Kiev faced with collaborationism in liberated cities

In recent weeks, the Ukrainian army has carried out a major counteroffensive in the north-east of the country that has allowed it to recapture several strategic towns. The liberation of towns such as Lyman, Izium and Balakliya is a major victory for Kiev, as well as a blow to the Kremlin.

Against this backdrop, the Ukrainian authorities face an important dilemma: how should citizens in the liberated areas be treated? As Foreign Affairs' Brian Milakovsky notes, Kiev will treat many as compatriots, while others might be labelled as collaborators.

Ukrainian President Volodimir Zelensky has assured that if a person did not work with the invading forces and did not betray Ukraine, there will be "no reason" to consider him or her a collaborator. However, Milakovsky notes that "determining who is a collaborator can be more complicated", indicating that there is a wide range from "outright treason" to "passive participation".

Milakovsky highlights the differences in the reception of Russian troops during the early stages of the invasion. While in areas close to Kiev or in cities such as Sumy the population rejected the occupation, in certain regions in the southeast, pro-Russian citizens welcomed the invading troops with open arms. Foreign Affairs notes, for example, the large number of pensioners nostalgic for the Soviet Union or a group of young people from Kupiansk in Kharkov who smashed the Ukrainian coat of arms of a local cultural centre and later expressed their contempt for Ukraine in front of the media.

Since March, Moscow has focused on the southeastern regions, which it considers an extension of Russia itself and calls Novorossiya or New Russia. "Putin is obsessed with the idea that this is a lost Russian province," says Milakovsky. He has gained his main support in the area in the Donbas, in the Donetsk and Lugansk regions, now annexed to Russia. In these areas, the Kremlin, through strong propaganda, has succeeded in recent years in entrenching pro-Russian sentiment and pushing an anti-Ukrainian discourse. Elsewhere in the southeast, the opposite has happened thanks to investments in infrastructure and government services.

In this regard, citizens in towns such as Berdiansk, Kherson and Melitopol held protests against the invading forces, contrary to Moscow's expectations. As Mykhailo Minakov, senior advisor at the Wilson Center's Kennan Institute, quoted by Foreign Affairs, explains, the Russian government tried to deal with this resistance by employing the same techniques it used against the opposition population in Chechnya. Russian forces used tear gas and live ammunition against pro-Ukrainian protesters and activists. They also abducted army veterans and their families. Some were detained indefinitely, while others were killed and buried in mass graves such as those being uncovered in liberated towns like Izium and Lyman.

A large part of Ukrainians demand that those who collaborated with Russian troops be punished. In March, the Kiev parliament passed a law criminalising association with the authorities of an aggressor state. Only doctors or emergency service workers are exempt.

Through Telegram channels, Ukrainian groups have tracked down sympathisers or collaborators and subsequently shared the information with the security services. Foreign Affairs stresses that many of these collaborators are officials who chose to cooperate with Russia "passively".

"The identification and punishment of collaborators by the Ukrainian government must be done in a transparent and accountable manner, so that it does not become another source of trauma for the war-affected populations," Milakovsky explains.

In this regard, Zaporiyia is one of the cities that is suffering the most from the effects of the conflict. The town on the banks of the Dnieper River has been under heavy shelling by Russian troops for several days. The latest attack - carried out in the early hours of the morning - killed dozens of people, including children.

Its nuclear power plant, as well as its strategic position, have made Zaporiyia one of Moscow's main targets. The nuclear power plant, the largest in Europe, is under Russian control and could become part of Russia's energy grid, as Putin annexed the region along with Kherson, Donetsk and Lugansk on 30 September.

Despite the new annexations and constant attacks, Ukrainian forces continue to advance in the east of the country, prompting criticism from the Russian elite, which is demanding a change in the course of the 'special military operation'. For this reason, the Kremlin recently appointed General Sergey Surovikin as commander of the Joint Forces Grouping in Ukraine.