Critical Reflections on ‘Amnesty’: the case of Ukraine (2014-2021)

Druey Schwab, Cécile Elisabeth (September 2023). Critical Reflections on ‘Amnesty’: the case of Ukraine (2014-2021) (Submitted). In: Conflict Research Society (CRC), Annual Conference. London. 11-13 September 2023.

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For eight years since September 2014, the official process to settle the conflict in the Donbas area of eastern Ukraine, known as the “Minsk Process”, has aimed to implement the provisions of the so-called “Minsk agreements” designed to restore peace and security in eastern Ukraine. This goal has remained elusive, and the “Minsk Process” has definitively collapsed in February 2022, when Russia started its full-scale military invasion of Ukraine. However, various peacebuilding elements, as they were foreseen by the Agreements and debated in society, have not lost their relevance. This paper critically assesses the concept of “amnesty” as an element of conflict transformation, from the perspective of all population groups affected by the conflict that has been ongoing in the Donbas region since 2014. The analysis is based on large empirical evidence from Ukraine and Russia, collected in the framework of the research project “The Minsk Process as perceived from within”. This study was conceptualised and implemented by a team of international researchers associated with the transnational dialogue platform “Women’s Initiatives for Peace in Donbas/s” between 2017 and 2020, with the support of the Universities of Bern and St.Gallen (Switzerland). Despite the now historical value of this data, the paper, which is dedicated to the concept of "amnesty" and analyses not only the positions but also the needs and interests of the different groups, can make a valuable contribution to the broader debate on the difficult handling of the experience of massive violence in Ukraine, and to the attempt to restore peaceful coexistence between hostile parties in the future.

Item Type:	Conference or Workshop Item (Paper)
Division/Institute:	06 Faculty of Humanities > Department of History and Archaeology > Institute of History > Modern and Contemporary History > Modern, Contemporary and Eastern European History 06 Faculty of Humanities > Department of History and Archaeology > Institute of History
UniBE Contributor:	Druey Schwab, Cécile Elisabeth
Subjects:	900 History 900 History > 940 History of Europe
Language:	English
Submitter:	Cécile Elisabeth Druey Schwab
Date Deposited:	08 Apr 2024 12:26
Last Modified:	08 Apr 2024 12:26
URI:	https://boris.unibe.ch/id/eprint/195246