Ukraine - a Country Divided

Photo by innaunique

With the situation changing almost daily it is hard to stay abreast of events in Ukraine. However a picture is worth a thousand words and a real-time picture is worth a thousand more. Therefore I have spent this morning exploring Ukraine on EchoSEC.

The EchoSec application displays social media messages and photos from Instagram, Twitter and Foursquare around any location. The link above has a bounding-box around Independence Square in Kiev. Beneath the map you can view a series of the latest photos submitted to Instagram, many of them showing the protests in Kiev.


A map is also worth a thousand words and both the Washington Post and Big Think have created maps that help explain the huge political divide in Ukraine. The Washington Post has mapped the 2010 Ukraine election results and Big Think the 2004 election results.

Both maps show a country almost split in half in their support for President Viktor Yanukovych or the Pro-European party. The president is pushing for ever more closer ties with Russia whilst the Pro-Europeans want closer integration with the European Union. The Washington Post map also attempts to show where the protests against Yanukovych are taking place, showing that at the moment the protests are almost exclusively in the areas where the Pro-European Party have most electoral support.