Former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko has described Vladimir Putin as “absolutely rational, cold, cruel and blackly evil” and said he is determined to move into Russian history alongside Stalin and Peter the Great.
In an exclusive interview, Tymoshenko rejected the suggestion that the Russian president was “crazy.” “It acts according to its own dark logic,” he said. “He is driven by this idea of historical mission and wants to create an empire. This is their hyperobjective. It comes from a deep inner desire and belief. “
Tymoshenko, leader of the 2004 Orange Revolution and twice prime minister, had several individual meetings with Putin. They held talks in 2009 after Putin, then prime minister, cut off gas supplies to Ukraine. Tymoshenko ran for president in 2010, 2014 and 2019, finishing second twice and then third.
Up close, Putin was “always cautious” in what he said and always suspected it might be recorded, he said. “It’s from a KGB school,” he said. Prior to Russia’s large-scale invasion of Russia in February, he did not hide his belief that “there was no nation like Ukraine, no people like the Ukrainians,” he said.
His ambitions went beyond seizing Ukrainian territory and overthrowing his pro-Western and pro-NATO government, Tymoshenko suggested. Its geopolitical goal was to take over Belarus, Georgia, and Moldova as well, and control Central and Eastern Europe, including the Baltic states, just as Moscow did in Soviet times, he said.
Yulia Tymoshenko and Vladimir Putin in Yalta, Ukraine, November 2009. Photo: Aleksandr Prokopenko / EPA
Tymoshenko was in Kyiv on February 24 when Russia launched a multi-front attack in the early hours. He said political rivalries and peacetime resentments disappeared immediately. That morning he went to the presidential administration along with other senior opposition officials and met with Volodymyr Zelenskiy, whom he faced in 2019.
“We hugged and shook hands. Everyone was surprised, pale and scared. None of us had planned to leave Kyiv,” he said. “Everyone knew we had to stop until the last minute. We agreed to support our president and our army and work for victory.” Zelenskiy’s decision to stay in the capital and “overcome his fear” was important, he said.
When Russian bombs fell, Tymoshenko took refuge in the basement of the modern office building of her Batkivshchyna political party in the Podil district of Kyiv, which was hit several times by missiles. When asked if she was ready to shoot Russian soldiers, she said, “Yes. I have legal weapons. According to sources, the Kremlin put me on a death list. We were ready.”
The Russian government had always considered her an enemy, Tymoshenko said. He noted his support for Ukraine’s accession to the EU and NATO. In the 2010 presidential election, he opposed Viktor Yanukovych, who had the support of Moscow. He blamed the defeat of the outgoing president, Viktor Yushchenko, an ally of the Orange Revolution.
The following year, Yanukovych imprisoned Tymoshenko in a case widely regarded as politically motivated. “Putin and Yanukovych imprisoned me. Yanukovych was never an independent player. He was always Putin’s puppet,” he said. He was released from prison in 2014 when Yanukovych fled to Moscow following protests against Maidan corruption. Weeks later, Putin annexed Crimea and instigated a separatist uprising in eastern Ukraine.
Protesters on Maidan Square, Kyiv, February 2014. Photo: Emeric Fohlen / NurPhoto / REX
Tymoshenko spoke in her downtown office decorated with the Ukrainian flag and photos showing her with Western leaders, including Margaret Thatcher. He praised the “incredible unity” of the “anti-Putin coalition” and highlighted the United Kingdom and Boris Johnson as special mentions, as well as the United States, Canada and Poland. “We see Britain as part of the larger Ukrainian family,” he said.
Last weekend, French President Emmanuel Macron said it was important not to “humiliate” Putin, a phrase interpreted as meaning that Ukraine should sacrifice part of its territory in exchange for a realpolitik deal with Moscow. . Tymoshenko said France and Germany, criticized for pedaling slowly in arms deliveries, should not be ostracized as Europe struggles with its worst security crisis in decades.
But he said Ukraine’s international partners had to understand that the only way to end the war was to crush Russian forces on the battlefield. Without naming anyone, he said they should not become “co-conspirators of evil.” He added: “There is no peace agreement with Putin because it does not lead to peace. It would lead to a new war a few years later.”
Betting on his country was existential, he said. The Kremlin’s goal was to “depersonalize” Ukraine, stripping it of its language and culture, and leaving it weak and “atomized.” The civilized world had a unique opportunity to stop Russia and prevent it from spreading “wars, corruption, blackmail, misinformation and lack of freedom,” he said.
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Russia had largely relinquished its claim that it was only targeting Ukraine’s military infrastructure, Tymoshenko said. The killing of civilians, in cities in the Kyiv region such as Bukha and Irpin, as well as in other areas, was cruel and deliberate, he said, and Russian soldiers followed instructions from Moscow.
“It is an inseparable part of his genocide against the Ukrainian nation,” he said. “What happened in Mariupol was even worse than in Bucha, Irpin and Hostomel. I am convinced that we will be able to recover Mariupol and discover the extent of the horrific murders that have taken place. It was a tragedy, a human catastrophe on an unthinkable scale. “
Given her words, the veteran politician concluded: “This is a great battle for our territory and our freedom. It is a historic opportunity for the free world to kill this evil. “