The article's lead section may need to be rewritten.(March 2024) |
A variety of social, economical, cultural, ethnic, and linguistic factors contributed to the sparking of unrest in eastern and southern Ukraine in 2014, and the subsequent eruption of the Russo-Ukrainian War, in the aftermath of the early 2014 Revolution of Dignity.
In eastern and southern Ukraine, Russification and ethnic Russian settlement during centuries of Russian rule caused the Russian language to attain primacy, even amongst ethnic Ukrainians. In Crimea, ethnic Russians have comprised the majority of the population since the deportation of the indigenous Crimean Tatars by Soviet General Secretary Joseph Stalin during the Second World War. This contrasts with western and central Ukraine, which were historically ruled by a variety of powers, such as the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and the Austrian Empire. [1] After the Orange Revolution in 2004, Russia launched a decade-long effort to restore its political influence in Ukraine, by playing on existing domestic fault lines and undermining the central government. [2]
The tensions between these two competing historical and cultural traditions erupted into political and social conflict during the Euromaidan, which began when then Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych refused to sign an association agreement with the European Union in November 2013. [3] Support for closer ties with Europe was strong in western and central Ukraine, whilst many in eastern and southern Ukraine traditionally favoured stronger relations with Russia. President Yanukovych, who drew most of his support from eastern regions, was forced out of office in February 2014. His ouster was followed by unrests in eastern and southern Ukraine. [4] [ failed verification – see discussion ]
After the Russo-Turkish War of 1768–1774, the Crimean Khanate, a vassal of the Ottoman Empire, formed in 1441, was made nominally independent by the Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca in 1774. [5] It was annexed by the Russian Empire in 1783 as the "Taurida Governorate". [6] The demographics of Crimea underwent dramatic changes in the centuries following the annexation. Prior to its incorporation into Russia, Crimea had been inhabited primarily by Crimean Tatars, a Turkic people who were predominately Muslim. The peninsula was also populated by Pontic Greeks (Urums), Crimean Goths, and Armenians, who were mostly Christian. In the run up to the annexation and immediately after it, Russia encouraged, and later ordered, the removal of all Christians from Crimea, and resettled them on the northern shore of the Sea of Azov, between Mariupol and Nakhichevan-on-Don. [7] [8] Empress Catherine the Great gave many of the lands she annexed to her advisors and friends. Native inhabitants of these lands were frequently forced out, spawning a large exodus of Tatars to Ottoman-controlled Anatolia. [9] Russian settlers were brought in to colonise the lands once occupied by the fleeing Tatars. By 1903, 39.7% of the population of Crimea, excluding the cities of Sevastopol and Yeni-Kale, were members of the Russian Orthodox religion. [10] 44.6% were Muslim. [10] In the context of this survey, the identifier "Muslim" was synonymous with ethnic Crimean Tatars. Russians constituted the majority of the population in the two excluded and separately-administered cities. [10] During and directly prior to this time, Crimea was considered the "heart of Russian Romanticism". [11] It was popular with Russians on holiday because of its warm climate and seaside. This association continued into the Soviet period. [11]
Crimea had autonomy within the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (SFSR) as the Crimean Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (ASSR) from 1921 until 1944. According to the Soviet Census of 1926, 42.2% of the population of the Crimean ASSR was ethnic Russian, 25% was Crimean Tatar, 10.8% was ethnic Ukrainian, 7% was Jewish, and 15% was from other ethnic groups. [12] Germans invaded the Ukrainian SSR and invaded Crimea itself with the launch of the Crimean Campaign that lasted from October 18, 1941 to July 4, 1942. The Soviets took back Crimea in 1944 with their Crimean Offensive. Soviet leader Joseph Stalin deported the entire population of Crimean Tatars from Crimea and abolished Crimean autonomy in 1944. [13] [14] At that time, the Crimean Tatars made up about one-fifth of the population of Crimea, and numbered about 183,155 people. [15] Most were sent to the deserts of Soviet-controlled Central Asia. [14] Around 45% of the deportees died during the deportation process. [16] Crimea was made the "Crimean Oblast" of the Russian SFSR. Following these events, for the first time in history, ethnic Russians comprised the majority of the population of Crimea.
