You're reading: Ex-Swedish Prime Minister Bildt says war in Donbas ‘not yet frozen’

In an interview given to German tabloid Bild, former Swedish Prime Minister Carl Bildt stated that Russian President Vladimir Putin wants to divide the West, and explained how Ukraine could be supported.

Also serving as
Sweden’s foreign minister in 2006-2014, Bildt currently advises Ukrainian
President Petro Poroshenko, and said the Kremlin leader “wants to divide the
European Union, as well as Europe and the United States,” according to the
interview given on July 6.

As Sweden’s prime
minister, Bildt was a key mediator in the Balkans during the war of Yugoslavia
in the early 1990s. Bildt now sits on Poroshenko’s International Advisory
Council on Reforms. This council submits proposals and recommendations on how
to implement reforms in Ukraine based on international experience.

He told the
German tabloid his account of what happened in eastern Ukraine during the
summer of 2014, when the Russia-instigated war reached its peak. At that time, according
to Bildt, the Ukrainian army was ready to defeat the Kremlin-backed
separatists, and recapture the remaining cities they were occupying.

Moscow’s support
to the eastern Ukrainian proxies then increased in size and scope when Russia
sent large numbers of regular troops to Ukraine instead of the small units of
special forces and the weapons which were sent earlier. The new forces mainly
provided crucial artillery support, intelligence reports and logistics, the
Swedish expert said, adding that the Kremlin-backed rebellion “would not
work today” without that support.

“It is
obvious Mr. Putin wants to destabilize the country,” Bildt said, referring
to Ukraine. He also said the Russian president does not have a fixed plan, and that
Putin would not risk too much in the war.

The European
answer to Putin’s aggression “is better than its reputation,” he
stated, saying that even though the European countries may have different views
on the conflict, they are all following the same direction concerning the
sanctions against Russia.”

Bildt continued:
“The European Union had taken sanctions against Russia in march 2014, following
the annexation of Crimea. These sanctions are targeting Russian individuals close
to the Kremlin as well as key sectors for the Russian economy, especially in
oil exploration and for military products.”

Bildt said he
supported the June 2015 extension of these sanctions as well as the Minsk II
peace agreement brokered in February 2015 in Belarus by the leaders of Ukraine,
Russia, France and Germany. He added that he doesn’t think that the agreement
“can be implemented properly without the deployment of peacekeeping forces
in the region.”

According to him,
the Kremlin would oppose such a proposition, as it opposes the presence of monitors
from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe at the
Russian-Ukrainian border, except for two small border checkpoints.

The Swedish
expert said delivering weapons to Ukraine was not the best option. The
Ukrainian army instead should be trained to increase their capabilities. He noted
that this is what the Americans, alongside the British, the Poles and the Canadians
are currently doing.

Today’s priority
is to stop the advance of the Russians, he concluded. Even though the situation
in Crimea is not likely to change in the upcoming years, Europe will not change
its attitude towards it, and the “conflict in Donbas is not yet frozen,” Bildt
said.

Kyiv Post writer Yves Souben can be reached at [email protected].