Right Sector

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_Sector

The Right Sector (Пра́вий се́ктор) is a coalition of Far Right groups including Patriot of Ukraine, Social-National Assembly (led by Andriy Biletsky), Trident and Ukrainian National Assembly - Ukrainian People’s Self-Defense, formed by Andriy Tarasenko, one of the constituent groups of All-Ukrainian Union Maidan, was led by Trident head Dmytro Yarosh, now led by Andriy Tarasenko:

“Ukrainian Pravda” tried to systematize information about the Right Sector’s connections and contacts with representatives of the past and present government, as well as to obtain unique information about the current state of the most radical force of the Maidan.

Right Sector is not a hierarchical organization with a vertical management structure. Rather, these are horizontal structures united by a single name and formally subordinated to a single headquarters. At the time of the creation of the Right Sector, it included VO “Trident”, SNA, UNA-UNSO and KUN, as well as the “Committee for the Liberation of Political Prisoners” and the Black Committee.

As you know, the leader of the Right Sector is Dmytro Yarosh . His closest associates are brothers from the “Tryzub” VO - Andriy Tarasenko (Chief Coordinator of the Steam Sector) nicknamed “Pylypas” and Andriy Stempitky - “Letun”.”

https://www.pravda.com.ua/rus/articles/2014/04/1/7020952/

Yarosh later left the group taking 20% of its membership with him, because the group was still taking a “pseudo revolutionary activities” and he opposed rioting against it at the time:

As before, we do not abandon the revolutionary path, but we categorically deny pseudo-revolutionary activities that threaten the existence of the state of Ukraine and tarnish the reputation of patriots. We are opposed to the current government, but we do not consider bloody (and doomed to defeat) riots against it to be appropriate.

For the above reasons, I, together with my team, am leaving the National Liberation Movement “Right Sector”.

https://web.archive.org/web/20160307121248/http://ps-zahid.info/news/yarosh-oholoshuje-pro-zasnuvannya-novoho-ruhu-ta-vyhodyt-z-nvr-ps/

The movement has a paramilitary force, Ukrainian Volunteer Corps, which acted independently from the Ukrainian government until the Russian invasion of 2022, when it was finally absorbed into the Ukrainian Military, also affiliated with 1st Separate Mechanized Battalion (Da Vinci Wolves), formed by Right Sector activist Dmytro Kotsiubailo.

Some Right Sector members also previously fought as members of the Shakhtarsk Battalion and its successor, the Tornado Battalion.

Olena Semenyaka was previously a spokesperson for Right Sector, she later left the coalition to join the National Corps Party as its international secretary.

In the last Ukrainian election (as of 2022), held in 2019, the party ran on a joint electoral list with National Corps, State Initiative of Yarosh (DIA), and Svoboda, and endorsed a joint Presidential candidate (Ruslan Koshulinsky of the Svoboda party) with the Congress of Ukrainian Nationalists, Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists, Svoboda, and C14. (https://www.pravda.com.ua/news/2018/11/19/7198643/), some Right Sector figures also previously ran as representatives of the Radical Party of Oleh Liashko in 2014¹.

Right Sector has also organised demonstrations alongside the Freikorps Military-Patriotic Organisation, Katekhon, Tradition and Order and Monolith movements:

On May 17 activists of Ukrainian right-wing radical groups, such as “C14”, “Tradition and Order”, “Right Sector”, “Monolit”, and “Katekhon”, held the action “Nationalists against the leftists from Amnesty”.

https://www.osce.org/files/f/documents/6/0/394781.pdf

In March 2018, members of Tradition and Order, Right Sector and another far-right group, the National Corps, blocked3 the entrance to the Shevchenkivskyi District Court during the hearing of Olena Shevchenko, the head of the LGBT+ organization “Insight.” Shevchenko had been issued a administrative violation during the Women’s March in Kyiv on March 8, 2018. The far-right demonstrators broke into the courtroom with weapons, and Shevchenko had to be evacuated through an emergency exit.

https://reportingradicalism.org/en/dossiers/groups/tradition-and-order

In June 2019, representatives of the organization together with the members of the associations “Tradition and order”, “Right sector”, “Nazkorpus” during the congress of the party “Trust in Affairs” arranged a demonstration, after which they went to the bust Marshal Zhukov, dropped it from the pedestal and hung it flag of Ukraine.

https://uk.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A4%D1%80%D0%B0%D0%B9%D0%BA%D0%BE%D1%80_(%D0%B4%D0%BE%D0%B1%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%BE%D0%BB%D1%8C%D1%87%D0%B8%D0%B9_%D0%BF%D1%96%D0%B4%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B7%D0%B4%D1%96%D0%BB)#%D0%93%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%BC%D0%B0%D0%B4%D1%8F%D0%BD%D1%81%D1%8C%D0%BA%D0%B0_%D0%B4%D1%96%D1%8F%D0%BB%D1%8C%D0%BD%D1%96%D1%81%D1%82%D1%8C

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Since the beginning of 2018, C14 and other far-right groups such as the Azov-affiliated National Militia, Right Sector, Karpatska Sich, and others have attacked Roma groups several times, as well as anti-fascist demonstrations, city council meetings, an event hosted by Amnesty International, art exhibitions, LGBT events, and environmental activists. On March 8, violent groups launched attacks against International Women’s Day marchers in cities across Ukraine. In only a few of these cases did police do anything to prevent the attacks, and in some they even arrested peaceful demonstrators rather than the actual perpetrators.

To be clear, far-right parties like Svoboda perform poorly in Ukraine’s polls and elections, and Ukrainians evince no desire to be ruled by them. But this argument is a bit of “red herring.” It’s not extremists’ electoral prospects that should concern Ukraine’s friends, but rather the state’s unwillingness or inability to confront violent groups and end their impunity. Whether this is due to a continuing sense of indebtedness to some of these groups for fighting the Russians or fear they might turn on the state itself, it’s a real problem and we do no service to Ukraine by sweeping it under the rug.