Soviet first secretary Nikita Khrushchev transferred Crimea from the Russian SFSR to the Ukrainian SSR in 1954. This event passed with little fanfare, and was viewed as an insignificant "symbolic gesture", as both republics were part of the Soviet Union and answerable to the government in Moscow. [17] [18] [19] Crimean autonomy was re-established in 1991 after a referendum, just prior to the dissolution of the Soviet Union. [20]
Ukrainian independence was confirmed by a referendum held on 1 December 1991. [21] [22] In this referendum, 54% of Crimean voters supported independence from the Soviet Union. [23] This was followed by a 1992 vote by the Crimean parliament to hold a referendum on independence from Ukraine, which spawned a two-year crisis over the status of Crimea. [21] At the same time, the Supreme Soviet of Russia voted to void the cession of Crimea to Ukraine. In June of the same year, the Ukrainian government in Kyiv voted to give Crimea a large amount of autonomy as the Autonomous Republic of Crimea within Ukraine. Despite this, fighting between the Crimean government, Russian government, and Ukrainian government continued. In 1994, Russian nationalist Yuriy Meshkov won the 1994 Crimean presidential election, and implemented the earlier approved referendum on the status of Crimea. [24] [25] 1.3 million people voted in this referendum, 78.4% of whom supported greater autonomy from Ukraine, whilst 82.8% supported allowing dual Russian-Ukrainian citizenship. [26] Later in that same year, the status of Crimea as part of Ukraine was recognised by Russia, which pledged to uphold the territorial integrity of Ukraine in the Budapest Memorandum. This treaty was also signed by the United States, United Kingdom, and France. [27] [28] Ukraine revoked the Constitution of Crimea and abolished the office of President of Crimea in 1995. [29] Crimea was granted a new constitution in 1998, which granted lesser autonomy than the previous one. [20] [30] Crimean officials would later seek to restore the powers of the previous constitution. [30] Throughout the 1990s, many Crimean Tatar deportees and their descendants returned to Crimea. [31]
One of the main tensions in Russia–Ukraine relations in the aftermath of the dissolution of the Soviet Union was the status of the Black Sea Fleet, which was and is based in Sevastopol. [27] Under the 1997 Russo-Ukrainian Partition Treaty, which determined the ownership of military bases and vessels in Crimea, Russia was allowed to have up to 25,000 troops, 24 artillery systems (with a calibre smaller than 100 mm), 132 armoured vehicles, and 22 military aeroplanes in Crimea. This treaty was extended in 2010 by Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych. Under this new agreement, Russia was granted rights to garrison the Black Sea Fleet in Crimea until 2042. [32] Residents of the Crimean city of Feodosia protested against the docking of the US Navy ship "Advantage" in June 2006. [33] The protesters carried signs with anti-NATO slogans, and considered the presence of NATO-affiliated troops an "intrusion". Some commentators in Ukraine viewed the protests as being driven by a "Russian hand". [33]
In the 2010 elections to the Crimean parliament, the Party of Regions received the largest share of votes, whilst the second-placed Communist Party of Ukraine received a much smaller share. [34] Both of these political parties would later be targets of the Euromaidan movement. [35] [36] [37] Former president of Crimea Yuriy Olexandrovich Meshkov called for a referendum on restoring the 1992 Constitution of Crimea in July 2011. As a consequence of this, a local court in Crimea deported Meshkov from Ukraine for five years. [38]
According to the Ukrainian Census of 2001, ethnic Russians comprised 58.5% of the population of Crimea. [39] The next two largest ethnic groups were Ukrainians, who comprised 24% of the population, and Crimean Tatars, who comprised 10.2%. Other minority ethnic groups recorded as present in Crimea include Belarusians and Armenians. 77% of the population of Crimea reported their native language as Russian, 11.4% indicated Crimean Tatar, and 10.1% indicated Ukrainian. [40]
