Join Columbia University's Harriman Institute for a talk with Taras Kuzio on Ukraine's 2019 elections. Five years after the Euromaidan Revolution, Ukraine is holding presidential elections in March and will hold parliamentary elections in October 2019. Kuzio argues that the elections will not be the traditional battle between "pro-Western" and "pro-Russian" forces because 16 percent of traditionally pro-Russian voters and 27 election districts are under Russian occupation in the Crimea and Donbas, the Party of Regions no longer exists and Ukraine's Communist Party is banned. Russia’s annexation of Crimea and the ongoing war in the Donbas and the Sea of Azov will provide the background to an election that will resemble those held those in Europe and the US where populists battle against reformers. With Russian soft power in Ukraine in terminal decline, as seen through the emergence of a Ukrainian Orthodox Church independent of Moscow, the 2019 elections will be a test as to whether or not Ukraine's reforms and European integration will continue and prove to be irreversible by the 2024 elections.

Speaker: 

Taras Kuzio, National University of Kyivan Mohyla Academy; Foreign Policy Institute; Johns Hopkins University-SAIS