Exclusive: Ukraine Minister Bondar hopeful of PM Modi's visit, emphasises cultural dialogue

Ukraine's deputy minister of culture & information policy, Anastasia Bondar had expressed optimism on PM Modi's visit to her country during an exclusive interview with WION last week in Delhi.

Speaking to our diplomatic correspondent, Sidhant Sibal, Minister Bondar had said, "I personally strongly believe that the Indian Prime Minister will hopefully very soon come to Ukraine, and this is the only possible way to bring and show him the real situation on what is going on right now in Ukraine".

The minister was in the Indian national capital for the World Heritage Committee meeting, that saw the passage of three Ukraine-supported resolutions on the impact of war on historic sites in the European country.

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The minister emphasised on a cultural dialogue with India. She said, "If we can find a cultural dialogue between our countries which might help our countries go deeper on our cooperation, I would be more than happy. I would be glad to invite the respected deputy or the Minister of Culture, any of my colleagues to Ukraine to see the situation with their own eyes." The deputy culture minister also spoke about Yoga, Bollywood and the famous Indian song "Jimmy Jimmy, Aja Aja".

Read on for the full conversation:

WION: What brings you here to Delhi?

Anastasia Bondar: First of all, it's the World Heritage Committee, in which we took part and for the first time Ukraine has become a member of the committee itself, not the observer, which is very important for us as the country which is facing the war of Russia towards Ukraine. We talk about the heritage during the war, the preservation of the heritage sites in Ukraine, and how the war of aggression of Russia influenced the destruction of cultural heritage in our country.

WION: How the war has impacted the heritage sites in Ukraine. I believe there were conversations at the heritage committee meeting as well, where you talked about the heritage sites being destroyed.

Anastasia Bondar: Exactly, and I would really like to have a wider discussion about the culture in general because the cultural heritage includes the immovable heritage. So if we talk about the cultural immovable heritage, meaning the archaeology and architecture, then right now over a thousand of sites have been destroyed or damaged. There's a huge number, but at the same time, we should talk about 2000 other cultural establishments which have always also been destroyed or damaged and had to stop their operations. So the numbers are huge. The war continues and the numbers are still going to increase, and this is the first time since the Second World War that the country has tried to put all its efforts into preserving heritage while the war continues.

Watch |Ukraine Minister Anastasia Bondar speaks to WION

WION: Since you are now a member of the committee, let's discuss how you can address this issue at the Delhi heritage committee meeting.

Anastasia Bondar: It is important for us to use every possible way to talk about the full-scale invasion of Russia into Ukraine, and how this situation influences the destruction of cultural heritage. For sure, committee is one possibility to tell the world about the huge amount of distractions we face right now, and how can the world help Ukraine protect and preserve our cultural heritage. So in the committee, we are talking about three sides which we have put earlier on the danger list. These sites are in Lviv, Kyiv and Odessa and we are here trying to get confirmation indeed from UNESCO that these sites continue to be under threat. And what is most important is that the threat is not caused by the host country, that this threat is due to the ongoing war by Russia in Ukraine.

WION: Have you experienced any wins?

Anastasia Bondar: There was an intense argument about how the formulations go because as you know, multilateral relations and international organisations, are all about formulations and how you use the wording. They are very important in how you put that in the official documents. So first-ever mention, in UNESCO's official document and it was adopted in the formulation of the full-scale invasion of Russia, that's super important for us.

WION: How do you see India's role in terms of safeguarding heritage is not only across the world but also perhaps in Ukraine?

Anastasia Bondar: I really wish that India would join Ukraine in our efforts to preserve our cultural heritage. I believe that we can find mutual ways to cooperate, especially taking into consideration the experience of India to get back its heritage. These are very important issues when we talk about museum heritage in particular because as of now 1.7 million museum items stay at temporarily occupied territories which means that we have as a Ukrainian state no information on the conditions of those museum items and how they're treated and if they are still at those territories, or they already have been taken to the territory of the Russian Federation. So basically, these are things we're going to fight for to bring them back to our country. And I am sure that on this matter, we can be great partners with India.

WION: The war started in 2022, it's been almost two years. What is the current situation in your country?

