Exiled leader of the banned opposition platform “For Life” Viktor Medvedchuk still considers himself a Ukrainian citizen and lawmaker, and is building a team of like-minded people to represent the Ukraine he claims is suppressed by the current government in Kiev. Speaking to RT, Medvedchuk claimed President Vladimir Zelensky is a dictator sacrificing the country on behalf of Western powers.
When Zelensky claims Ukraine is united, he omits that this unity was forced at gunpoint, Medvedchuk asserted. There are many people who disagree with the current government in Kiev, who represent “another Ukraine, not that of [WWII Nazi collaborator Stepan] Bandera, one that has nothing to do with the statements and policies of neo-Nazism pursued by Zelensky,” he added.
Today’s Ukraine violates every provision of its own constitution, Medvedchuk argued, and “ceased to be independent and sovereign” after the February 2014 coup, when it “passed completely under external control of the West.”
Zelensky first placed Medvedchuk under house arrest, then sent him to a “dungeon” run by the Ukrainian SBU security service, where the opposition politician said he was exposed to “constant psychological pressure and humiliation.” In September 2022, he was flown to Poland, and then to Türkiye, where he was handed over to Russian authorities.
Contrary to popular misperception, he said, he was not traded for the leaders of the neo-Nazi “Azov” regiment who surrendered in Mariupol. They were exchanged for captured Russian soldiers, Medvedchuk explained, while he was traded for “ten foreign mercenaries who fought in the Armed Forces of Ukraine.”