Putin is increasing his attacks on Ukrainian civilians and may be preparing to use chemical weapons. But these horrific tactics are not new — they were perfected by the Russian army during a brutal war in Syria.
country: Ukraine
Stay updated with comprehensive news on Ukraine from Worldcrunch. Discover insights on Ukrainian politics, economic strategies, societal issues, and cultural landmarks with translations from top international sources. Highlights include Kyiv, Ukrainian history, and current events.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky seems ready to accept death on the battlefield — but he would be doing his people an even greater service if he fled Ukraine to establish a government-in-exile.
Since Russia’s annexation of Crimea, NATO has reinforced its presence eastward — but the Baltic countries and Poland were the prime beneficiaries. But Romania, which shares the longest border with Ukraine, may be the country most directly in Vladimir Putin’s path.
China is already profiting from the West’s economic divorce from Russia. But its biggest interest may be to learn from Russia’s experience of invading a land it claims for itself.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán is trying to keep the EU and NATO happy without upsetting Vladimir Putin. The war in Ukraine has upped the stakes in Hungary, where tense elections are just a few weeks away.
No one should be under any illusions that Ukraine is about to join the EU or NATO. If this war is to end in a lasting peace, Ukrainians will have to accept a new position on the world stage and a new approach. The famously “neutral” and multilingual Switzerland could be a model.
An exclusive visit inside Moldova’s breakaway pro-Russian republic of Transnistria, which many fear may be the gateway to the next war after Ukraine in the strategically important target.
China did not expect a protracted and bloody war in Ukraine, which is causing global upheaval and thus major problems for Beijing’s interests. There are growing signs that the Chinese government’s policy of “strategic neutrality” is reaching its limit.
Putin says he wants to “denazify” Ukraine, but his true goal is bringing the country back into Russia’s sphere of influence as part of an all-Russian nation. To achieve that, he will try to turn it into a second Belarus, with a puppet ruler who has a familiar face.
Ukrainians are pleading with the West to establish a no-fly zone to stop the destruction of their country. But that would be a high-risk option. Now the U.S. is considering delivering fighting jets, but that could also escalate the conflict. What else can be done?
Ukranian literary translator Juri Durkot shares his notes about new everyday tasks as the country is at war.
The shelling near the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant has raised concerns, even if there are no initial signs of radiation from this incident. But what about the other plants that are located in the immediate vicinity of the Russian attack path?
The war in Ukraine has prompted a huge outpouring of compassion across the border in Poland. It is a positive reflection of the human condition, but also a reminder that we should care for others and outsiders even when there’s no nearby conflict.
Less than a week after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine triggered a new cleavage in international affairs, U.S. President Joe Biden outlined a vision for confronting Moscow as necessary for the pursuit of America’s ambitions at home and abroad.
For decades, burdened by its history, Germany refused to face the harsh realities of foreign policy. Now, suddenly spurred by the Ukraine crisis, the German government is ready to once again show strength — long-awaited good news, for all.
A reporter arrived from elsewhere in Europe, posing the questions so many others have begun to ask themselves since all-out war began last week.
The Russian leader’s invasion is a both a pursuit of his Hitlerian obsession to rectify his nation’s humiliation, and a bet that the West’s decline is permanent.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine that began Thursday morning on multiple fronts was meant to quickly overrun the outnumbered defensive positions. Kyiv-based Livy Bereg reports that it hasn’t turned out that way.
Vladimir Putin’s claims that NATO threatens Russia’s security, and that the only way Russia will back down is if NATO promises never to admit Ukraine, is a bait and switch. His long-term dream is to erase the idea of a Ukrainian nation on the road to his wider tsarist conquests.
War is upon us. But many in the West have sleepwalked through two decades of rising tensions with Russia. The situation in Ukraine can only be understood in the context of Vladimir Putin’s view on Boris Yeltsin, NATO’s eastward expansion, wars in the Balkans and Iraq, and beyond.
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Ukraine, A Guidebook For Our Survival
Faced with a massive invasion by its far more powerful neighbor, Ukrainians must be conscious of the stakes at play and the means that Vladimir Putin is prepared to employ.
Faced with a $32 billion drop in their wealth this year, Russian oligarchs are looking for assets to allow them to overcome sanctions that will increase with the invasion of Ukraine. Familiar with crises, they see bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies as an escape from the hegemony of the dollar, and a way to diversify their holdings.
Moscow’s large-scale attack launched on Ukraine erases any lingering doubts about where Russia’s president wants to go. Vladimir Putin is taking back part of the Soviet empire and attacking the European post-War order. Europe and NATO must respond, by arming the eastern flank.
Exclusive: New details emerge of a would-be forced evacuation last week of pro-Russian civilians from the Donetsk and Luhansk territories that Vladimir Putin has used to justify Thursday’s invasion of Ukraine. Locals call the operation a “farce.”
Russia’s president is neither clearly right-wing nor left-wing. As his dubious allies around the world suggest, he simply hates Western liberal democracy and seeks to expand his personal power, at home and abroad, by sowing unrest and conflict.
The situation in eastern Ukraine is highly explosive. What will happen after the recognition of the self-proclaimed “People’s Republics” of Donetsk and Luhansk as independent states? Will Putin hunker down or double down? Instant analysis from German foreign policy thinkers on what happens next.
It’s not the presence of Western weapons that scares Moscow, it is the idea of freedom. And yet by threatening Ukrainians with invasion, his neighbors and rivals in the West rally around that same idea. Has the would-be strategic mastermind in the Kremlin finally painted himself into a corner? Unfortunately, that’s a dangerous place.
Over the past two months, as tensions rose in Ukraine, Russian has launched new missiles from the contested islands north of Japan. Kyiv and Tokyo have made it clear that they are firmly aligned with each other and with Washington. Moscow’s eastern flank opens major strategic questions, including China’s role.
The United States expects Germany to put a halt to the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline in the event of a Russian invasion of Ukraine. But the Americans are not mentioning the fact that they themselves import plenty of oil from Russia.
As with Ukraine and Belarus, Kazakhstan is falling under the grip of Moscow as a response to disorder and threats to align with the West.
Surrogacy is still considered quite controversial, especially in Italy where a story has made headlines after would-be parents renounced a baby born in Ukraine. The author says we must face the ethical (and other) questions rather than dismiss the practice as “uterus for rent.”
The global probe of offshore accounts around the world strike at the heart of Kiev’s current government and power structure of a ruling class that rose to power on the promise of fighting corruption, including the television-star-turned-President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Joe Biden’s Geneva meeting with Vladimir Putin cannot avoid the Nord Stream 2 pipeline standoff. Kyiv will be watching every step.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is delusional in believing that the U.S. and Europe will force Moscow’s hand, so long as Russia holds so many cards.
The head of state, a political outsider who had promised to fight corruption, must contend with the powerful oligarchs in his own entourage at the risk of disappointing his voters.
The New Year’s Eve prison exchange between Russia and Ukraine was a rare softening of hostilities in the occupied region in eastern Ukraine. Here’s the story of one of those released.
There’s an old joke about the apartment complexes named after Khrushchev.
Ukraine’s president-elect Volodymyr Zelenskiy has learned how to appeal to the whole country — but now this former comedian has to learn how to rule it.
Strains of drug-resistant tuberculosis are spreading across Ukraine, where armed conflict and market misgivings are making a bad situation even worse.