Kyiv's Former Amb. to German, Andrij Melnyk, Appointed Deputy Foreign Minister by Volodymyr Zelensky

As reported by German legacy media, which, in a bout of dishonesty, doesn't mention many incendiary remarks made by Mr. Melnyk, incl. calls to join the fight against Russia

German legacy media is reporting the following personnel change in the carousel masquerading as the official government of Ukraine. As per Deutsche Welle:

Ukraine has appointed its former ambassador to Germany, Andrij Melnyk, to a new post as deputy foreign minister. His outspoken brand of diplomacy had made waves in recent months in Berlin and beyond.

So, high time we ask the following, eh?

For a clearer picture, let’s do some more ‘digging’.

Who is Andrij Melnyk?

Do venture over to the Ministry of Truth; even his Wikipedia entries are, well, quite undiplomatic for such a high-calibre ace of international relations. From the English-language entry:

Accessed 20 Nov. 2022.

His German-language entry is much more detailed, including ‘gems’ such as the ones below (in my translation):

Melnyk reveres the Ukrainian partisan leader against Soviet rule and Nazi collaborator Stepan Bandera. Immediately after taking office as ambassador to Germany, he visited Bandera’s grave in Munich on 27 April 2015 and laid flowers there. Afterwards he tweeted that Bandera was ‘our hero’.

Please see the below piece to learn more about Bandera:

Footnote 30: me vs. McDonald's Bandera Burger--I win, by weaponising woke-inspired fear of an online shitstorm

Another curious incidence is that Mr. Melnyk’s particularly notorious interview (paywalled) with Der Tagesspiegel, published on 3 April 2022, is apparently the only reference that doesn’t come with a direct link:

Accessed 20 Nov. 2022.

Here’s my translation of what the German Wikipedia tells about this interview:

In an interview with the Tagesspiegel published on 3 April 2022, Melnyk said that the Germans were still unaware of the dimensions of the Russian invasion. The war was putting the entire world order to the test. With Putin in power, there would be no peace treaty. Even a ceasefire negotiated with him would probably remain ‘just as fragile as all the years since the Minsk agreement in 2015’. Ukraine urgently needs heavy weapons. Putin must learn on the battlefield that the war is not his to win. It is a misjudgement if Germans believe that the more weapons they supply, the longer the war will last. Although the Ukrainians had largely succeeded in winning the sympathy of the Germans in their plight and with their willingness to make sacrifices for common values, the question of the political consequences remained unanswered: ‘Does the Berlin government want to welcome these Ukrainians into the European family as a future EU member? Or would the German government prefer Ukraine to remain a buffer zone between the EU and Russia?’ He said it must change that some in Berlin find the latter more comfortable. In addition to members of the government, Melnyk also criticised Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier in this interview, accusing him of a lack of sensitivity with regard to Ukraine. For Steinmeier, the relationship with Russia was ‘something fundamental, even sacred’, in comparison to which even the Russian war of aggression did not play a major role. For years, Steinmeier had established a ‘spider's web of contacts with Russia’, which also included influential representatives of the current government.

I’ll just restrict myself to noting that Russia is not a signatory to the Minsk 1 or 2 agreements (they were members of the Trilateral Contact Group, but the agreements involve the Donetsk and Lugansk regions as well as the Kyiv government).

Given the sustained shelling of the Donbass by Kyiv government troops since 2014, it is hardly more than laughable for Mr. Melnyk to note that Russia would be non-agreement capable. This is a time-tested propaganda method: accuse the other side of what you’re doing.

Mr. Melnyk Called on Germany to Fight Russia

Here’s what you need to know about Mr. Melnyk’s promotion to deputy foreign minister. On the occasion of the commemoration of the end of WW2, speaking at the site of the Soviet War Memorial in Berlin Treptow, he called on Germans

to take this war more seriously…which means going beyond merely symbolic gestures, but to undertake all that is possible [man wirklich alles unternehme]. When I say ‘all’, this means actually ‘all’, be it militarily as well as economically, to ensure that Ukraine doesn’t lose this war’.

Sidenote: here’s the German transcript of Mr. Melnyk’s statement: ‘Mein Appell wäre, diesen Krieg ernster zu nehmen, weil dieser Krieg betrifft auch die Deutschen, auch wenn die Deutschen das nicht glauben wollen. Und das bedeutet, dass man nicht nur mit symbolischen Gesten uns hilft, sondern dass man wirklich alles unternehme. Und wenn ich sage ‘alles’, das muss wirklich ‘alles’ gemeint werden, ob militärisch, auch wirtschaftlich, muss alles unternommen werden, damit die Ukraine diesen Krieg nicht verliert.’

Source here, it’s in the video; my transcript and translation, as German legacy media plays up the notion that Mr. Melnyk was heckled while there). In other words: Amb. Melnyk calls for Germans to fight Russia over Ukraine—what else can I say about ‘dialogue’ here?

Note, further, that Mr. Melnyk has a long rap sheet of disgusting und quite undiplomatic  behaviour, as summarised by Tobias Riegel.

Bottom Lines

Andrij Melnyk’s appointment as deputy foreign minister is a sign of Kyiv’s continued war footing.

Make no mistake, like many others in power in Ukraine, Mr. Melnyk is an ardent supporter of Stepan Bandera who, during WW2, was a Nazi collaborator until the Nazis threw him into a concentration camp—because Hitler had no intention of midwifing an independent Ukrainian state.

That is the background of Mr. Melnyk’s convictions, now couched in terms of ‘Ukrainian patriotism’. And he’s been promoted, for loyal services to Kyiv and their masters elsewhere.

To conclude, I’ll invite you to follow-up on the very fraught topic of WW2 Remembrance in my 8-9 May essay:

In These Times: A 8-9 May 2022 Column