May 29, 2015

June 6, 2014

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Last year on June 6, 2014, on the 70th anniversary of the Allied D-Day invasion (Operation Overlord), President Barack Obama and his European peers met with President Vladimir Putin at Normandy. A day earlier, at the G-7 summit in Brussels – that was scheduled to be a G-8 summit in Sochi prior to Russia being excluded – members called on all international actors to recognize the legitimacy of the Ukrainian government and on Moscow to refrain from further inciting unrest in eastern Ukraine.

President-elect Petro Poroshenko met with his Russian counterpart during the Normandy commemorations, prior to his inauguration as Ukraine’s president on June 7, 2014. Ukraine’s Parliament was also preparing for new parliamentary elections that were threatened by Russian escalation of the conflict. These challenges, in addition to forging national unity and enacting political and economic reforms were a full agenda for the new president.

Out of these meetings the Normandy Format – Ukraine, France, Germany and Russia, was formed, including a secondary representation at the ministerial level. The last of its meetings were in Minsk, Belarus, on February 11-12, when the Minsk II agreement was signed.

In 2014, the targeted sanctions against Russia’s aggressive actions were aimed mostly at individuals and did not touch upon military contracts with Russia, like the French Mistral-class warships, which are now off the table.

Ukraine is pursuing economic reforms to avoid state failure, whereas Russia’s reforms are in line with its geopolitical ambitions in the face of state failure. Mr. Putin is banking on mega-projects such as the natural gas pipeline to China, the new gas corridor via Turkey, and a bridge to the Crimean peninsula that was estimated to cost $10 billion.

“The Russian president probably also has few illusions regarding the usefulness of the new energy contracts with China, and not only because his Beijing counterparts firmly put their economic interests first, but also because Chinese business remains impregnable to Russian corruption, while producing plenty of its own,” Pavel K. Baev of the Eurasia Daily Monitor wrote. Europe, on the other hand, has been the main destination for Russian corruption, using “the convenient conduits, such as Cyprus or Austria, to influence the opinions in the key financial centers of London and Frankfurt.” The European Commission (EC) seeks to put a stop to a proposed gas pipeline under the Black Sea, while Austria, Bulgaria, Hungary and Serbia are eager to proceed with their special deals with Gazprom, which is under investigation by the EC for EU anti-trust law violations.

Ukraine’s slim chances for success are enough to motivate Mr. Putin to view it as a threat. “If reforms and reconciliation put Ukraine on the track of building a democratic and European state identity, Mr. Putin’s corrupt authoritarian petro-state project would be compromised and defeated,” Mr. Baev noted. Moscow punishes Kyiv’s progress with economic sanctions and military threats.

Mr. Baev underscored that failed diplomacy cannot dissuade Mr. Putin, but Euro-Atlantic unity can deter the Kremlin from experimenting with proxy war. The annexation of Crimea by Russia eliminates the West’s political options to give Russia incentive to cooperate on rehabilitating Ukraine. The need is greater, he adds, for “building credible instruments of containing the inherent aggressiveness of an arrogant and desperate regime.”

This year, the G-7 is scheduled to meet in Germany at Schloss Elmau, in Krun, Bavaria, on June 7-8. The G-7 rotating presidency is held by Germany, and the European Union is represented by Jean-Claude Junker (EC president) and Donald Tusk (European Council president). On the agenda are foreign and security policy, economic growth and free trade, dialogue with civil society and the shared values of the G-7 community.

The Wikipedia entry on the 41st G-7 summit notes: “Freedom and human rights, democracy and the rule of law, peace and security, prosperity and sustainable development are core principles agreed by the G-7. The heads of state and government of the G-7 do not accept the Russian Federation’s illegal annexation of Crimea. As a community of values, they have therefore decided to hold their meetings without Russia until further notice.”

 Source: “News Analysis: Could Normandy help Ukraine contain Russia?” by Pavel K. Baev (Eurasia Daily Monitor), The Ukrainian Weekly, June 15, 2014.

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