The First Deputy Prime Minister presented the order to a Russian deputy

confession

First Deputy Prime Minister Mykola Azarov yesterday awarded the Order “For the Revival of Ukraine”, 1st degree, to Russian State Duma deputy Konstantin Zatulin, who has the status of persona non grata in Ukraine. The Presidential Secretariat told Kommersant that they have nothing to do with this award, since the insignia presented to Mr. Zatulin is not a state award. And representatives of nationalist parties promised Mr. Azarov popular reprisal for awarding the “toy” order of “the enemy of the Ukrainian people.”

Yesterday, First Deputy Prime Minister of Ukraine Mykola Azarov presented the Order “For the Revival of Ukraine”, 1st degree, to the deputy of the Russian State Duma, head of the committee for cooperation between the Ukrainian and Russian parliaments, Konstantin Zatulin. The award awarded to Mr. Zatulin is not on the state list: the order was established by the Ukrainian Foundation for Scientific, Economic and Legal Cooperation, of which Mr. Azarov himself is the honorary president. Despite this, after presenting the award, Mr. Zatulin considered it necessary to thank the President and the Government of Ukraine “for the high honor, as well as for the good feelings and understanding” shown in connection with his arrival. “Happiness is when you are understood,” the deputy shared his joy. Mr. Zatulin came to Ukraine to participate in a meeting of the interparliamentary commission on cooperation between the Verkhovna Rada and the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation.

It is worth noting that Mr. Zatulin’s visit to Ukraine required special permission from the Security Service of Ukraine. As Kommersant has already reported, the deputy is prohibited from entering the territory of Ukraine. In June, the SBU declared him persona non grata “for encroaching on the territorial integrity of the Ukrainian state” based on information about his involvement in protests against the landing of US troops in Crimea (see Kommersant on June 6).

In August of this year, Konstantin Zatulin appealed to the Shevchenkovsky District Court of Kyiv with a demand to cancel the decision of the SBU, but the court refused to satisfy his claim. The deputy’s appeal to the Kyiv Court of Appeal was also unsuccessful: by its decision of November 30, the highest court decided to uphold the district court’s decision. Mr. Zatulin was first declared persona non grata back in 1996 - the reason was his statements that Sevastopol and Crimea are part of Russia. Then Mr. Zatulin, as chairman of the State Duma Committee on CIS Affairs, tore the national flag of Ukraine at a parliamentary meeting, after which the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry forbade the deputy to cross the border until July 28, 2001.

Mr. Zatulin's lawyer Andrey Fedur told Kommersant yesterday that he is preparing a cassation appeal to the Supreme Administrative Court of Ukraine. “If our complaint is not satisfied in this instance, there will be nothing else left but to go to the European Court of Human Rights, because the ban on the entry of Konstantin Zatulin has no legal basis - this is pure politics,” Mr. Fedur is sure. Yesterday, First Deputy Prime Minister Mykola Azarov also spoke about the illegality of the SBU ban on the entry of Mr. Zatulin: “It is a disgrace for the democratic system of our state if we prohibit the entry into the state of a member of the parliament of another state only because he thinks differently than, for example, , Boris Tarasyuk (Minister of Foreign Affairs - Kommersant)."

Meanwhile, Mr. Tarasyuk himself expressed dissatisfaction with the Deputy Prime Minister’s action yesterday. “I will not comment on the actions of Mr. Azarov, I will only say that the order was awarded to a person who has repeatedly discredited the Ukrainian state and violated Ukrainian laws,” the head of the foreign policy department told Kommersant.

The Presidential Secretariat told Kommersant that they had nothing to do with yesterday’s award ceremony and called Mr. Zatulin’s words of gratitude to the President “ridiculous.” “No one presented any state award of Ukraine or on behalf of the Ukrainian state to State Duma deputy Zatulin,” said presidential press secretary Irina Vannikova.

Representatives of nationalist parties promised Mykola Azarov “popular reprisal” for awarding Konstantin Zatulin with the “toy order.” “It’s simply outrageous that a foundation that has nothing to do with Ukraine or its revival is handing out such awards. Mykola Azarov, by his act, simply poured a bucket of vomit on Ukrainians, humiliated our sense of national dignity,” the chairman of the All-Ukrainian Association told Kommersant. Freedom" Oleg Tyagnybok. In his opinion, such “Ukrainian-hating steps” of Mykola Azarov will soon lead to a second national revolution. “But it will no longer be as ‘smooth’ and bloodless as the ‘Orange Revolution’ was,” Mr. Tyagnybok promised.

LYUBOV BORSHCHEVSKAYA

Konstantin Zatulin revived Ukraine