Carnegie Moscow Center
Facing economic collapse, a winter without Russian natural gas, and a frozen conflict in the Donbas, a divisive election may be the last thing Ukraine needs. But on October 26, Ukrainians will head to the polls to elect a new parliament.
By turning Russia into a war state, President Putin has unleashed a process he cannot stop and made himself hostage to suicidal statecraft.
The current conflict between the European Union and Russia is a clash between a postmodern world, in which states prefer to use soft power to achieve their foreign policy goals, and a modern one, in which the use of force in foreign policy is considered acceptable.
Ukraine needs more than the current level of Western assistance. But the Ukrainian government also needs to pull its weight, promising (and delivering) transparency.
Leonid Kuchma deserves credit for stepping forward at a moment of national peril. A realist and truth-teller of Kuchma’s calibre is a strikingly rare commodity in Kyiv and the West these days.
The Ukraine crisis has betrayed fissures in the Russo-Kazakh relationship. It is difficult to predict a post-Nazarbayev Kazakh policy toward Russia, but developments in Ukraine suggest that future Kazakh leaders will have to deal with a new source of friction with the Kremlin.
This summer’s crisis in eastern Ukraine has made the European Union and Belarus keen to develop a more constructive relationship with each other.
Separatists across Europe are hailing Scotland's referendum, but they also know that breaking up is a traumatic process.
Even a threat like Islamic terrorism won’t force Russia and the Unites States to make security collaboration a higher priority than geopolitical rivalry over Ukraine.
The EU and Ukraine have suspended provisional application of the Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement (DCFTA) until the end of 2015. Though their decision might look like Putin’s victory, this conclusion is not obvious. It is high time to stop viewing Ukraine through the prism of Russia policy.