I would say that this is pretty much contradicted by all of the videos, which show people in front of the building throwing Molotov cocktails at the building.
DAVID SPEEDIE: And I understand the death toll is in excess of 40 from the fire in that building, Nicolai.
NICOLAI PETRO: The official death toll so far is 46, but there are still 80 people hospitalized and 26 in very serious condition.
DAVID SPEEDIE: It's reported today, Nicolai, that a man named Igor Palitsya--I think I'm getting his name correct--has been appointed governor in Odessa. He has no previous ties to Odessa. I gather he's a friend of Mr. Kolomoisky, who was appointed governor of Dnipropetrovsk. This seems to be another of the Kiev's, the interim government's, strategy to appoint Western governors in places where there are no links, which may actually inflame the situation.
I gather that Kolomoisky visited Palitsya today or yesterday. This sounds like a shady character. First of all, he said, "Those who want to have any affiliation with Russia, I'll buy tickets for them." But, more ominously, there are reports that he has offered bounty to police forces for up to $100,000 for capture of subversive pro-Russian elements.
This seems like a rather inflammatory cocktail.
NICOLAI PETRO: He has been in office, what, 24 hours now. I haven't caught up with everything that he has said.
He is indeed a very wealthy individual, and his appointment seems to be part of a strategy to utilize, if not even co-opt, certain oligarchs to support the new regime. It has not proved effective certainly in Donetsk or even particularly in Dnipropetrovsk. I see no reason to expect that it will be more successful here.
Odessans are quite proud of their distinctive heritage within Ukraine and the historical community that they have established, which, I would underscore, has always been a cosmopolitan one. So for anyone to come in from elsewhere in Ukraine and bring some other type of either distinctly Ukrainian approach or even a distinctly Russian approach would simply not be well appreciated, I think, here. People like to, to put it simply--I guess the best model I can think of for Odessa is to live and let live.
Which leads me to speculate a little bit about the recent tragedy, in which people sort of take it for granted that because of how uncharacteristic these events were for the city, its culture and its temperament, it had to be instigated from people from out of town. Then what I've found, at least, is that people like to name their favorite personal villain. I think what your listeners might find interesting is that these personal villains range all over the map. They can be Russian special forces. They can be the Right Sector. They can be American mercenaries. They can be the former prime minister. They can be the siloviki (politicians from the security or military services) in Kiev.
It seems hard to imagine that you could have a plausible narrative involving all of these at once. But that's what makes it so very interesting to listen to these people. Some sort of coherent narrative can indeed be constructed. What they differ on mostly is the degree of plausibility.
But what I find interesting is that what seems entirely implausible to the average American can sound perfectly plausible at this point to the average Ukrainian.
DAVID SPEEDIE: And it certainly seems more plausible than the simplistic reporting hitherto that suggests that Russia is pulling all the strings here. That has actually been modified somewhat. There was a piece in The New York Times on Sunday, which you may have seen, "Behind the Masks in Ukraine, Many Faces of Rebellion." It really did, to some extent, modify the idea that all this is just Russia, the organ grinder and the performers in Ukraine doing Russia's bidding. It's a much more complex situation than that.
NICOLAI PETRO: I must say that one of the things that does not lend credibility to the interim government is that the automatic first accusation made by the security forces in Kiev to any event is that Russian special forces are somehow involved. They make this claim so gratuitously, without even bothering to provide any evidence, that it cannot really be taken seriously.
In the case of the fire, for example, in Odessa, the same claim was made. Yet we have, again, video from amateur video reporters who were in the building, looked at the documentation, and so far, as far as I can tell, all the people who died in this tragic fire appear to have been from Odessa.
DAVID SPEEDIE: Simplistic narratives are unhelpful in this case. The simplistic narrative is that, on the one hand, the Kiev government is a brave sort of David against the Russian Goliath trying to hold the country together.
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