Infuriatingly Awkward Details

"We turn these [non-lethal Canadian-provided bullet-proof vests, helmets and other gear from the Canadian Forces] over to representatives of the Ukraine government. Again this is part of our continuous efforts to support Ukraine."
Defence Minister Rob Nicholson, Canada

"They're still marching up and down Kyiv with torch-light parades and a fabricated form of a Swastika."
"What has been ignored in Canada is the role the far right is playing in today's Ukraine."
James Bissett, former Canadian ambassador to Yugoslavia, Bulgaria and Albania

Screen grab from German TV ZDF - Photo: screen grab

"We need to be able to count on the government that when they are sending equipment, they have channels that they can be assured it will end up in the hands of groups that are not a future threat to the objectives we have with other NATO members in stabilizing the area."
Joyce Murray, Liberal defence critic

Ukraine's armed forces, battling the ethnic-Russian-speaking Ukrainians bent on splitting east Ukraine from the central government and joining Russia geographically for their new version of Novorossiya, are supported by units one of which is the National Guard under the command of the Ministry of the Interior. Under that command is the 300-strong Azov Battalion, members of whom are both Ukrainian and foreign fighters.

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko was in Ottawa this past week, and travelled on to the United States. In both countries he expressed his own country's gratitude for the support received from the Canadian and American administrations in Ukraine's desperate struggle to hold on to its territory against Russian complicity with ethnic-Russians revolting against Ukraine's continued rule of its own eastern territory. And, while thanking both countries for their generosity and alliance, also hoped to be given combat-oriented equipment like armoured vehicles and anti-tank rockets to fight the insurgency.

That was not forthcoming. There have been instances where it has been noted in the near past that American military goods that were donated to Ukraine were being advertised by local Ukrainian businessmen on auction sites appearing on the Internet. Along with Ukraine's internal problems of a frail economy and the dissent between peoples of different ethnic groups, there is also the indelible fact of rampant corruption; this situation as good an impression of that state as any.

What has now also been revealed is that one of Ukraine's combat units and the far right Azov Battalion were revealed on German television to be wearing helmets emblazoned with Nazi insignia. This has, understandably, caused some measure of consternation within the Canadian Parliament. While a Ukrainian military spokesman denies that U.S.-donated military meals are being sold on the Internet and some Ukrainians are dismissive of concerns about fascist elements in the country's political system and military, evidence to the contrary goes beyond troubling.

Labelling such claims as representative of Russian propaganda is rather facile, given the evidence produced. Claims that the Azov Battalion is privately funded by wealthy businessmen and the Ukrainian diaspora doesn't exactly inspire confidence, either. The unit makes use of the Wolf's Hook symbol on their banner, reflective of the insignia used by Nazi SS units during World War Two.

Soldiers from the Ukrainian self-defense battalion "Azov" sitting at a checkpoint in the southern coastal town of Mariupol September 8, 2014. Photo by Reuters

Some of its members are known to be anti-Semitic by their statements even while spokesmen for the battalion repeatedly deny any neo-Nazi links; the unit is comprised of Ukrainian nationalists, they insist. At the same time Jews in Europe have raised concern about the rise of the Svoboda party led by Oleh Tyahnybok whose party members were on the protest front lines leading to the overthrow of Ukraine's pro-Russian president in February.

Mr. Tyahnybok denies being anti-Semitic, but he co-signed an open letter to Ukraine's then-president in 2005 calling for a government investigation into "criminal activities of organized Jewry in Ukraine"; just a little bit of a neutral heads-up. As well the Svoboda Party MP Igor Miroshenychenko labelled Ukrainian-born U.S. actress Mila Kunis in 2012, a "dirty Jewess". Which doesn't exactly speak to fond relations with a sector of Ukrainian citizens.

The conservative London Telegraph offered more details about the Azov battalion in an article by correspondent Tom Parfitt, who wrote: "Kiev’s use of volunteer paramilitaries to stamp out the Russian-backed Donetsk and Luhansk 'people’s republics'… should send a shiver down Europe’s spine.

"Recently formed battalions such as Donbas, Dnipro and Azov, with several thousand men under their command, are officially under the control of the interior ministry but their financing is murky, their training inadequate and their ideology often alarming. The Azov men use the neo-Nazi Wolfsangel (Wolf’s Hook) symbol on their banner and members of the battalion are openly white supremacists, or anti-Semites."