Boris Akunin: "An attempt to sum up the results"

"My conclusions are as follows:

1. The Ukrainian state is in crisis and discord; The current government is weak and ineffective. Maybe it will get better after the elections, but for now it’s like this.

2. In problem regions, the line of division runs not along national or linguistic lines, but along social lines. The rebellion is mainly supported by people who have a very bad life: because of unemployment, because of low salaries and pensions, because of a lack of faith in the Ukrainian state, from which they have not seen anything good. These people pin their hopes for a better life on Russia because the standard of living is higher there and because they have seen enough of Russian television, which greatly distorts our reality. It’s useless to explain to these people that life in Russia isn’t easy either—they won’t believe it now..."