Ukraine conflict newest: Russians pushed back far out of Kharkiv – Metropolis mayor

ReutersCopyright: Reuters

This yr's Eurovision is surely essentially the most political in a very long time.

Russia has been banned. Ukraine is the runaway favourite to win, buoyed by a normal sense of solidarity round the remainder of the continent.

However this year’s occasion is political for other reasons too. The Kalush Orchestra, the act which will signify Ukraine tonight, was not the country’s original choice.

That was Alina Pash, a 29-year-old rapper and former reality show contestant.

However when it was alleged she had visited occupied Crimea, she was dropped amid public outcry.

Kalush Orchestra, a folks rap group from Western Ukraine, got their probability as an alternative.

Dressed in traditional outfits and drawing on the nation’s long however repressed musical traditions, they're an implicit rebuke to the suggestion, oft repeated by Vladimir Putin, that Ukraine will not be an actual country - however merely a "little Russia", a area that wants reintegration.

Tonight, when the Kalash Orchestra take to the stage, they are going to be representing a nation that is increasingly confident in itself.

And therein lies the irony, some would say strategic blunder, at the coronary heart of president Putin’s invasion.

A warfare predicated on the concept that this nation had no nationwide id, no foundational myths, no nationwide heroes, no will to withstand, is what's uniting Ukraine extra with each passing day.