Old battles are renewed in the May 25 vote to be Ukraine’s next president. But the first order of business is to make sure the ballot takes place.
Category: Ukraine Winter
Lower visibility, a falling ruble and rising inflation: The Ukrainian crisis is taking its toll on the Russian economy.
Should a state be driven by law, or by force? Russia’s neighbors, friends and enemies must reflect on what’s really at play in the showdown over Ukraine.
KOSTIANTYNIVKA — It was still early on Monday morning in the east Ukrainian city of Kostiantynivka when the city administration and police station were visited by 20 weapons-bearing men wearing camouflage uniforms. Within a few minutes they had control of the seat of power in this city of 95,000 people, and it wasn’t long before […]
In Sloviansk, masked men storm homes of Roma families and agitators blame the Jews.
MOSCOW — The same picture that we saw at the end of 2013 in Kiev has now simply moved to Donetsk, Kharkiv, Luhansk and Mykolaiv. Buildings stormed, barricaded streets, people in masks and flags flying. The differences, at first glance, appear insignificant. Before, there was just one center of the protests — Kiev — whereas […]
BERLIN — It looked as if a great moment might be in the making: German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier and his Polish colleague Radoslaw Sikorski had teamed up with French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius, and the trio flew to Kiev for joint talks with the then-Ukrainian government and opposition. At the time violence on Maidan […]
MILOVE — This town located 900 kilometers from Kiev and Moscow is unwittingly embroiled in the bitter, and at times deadly, dispute between Russia and Ukraine. The border separating the two countries divides the town of Milove in half, and Ukrainian residents in this poor region vitally need to trade with the richer Russia to […]
The Maidan protests were driven by public disgust with corruption, more than picking sides between the EU and Russia. But ousting Viktor Yanukovych has not ended the dirty business woven into the fabric of Ukrainian life.
“If you’re standing at the ATM and it is not giving you your money, you don’t care where something is going wrong…”
Extraordinary Russian wealth has accumulated in London, much of it of questionable origins. Inevitably, it will be factored into British decisions in the showdown with Vladimir Putin.
MOSCOW — As expected, the West reacted poorly to Russia signing an agreement allowing Crimea to join the Russian Federation. But will their threats of consequences really be felt? “We join Poland and the international community in condemning the continuing assault on Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrety,” said U.S. Vice President Joe Biden, who was […]
Complicated…and crucial to resolving the current showdown between Russia and the West.
PEREVALNE — While Russian flags fly in Simferopol and people celebrate the “return home” in the main square, a few miles away in the village of Perevalne a strange calm has descended. For weeks now, the Ukrainian military regiments here have been surrounded by Russian forces, and armored vehicles have patrolled the streets. Pro-Russian activists […]
It will take the international community years to recover from the trust Russia violated over its illegal interference in Ukraine. But Putin and his close collaborators will never be punished.
The path of the EU and the U.S. on Ukraine is defining not only the West’s long-term interests but also the key geopolitical players involved. A Russian look at two key diplomatic players.
The competing sides, both globally and regionally, will never see Ukraine’s reality the same way, so deep are the historical and cultural divides. Analysis from Kiev.
MOSCOW — The U.S. government seems to believe that Russia has already established “complete operational control of the Crimean Peninsula.” American intelligence sources have cited no fewer than 6,000 Russian soldiers who were used to achieve this goal. (In a press conference Tuesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin denied his country’s troops were currently occupying Crimea, […]
Europe and the U.S. must respond to Russian President Vladimir Putin with neither war nor capitulation. There is a third option: total isolation.
The West has woken up to the gravity of the situation. But what real options are on the table?
In the capital of Ukraine’s Crimea region, where ethnic Russians and otherwise pro-Russian citizens hold sway, dissenters are holding a countermovement to the pro-EU Maiden protests.
-OpEd- MUNICH — When the Winter Olympics ended Sunday evening, the second part of the Ukrainian revolution began. Now the country’s cohesion and its chances of economic survival will be decided. After a dramatic week in Kiev, a civil war was avoided when the Ukraine Parliament removed the president from power. And now even Ukrainians […]
In Eastern Ukraine, near the Russian border, the scene – and sentiments – and not exactly like those in Kiev.
-OpEd- The Western world felt safe in the illusion that nothing would happen in Ukraine until the end of the Sochi Olympic Games. But it woke up on Wednesday to terrifying images of the bloody battlefield of central Kiev, literally ablaze. After a three-month-long face-off between a pro-European opposition, which hasn’t weakened despite the cold […]
To understand the Maidan protesters in Kiev, just go to Prague, Warsaw and beyond. While other post-Soviet bloc economies have emerged, Ukrainians know too well that their leaders have failed them.
And Igor Luzenko is the lucky one. The other activist with whom he was abducted, beaten and interrogated didn’t make it home alive.
-OpEd- MUNICH — During these past years of economic crisis, we Europeans learned that our fate was inextricably linked to that of the banks. We’re accustomed to the idea that numbers will decide how the continent fares. A good European, then, is a thrifty European. And now the pictures from Kiev come crashing in. They […]
KIEV — “Dude, are you drunk? Get out of here!” says Evgeni Dudchenko, a pro-EU protester who works security for the so-called Euromaidan movement, named for the square where the dissidents gather. He checks out everyone who wants to enter the demonstration area. “If someone is drunk, he’s out of here. Alcohol is forbidden here, […]
As overnight clashes in Kiev leave at least two dead, the Russian daily reports that the violence is being fed by nationalist groups that advocate open revolution.
The former boxing champion has been plucked by the Western media as the new face of Ukraine’s opposition. The situation is more complicated than that, even as risks for all rise.
Europe represents the freedom from political dictatorship. But at what cost?
Putin is doing everything to not be remembered by history as the one who “lost” Ukraine. Mother Russia’s imperial face is on the line.
KIEV — So Ukraine’s former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko is still a prisoner — and Ukraine’s future as part of the European Union hangs in the balance. The Ukrainian Parliament balked Wednesday night on any decision to release the opposition leader, who has been jailed since 2011. Meanwhile, the EU has sent Kiev a clear […]
Kiev doesn’t want to risk its ties with Moscow, but can’t afford to pass up economic opportunities in Europe. And where does that leave jailed opposition chief Yulia Tymoshenko?