MOSCOW, November 25. /TASS/. By choosing the "Western vector" in 2014, Ukraine became the poorest country in Europe, losing its sovereignty, Viktor Medvedchuk, leader of the Other Ukraine movement and former head of the Opposition Platform - For Life party (banned in Ukraine), said.

"Ukraine's propaganda declares the Western vector of development the only path to prosperity and economic well-being. <...> European integrators have made Ukraine's economy and living standards the poorest in European and world rankings. Since the coup in 2014 and until 2023, Ukraine has become weak in every aspect, and it has been considered the poorest country in Europe since 2018," Medvedchuk wrote in his article published on the movement's website.

The country is sinking into poverty, chaos, and destruction, and its residents flee whenever they have an opportunity, the politician said. According to the World Bank's estimates, Ukraine ranks last among European countries in terms of GDP per capita and purchasing power, with the average salary in the country being the lowest in Europe, Medvedchuk added.

Ukrainians have never seen the promised freedom, Medvedchuk noted. "Parliamentary turbo mode, flagrant violations of existing laws, usurpation of power, and outrages by the law enforcement system built by [Vladimir] Zelensky have brought Ukraine to its lowest point in terms of world economic freedoms," he said.

People in Ukraine are now deprived of making decisions in their own country: both Ukraine's judicial and law enforcement systems and the supervisory boards of leading state-owned companies are formed through expert councils under foreign control. The ill-considered American-centric partnership of Ukraine against national interests became an object lesson, Medvedchuk said.

"Because of the coup and two Maidans, Ukraine ended in war, de-sovereignization, de-intellectualization, deindustrialization, depopulation, and total degradation of all spheres of life. The impoverishment of tens of millions of Ukrainians. Absolute dependence on the collective West," Medvedchuk emphasized.