Kyiv, Ukraine. As an investigative journalist, then an activist, and later a legislator, Yehor Soboliev sought to expose corruption in business and government as a way to defend Ukraine democracy in the making.
Now, as a soldier fighting Russia, he’s had to put those goals aside as he fights alongside some of the people he once tried to take down.
“Until victory, we are on the same side,” said Soboliev, a lieutenant in a frontline drone unit. “But maybe – definitely – after the victory, we should separate ourselves from each other. And we must continue that fight to make our country more honest, more responsible and more helpful to its citizens.”
Ukraine has been trying for years build a western style democracy, though not without some bumps in the road as he shed habits from his Soviet past. Russia’s full-scale invasion two years ago raised the stakes in these democracy-building efforts, which are critical to Ukraine’s goal of join the european union and NATO.
Soboliev’s sentiments capture a paradox within Ukraine: to push back Russia and remain a democracy, it has felt forced to temporarily suspend or restrict some democratic ideals.
Elections have been postponed, a once-robust media has been curtailed, the fight against corruption has taken a back seat on the agenda, and freedom of movement and assembly has been curtailed by martial law.
And as Russia attacks Ukrainian cities and makes gains on the battlefield, the unity brought about by the invasion (and sense of common purpose crucial to defending democracy—have come under increasing pressure.
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This story, supported by the Pulitzer Center for Crisis Reporting, is part of an ongoing Associated Press series covering threats to democracy in Europe.
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When the comedian became a politician Volodymyr Zelensky was elected president of Ukraine in 2019, promised to crack down on corruption which had flourished for decades after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
The war has not made it easier. Corruption exists on a “terrifying scale” in Ukraine, the pro-democracy organization Freedom House said in a February report, noting that it “metastasized within the military in 2023,” especially around defense contracts and men seeking exemptions from service. mandatory military.
The European Union says Ukraine must reduce corruption before it can join the 27-nation bloc and in November said the country had made “some progress” but needed to do more, especially in “high-level cases.” Ukraine’s defense minister Minister of AgricultureThe top prosecutor, the intelligence chief and other senior officials have been ousted in the past two years, and last year the president of the Supreme Court was arrested for allegedly accepting bribes.
But Ukraine’s judiciary has been an obstacle. After Zelenskyy took office, Ukraine’s top court said officials no longer needed to declare their assets in an electronic registry. That decision was overturned, in part due to public pressure, but it was just one of many that have undermined anti-corruption efforts.
Still, Olha Aivazovska, who chairs the pro-democracy charity OPORA, believes the pressure to root out corruption will continue thanks to Ukraine’s desire for EU membership.
“Ukrainian politicians will not win any elections after the end of the war if they do not succeed on the path of EU integration,” he said.
zelensky postponed indefinitely 2024 presidential elections due to war. With nearly a fifth of Ukraine occupied by Russia and millions of citizens displaced from their homes, Ukraine’s opposition leaders supported the decision and opinion polls suggest that a majority of Ukrainians agree.
But some Ukrainians complain about the power Zelenskyy has amassed. Criticism of him increased last year after Ukraine’s failed counteroffensive, and political rivals are testing the waters.
kyiv Mayor Vitalii Klitschko accused Zelenskyy of becoming increasingly autocratic, citing the replacement of some elected mayors with military officials. Zelenskyy’s immediate predecessor as president, candy magnate Petro Poroshenko, says he is planning a post-war return. And in a possible sign of his desire to sideline his rivals, Zelenskyy fired the country’s popular military chief, General Valerii Zaluzhnyi, in February.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has used the canceled election to question Zelenskyy’s legitimacy. The idea that Zelenskyy is undemocratic has been echoed in the United States by some Republicans in Congress who oppose military support for Ukraine.
Aivazovska rejects that argument. “In times of war, Ukraine can be a democracy even without elections,” she said, as long as it strengthens its media, its local governments and its civil society organizations.
“Russia formally held elections in March, but that does not mean that Russia is a democratic state,” he said. “We need real democracy in Ukraine for development, not fake democracy like Russia has.”
Shortly after the invasion, a handful of Ukrainian television networks combined resources to create a 24/7 channel, the “United News Telemarathon,” as a way to ensure continuity.
Public trust in the channel is low, as are ratings, according to Reporters Without Borders, a journalism advocacy group that has called for the agreement to be broken. The US State Department said the consolidation stifled competition and “allowed for an unprecedented level of control” by the government by effectively establishing a single authorized broadcaster.
