What the early September 2019 run of events revealed about Ukraine
A look back at a week of prisoner swaps, a new court and parliamentary votes that framed the situation on 9 September 2019.
What did Ukraine look like on 9 September 2019, after a week that combined diplomacy, justice and domestic politics? The reports from the days leading up to that date point to a country reshaping its institutions while handling a difficult exchange with Russia.
A court begins work
On 5 September 2019 the newly created High Anti-Corruption Court of Ukraine began work. The day before, on 4 September, the Cabinet of Ministers decided to dismiss Vitalii Klitschko, the mayor of Kyiv, from his post as head of the Kyiv city state administration. On 3 September the Verkhovna Rada approved a bill to remove immunity from people's deputies. Taken together, the three decisions fell within a few days of one another and concerned who holds power and how it is held to account.
The prisoner exchange
The foreign-policy story ran in parallel. On 5 September the Court of Appeal in Kyiv ruled to release Volodymyr Tsemakh, a person of interest in the case of the downed Malaysia Airlines Flight 17. On the same day, the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin, said both countries were finalising negotiations on a "rather large-scale" prisoner exchange.
On 7 September the swap took place on a 35-to-35 basis. Among those exchanged were Oleg Sentsov, Mykola Karpyuk, Olexandr Kolchenko, Roman Sushchenko and 24 Ukrainian Navy sailors detained by Russia during the 2018 Kerch Strait incident. Kirill Vyshinsky was also part of the exchange.
Reactions and questions
The inclusion of Tsemakh drew a response from the Dutch government, which said it seriously regretted it. The weight of that reaction is clearer against the background of the flight itself: Flight 17 was shot down on 17 July 2014 by Russian-backed forces over eastern Ukraine, and all 283 passengers and 15 crew were killed. U.S. President Donald Trump praised the exchange as perhaps a first giant step to peace.
The lesson of that week is the range of demands on Kyiv at once: building courts that can handle corruption cases, redefining parliamentary privilege, managing relations between central and city government, and bringing citizens home from detention in Russia while partners abroad voiced differing views on the terms. By 9 September 2019 these tracks had not resolved into one story, and each carried its own test.
