We translate and publish this interview with a Ukrainian antimilitarist
forced to go abroad to escape the call to arms. There are manyUkrainians who have expatriated or live clandestinely in the country to
avoid ending up in the army. But there are also thousands of actual
deserters, who abandon their military units. This text appeared on
January 14, 2025 on the website of the British Anarchist Communist Group
https://www.anarchistcommunism.org/2025/01/14/interview-with-ukrainian-antimilitarist/
which reports an interview made by the Ceskoslovenské anarchistické
sdruzení - Czechoslovak Anarchist Association (CAS) which maintains
internationalist and antimilitarist positions: https://anarchiste.org/
Briefly introduce yourself to the readers of our magazine. You are
Ukrainian, where were you born and spent your youth?
Hello. My name is Vadym Yakovlev, I am a Ukrainian queer writer and
journalist and I am against war and nationalism. I was born in Odessa,
the largest multicultural city in the south of Ukraine, a few months
before the collapse of the USSR. My mother is Ukrainian and my father is
Russian. Their fathers were military men. My father worked in a factory.
With the collapse of the USSR, the factory was closed and my father lost
his job. This affected my family and my childhood. I grew up in Odessa,
but a year before fleeing Ukraine I lived in Lviv, the largest city in
the western part of Ukraine. At home my parents spoke Russian and
Ukrainian, so I never focused on issues such as national identity. My
family was an unhappy international family that lost a lot with the
collapse of state communism in Ukraine. I guess all this influenced me a
lot in my search for real political views and in my desire to do
something that could have an impact on society.
You left Ukraine, what made you make this decision?
On the one hand, I could no longer work in Ukraine because of my
political beliefs. The Ukrainian intelligentsia, journalists and
artists, as a community, with the beginning of the war decided to become
privileged propagandists of the elite in the service of the state. I did
not want to do propaganda, so I lost the opportunity to publish my
articles. And if you publicly express opinions like mine in Ukraine, the
authorities can put you in prison. On the other hand, of course, because
of my views, I did not want to go to war on the front line. That is why
I ran away.
What is your attitude to war and antimilitarism?
Much of my work in Ukraine was related to my anti-patriotic beliefs. My
articles and participation in art projects have most often been devoted
to the criticism of Ukrainian patriotism, Ukrainian nationalism and the
privileged, "pro-Western" and pro-war Ukrainian civil and cultural
elite. I have always been interested in anti-war art and anti-war
activism. Since 2022, I had to start doing this, even at the cost of
losing the opportunity to stay and work in my native country and losing
close friends who abandoned me because of my beliefs.
The war in Ukraine has changed many things. Are you in touch with your
friends back home? What are their attitudes towards the war? How do they
live?
As I said in response to the previous question, I have lost most of my
friends from the privileged art scene and the community of journalists
and activists. Almost all of them have become propagandists, receiving
support from the state and Western foundations. I have also lost contact
with the majority of the Ukrainian left, which supports militarism,
nationalism and NATO. This kind of left is also supported by the state
and Western foundations. But I am still in touch with friends who do not
work with the state and have nothing to do with the privileged classes.
They support me and my anti-war views. Many of them, if they are men,
live a horrible life now, because they have to hide in their apartments
all the time for fear of going out. The Ukrainian army kidnaps people on
the streets and sends them to the front lines without their permission.
And most people with a male gender indication in their documents are not
allowed by law to leave the country.
Many people, including anarchists, have joined the army and left
anti-militarism? ... Are you in touch with them?
As for the anti-war anarchists in Ukraine, we have an anti-war
collective called Assembly https://libcom.org/tags/assemblyorgua They
are from Kharkiv and have their own website where they publish anti-war
and anti-conscription texts.
This group of anarchists is anonymous and hides the names of their team
members. This is the only way to conduct any anti-war activity in
Ukraine. There was only one Ukrainian organization that did not hide the
names of its members and spoke out openly against the war: the Ukrainian
Peace Movement. The Ukrainian Security Service accused them of
supporting Russia and sent its leader to court. After that, the
organization significantly softened its public position, fearing prison.
