Peter Hitchens writes:
Friday night's Any Questions on BBC Radio 4,
repeated on Saturday afternoon and then available on i-player, opened with a
very interesting question about the legitimacy of the new Kiev government.
I
don't have the exact wording to hand but I think it could be fairly summed up
as 'How big does a mob have to be to supplant an elected government?'
The panel was pretty mainstream and dominated by
conventional wisdom, and rather struggled with the point of the question, which I thought very sharp and carefully-crafted.
They didn't
particularly want to consider the possibility that the Euromaidan crowd were
anything other than spotless heroes of freedom.
Eventually a sort of consensus
was reached that the Yanukovych government had lost legitimacy because it had
opened fire on what was repeatedly described as a peaceful crowd.
Once again I need to say here that I am not defending the actions of the Yanukovych state. It was corrupt, ill-governed
and not very bright.
The shooting of demonstrators is almost always wrong,
and invariably a mistake in an open society. Though the Kazakh government,
whose society is not exactly open, recently got away with it , and was
subsequently blessed by a visit from Mr Cameron.
But everyone seems to
have forgotten (or maybe it has been shown that this was untrue, in which
case I'd welcome information) that 13 Ukrainian policemen, acting under
the lawful authority of a legitimate government, were shot dead and
another 130 suffered gunshot wounds, and it was only after this that the
Yanukovych government authorised the use of lethal weapons by the police.
Demonstrators were also seen and filmed carrying firearms. I might add
that many policemen were injured in previous clashes with demonstrators, who
used firebombs and clubs without much hesitation.
It simply cannot be said, given these facts, that
the demonstration was peaceful.
I don't claim that this fact resolves any
issues. But surely people in public life ought to know that?
I think it is a
reflection on the very poor coverage of these events by British media,
that nobody on the panel, or even the chairman, seemed to be aware
of such an important fact.
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