The past week was marked by the EU Council's decision to initiate accession negotiations with Ukraine, coinciding with Russia's buildup of forces near Mariinka and its ongoing terror against civilians.

The US and Ukraine are fathoming a new strategy for future operations against Russia, slated for implementation in early 2024. The previous week saw Ukraine's persistent efforts to repatriate Ukrainian children abducted by Russian occupiers. 

Explaining Ukraine is a podcast by UkraineWorld, an English-language website about Ukraine. 

Volodymyr Yermolenko, Ukrainian philosopher and chief editor of UkraineWorld, is joined by Anastasia Herasymchuk and Daria Synhaievska, journalists and analysts at UkraineWorld, to discuss key events in and around Ukraine for the last week.

UkraineWorld (ukraineworld.org) is brought to you by Internews Ukraine, one of the largest Ukrainian media NGOs.

Support our work at patreon.com/ukraineworld. We provide exclusive content for our patrons. 

Support our volunteer trips to the frontlines at PayPal: ukraine.resisting@gmail.com.

The EU opened accession talks with Ukraine at a historic summit - Weekly, 11-17 Dec

Ukraine has passed the long-awaited mobilization law. It aims to ensure that Ukraine's army has more people, as it faces hundreds of thousands of newly mobilized soldiers on the Russian side. Ukraine's army, on the contrary, lacks personnel. But will this law solve Ukraine's problems? Particular criticism was voiced at the fact the law doesn't provide conditions for demobilization. This means that soldiers who are on the frontline don't know when they will come back home.

This is our weekly roundup of key events and trends in and around Ukraine.

Volodymyr Yermolenko, the chief editor of UkraineWorld, is joined by Anastasiia Herasymchuk, Deputy Editor-in-Chief, and Dariia Synhaievska, analyst and journalist at UkraineWorld, to discuss key events and trends in and around Ukraine over the past week.

UkraineWorld (ukraineworld.org) is brought to you by Internews Ukraine, one of the largest Ukrainian media NGOs.

Listen on various podcast platforms (Google, Apple, Spotify etc): li.sten.to/explaining-ukraine

Support us at patreon.com/ukraineworld

We provide exclusive content for our patrons. You can also support our volunteer trips to the frontlines at PayPal: ukraine.resisting@gmail.com.

Ukraine passes its mobilisation law: will it help? - Weekly, 8 - 14 April

Jen Stout is a Scottish journalist who has spent a significant amount of time in Ukraine during the hottest stages of the full-scale Russian invasion. She has just published a book "Night Train to Odesa: Covering the Human Cost of Russia's War", a very touchingly personal account of the people she has met and experiences she has lived traveling through war-torn Ukrainian cities and villages.

The Explaining Ukraine podcast invites Jen Stout to talk about her book and her experience of being in Ukraine and reporting on the war. 

Book: https://birlinn.co.uk/product/night-train-to-odesa/

Host: Volodymyr Yermolenko, Ukrainian philosopher, chief editor of UkraineWorld and president of PEN Ukraine

UkraineWorld (ukraineworld.org) is brought to you by Internews Ukraine, one of the largest Ukrainian media NGOs.

Listen on various platforms: https://li.sten.to/explaining-ukraine
 
Support us at: patreon.com/ukraineworld. We provide exclusive content for our patrons.

You can also support our volunteer trips to the front lines at PayPal: ukraine.resisting@gmail.com

“Immediate solidarity”: being a foreign reporter in war-torn Ukraine -- with Jen Stout

We tend to look at today’s world as a consequence of World War II. Yet, in the first years after that war, there were several directions which the world could have turned. There was a chance that China would not have become communist. There was also a chance that Europe would have become much more communist. 

A few years ago, Daniel Kurtz-Phelan, the current editor of Foreign Affairs magazine, wrote The China Mission, a book in which he explores the attempt by George Marshall, the architect of the Allies’ victory against the Nazis, to bring China closer to America. 

Find the book: https://wwnorton.com/books/9780393240955

We discuss why this mission failed, how the world could look differently if it had succeeded, and what lessons we can draw from that episode for today’s world. We also talk about how Russia's invasion of Ukraine is changing the world now. 

Daniel Kurtz-Phelan is the Editor of Foreign Affairs. His book The China Mission was published in 2018 and named a best book of the year by The Economist and an editor's pick by the New York Times Book Review.

