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Geopolitics

Ukraine's Wounded v. Russian Bank Accounts? Why Swiss "Neutrality" Is Pure Hypocrisy

Switzerland has rejected a NATO request to take in injured Ukrainian soldiers, arguing it would compromise its neutrality. This is an old game of masking moral cowardice by a country that has profited off the Putin regime.

Photo of Biden, Parmelin and Putin in Geneva

Switzerland's President Guy Parmelin behind President Joe Biden, and Russia's President Vladimir Putin at the Geneva Summit in 2021

Clemens Wergin

-OpEd-

BERLIN — In recent weeks, NATO sent out a request to members and partners asking them to take in wounded Ukrainians for treatment. Its partner country Switzerland declined the request. It said it did not want to treat wounded soldiers because they might return to the war. This, they said, would endanger Switzerland's neutrality, the famous core principle of Swiss foreign policy.

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But they also don't want to take in wounded civilians for treatment. Because it is "almost impossible to distinguish civilians from soldiers," as Swiss diplomat and politician Johannes Matyassy explained.


That is a weak argument, to say the least. If it were really so difficult to distinguish between combatants and non-combatants, Switzerland would no longer be allowed to accept people fleeing from crisis areas because of war or civil war. So when it comes to the reception and treatment of injured Ukrainian civilians, neutrality is just an excuse.


Photo of the Russian and Swiss flag

The flags of Russia and Switzerland are seen at a meeting of Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Switzerland's President

Russian Foreign Ministry/TASS/Zuma

Moral cowardice

The Swiss decision is particularly offensive in light of the fact that the country has for decades been a favorite retreat of the oligarchs and officials who support and profit from Vladimir Putin's regime.

They saw nothing wrong with continuing to roll out the red carpet for Putin's accomplices.

They deposit their money in Swiss numbered bank accounts, buy luxurious Swiss chalets and send their children to Swiss private schools. For example, Putin's mistress, former gymnast Alina Kabaeva, lived in Switzerland for years with her children who were believed to be fathered by the Russian president.

Like many EU countries, Switzerland saw nothing wrong with continuing to roll out the red carpet for Putin's accomplices, even after Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine started in 2014. Unlike many EU members, however, Switzerland now seems to have problems unequivocally supporting a country that is being subjected to a cruel war of aggression that violates international law, aims to exterminate the Ukrainian nation, and has genocidal features.

To reject the treatment of injured Ukrainians with a dubious reference to international law, as Switzerland is doing, is particularly disgraceful.

The message from this decision is clear. For decades, Switzerland has had no problem getting involved with the perpetrators of the Putin regime, taking their money and harboring them. But it would rather not treat the victims of Moscow's criminal regime in its own country.

What is sold as neutrality is, in fact, just moral cowardice.

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Economy

Will China Invade Taiwan? Volkswagen's €180 Billion Bet Says 'No'

German automobile giant Volkswagen will invest billions in China to manufacture electric vehicles. It has deemed the risk of China invading Taiwan "unlikely," a peek into the calculations that private-sector conglomerates make, just like state actors.

Photo of workers at the production line of SAIC Volkswagen in Shanghai

Workers at the production line of SAIC Volkswagen in Shanghai

Pierre Haski

-Analysis-

PARIS — Automaker Volkswagen has decided to accelerate its investments in electric vehicles: €180 billion, mainly in the United States and China. The Financial Times has reported that the company's management evaluated the risk and concluded that China would not invade Taiwan in the short term. It decided as a result that it was reasonable to invest in China, one of its main markets.

It's an interesting vantage point to undertand events. Governments around the world are questioning China's intentions towards the island of Taiwan, which Beijing claims as its own. What is less known is that large companies also need to calculate geopolitical risk and conduct their own analyses.

A few months after Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the President of the European Chamber of Commerce in China, which represents thousands of companies, sounded the alarm in an interview with an economic magazine. Joerg Wuttke mentioned the trauma of Western companies forced to leave Russia and lose everything, and warned Chinese authorities that the same thing could happen if China invaded Taiwan.

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