The organisers called it a show of support for their struggling alma mater, but Ballet Without Borders at Moscow's Bolshoi theatre has only deepened enmity between Russia and Ukraine.

Alumni of Kiev’s state choreography school said they merely wanted to raise funds for the renowned academy. But politics and propaganda tainted the glittering gala, and ballet was dragged into the countries’ bitter and sometimes bizarre “culture war”.

The traditional closeness of Ukraine and Russia is exemplified by the ballet school, which occupies a long, low building in a nondescript suburb of Kiev.

It has trained generations of young dancers from Russia and around the world, and many graduates have enjoyed celebrated careers with Russia’s best ballet companies.

Photographs of former pupils who achieved stardom in Russia line the corridors, but there is no sign of a current doyenne: Svetlana Zakharova.

Born in Lutsk in northwest Ukraine, Zakharova spent six years here before moving to Russia, where she danced for the Mariinsky Theatre in St Petersburg and then switched to the Bolshoi, where she is a principal dancer.

In disrepair

Zakharova (35) said she was inspired to organise the starry

Ballet Without Borders

event after finding her old school in disrepair on a 2013 visit.

The children “should study in normal conditions”, she said, “without freezing in winter in cold ballet halls. And without being scared that, at any moment, part of the ceiling could collapse because the roof is leaking.”

Ivan Doroshenko, the director of the school, said Zakharova exaggerated its problems, but at first he welcomed her offer of help to bring in badly needed cash.

"I didn't know why she said conditions were so terrible . . . But when I heard about her idea, I thought why not, we should work together," he told The Irish Times.

That changed when he discovered that Zakharova was among hundreds of cultural figures in Russia who signed a letter last March to “strongly declare support for the position of the Russian president on Ukraine and Crimea”.

Appalled

Like most Ukrainians, Doroshenko is appalled by Russia’s annexation of Crimea and backing for separatists in eastern Ukraine, where fighting with government forces has killed more than 4,700 people and displaced one million.

"The money raised by this concert cannot compare with the thousands of victims, the hundreds of thousands of square kilometres of territory, the tens of billions of hryvnias that Ukraine has lost as a result of the 'position of the Russian president on Ukraine and Crimea'," Doroshenko wrote in rejecting the assistance of Ballet Without Borders.

“The event was undoubtedly being used as propaganda,” he said in his office. “They were making out that Russia is so rich and generous, while we are so poor and miserable; that Russia will repair the school because Ukraine can’t do it.”

Zakharova insisted the fundraiser had nothing to do with politics or propaganda and was devised “before the situation became complicated” between Russia and Ukraine.

But this bitter and bloody conflict now infects contact at all levels, dividing families and friends and destroying diplomatic, economic and even cultural ties.

Ukrainian pop stars who perform in Russia are denounced in their homeland, and the few Russian celebrities who dare question Kremlin policy on Ukraine are portrayed as traitors by Moscow’s state-dominated media.

After playing for displaced civilians in a government-controlled town in eastern Ukraine, veteran Russian rock singer Andrei Makarevich faced calls from pro-Kremlin politicians to be stripped of his state honours, as well as accusations of collaborating with the "fascists" whom Russian officials say are running Kiev.

In Ukraine, violent protests have disrupted concerts by local singer Ani Lorak, whose appearances on Russian state television and at a Moscow awards ceremony prompted compatriots to question her allegiances.

Ukrainian bands that supported last year's overthrow of Kremlin-backed president Viktor Yanukovich are not welcome in Russia's concert halls, while Kiev has made Russian stars unwelcome for lauding the annexation of Crimea or praising the pro-Moscow separatists.

One blacklisted celebrity is Iosif Kobzon, an ageing crooner and deputy for Russia’s ruling party. In October he sang in the rebel stronghold of Donetsk and performed a duet with a camouflage-clad militant.

The same week, prominent Russian actor Mikhail Porechenkov donned a flak jacket and helmet marked "Press" and fired a heavy machine gun with rebels fighting for Donetsk airport.

Porechenkov claimed to have fired only blanks, but Ukraine put him on the wanted list and banned his films from the country’s screens.

Truth ministry

Kiev has now formed a ministry of information policy to counter a massive propaganda campaign from Moscow, which it blames for turning large parts of Russian-speaking eastern Ukraine against the country’s new pro-western leaders.

The new agency – half-jokingly dubbed the “ministry of truth” – is now examining the Inter television station’s New Year’s Eve broadcast of a Russian show featuring Kobzon and several other allegedly “anti-Ukrainian” Russian stars.

Critics want officials to ban Inter, which is jointly owned by Ukrainian tycoons with strong ties to Moscow and Russian state television.

Yuriy Stets, the minster for information policy, advocates extending the status of “persona non grata” to faces on television and voices on radio.

“These people should not only be absent from Ukraine physically,” he said. “They should not be allowed to enter our country through broadcasts.”

The deepest ties that bind Ukraine and Russia – language and culture – are increasingly seen as routes by which dangerous propaganda and disinformation can reach their people, thereby spreading “unpatriotic” thoughts and weakening resolve. So these pathways are filtered, blocked or simply severed.

The Kiev ballet school is still teaching Russian children, however, and Doroshenko hopes Russia’s theatres will keep hiring its graduates.

But he is adamant that he will not take charity from Zakharova or any other supporter of Russia’s behaviour in Ukraine.

“We may not have much money, but we have our pride,” he said, “and we will improve things here ourselves”.