Ukraine’s president has urged closer ties between the ex-Soviet nation and Nato and the European Union in a speech marking the 30th anniversary of the country’s independence.
Ukraine celebrated its independence day with a military parade and massive festivities in the capital Kyiv.
Opening the parade, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that a strong Ukraine is “a country that dreams ambitiously and acts decisively”.
“Such a country becomes Nato’s Enhanced Opportunities Partner; such a country is officially supported by others when it applies to join the European Union,” Mr Zelenskyy said.
Ukraine did not officially become independent until the collapse of the Soviet Union in December 1991. But like most of the 15 former Soviet republics, it declared its sovereignty immediately after the failed hardline coup against reformist Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev.
On August 24 1991, the Ukrainian parliament adopted the Act of Declaration of Independence of Ukraine, re-establishing the country’s independence after more than 70 years of being part of the Soviet Union.
Less than four months later, Boris Yeltsin and leaders of other Soviet republics declared the Soviet Union defunct and Mr Gorbachev stepped down on December 25 1991.
The 30th anniversary of Ukraine’s independence came as the country is locked in a bitter tug-of-war with Russia, which in 2014 annexed Crimea and has since been backing a separatist insurgency in eastern Ukraine, and Kyiv’s efforts to shore up support among Western nations.
“Territories may be occupied, but one can’t occupy the people’s love for Ukraine. One can create a desperate situation and make people get (Russian) passports, but one can’t issue passports for their Ukrainian hearts,” Mr Zelenskyy said.
“If some people in Crimea and Donbass (a region in eastern Ukraine, controlled by Russia-backed separatists) are afraid to talk about it, it doesn’t mean they are afraid to think about it. They will come back, because we’re family.”
The centre of Kyiv turned into a large venue for concerts and other festive events marking the anniversary. Thousands of people flocked to the central Maidan square, which over the past 30 years has been a rallying point for Ukrainians.
The popular uprising of 2013-2014, which ousted pro-Russia president Viktor Yanukovych and triggered the long confrontation with Moscow, started on Maidan square.
Delegations from 46 countries and blocs, including 14 presidents, attended the parade in Kyiv.
The day before, they took part in the Crimean Platform summit called by Ukraine to build up pressure on Russia over the 2014 annexation of Crimea that has been denounced as illegal by most of the world.
The annexation and Moscow’s backing of rebels in the east of Ukraine, where more than 14,000 have been killed since 2014 in the fighting between separatists and Ukrainian forces, plunged Russia’s relations with the West to post-Cold War lows.
The tensions rose once again this year after Russia increased troop numbers near its borders with Ukraine, including in Crimea, eliciting international outrage.
Russian President Vladimir Putin published an article last month, describing Russians and Ukrainians as “one people” and accusing the West of working methodically to rupture historic links between the two neighbours and to turn Ukraine into a key bulwark to contain Russia.
But polls in Ukraine show that the vast majority of Ukrainians support the independence of the country. If a referendum on Ukraine’s independence was held this year, 70.3% of the country’s residents would vote for it, according to a survey of the prominent Kyiv International Institute of Sociology.