Donbas (Ukrainian : Донбас; Russian : Донба́сс), or the Donets Basin, is a region that is today composed of the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts of Ukraine. [41] [42] Previously known for being "Wild Fields" (Ukrainian : дике поле, dyke pole), the area that is now called the Donbas was largely under control of the Ukrainian Cossack Hetmanate and the Turkic Crimean Khanate until the mid-late 18th century, when the Russian Empire, led by Empress Catherine II, conquered the Hetmanate and annexed the Khanate. [43] It named the conquered territories "New Russia" (Russian : Новоро́ссия, Novorossiya). As the Industrial Revolution took hold across Europe, the vast coal resources of the Donbas began to be exploited in the mid-late 19th century. This led to a population boom in the region, largely driven by Russian settlers. [44] In 1858, the population of the region was 700,767. By 1897, it had reached 1,453,109. According to the Russian Imperial Census of 1897, ethnic Ukrainians comprised 52.4% of the population of region, whilst ethnic Russians comprised 28.7%. [45] Ethnic Greeks, Germans, Jews and Tatars also had a significant presence in the Donbas, particularly in the district of Mariupol, where they comprised 36.7% of the population. [46] Despite this, Russians constituted the majority of the industrial work-force. Ukrainians dominated rural areas, but cities were often inhabited solely by Russians who had come seeking work in the region's heavy industries. [47] Those ethnic Ukrainians who did move to the cities for work were quickly assimilated into the Russian-speaking worker class. [48]
Ukrainians in the Donbas were greatly affected by the 1932–33 Holodomor famine and the Russification policy of Joseph Stalin. As most ethnic Ukrainians were rural peasant farmers (called "kulaks" by the Soviet regime), they bore the brunt of the famine. [49] [50] According to the Association of Ukrainians in Great Britain, the population of the area that is now Luhansk Oblast declined by 25% as a result of the famine, whereas it declined by 15–20% in the area that is now Donetsk Oblast. [51] According to one estimate, 81.3% of those who died during the famine in the Ukrainian SSR were ethnic Ukrainians, whilst only 4.5% were ethnic Russians. [52] During the reconstruction of the Donbas after the Second World War, many Russian workers arrived to repopulate the region, further altering the population balance. In 1926, 639,000 ethnic Russians resided in the Donbas. [53] By 1959, the ethnic Russian population had more than doubled to 2.55 million. Russification was further advanced by the 1958–59 Soviet educational reforms, which led to the nigh elimination of all Ukrainian language schooling in the Donbas. [54] [55] By the time of the Soviet Census of 1989, 45% of the population of the Donbas reported their ethnicity as Russian. [56]
After the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, residents of the Donbas were generally in favour of stronger ties with Russia, in contrast to the rest of Ukraine. A 1993 strike by miners in the region called for a federal Ukraine and economic autonomy for Donbas. [56] This was followed by a 1994 consultative referendum on various constitutional questions in Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, held concurrently with the first parliamentary elections in independent Ukraine. [57] These questions included whether Russian should be enshrined as an official language of Ukraine, whether Russian should be the language of administration in Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, whether Ukraine should federalise, and whether Ukraine should have closer ties with the Commonwealth of Independent States. [58] Close to 90% of voters voted in favour of these propositions. [59] None of them were adopted: Ukraine remained a unitary state, Ukrainian was retained as the sole official language, and the Donbas gained no autonomy. [56]
Donbas voters and politicians had wide influence over Ukrainian politics until the 2004 Orange Revolution. [60] Then Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych, who was the target of that revolution, is from the Donbas, and also found most of his support there. At the revolution's height, pro-Yanukovych regional politicians in the Donbas called for a referendum on the establishment of a "South-East Ukrainian Autonomous Republic", or for secession from Ukraine. [60] [61] [62] [63] This did not happen, and Yanukovych's Party of Regions went on to win the 2006 Ukrainian parliamentary election. He was later elected president in 2010. His government, led by Prime Minister Mykola Azarov, implemented a controversial regional language law in 2012. This law granted a language the status of "regional language" where the percentage of representatives of its ethnic group exceeded 10% of the total population of a defined administrative district. [64] Regional language status allowed use of minority languages in courts, schools and other government institutions in these areas of Ukraine. This meant that the Russian language received recognition in the Donbas for the first time since Ukrainian independence. [64]
