President of Ukraine from 2010 to 2014
Viktor Fedorovych Yanukovych (Ukrainian: Ві́ктор Фе́дорович Януко́вич, Russian: Виктор Фёдорович Янукович; born 9 July 1950) is a Ukrainian politician who served as the fourth President of Ukraine from 2010 until he was removed from office in the 2014 Ukrainian Revolution. From 2006 to 2007 he was the prime minister of Ukraine; he also served in this post from November 2002 to January 2005, with a short interruption in December 2004. After rejecting the Ukrainian-European Association Agreement, Yanukovych was ousted from office in the 2014 Ukrainian Revolution. He currently lives in exile in Russia. On 18 June 2015, Yanukovych was officially deprived of the title of President of Ukraine by the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine. On 24 January 2019, he was sentenced in absentia to thirteen years' imprisonment for high treason by a Ukrainian court, which was affirmed on appeals that went all the way to the Supreme Court of Ukraine. Yanukovych was known for his numerous gaffes, which often relate to his poor knowledge of Ukrainian, malapropisms, Freudian slips, geography mistakes, or general errors of speech. Earlier speeches could sometimes include aggressive rhetoric, while some examples (not shown due to their intranslateability) have sparked controversy due to the employment of criminal jargon.
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On [the Ukrainian] western borders, the situation is also not so unequivocal. Poland not only remembers September 1939, it also scrupulously conserves the memories of [the Paris conference of] March 1923, when the countries of the Entente have definitively included the territories of East Galicia and the western part of Volhynia in the Second Polish Republic. The current situational rapprochement with Poland risks a situation when Ukraine will be forced to effectively merge with it, as the latter's possibility to safeguard economic sustainability might be in jeopardy. This was exactly the consequence of the realisation of the European dream, for which the Ukrainian nation supposedly went out on its last Maidan.
I have no illusions, or as they say, some big ambitions. I just have to take a principled position today, because as a person I can't act otherwise. I am obliged today to take an active position by political means, in order to bring an end to the war in Ukraine, to begin the restoration of the destroyed Donbas, my small homeland, where I was born and lived for more than 50 years.
One should always remember that no victory can be achieved without losing. Burning bridges is never an option in politics, never.
Such outrageous actions can have really bad consequences.
I never took the liberty they afforded – to unleash war on an entire region, running people over with tanks and using artillery, and for what?
For not liking you or treating you somewhat below par?
Or having an opinion of their own about their future?
This is wrong.
If you take the history of any country, it never ended well for those who came to power through bloodshed.
No amount of power is worth spilling even a drop of blood to obtain.
That’s my fundamental principle, but they chose a different path.
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I didn't flee anywhere. I moved from Kyiv to Kharkiv. During my relocation I was shot at with weapons. The car which hid me from all sides was all in bullets.
I appeared in Russia thanks to patriot officers, who have performed their duty and helped preserve my life.
The representatives of the West and the USA are responsible for the Maidan. They have abetted Maidan. It is them who bear responsibility.