The UK authorities has been at the leading edge of the worldwide attempt to help Ukraine because it suffers the awful results of the conflict with Russia, and thru its refugee scheme, main former high minister Boris Johnson to emerge as some thing of a hero withinside the region.
So while extra than 100,000 refugees fleeing Ukraine determined to make the United Kingdom their home, they will were amazed via way of means of the chaotic political panorama they located themselves in as Johnson’s scandal-ridden premiership unravelled dramatically over the summer, handiest to be observed via way of means of the instantaneously combustion of Liz Truss’s authorities.
Twenty four-year-antique Svitlana Morenets become traveling in western Europe while the conflict broke out. Unable to go back to her small place of birth in western Ukraine, she got here to the United Kingdom wherein she landed a process as a journalist on the Spectator, and had a incredibly uncommon creation to British politics.
Attending the distinguished Spectator celebration withinside the summer, she rubbed shoulders with a number of the most important names in Westminster; however being so new to the sector of SW1, she had no concept who they were, talking frankly to everyone who might concentrate approximately the pressing want for the United Kingdom to offer Ukraine with weapons.
Morenets told PoliticsHome that most Ukrainians largely perceive British politics through the lens of whether the UK government is supporting Ukraine enough while the war with Russia is still ongoing.
Boris Johnson is seen by many as a trailblazer among Western leaders for providing assistance to Ukraine, including the provision of arms and technology and sanctions against Russia. Nonetheless, Ukrainians still see Britain as their main ally, and Johnson is seen as a particularly strong symbol of the alliance.
“Everybody loves Boris Johnson,” Morenets said. “There is a street named after him and he has many awards in Ukraine. He is a hero.”
In one city, a pastry dessert was named after Johnson and was topped with cascading meringues to replicate Johnson’s famous blonde hair. Morenets believes Ukrainians have yet to form an opinion on Johnson’s successor, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, and is interested in whether he will live up to many of Johnson’s promises. I believe that the outcome of this will depend on support from countries like the UK.
“Our soldiers are dying every minute and people are being killed, so there is no time for diplomacy,” she said.
When all-out war broke out in February, Maria Romanenko, a 30-year-old journalist from Kyiv, and her British boyfriend drove shockingly from their home in the Ukrainian capital to Stockport in the Manchester area. I had a great trip.
Since her arrival in the UK, Romanenko has made a name for herself as a freelance journalist, with her work appearing on a number of channels and publications including ITV News, The Guardian and Business Insider.
She agrees that Johnson is popular with Ukrainians, but admits that many Brits don’t share the same positive sentiments.
“I know a lot of people in the UK didn’t like him and there were a lot of problems in his household.
“I’ve come to the point where it’s hard to say good things about Boris Johnson on Twitter as I feel many Brits are frowning.
“For me he stands for Ukraine and that’s great. He was made like a national hero in Ukraine.”
Both Romanenko and Morene praise the Conservative government’s support for their country, but their views of the Labor Party are more nuanced, in line with their government colleagues’ positions on Ukraine.
In Greater Manchester, where Romanenko lives, the Labor Party is the leading party in local councils and general constituencies, and Labor’s Andy Burnham is mayor of the region.
However, former Labor leader Jeremy Corbyn’s reluctance to explicitly support Ukraine in the years leading up to the war made her skeptical of the party.
“I was not prepared to support Labor because they had a very unclear policy in Ukraine, especially with Jeremy Corbyn at the helm,” she said.
A year before Corbyn became party leader after Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, Corbyn wrote on her Stop the War Coalition website that Britain opposes any foreign military intervention in Ukraine. I wrote that I should. “It will only result in the country reliving its traumatic past as a battlefield where Russia and Western Europe are fighting for dominance,” he said.
Corbyn announced his 2020 appointment to Kiel, where he was ousted as party leader by Sturmer and was subsequently expelled from the party on suspicion of anti-Semitism, but he remained an important voice in left-wing politics and served as an independent member of parliament. Are active. When Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine earlier this year, he urged Britain to stop arms sales to Ukraine and showed up with far-left groups to demand peace talks.
“I don’t think he has any idea what he’s talking about,” Romanenko said. “For me, a Ukrainian, it hurts me so much that people like him are holding an end-of-war debate forum without inviting Ukrainians to the panel.
“To me, he looks like an idiot that the Russian government is going to take advantage of.”
But she is cautiously optimistic that Sturmer, who has consistently supported Ukraine in the fight against Russia, has “very similar views on Ukraine as the Conservatives.”