According to the Ukrainian Census of 2001, 57.2% of the population of the Donbas was ethnic Ukrainian, 38.5% was ethnic Russian, and 4.3% belonged to other ethnic groups, mainly Greeks (1.1%) and Belarusians (0.9%). [65] 72.8% of the population reported that their native language was Russian, whilst 26.1% reported that it was Ukrainian. [66] Other languages, spoken mainly by minority ethnic groups, accounted for 1.1% of the population. Amongst these groups, only the Roma were reported as not using Russian in daily life, citing Romani instead. [66]
Large numbers of ethnic Ukrainian settlers first came to the land that is now Kharkiv Oblast, previously a sparsely populated region, around the time of the 1648–57 Khmelnytsky uprising. These settlers had fled fighting between Ukrainian Cossacks and the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth near the Dnieper River. The area that they settled in was named "Sloboda Ukraine" (Ukrainian : Слобiдська Україна, Slobidska Ukraina). [67] The region had an autonomous Cossack government until it was abolished by Catherine the Great in 1765. [68] By 1832, the urban-rural divide became firmly entrenched: 50% of merchants were ethnic Russians, as were 45% of factory owners. [67] In line with this increasing Russification, the name Sloboda Ukraine was replaced by Kharkov Governorate in 1835. Ethnic Russians in agriculture-dominated Kharkiv were never as numerous as in industrial Donbas, and the region always retained a distinct Ukrainian culture. [67] The Imperial Census of 1897 recorded the native language of 80.6% of the population of Kharkov Governorate as Ukrainian, whereas Russian was recorded as the native language of only 17.7% of the population. [69]
The city of Kharkiv became the capital of the Ukrainian SSR in 1922. During the 1932–33 Holodomor famine, the ethnic Ukrainian-populated countryside of Kharkiv Oblast was devastated. [70] At the same time, the city of Kharkiv became heavily industrialised, and its ethnic Russian population boomed. By the time of the Soviet Census of 1989, 33.2% of the population of Kharkiv Oblast identified as ethnic Russian, and 48.1% of the population reported that their native language was Russian. [71] [72]
According to the Ukrainian Census of 2001, ethnic Ukrainians comprised 70.7% of the population of Kharkiv Oblast, whilst ethnic Russians comprised 25.6%. [73] Other minority ethnic groups recorded as present in Kharkiv Oblast include Armenians, Jews, and Belarusians. 53.8% of the population reported that their native language was Ukrainian, whilst 44.3% reported that it was Russian. [72]
At the time of the Imperial Census of 1897, the population of the approximate area of modern Odesa Oblast was 1,115,949. [74] According to that census, the mother tongue of 33.9% of the population was Ukrainian, 26.7% was Russian, 16.1% was Jewish, 9.2% was Moldavian, 8.6% was German, 2% was Polish, and 1.6% was Bulgarian. [74] [ non-primary source needed ]
In the early period of the Ukrainian SSR, Odesa Governorate was formed out of parts of the former Kherson Governorate. [75] This new area formed the basis for modern Odesa Oblast. Throughout the interwar period, Budjak was part of the Kingdom of Romania. The 1932–33 Holodomor famine had a profound demographic effect on the region. [76] Its population declined by 15–20%. [51] About a decade later, the Nazi occupation of Ukraine during the Second World War had a devastating impact on the region's previously large Jewish population. [77] Also during the war, the ethnically-diverse Budjak was annexed to the Ukrainian SSR as Izmail Oblast. It was merged into Odesa Oblast in 1954.
By the time of the Soviet Census of 1989, 27.4% of the population of Odesa Oblast identified themselves as ethnic Russian, whilst 55.2% identified themselves as ethnic Ukrainians. [78] [79] The remainder was made up mostly of Moldavians, Bulgarians and Gagauz.
