vIII KyIv versus moscow
X. neITher war nor Peace
3. faltering internal security
At the time of the Revolution of Dignity, and later during the initial phase of the war, civilians in Ukraine got hold of large numbers of weapons (mostly fire arms, manportable antitank weapons and mines, including antipersonnel and antitank mines).213 In 2014, many volunteer armed formations were created which only theoretically recognised the supremacy of the Ukrainian authori ties, while in reality they were controlled by noone except their commanders. Paramilitary organisations, which had been banned but tolerated in Ukraine, grew considerably in strength. The criminal world also armed itself better, while at the same time the police stopped operating in many areas. As a result, the state lost its monopoly on the use of force, and the law & order authorities lost control of what was happening in the criminal underworld.
The largest threat to public order, posed by the dobrobaty, was tackled quickly and effectively. Contrary to the fears voiced in late 2014, the units accepted being subordinated to the state’s command structures without resistance (though
213 This is indirectly confirmed by the Ukrainian media, which report almost every week on dis
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not without friction), and were then incorporated into the structures of either the National Guard or the land troops, usually keeping their original names and their status as ‘separate’ units. In this way, they ceased to be volunteer for mations. At the same time, they were joined by professional commanders and submitted to daily military routines. For some units it sufficed to purge them of people with criminal inclinations; but there was one unit, the ‘Tornado’ patrol service company of the Interior Ministry, which had to be formally disbanded. The Volunteer Corps of the Right Sector (probably numbering around 1000 peo ple and running several training centres in central Ukraine) was the one unit which was not incorporated into the regular army and yet whose activities continued to be tolerated. The strongest among the ‘new’ units, i.e. the Azov Regiment of the Interior Ministry’s National Guard, has also retained consid erable autonomy and maintains its own network of training centres, includ ing a sergeant school.214 The ‘Azovtsy’ also form a political movement of their own, but in military terms, they are more of a laboratory for new forms and procedures than a security threat. What does pose a risk, though, is the fact that in many localities, cells of the ‘Azov’ Civilian Corps have been taking over the functions of the police,215 which will lead to wrangles with the newly formed regular police.
The de facto division of the country into two zones which were never fully iso
lated from one another has been conducive to the development of crime, espe cially corruption at the checkpoints controlling traffic and cargo movements across the ceasefire line. On the one hand, the line’s permeability has made life easier for the people who have found themselves in the separatistcontrolled territories; but on the other, it has been corrupting the Ukrainian state’s new cadres, who should be stimulating the regeneration of law enforcement in Ukraine. The problem is not limited to small trade; Ukraine’s energy sector needs large amounts of anthracite, which is mined in the separatistcontrolled territory, a fact which has led to the creation of illegal supply schemes. Energy supply has thus been ensured, but at the price of undermining the process of the state’s ‘cleansing’.
214 A newtype of noncommissioned officer school; https://foxx.salon24.pl/729942,kijowq
29.09%e2%80%932016zakonczeniepierwszegokursuszkolysierzantowimkonowalca, (material unavailable), accessed on 17 October 2016.
215 С. Шебеліст, «Азов»стайл, http://zaxid.net/news/showNews.do?azovstayl&objectId=1406755,
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As it does always and everywhere, the war has also brought about a rise in com mon crime. Large numbers of criminals joined the ranks of the volunteer units (usually for short periods); mentally unstable people came into the possession of weapons; and many veterans failed to build civilian lives. The disorganisation of the militsiya (including the criminal departments), and the subsequent efforts to build the police from scratch emboldened the criminal world. The postrevo lutionary shakiness of the state structures created favourable conditions for the local ‘barons’ and extremist organisations trying to create a business basis for their activities (one case illustrating this phenomenon was the wellpublicised standoff in Mukachevo on 11 July 2015 between the Right Sector militants and the people of the local ‘contraband king’).
In June 2015, the number of firearms possessed illegally by private persons in Ukraine was estimated at 6 million (only 4.5 million according to other esti mates), compared to 800,000 registered firearms. That corresponds to 11–14 fire arms (both legal and illegal) per 100 inhabitants, compared to 6.6 in 2012 (which was a similar level to the United Kingdom).216 The numbers of military weap ons held in illegal arsenals has also increased. It is therefore hardly surprising that in 2014, the number of criminal acts involving firearms increased rose by as much as 40% according to some estimates (detailed figures are not avail able), and doubled in 2015. At the same time, the number of criminal acts involv ing knives and similar objects decreased, as firearms had apparently replaced knives in the arsenals of common criminals.217
The upward trend in the number of heavy crimes also continued in 2016 (the num ber of such acts in Kyiv increased by a third within nine months).218 Interestingly, the largest rise in robberies recorded by law enforcement agencies took place in two districts of Volhynia (82% and 72% respectively); the causes for this should be seen not in a sudden rise of crime, but in the increased effectiveness of law enforcement. Various reports also suggest that law enforcement and courts treat serious crimes committed by war veterans with great indulgence. This situation does not contribute to the restoration of the state structures’ authority.
216 О. Лой, До зброї готові!, 10 December 2015, http://glavcom.ua/articles/35932.html,
accessed on 11 December 2015.
217 Ibidem.
218 Ю. Луценко, Про причини погрішення ситуації із станом злочинності та пропозиції
щодо законодавчого забезпечення проведення реформи у правоохоронних органах (summary of the prosecutor general’s testimony before the parliamentary committee), http://blogs.pravda.com.ua/authors/lucenko/57e354f186267, accessed on 22 September 2016.
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The situation in Volhynia has unexpectedly presented a new challenge for the Ukrainian authorities. In the northern districts of the Volyn, Rivne and Zhy tomir oblasts, which are heavily forested, sparsely populated and very poor, amber deposits have been exploited illegally, but under controlled, organised systems patronage, potentially reaching as far as Kyiv. At present the sharp rise in amber prices, the deepening pauperisation and the instability of state order has led to the mass illegal extraction of amber, which poses a threat to the for est and water management in the region on the one hand, and control over the export of amber by structures on the borderline of the criminal world and the nationalist organisations219. Consequently, Kiev lost control of some of these regions in 2015, and from available reports has still not recovered control over them. However, the situation does not pose a threat to Ukraine’s territorial integrity, and it is probably for this reason that Kyiv has not been paying much attention to it.