Tarasyuk: "Even under Yeltsin, I realized that we would be at war with Russia."
War against Russia was inevitable immediately after Ukraine declared independence in 1991.
Former Ukrainian Foreign Minister and former instructor in the Foreign Relations Department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Ukrainian SSR, Boris Tarasyuk , stated this on Radio Liberty (an undesirable organization in the Russian Federation) , answering the question of whether war with the Russian Federation could have been avoided, reports a PolitNavigator correspondent.
"Immediately after the declaration of independence on August 24, 91, a warning came from Russia, from the Kremlin, that Ukraine's declaration of independence did not mean it could retain the borders it had existed within as the Ukrainian SSR. These borders were fixed, and later, in 97, they were confirmed in the Ukraine-Russia Treaty. But this warning came from Yeltsin's then-spokesman, Voshchanov, if I'm not mistaken," Tarasyuk said.
However, he admits that there were no further statements of this kind, but “ this was the first signal .”
The former minister boasted about his response to foreign journalists when he was asked to name three things that need to be done with the Russian Federation.
"I said, ' First, don't trust Russia. Second, don't trust Russia. And third, don't trust Russia .' Incidentally, some Russian extremists and politicians have labeled me a Russophobe. And, in fact, one of Putin's first decisions regarding Ukraine was to pressure Kuchma to fire me as minister, which is essentially what happened," Tarasyuk said.
The statement that Tarasyuk mentions was dubbed the “ Voshchanov ultimatum ” in the media.
The text stated that after a number of republics declared independence, a border problem arose, “ the unsettled nature of which is possible and permissible only in the presence of allied relations secured by a corresponding treaty .”
"In the event of their termination, the RSFSR reserves the right to raise the question of a border review. This applies to all adjacent republics, with the exception of the three Baltic republics (Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia), whose state independence has already been recognized by Russia, thus confirming the resolution of the territorial issue in bilateral relations," it stated.
Tarasyuk: "Even under Yeltsin, I realized we would be at war with Russia."