Oleg Tsaryov is a pro-Russian Ukrainian businessman, politician and ex-separatist official in eastern Ukraine. On 26 July 2014, he became the speaker of the Parliament of Novorossiya, a confederation that contained the separatist Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics, and performed until its dissolution on 18 May 2015.
The European Union sanctioned Tsaryov for calling for the creation of the Federal State of Novorossiya in May 2014. The UK government also sanctioned him in 2014 for the Russo-Ukrainian War. In 2018, Ukrainian media presumed that Tsaryov was residing in Russia, probably in Russia’s annexed Crimea.
In February 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin declared that Russia was executing a “special military operation in Donbas”; a large-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine followed this announcement. The United States intelligence community designated Tsaryov as a possible Kremlin-supported choice to head a pro-Russian puppet Ukrainian government. In the wake of the attack Tsaryov declared
“As promised, the denazification procedure has begun.”
He also asserted he was “already in Ukraine” and that “Kyiv will be freed from the Nazis.”
In March 2022, Russian channel RT released a discussion with Tsaryov in which he claimed he was in Ukraine and delivering humanitarian aid to Ukrainian territory under the control of Russian brigades. On 20 March 2022, Tsaryov asked the acting mayor of Kryvyi Rih, Oleksandr Vilkul (while asserting “his” Russian troops “are now near Kryvyi Rih”) to renounce the city to Russian troops. Tsaryov discoursed Vikul as “used to be my fellow party members” and claimed that Vikul had “always taken a pro-Russian perspective”.
On 24 March 2022, Tsaryov reported Russia’s decision to
“create military-civilian oversights in the occupied territories, which will carry all the power of authority”
and said that
“this [Ukraine] has always been and will be Russian ground and we are restoring sovereignty over this land.”
On 2 April 2022, the Russian military gave up their endeavours to gain control over Kyiv, and thus the possibility of forming a puppet Ukrainian government, when it ditched its Kyiv offensive.