According to the Ukrainian Census of 2001, ethnic Ukrainians comprised 62.8% of the population of Odesa Oblast, whilst ethnic Russians comprised 20.7%. [79] Significant Bulgarian and Moldavian communities are present, centred on the historical region of Budjak. These comprised 6.1% and 5% of the population of Odesa Oblast respectively. 46.3% of the population reported that their native language was Ukrainian, whilst 41.9% reported that it was Russian. [80] 11.8% specified other languages, mainly Bulgarian and Moldavian.
According to the United Nations, Ukraine has a population of 36,744,636 as of 2023. In July 2023, Reuters reported that due to the refugee outpouring into Western Europe, the population of Kyiv-controlled areas may have decreased to as low as 28 million. This is a steep decline from 2020, when it had a population of almost 42 million people. This is in large part due to the ongoing Ukrainian refugee crisis and loss of territory caused by Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The most recent census of a post-Soviet Ukraine occurred over 20 years ago, in 2001. Thus, much of the information presented here could be inaccurate and/or outdated.
Donetsk Oblast, also referred to as Donechchyna, is an oblast in eastern Ukraine. It is Ukraine's most populous province, with around 4.1 million residents. Its administrative centre is Donetsk, though due to the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian War, the regional administration was moved to Kramatorsk. Historically, the region has been an important part of the Donbas region. From its creation in 1938 until November 1961, it bore the name Stalino Oblast, in honour of Joseph Stalin. As part of the de-Stalinization process, it was renamed after the Siversky Donets river, the main artery of Eastern Ukraine. Its population is estimated at 4,100,280.
The Donbas or Donbass is a historical, cultural, and economic region in eastern Ukraine. Parts of the Donbas are occupied by Russia as a result of the Russo-Ukrainian War.
Crimean Tatars or Crimeans are a Turkic ethnic group and nation native to Crimea. The formation and ethnogenesis of Crimean Tatars occurred during the 13th–17th centuries, uniting Cumans, who appeared in Crimea in the 10th century, with other peoples who had inhabited Crimea since ancient times and gradually underwent Tatarization, including Greeks, Italians, Goths, Sarmatians, English and others.
Taurida Governorate was an administrative-territorial unit (guberniya) of the Russian Empire. It included the territory of the Crimean Peninsula and the mainland between the lower Dnieper River with the coasts of the Black Sea and Sea of Azov. It formed after Taurida Oblast was abolished in 1802 during the course of Paul I's administrative reform of the territories of the former Crimean Khanate which were annexed by Russia in 1783. The governorate's centre was the city of Simferopol. The name of the province was derived from Taurida, a historical name for Crimea.
Armenians in Ukraine are ethnic Armenians who live in Ukraine. They number 99,894 according to the 2001 Ukrainian census. However, the country is also host to a number of Armenian guest workers which has yet to be ascertained. The Armenian population in Ukraine has nearly doubled since the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1989, largely due to instability in the Caucasus. Ukraine was home to the fifth largest Armenian community in the world before the invasion by Russia displaced millions of people.
Christianity is the predominant religion in Ukraine, with 85% of the population identifying as Christian according to a 2022 survey conducted by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS). Seventy-two percent of the population avowed fidelity to an Eastern Orthodox Church: 54% of Ukrainians proclaimed adherence to the autocephalous Orthodox Church of Ukraine; 14% identified as Orthodox Christian without specifying a church affiliation; 4% associated with the Moscow Patriarchate. Another 9% of Ukrainians professed devotion to the Catholic Church in Ukraine: 8% Ukrainian Greek Catholics and 1% Latin Catholics. Two percent of the population declared affiliation to a mainstream Protestant Church, and a further 2% identified with some alternative sect of Christianity.
