Ukraine is a bastion of freedom, democracy and human rights... right?

Since the beginning of Russia's Special Military Operation in Ukraine, the conflict has been universally characterised in the western media and by western politicians as a battle between democracy and autocracy/dictatorship, with Ukraine firmly on the side of democracy. If such an insulting oversimplification were to be taken seriously (and not everyone does), what exactly are the criteria by which Ukraine could be judged to be a democracy and Russia an autocracy?

Freedom of the press

Since 2019, laws have been introduced in Ukraine that curtail press freedom in the name of 'fighting disinformation' or 'stopping the spread of fake news'. In practice this means that the Ukrainian National Council for Radio and Television Broadcasting are able to block websites and TV and radio stations, if they don't approve of what they're saying. In February 2021, they used these powers to shut down three TV stations. In January 2023, the draft bill introduced in 2019 was passed.

Freedom of opposition political parties

Within a month of the start of the SMO, eleven political parties were banned due to having 'links to Russia'. Being accused of having links to Russia is a vague accusation that could apply to an awful lot of people in Ukraine, especially in the east of the country. 'Pro-Russian' politician Viktor Medvedchuk was taken into SBU custody in April 2022, and Zelensky bizarrely offered to exchange him with Russia for Ukrainian prisoners of war... even though Medvedchuk is himself Ukrainian. He had previously been under house arrest, under investigation for allegedly having connections to separatist fighters in the DPR and LPR, and for having profited from Crimea after it was annexed by/voted to join Russia.

Freedom of religion

In December 2022, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate was banned, on the grounds that it was affiliated with Moscow. The SBU raided a number of churches. There has been widespread outrage about this, not that you would know this from the western press. The UK even sanctioned Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill in June 2022 for his support for the SMO.

Human rights

The US Department of State's Ukraine 2019 Human Rights Report states that

Significant human rights issues included: unlawful or arbitrary killings; torture and other abuse of detainees by law enforcement personnel; harsh and life-threatening conditions in prisons and detention centers; arbitrary arrest and detention; substantial problems with the independence of the judiciary; restrictions on freedom of expression, the press, and the internet, including violence against journalists, censorship, and blocking of websites; refoulement; widespread government corruption; and crimes involving violence or threat of violence targeting persons with disabilities, ethnic minorities, and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex (LGBTI) persons.

The report goes on to say that similar human rights abuses were reported in Russia-controlled DPR, LPR and Crimea, which is of course equally deplorable - but this doesn't mean that the abuse in government-controlled Ukraine didn't happen. The UN's 2021 Report on the Human Rights situation in Ukraine states that the human rights situation had improved, but still details abuses by both sides.

So in the context of the SMO, why is Ukraine a defender of democracy despite the abuses, but Russia is an aggressor because of the abuses? Since February 2022 I've seen some very upsetting videos of assaults on (and murders of) civilians suspected of being pro-Russian, by both Ukrainian security forces and paramilitaries, all of which were presented proudly, as warnings. To say nothing of the videos of abuse and murder of Russian or Russia-aligned surrendered military prisoners, or the extortion videos/calls made to the families of captured Russian servicemen to extract ransoms for their lives or physical integrity, of which there are many. I haven't seen any similar videos purporting to show Russians doing such things to Ukrainians, either civilians or military, but there are numerous allegations of the existing.

Searching for news stories about ransom videos for Ukrainian PoWs, there is one story that gets repeated in numerous outlets, alleging that the mother of a Ukrainian soldier posted on Facebook that she had been sent a video of her son being interrogated by Russian forces, and that they had demanded €5000 from her, or he would be executed. Bizarrely, she says that the kidnappers also screamed "Slava Ukraini" into the phone. The alleged Facebook post has been deleted, but the video in question was tweeted by Mikhailo Podolyak, adviser to president Zelensky. In it, the soldier says he is a member of the 109th territorial defense brigade of Donetsk, that he hasn't been hit "except this time"(?) and that he does not need medical attention. There is nothing in the video about demanding money for his release, or any of the other lurid details in the media reports. There also seem to exist no followup articles to tell us what happened. 

Democratic values

Much of the current situation hinges on the perception of how democracy has been practiced since the Euromaidan coup (or the Revolution of Dignity, depending how you see it). The democratically-elected president Viktor Yanukovych was ousted after he refused to sign a trade deal with the EU in 2013, in favour of a deal with Russia. The group Right Sector (Pravvi Sektor) were instrumental in the Euromaidan protests, and they are either far-right extremists or just nationalists, depending who's talking.

Residents of the Russian-majority Crimea were not happy with the ousting of Yanukovych, and protested against the new coup government. This was violently suppressed, and ultimately culminated in the 'disputed' March 2014 Crimean status referendum, in which 97% of participants voted to join Russia. The UN declared it invalid. Some evidence suggests that the Euromaidan coup was part of a plan by the Obama White House to seize Russia's naval base at Sevastopol. 

On 2 May 2014, 39 pro-Russian demonstrators were killed at the Odessa Union Building, both by a fire in the building and by being attacked by members of Right Sector and other groups if they tried to leave.

On 11 May 2014, the disputed (by everyone except Russia) Donbas status referendums resulted in 89% and 96% of participants respectively, voting for Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts to delcare independence from Ukraine. Ukraine responded by launching the Anti-Terror Operation (ATO), aimed at taking back control of these regions.