukrainian team with Russian-connected "political technologists:" Timofei Sergeitsev, Dmitry Kulikov, and Iskander Valitov.

As well as working for Yanukovych's controversial campaign in 2004, the new Russian team came from the Duma Expert Council under Konstantin Zatulin. It is headed by Sergei Markov and notorious for its attempts to set up Russia-friendly NGOs and politicians throughout the CIS. If Russia cannot control or confront Ukraine directly, it has an interest in helping to build up a "satellite ideology."

The new team pushed a version of a Russian "third way" ideology, which stretches from the nationalist right to earlier campaigns for the Union of Rightist Forces and Anatoly Chubais's infamous "liberal imperialism." It combines business-friendly policies with attacks on the bankruptcy of the West and Western liberalism, the consequent degradation of structures based on them like the EU, and the rise of an alternative pole centered around Russia in the east.

'Greater Europe'

Yatsenyuk shifted from his plague-on-both-your-houses rhetoric and so-called "New Ukrainian Pragmatism" to something more like a new Ukrainian isolationism, suddenly repositioning himself as the Sinn Féin ("Ourselves Alone") candidate and lambasting the EU and everything non-Ukrainian. His campaign slogans - "Productive Village," "A Battle-Ready Army," and "New Industrialization" - suddenly sent a different message, one that also sounded more like "feed and support Russia."

Ukrainian Presidential Candidate Arseniy Yatseniuk's Foreign Policy | EuroDialogue -

Related reading ...

Ukraine Caught Between East and West, Red and Blue | by Oui Thu Oct 3rd, 2019 |