Many Ukrainian leftists sided with the war, it seems to me, because of
conformism. They are afraid to express their true position or simply do
not have one, as it seems to me, and are simply following the mainstream
trend. But these are just my assumptions. In Ukraine, as an
authoritarian and militaristic country, it is extremely dangerous to be
against the war.
What about Ukrainians in exile? Are they doing any anti-war activity?
Are they organizing in their workplaces?
Lately, many Ukrainian anti-war initiatives have appeared abroad. For
example, Ukrainians are organizing demonstrations against mobilization
and human rights violations in Ukraine. These demonstrations are taking
place in Germany, Italy and France. Often, these actions are organized
by Ukrainian leftists who have nothing to do with the pro-war Ukrainian
left such as the so-called "Ukrainian anti-authoritarians" or Solidarity
Collectives. These Ukrainian anti-war leftist groups are not funded by
anyone, they are a personal initiative of committed and active young
people. There will be more such actions, and I am in active
communication with the organizers and members of these initiatives, this
is very inspiring! In addition, in the West there are a number of
Ukrainian intellectuals and artists who are against the war and who are
constantly marginalized and silenced here in the West. But we have all
been silenced for too long, our voices have been erased for too long,
and now we are increasingly trying to build horizontal connections at
various levels, organizing a front against the war here abroad, against
war and propaganda. There are many more of us than we think.
The media are silent about the forced mobilization of the Ukrainian
government. Does information about defectors rarely leak out? What can
you tell us about it?
No one knows the exact number of defectors from the Ukrainian side, but
according to official and unofficial statistics, there are about 150-200
thousand people! These are huge numbers. The official Ukrainian media
are controlled by the state or the Security Service of Ukraine.
Ukrainians mainly consume information from anonymous news channels on
Telegram or TikTok. It is there that videos of violence against
civilians by the Ukrainian military are constantly published. These
videos, full of terrible scenes and evidence of human rights violations,
do not reach the official media. The Ukrainian authorities are
constantly trying to find the authors of anonymous Telegram channels
that criticize the actions of the Ukrainian army or advocate peace, and
put them in prison. Sometimes the authorities succeed. The Ukrainian
government, police and the Security Service of Ukraine do not hesitate
to use any method to silence alternative voices. For example, the police
recently arrested the mother of a blogger who is abroad and speaks out
against forced mobilization, for sharing his post! There are also
unofficial ways to silence dissidents. I remember one teenager who had
his own Telegram channel, where he criticized Ukrainian nationalism and
mobilization. He identified himself as an anarchist. Fascists would come
to his house to have a "conversation", after which he would publicly
renounce his beliefs. But the pro-war Ukrainian left, who are
propagandists and accomplices of all these crimes against Ukrainians,
will never tell you about these things.
Do you know anyone who has deserted or avoided conscription? How can we
in Czechoslovakia help them?
I know people who have fled the country illegally, and I have many
acquaintances and friends in Ukraine who are hiding from the army and
conscription. Perhaps, over time, it will be necessary to create
initiatives to help these people within the framework of Ukrainian
anti-war movements abroad, which have just begun to emerge. If such
initiatives arise, I hope that there will be people in the Czech
Republic and Slovakia who will want to help these Ukrainians.
What message would you give to Ukrainian and Russian workers at home and
abroad?
The only thing I want to say to those who are not part of the privileged
classes (so not only the proletariat), regardless of their nationality
and position is: never trust those who build their fortune on your
exploitation, marginalization and systematic discrimination, and above
all do not be foolish and do not participate in their wars, it is simply
stupid!
Thank you for the interview and if you have anything else to say, we
will be happy to report it.
Thank you, comrade, for interviewing me.
by CRInt - FAI
https://umanitanova.org/perche-ho-disertato-intervista-a-un-antimilitarista-ucraino/
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