Sergey Slobodchuk, Director of the Slobodchuk and Partners: Politics, PR, Elections Company, said that association with the EU was only a motive for the mass protests at the Maidan Square in late November 2013. He noted that Ukrainian authorities had made a key mistake by using Berkut special units for a crackdown of peaceful protests.
The expert believes that it stirred up the public. Ministers started explaining reasons for halting the association process but the public wondered why such explanations could not be given earlier. Overall, the problem is that the public had been ignored for a long time. People are also outraged by the use of force against the protesters and numbers of law enforcers in the country.
Political analyst Alexey Voronenko pointed out that the new wave of protests started on Sunday had nothing to do with EU association. Authorities provoked new grievances by passing bills restricting freedom of assembly and passing of cars to protest areas. The government triggered more outrage by passing the bills.
Political analyst Igor Gridasov explained that the events were a result of disappointment with President Victor Yanukovych. Grievances were accumulated since his election win. Different population groups have their own reasons for protests. Failure to sign the association agreement at the Vilnius summit was simply the trigger that started the demonstrations, according to Gridasov.
