Ukraine conflict latest: Russians pushed again far out of Kharkiv – City mayor

ReutersCopyright: Reuters

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

Russia has been banned. Ukraine is the runaway favorite to win, buoyed by a common sense of solidarity around the remainder of the continent.

However this yr’s event is political for other reasons too. The Kalush Orchestra, the act which can represent Ukraine tonight, was not the country’s original selection.

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, acquired their likelihood as a substitute.

Dressed in traditional outfits and drawing on the country’s long but repressed musical traditions, they are an implicit rebuke to the suggestion, oft repeated by Vladimir Putin, that Ukraine shouldn't be an actual nation - but merely a "little Russia", a region that needs reintegration.

Tonight, when the Kalash Orchestra take to the stage, they will be representing a nation that's increasingly assured in itself.

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

A struggle predicated on the idea that this country had no national identification, no foundational myths, no national heroes, no will to withstand, is what's uniting Ukraine more with each passing day.