Ukraine’s envoy to UK reacts to Netrebko’s London Royal Opera performances

Zaluzhnyi published a column in the Daily Mail in which he recalled that in 2014, after the occupation of Donetsk, Netrebko “donated” one million rubles to a local theater, met with Oleg Tsaryov and posed with the flag of the so-called “Novorossiya.”

“This was not a ‘gesture of mercy’ by Netrebko, as she claimed at the time. It was a demonstration of political loyalty. And no aria can erase this fact. Artists like Netrebko are the Kremlin’s ‘soft power,’ a tool that helps the world see Russia not as an aggressor but as a country of ‘great traditions,’” Zaluzhnyi wrote.

He added that the Russian singer is a “cultural instrument legitimizing killings in Ukraine.”

“This week she will take the stage at Covent Garden, and people will applaud her as if she were just a singer, as if the war never happened. The Kremlin closely watches such signals. For them, Netrebko’s performance at Covent Garden is not just a concert. It is proof that even after Bucha, Mariupol, Kramatorsk, Russian artists who once served the dictator can once again appear on Europe’s best stages,” the ambassador added.

According to Radio Liberty, on Sept. 7 several hundred protesters gathered outside the Royal Opera House in London to protest Netrebko’s performances.

The singer is scheduled for four appearances in Giacomo Puccini’s Tosca. The first performance is set for Sept. 11, and all tickets for her appearances are already sold out.

Recently, it was reported that the Russian singer will continue her lawsuit against the Metropolitan Opera in New York, which dismissed her after she refused to condemn Putin for Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.