The Nation: The Ukrainian Nationalism at the Heart of ‘Euromaidan’

(Note: this article is several weeks old but a good discussion of the very relevant issue that is a major part of what is splitting the country apart. Since this article, Svoboda has been given 11 additional seats in Parliament and both Svoboda and Right Sector have high level executive branch positions in the current administration over Defense and Security.)
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Coverage focused on the call for European integration has largely glossed over
the rise in nationalist rhetoric that has led to violence.
The Nation

http://www.thenation.com/article/178013/ukrainian-nationalism-heart-euromaidan

"According to Maksim Butkevich of the coordinator of the No Borders Project of the Center for Social Action NGO, which works against discrimination and xenophobia, far-right groups have grown in popularity over the course of Euromaidan."

"Kiev’s two-month-long “Euromaidan” protest turned violent on Sunday as people in masks, outraged over restrictive protest laws hurriedly passed last week, marched on parliament and ran into police cordons that they pelted with stones and Molotov cocktails. Police hurled gas canisters, stun grenades, and a water cannon and rubber bullets at them, setting off a wave of clashes previously unknown at the largely peaceful protest.

Spearheading the clashes with police was Right Sector, a group with ties to far-right parties including the Patriots of Ukraine and Trident, which BBC Ukraine reported is largely comprised of nationalist football fans. In a statement the next day, the group claimed credit for Sunday’s unrest and promised to continue fighting until President Viktor Yanukovich stepped down."


"The surge in violence sparked by Right Sector has revealed how uncritical and undiscerning most of the media has been of the far-right parties and movements that have played a leading role in the “Euromaidan,” the huge protests for closer ties to Europe that flared up in November and have taken over Kiev’s Independence Square (“Maidan Nezalezhnosti”). Protest coverage focused on the call for European integration and the struggle against the Yanukovich regime has largely glossed over the rise in nationalist rhetoric, often chauvinist, that has led to violence not just against police, but also against left-wing activists."

More: http://www.thenation.com/article/178013/ukrainian-nationalism-heart-euromaidan