Ukraine has a vigorous online media that includes widely read investigative outlets, although some independent journalists say they have faced dirty tricks from authorities.
In January, the Committee to Protect Journalists called on the government to investigate threats against journalist Yuriy Nikolov, whose apartment door was covered in notes calling him a traitor and draft evader after he wrote about corruption in the Ministry of Defense. That same month, online investigative outfit Bihus.Info said its journalists had been wiretapped and surreptitiously filmed after a video was published purportedly showing employees taking drugs at a party.
In Reporters Without Borders’ 2024 press freedom index, Ukraine ranked 61st out of 180 countries surveyed, up from 79th last year. The group said the situation is improving, citing a reduction in political interference, an open media and May’s decision to reinstate journalists to cover parliament.
Marichka Padalko, a television presenter whose channel is part of the Telethon, said Ukrainian journalists know they must fight to ensure a free press.
“All governments are friends of the press at first, and then they want to control it,” said Padalko, who is married to Soboliev, the former lawmaker who is now part of the frontline drone unit. “There is a lot of self-censorship among Ukrainian journalists. A lot depends on the individual decisions you make.”
Martial law, imposed on the day Russia launched its full-scale invasion, gave Ukraine’s government power to expropriate property, impose curfews, limit people’s movement, ban gatherings and more.
Men between 18 and 60 are prohibited from leaving the country without permission and must register with the military. However, there has been an illicit exodus of men of fighting age.
With Ukraine troops outnumbered Faced with repeated attempts by the much larger Russian army to push them back, in April the government lowered the draft age and announced that it was suspend passport renewal and consular services for men of draft age who are outside the country.
Some human rights groups criticized the measure aimed at putting pressure on expatriates to register for the draft. But it found widespread support within Ukraine, where the divide between those who stayed and those who left could become a fault line that threatens social unity in the future.
Aivazovska, the pro-democracy activist, said the military finds it “difficult to accept that many others do not want to serve.” And those who have left fear that society “won’t accept them” if they return when the war ends, she said.
Still, research suggests that the war has not destroyed Ukrainians’ faith in democracy and may have strengthened it.
About 59% of Ukrainians surveyed by the kyiv International Institute of Sociology said they felt democracy was more important than having a strong leader (up from 31% before the war).
In the latest survey, respondents expressed that “Ukraine is a democratic state, but not a full democracy,” said the institute’s executive director, Anton Grushetskyi.
Twice in the last two decades, Ukrainians have taken to the streets to defend democratic decisions. In 2004, mass protests against attempted electoral fraud brought pro-Western President Viktor Yushchenko to power in what became known as the Orange Revolution.
In late 2013, Moscow-friendly President Viktor Yanukovych ruled out a deal to bring Ukraine closer to the EU. Protesters flooded kyiv’s Independence Square and were met by brutal police repression. Yanukovych was eventually overthrown in what became known as the Revolution of Dignity.
Putin annexed Crimea soon after, and then Moscow-backed separatists began an uprising in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine that grew into a conflict that left thousands dead.
More than two years after Putin escalated his conflict with a full-scale invasion, many Ukrainians are tired and traumatized by a war in which victory seems remote. But overall, they do not feel powerless to influence events, something experts say is key to the country’s resilience.
Political scientist Olexiy Haran said Ukraine has retained an impressive level of democracy despite the war.
“And it’s definitely not just because of our government, but also because of the opposition, civil society, the expert community and the media,” he said.
Soboliev, who joined the army on invasion day in February 2022, was one of the organizers of the 2013 protests against Yanukovych and sees the current war as an extension of that fight for democracy.
“I wrote about democracy. I tried to build to improve democracy and now I am fighting for it,” he stated.
Sitting in the family’s apartment in kyiv as her husband prepared for a deployment to the front, Padalko admitted that democracy “is fighting during the war.”
“But we need to bring a new democracy to Ukraine once the war is over,” he said.
His son Misha, who was seven when Russia seized Crimea and 15 when the full-scale invasion began, once dreamed of being a professional soccer player. He is now 17 years old, focused on his studies and, in his free time from classes, he built a drone to send to his father’s unit.
“But then I understand that good food and other good things (good friendships, relationships) can only exist in a free state,” he said. “For me it is a motivation to work hard every day and win this war for independence.”
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Associated Press writers Illia Novikov and Alex Babenko in kyiv contributed to this report.
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