Host: Volodymyr Yermolenko, Ukrainian philosopher, chief editor of UkraineWorld, and president of PEN Ukraine

UkraineWorld (ukraineworld.org) is brought to you by Internews Ukraine, one of the largest Ukrainian media NGOs.

Listen on various platforms: https://li.sten.to/explaining-ukraine 
Support us at patreon.com/ukraineworld. We provide exclusive content for our patrons.

You can also support our volunteer trips to the frontlines at PayPal: ukraine.resisting@gmail.com.

Foreign Affairs’ Daniel Kurtz-Phelan - on America, China, Ukraine, and geopolitics

A conversation about Ukraine, the Russian invasion, resistance, ideas, and ordinary people doing extraordinary things, - held during Volodymyr Yermolenko’s visit to Yale University in February 2024. 

Timothy Snyder is an American historian and Richard C. Levin Professor of History at Yale University.

Marci Shore is an American historian and associate professor at Yale University.

Volodymyr Yermolenko is a Ukrainian philosopher, chief editor of UkraineWorld and president of PEN Ukraine.

Let us thank Yale University and Ukraine House at Yale for organizing this discussion and helping us to publish its recording. 
UkraineWorld (ukraineworld.org) is brought to you by Internews Ukraine, one of the largest Ukrainian media NGOs.

Listen on various platforms: https://li.sten.to/explaining-ukraine 

Support us at patreon.com/ukraineworld. We provide exclusive content for our patrons.

You can also support our volunteer trips to the frontlines at PayPal: ukraine.resisting@gmail.com.

Timothy Snyder, Marci Shore, and Volodymyr Yermolenko at Yale

What do citizens of the EU and the United Kingdom think about Ukraine? How substantial is their support? How high the Ukrainian topic is on their agenda? 

The Explaining Ukraine podcast invites experts from “More in Common” - an international initiative aiming to understand the forces driving people apart, find common ground, and bring people together to tackle shared challenges.

Guests: 
Mathieu Lefèvre, CEO and Co-founder of “More in Common”; 
Luke Tryl, Director of “More in Common” UK.

Host: Volodymyr Yermolenko, Ukrainian philosopher, chief editor of UkraineWorld and president of PEN Ukraine

UkraineWorld (ukraineworld.org) is brought to you by Internews Ukraine, one of the largest Ukrainian media NGOs.

Listen on various platforms: https://li.sten.to/explaining-ukraine 

Support us at patreon.com/ukraineworld. We provide exclusive content for our patrons.

You can also support our volunteer trips to the frontlines at PayPal: ukraine.resisting@gmail.com.

What do other Europeans think about Ukraine?

Do India and Ukraine share common ground for cooperation? What shared interests might emerge from their unique contexts? And in the face of Russian aggression, how can these nations forge relations that benefit both sides?

In this episode, UkraineWorld's Deputy editor-in-chief Anastasiia Hersymchuk spoke withSwasti Rao, Associate Fellow at the Europe and Eurasia Center, Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses and Olha Vorozhbyt, an affiliated expert with the Foreign Policy Council “Ukrainian Prism”, deputy editor-in-chief of the “Ukrayinskyi Tyzhden” news website.

This episode is part of a joint series “Ukraine’s global partnerships” made as a partnership between UkraineWorld and the Foreign Policy Council “Ukrainian Prism”. 

UkraineWorld (ukraineworld.org) is brought to you by Internews Ukraine, one of the largest Ukrainian media NGOs.

SUPPORT us at www.patreon.com/ukraineworld. We provide exclusive content for our patrons.

You can also support our volunteer trips to the frontlines at PayPal: ukraine.resisting@gmail.com.

This podcast series was created with the support of the International Renaissance Foundation. Its content is the exclusive responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily reflect the views of the International Renaissance Foundation.

Ukraine-India relations | Ukraine’s global partnerships #1

Almost 20,000 Ukrainian children have been kidnapped by Russia during its invasion of Ukraine, according to Kyiv’s official data. Russia’s figures are much bigger: it says it has relocated more than half a million of Ukrainian children - and is not going to give them back. This is a horrible, systematic policy of depriving the Ukrainian nation of its future. 