Russian is the most common first language in the Donbas and Crimea regions of Ukraine and the city of Kharkiv, and the predominant language in large cities in the eastern and southern portions of the country. The usage and status of the language is the subject of political disputes. Ukrainian is the country's only state language since the adoption of the 1996 Constitution, which prohibits an official bilingual system at state level but also guarantees the free development, use and protection of Russian and other languages of national minorities. In 2017 a new Law on Education was passed which restricted the use of Russian as a language of instruction. Nevertheless, Russian remains a widely used language in Ukraine in pop culture and in informal and business communication.
Russians are the largest ethnic minority in Ukraine. This community forms the largest single Russian community outside of Russia in the world. In the 2001 Ukrainian census, 8,334,100 identified as ethnic Russians ; this is the combined figure for persons originating from outside of Ukraine and the Ukrainian-born population declaring Russian ethnicity.
Ukrainian Greeks are a Greek minority that reside in or used to reside in the territory of modern Ukraine. The majority of Ukrainian Greeks live in Donetsk Oblast and are particularly concentrated around the city of Mariupol.
Eastern Ukraine or east Ukraine is primarily the territory of Ukraine east of the Dnipro river, particularly Kharkiv, Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts (provinces). Dnipropetrovsk and Zaporizhzhia oblasts are often also regarded as "eastern Ukraine". In regard to traditional territories, the area encompasses portions of the southern Sloboda Ukraine, Donbas, the eastern Azov Littoral (Pryazovia).
Lenine Raion or Yedy-Kuiu Raion was one of the twenty-five districts of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea in Ukraine until its abolition in 2020. It continues to be used by the Russian administration known as the Republic of Crimea, as Russia has occupied Crimea since 2014.
Administrative divisions development in Ukraine reviews the history of changes in the administrative divisions of Ukraine, in chronological order.
During its existence from 1919 to 1991, the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic consisted of many administrative divisions. Itself part of the highly centralized Soviet Union, sub-national divisions in the Ukrainian SSR were subordinate to higher executive authorities and derived their power from them. Throughout the Ukrainian SSR's history, other national subdivisions were established in the republic, including guberniyas and okrugs, before finally being reorganized into their present structure as oblasts. At the time of the Ukrainian SSR's independence from the Soviet Union, the country was composed of 25 oblasts (provinces) and two cities with special status, Kiev, the capital, and Sevastopol, respectively.
The Russia–Ukraine border is the de jure international boundary between Russia and Ukraine. Over land, the border spans five Russian oblasts and five Ukrainian oblasts. Due to the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian War, which began in early 2014, the de facto border between Russia and Ukraine is different from the legal border recognized by the United Nations. As of 2024, Russia is militarily occupying a significant portion of Ukraine.
From the end of February 2014, demonstrations by Russian-backed, pro-Russian, and anti-government groups took place in major cities across the eastern and southern regions of Ukraine in the aftermath of the Euromaidan and the Revolution of Dignity, which resulted in the ousting of Russian-leaning President Viktor Yanukovych. The unrest, which was supported by Russian military and intelligence, belongs to the early stages of the Russo-Ukrainian War.
The Autonomous Republic of Crimea is an administrative division of Ukraine encompassing most of Crimea that was annexed by Russia in 2014. The Autonomous Republic of Crimea occupies most of the peninsula, while the City of Sevastopol occupies the rest.
Regionalism in Ukraine has been a significant force during the building of an independent state after the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. While most acutely this issue manifested itself during the 2014 pro-Russian unrest in Ukraine, other ethnic minorities in Ukraine sought for greater political or economical autonomy during 1990s. These movements, while not being secessionist, were perceived by central government as a threat to the unity of the state.
Novorossiya is a historical name, used during the era of the Russian Empire for an administrative area that would later become the southern mainland of Ukraine: the region immediately north of the Black Sea and Crimea. The province fell largely within a slightly wider area known in Ukrainian as the Stepovyna "Steppe Land", or Nyz "Lower Land". The name Novorossiya, which means New Russia, entered official usage in 1764, after the Russian Empire conquered the Crimean Khanate, and annexed its territories, when Novorossiya Governorate was founded. Official usage of the name ceased after 1917, when the entire area was incorporated in the Ukrainian People's Republic.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to the Russo-Ukrainian War:
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