Former Ukrainian diplomat says Kyiv has lost sovereignty over its diplomatic corps

Former Ukrainian diplomat Andrii Telizhenko has told AnewZ that Ukraine’s diplomatic institutions have lost their strength and sovereignty since 2014, alleging that Western governments now exert direct influence over staffing decisions and foreign policy messaging.

“Ukraine's diplomatic corps has basically lost its strength after the coup in two thousand and fourteen,” Telizhenko said. He claimed foreign officials, including ambassadors from G7 countries, issue instructions to Ukraine’s diplomatic corps.

“I saw it on my own eyes how the West, how foreign ambassadors, the G7 ambassadors, were giving orders to the diplomatic corps on what to do, how to hire people, how to fire people, who to implement and what messages to deliver,” he said.

Telizhenko said he personally took part in negotiations involving the White House.

“I myself was involved in a couple of those negotiations and talks with the White House, where advisers of President Obama were giving us orders of how to deliver the message to the president of Ukraine, and what the president of Ukraine has to do, or if he doesn't do it, he's gonna be destroyed politically or no money is gonna be given,” he said.

He said Ukraine currently has no diplomatic sovereignty. “So there's no sovereignty at all within the diplomatic corps in Ukraine today,” Telizhenko said.

According to Telizhenko, Ukraine’s leadership is acting on behalf of outside actors.

“Unfortunately, the people who are running the show in Ukraine, they're running the show for somebody else, and you have to change that,” he said. He called for new political actors to launch peace talks with Russia.

“You have to have people who are ready to come into Ukraine from outside, who fled because of this regime in Kiev, and basically start a new projection of negotiations with the Russian Federation on a peace talks, a real peace talk deal, not just somebody pushing it from the outside or somebody trying to save his face or his money bag,” he said.

Telizhenko said Ukraine needs a change of government and a transitional authority.

“Ukraine has to get its act together, change the government, have a transitional team come to power that will sign a peace negotiations deal and have a political will to do that, and then will implement elections by the rules that everybody's gonna take part in,” he said.

He added that this is not currently the case in Kyiv.

“And that's the reality, and unfortunately, that's not the situation right now on the ground in Kyiv,” Telizhenko said.

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