The Explaining Ukraine podcast invites Khrystyna Shkudor, advocacy manager of the campaign “Where Are Our People?” (https://deportation.org.ua/). The campaign is aimed at uncovering Russia's policy of forcible deportations of Ukrainians. It is run by PR Army, a Ukrainian non-profit communication initiative. 

Host: Volodymyr Yermolenko, Ukrainian philosopher, chief editor of UkraineWorld, and president of PEN Ukraine

UkraineWorld (ukraineworld.org) is brought to you by Internews Ukraine, one of the largest Ukrainian media NGOs.

Listen on various platforms: https://li.sten.to/explaining-ukraine 

Support us at patreon.com/ukraineworld. We provide exclusive content for our patrons.

You can also support our volunteer trips to the frontlines at PayPal: ukraine.resisting@gmail.com.

How Russia kidnaps Ukrainian children, and why

How can history help us understand the Russian invasion of Ukraine? Why can Moscow not even imagine itself without Kyiv? Is Russia an empire in decline? 

The Explaining Ukraine podcast invites Professor Serhii Plokhii, a prominent Ukrainian historian, director of the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute (HURI), and author of numerous books about Ukraine, Russia, and Eastern Europe. His latest book is The Russo-Ukrainian War: The Return of History.

This conversation was held in Kyiv on May 24th, 2024, before Plokhii met with the Ukrainian public at the UkraineWorld Club and PEN Ukraine. 

Host: Volodymyr Yermolenko, Ukrainian philosopher, chief editor of UkraineWorld and president of PEN Ukraine.

UkraineWorld (ukraineworld.org) is brought to you by Internews Ukraine, one of Ukraine's largest media NGOs.

Listen on various platforms: https://li.sten.to/explaining-ukraine 

Support us at patreon.com/ukraineworld. We provide exclusive content for our patrons.

You can also support our volunteer trips to the frontlines at PayPal: ukraine.resisting@gmail.com.

Check two other podcasts with Plokhii:

What Makes Ukrainian History Interesting to the World
https://ukraineworld.org/en/podcasts/ep-46-ukrainian-history

World War II and the Russian Invasion of Ukraine
https://ukraineworld.org/en/podcasts/ep-223

Serhii Plokhii on the historical context of the Russo-Ukrainian war

Is democracy in decline today? What is “Post-Wall” Europe, born after the fall of the Berlin Wall, and why is it now gone? How is Ukraine’s resistance to the Russian invasion changing Europe? 

UkraineWorld invites Timothy Garton Ash, a British historian, Professor of European Studies at the University of Oxford, Isaiah Berlin Professorial Fellow at St Antony's College, Oxford, and Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. His latest book is "Homelands: A Personal History of Europe". 

This episode is a recording of Professor Garton Ash’s meeting with the Ukrainian public in Kyiv, at the UkraineWorld Club and PEN Ukraine, on May 15th, 2024. It is part of UkraineWorld’s series Thinking in Dark Times. 

Host: Volodymyr Yermolenko, Ukrainian philosopher, chief editor of UkraineWorld and president of PEN Ukraine

UkraineWorld (ukraineworld.org) is brought to you by Internews Ukraine, one of Ukraine's largest media NGOs.

Listen on various platforms: https://li.sten.to/explaining-ukraine 

Support us at patreon.com/ukraineworld. We provide exclusive content for our patrons.

The FULL conversation (with questions from the audience and replies by Timothy Garton Ash) is available for UkraineWorld's patrons at https://www.patreon.com/posts/timothy-garton-106112059

You can also support our volunteer trips to the front lines at PayPal: ukraine.resisting@gmail.com.

Check two other conversations with Professor Garton Ash: 

Timothy Garton Ash on Ukraine’s role in Europe
https://ukraineworld.org/en/podcasts/ep-225

Timothy Garton Ash on Europe, Lviv and Wounded Soldiers
https://ukraineworld.org/en/videos/garton

Timothy Garton Ash on how Ukraine is changing Europe

A podcast by UkraineWorld.org, a multimedia project about Ukraine run by Internews Ukraine. Explaining Ukraine, its politics, society and its culture. Support us: patreon.com/ukraineworld

The EU opened accession talks with Ukraine at a historic summit - Weekly, 11-17 Dec

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