Words should have meanings – especially those used in important bills. So let’s call things by their names.
Let us remember that the un-adopted draft law No. 6400, the ideological inspiration for which came from Deputy Speaker Oksana Syroyid, was at the beginning of 2017 referred to for short by journalists and politicians as “the bill on the occupied territories.” In this case, the short title reflected the essence of the bill – its full title was “On the Territories of Ukraine that are Temporarily Occupied by the Russian Federation.”
In contrast, the president’s draft law No. 7163 is for short referred to in terms of “reintegration” or “de-occupation” – which sounds a lot nicer than “occupied territories.” However, it’s complete nonsense – neither of these words correspond to what’s actually contained within the draft law.
As far as I see it, those who are aligned with the president and his political force, the Bloc of Petro Poroshenko, are much more likely to say this draft law is about “reintegration,” as if trying to give the impression that Poroshenko is not throwing away these territories, and that he cares about the occupied Donbas.
Meanwhile, unlike the Bloc of Petro Poroshenko, the People’s Front prefers to say the draft law is about “de-occupation,” putting on a more militaristic emphasis.
Each (the “reintegrators” and the “de-occupiers”) are echoed by journalists or experts, depending on their own opinions about what should be done with the Donbas.
But unfortunately, there’s nothing written in this law about reintegration or de-occupation. By using these words and trying to dumb-down their messages for the public – knowingly or not – the politicians and journalists are misleading people and raising their expectations too high.
I became even more convinced that we were confusing everybody with this terminology after meeting with foreign diplomats.
“It is true that the Verkhovna Rada has given the president the authority to start military operations for the de-occupation of Donetsk and Luhansk?” one asked.
“Why can’t it be possible during reintegration to establish mechanisms to pay pensions to the residents of the occupied Donbas?” asked another.
Those are just some of the questions about what is planned, and not planned, under this law. I don’t know what got into the final reports on this law that the embassies prepared for their capitals, but I think the communication work for this draft law was hardly satisfactory.
In my opinion, the official title of the law – “On the Specifics of State Policy on Ensuring the Sovereignty of the Ukrainian State over the Temporarily Occupied Territories in Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts” – while being a bit of a mouthful, fully reflects what it actually does, which is this:
The Verkhovna Rada, in the fourth year of Russia’s military aggression against Ukraine, gave a clearer political signal and defined certain specifics of state policy to the aggressor country and the occupied territories, made reference to the international documents on which our position is based, and modified the organizational and legal ways for using the armed forces and law-enforcement forces in the war zone.
In addition, it was decided to cancel the court fees for claims made against the Russian Federation, provide the status of participants of hostilities to medics, and introduce a few more relatively small innovations.
Unfortunately, a number of unconstitutional provisions were also approved to increase the powers of the president, and these could well be challenged in the Constitutional Court, leading to certain articles, or even the entire law, being declared unconstitutional.
The words “reintegration” and “de-occupation” are not to be found in the text, and likewise there is no indication that any actions in this regard will be taken as a result of the adoption of this bill.
So let’s call things by their names.
Oleksiy (Alex) Ryabchyn is a member of the Ukrainian parliament from the Batkivshyna Party, and Chairman of the Subcommittee on Energy Saving of the Committee on Energy Efficiency of the Fuel and Energy Complex, Nuclear Policy, and Nuclear Safety.
This blog post was first published on Jan. 22 on the website of the Ukrainian online newspaper Ukrainska Pravda.
