Billionaire Kolomoisky calls upon Ukraine to realign with Russia

Billionaire Ihor Kolomoisky, Ukraine’s most
influential oligarch at the moment, called for Ukraine to realign itself
geopolitically with Russia in a sensational interview published on Nov. 13 on
the nytimes.com news site. Kolomoisky offered the argument posed by Ukraine’s
pro-Russian forces for years, which is that “the European Union and NATO will
never take in Ukraine, so it would be best to accept reality and not even try,”
the nytimes.com reported, citing his words. “There’s no use in wasting time on
empty talk, whereas Russia would love to bring us into a new Warsaw Pact,”
Kolomoisky said. “They’re stronger anyway. We have to improve our relations.”
Ukrainians no longer want to be at war, he said, while the U.S. “are forcing us
to be at war, and not even giving us the money for it.”

Recall, Kolomoisky was the main sponsor for the
presidential election campaign of Volodymyr Zelensky, promoting his candidacy
on his influential mass media resources. Kolomoisky had been the biggest target
of former President Poroshenko’s “deoligarchization” campaign, having lost
control of his stakes in Privatbank and Ukrnafta and being accused of hatching
a USD 5 bln fraud. Kolomoisky distinguished himself in 2014 for offering
support to Ukrainian nationalists and paramilitaries who volunteered to thwart
advancing pro-Russian armies in eastern Ukraine when Ukraine’s Armed Forces
were caught offguard and ill-prepared. At the time, he told a press conference
in Kyiv that Ukraine’s future was to become a normal eastern European country.

In the nytimes.com interview, Kolomoisky’s tone was
directly opposite. “Give it five, 10 years, and the blood will be forgotten,”
Kolomoisky said about the war in Donbas. “I showed that in 2014 that I don’t
want to be with Russia. I’m describing, objectively, what I’m seeing and where
things are heading.” He said financing from Russia could replace loans from the
IMF, which has pushed for anti-corruption reforms that annoy Ukraine’s
entrenched business interests. “We’ll take USD 100 bln from the Russians,” he
said. “I think they’d love to give it to us today. What’s the fastest way to
resolve issues and restore the relationship? Only money.”

For Kolomoisky, the enmity towards the U.S. is
personal, the nytimes.com news site reported. He said he believes he is a
target of the F.B.I., which is reported to have started a financial-crimes
probe into his activities. During the U.S. impeachment hearings, Fiona Hill,
the former Europe and Russia adviser at the White House, told lawmakers that
she was “extremely concerned” by Kolomoisky’s influence with Zelensky. George
Kent, a senior U.S. State Department official, said he told Zelensky that his willing
to break with Kolomoisky – “somebody who had such a bad reputation” – would be
a litmus test for his independence.

Zenon Zawada: Kolomoisky’s
call for Ukraine to abandon its Western integration aspirations comes as no
surprise as he has been increasingly making comments favorable to Russia in the
last year. In late May, he made the reckless statement
that Ukraine abandon its cooperation with the IMF and default on its loan
obligations. His reputation in the West worsened even further when former
National Bank Governor Valeria Gontareva accused him of attempting to
assassinate her, blaming him for several attacks against her in recent months,
including the arson of her suburban Kyiv
residence. Kolomoisky worsened his reputation even further in late October with
his boorish response ridiculing the
accusations and hurling vicious insults at Gontareva.

Kolomoisky isn’t the first oligarch to call for
scaling back Western integration hopes. Fellow Dnipro native and billionaire Victor Pinchuk suggested in a
December 2017 column for the Wall Street Journal that Ukraine suspend talks on
EU membership and settle for privileged partner status. We believe Zelensky’s
plans to find peace in Donbas are part of this agenda by Ukraine’s elites to
end the war and renew ties with Russia. It’s no coincidence that former
President Kuchma, Pinchuk’s father-in-law and business partner, was reappointed by Zelensky
to negotiate a peace in the Trilateral Contact Group talks in Minsk. Being a
professional performer, Zelensky simply has the better ability to spin these
plans to the public than the boorish, course Kolomoisky.

If Kolomoisky deserves credit for anything, it’s
for recognizing that Ukraine’s Euro-Atlantic integration is impossible if it
wants to secure peace in Donbas, which has been our firm and consistent
position. The Kremlin will make sure that any agreement on the Minsk Accords
will give the regions of Donetsk and Luhansk enough influence to act as a fifth
column and undermine any legislative and diplomatic efforts towards further
integration into Euro-Atlantic structures.