Ukraine warfare newest: Russians pushed back far out of Kharkiv – Metropolis mayor

ReutersCopyright: Reuters

This year's Eurovision is unquestionably essentially the most political in a long time.

Russia has been banned. Ukraine is the runaway favorite to win, buoyed by a general sense of solidarity round the rest of the continent.

However this year’s occasion is political for different reasons too. The Kalush Orchestra, the act which is able to symbolize Ukraine tonight, was not the nation’s original choice.

That was Alina Pash, a 29-year-old rapper and former reality present contestant.

However when it was alleged she had visited occupied Crimea, she was dropped amid public outcry.

Kalush Orchestra, a folk rap group from Western Ukraine, acquired their chance as an alternative.

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

Tonight, when the Kalash Orchestra take to the stage, they are going to be representing a nation that is more and more assured in itself.

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

A battle predicated on the idea that this country had no national identity, no foundational myths, no national heroes, no will to resist, is what's uniting Ukraine more with every passing day.