Anastasia Bondar: It's actually the third year, as of February 24. So basically, the situation is quite complicated. We face a difficult situation with bombardments of the power plants and two huge shortages of electricity, which also greatly influence the preservation of cultural heritage.

You may imagine that in summer when there are high temperatures and heat we have to keep the microclimate, in order to preserve the heritage buildings and the museum items. It's completely impossible. The same goes for winter when the shortages of the electricity department go back there and the situation is completely opposite, to heat the premises. Secondly, is the constant bombardments especially in the city of Odessa. As it is situated by the Black Sea and close to Crimea, I guess that bombardments happen, like each second or third day, and there can be ten, twenty or twenty-five missiles launched at once. It is important to mention that it's not only the direct hits, which harm and damage the buildings themselves. It's also the blast and the sound waves which create this effect over the ancient buildings and make them jump a little bit or create the micro scratches inside of the building structure, which then influences them.

WION: As a minister from Ukraine, are you hopeful of the peace talks which have happened?

Anastasia Bondar: I'm very hopeful about Ukraine's victory. And this is very important for us. We do believe that the most important document all countries of the world accepted in 1991 is our independent document, as everybody accepts where the borders of our countries are. So we really fight right now for the integrity of our country. We have not been taking any steps to conquer anybody's territory. We're trying to protect what belongs to us.

WION: Any fatigue from the war?

Anastasia Bondar: Indeed. It's the third year now and I am sure we all are humans and we would be tired living every day in the shelling and constant air raids and alarms. But that doesn't change our desire to fight for our land.

WION: How do you see India's position on the war? The Indian side has repeatedly emphasised on dialogue and diplomacy. What's your take?

Anastasia Bondar: I'm the one here to talk about culture. And if we can find a cultural dialogue between our countries which might help our countries, go deeper in our cooperation, I would be more than happy. I would be glad to invite the respected deputy or the Minister of Culture, or any of my colleagues, to Ukraine to see the situation with their own eyes.

WION: Have you invited any of your counterparts?

Anastasia Bondar: I have not yet had a chance to meet anybody from the counterpart ministry. But we do have our conversations ongoing in order to have the mutual Working Group on culture and hopefully, I would like to use this opportunity to invite the respected minister of culture to come to Ukraine and witness the situation we have.

WION: Can you share more details about the cultural dialogue

Anastasia Bondar: Well, I think that as of now, culture has become the main message line, which is working in the world. You might have noticed a lot of singers, a lot of players, a lot of artists, a lot of exhibitions. All these things through cultural methods are showing the world what is going on in our country. And this is very important.

WION: Have you seen Bollywood movies? What aspects of Indian culture also specifically do you like?

Anastasia Bondar: I think I like the first of all the dresses. The National dress is the most important for me as a lady, I really liked the way it looked. For sure all the jewellery and the moves, this is just an amazing part, which I really adore. We used to watch some of the movies back since I'm not watching TV, but I remember from my childhood that we used to watch some of the films and they always liked this sound.

WION: Do you do yoga? Is yoga popular in Ukraine?

Anastasia Bondar: Yoga is very popular. I used to do yoga myself as I have lived in Asia, actually in Nepal for several years. So I'm very familiar with yoga and everything which is connected to the culture.

WION: You mentioned the working group meeting. So is it happening? What's the current status of the working group meeting on culture?

Anastasia Bondar: I think that we are on the negotiation side of confirming the final details of what should be the agenda. We are very open to new proposals if we should enlarge the scale of our cooperation if we should keep it to the cultural exchanges. For example, in the creative industry, should we go for the book exchange because this part of literature development is also very important for us in both ways we would like to have more development on the translations of Ukrainian literature to Hindi and otherwise why don't we just start learning, what you have as the best well use of your literature in Ukrainian language.

WION: We saw the visit of the Indian Prime Minister to Russia and his meeting with the President of Ukraine in Italy. How do you perceive these meetings and what are your expectations for the visit of the Indian Prime Minister?

Anastasia Bondar: I personally strongly believe that the Indian Prime Minister will hopefully very soon come to Ukraine, and this is the only possible way to bring and show him and all the team would be joining him to show the real situation on what is going on right now in Ukraine. So, again, I would very much welcome the Prime Minister together with all the ministers and our partners from the Ministry of Culture in Ukraine. Hope to see them in Kyiv very soon.