The prospects for peace in Ukraine’s Donbas turned brighter than they have been for months in early September, as a ceasefire finally appeared to be taking hold in the conflict zone.
The warring sides agreed from Sept. 1 to silence their guns, and apart from
some isolated incidents, the ceasefire appeared to be holding as of Sept. 10.
The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe’s Special Monitoring
Mission in Ukraine, while noting in a report issued on Sept. 8 that it has
heard lots of explosions in the conflict zone, has not reported any major
fighting there in recent days.
Ukrainian military sources and news websites on the separatist side have
also reported a sharp fall in the number of claimed violations of the ceasefire
since the latest ceasefire was declared on Sept. 1.
But the dwindling of fighting in Ukraine’s east took place on the
backdrop of the worst politically motivated violence seen in Kyiv since the
Maidan mass public protests forced the ouster of former President Viktor
Yanukovych on Feb. 22, 2014. More than a hundred riot police were injured and
three national guardsmen died when a supporter of the right wing Svoboda Party
tossed a fragmentation grenade into packed ranks of police outside parliament
on Aug. 31.
The violence came shortly after the Ukrainian parliament voted through a
controversial bill on constitutional amendments that could lead to the
separatist-held areas in Ukraine’s east gaining a special status under
Ukrainian law. Many nationalists bitterly oppose the bill, which still has to
pass another reading at parliament before it becomes law, seeing it as
capitulating to Kremlin demands that Ukraine undergo a form of federalization.
Adding intrigue to the mix were reports of a “coup” in the
separatist-controlled part of Donetsk Oblast, in which the hardline separatist
leader Andrey Purgin was replaced as speaker of the area’s pseudo parliament by
the reputedly more pragmatic Denis Pushilin.
Commenting on the move on the Euromaidan Press website on Sept. 5,
Russian journalist Kirill Mikhailov
speculated that Purgin’s ouster might indicate that the Kremlin is seeking to
end the deadlock over the Minsk peace process by removing from its proxy
authorities in Donetsk those leaders who oppose the deal.
“Reacting to the controversial Ukrainian constitutional amendments providing for the Donbas’s
special governance as per the Minsk agreement, Purgin outright rejected them, while Pushilin talked of dialogue with Kyiv over local elections
(which are also part of Minsk agreement, that Pushilin, being part of the peace
talks, may have actually read),” Mikhailov wrote.
In a further indication that separatist leaders
might be softening their stance on implementing the Minsk accords, another
separatist leader, Alexander Zakharchenko, said on Sept. 5 that “there is no
alternative to the Minsk agreements.”
That was a marked change in rhetoric from
Zakharchenko, who has previously said the Minsk agreements should be considered
canceled. He has also threatened on several occasions to use military force to
take the key strategic government-held city of Mariupol in the south of Donetsk
oblast, and expand the area his forces control up to the edge of Donetsk
Oblast, a move that would certainly deal a fatal blow to the Minsk agreements.
On the diplomatic front, French President
Francois Hollande on Sept. 7 called for another meeting the leaders of France,
Germany, Russia and Ukraine in Paris later in the month to build on the
progress made with the recent ceasefire. He also raised the prospect of lifting sanctions on Russia if progress were to be
made on implementing the Minsk peace agreements.
“The process has moved forward. There has been progress in the last
few weeks. The ceasefire has almost been respected,” Hollande said at a
news conference, Reuters reported.
“The foreign ministers will speak in the coming days, and I propose
a meeting (of leaders) in Paris before the U.N. General Assembly (on Sept. 28)
so that we can evaluate the process and lead it to its end.”
“If the process succeeds I will support the lifting of
sanctions.”
Hollande made no mention of Crimea, the invasion and illegal annexation
of which by the Kremlin was the original cause of Western sanctions being
imposed on Russia.
Andrew Wilson, a senior policy fellow at the
European Council on Foreign Relations, said that following the implementation
of the ceasefire and the withdrawal of heavy weapons, the next sticking point
for the peace process could be the eleventh and twelfth articles of the Minsk
agreements, which stipulate the granting of a special status to the
Russian-occupied parts of the Donbas and the holding of local
elections in the occupied territories under terms agreed between the warring
sides.
“It’s very unlikely that the elections will go ahead (in this way),” he
told the Kyiv Post.
He described the proposed upcoming elections in
the occupied territories as a “time bomb” that had the potential to “destroy”
the Minsk peace process.
As for Hollande’s statement about lifting
sanctions – this should not worry Kyiv overly, according to Wilson, as such a
decision is not for the Elysee Palace to make alone.
“France is not Europe,” Wilson told the Kyiv
Post. “Italy is of a similar opinion, but Germany is key. The UK is
unfortunately absent from the debate for other reasons. But the sanctions were
prolonged for six months, not longer. (But) there are some signs that the EU’s
relative consensus on sanctions after the MH17 tragedy may be wearing off.”
Despite the Minsk peace process essentially being in deadlock for the
past few months, meetings of subgroups set up under the agreements have
continued, with the latest being held on Sept. 8. However, there were reports
that at the latest meeting the sides failed to agree on the withdrawal of heavy
weapons – the next key stage of implementing the Minsk agreements after the
ceasefire.
Meanwhile, the reduction in violence in eastern Ukraine coincided with
reports that Russia was upping its military presence in another war-torn
country – Syria. A video purporting to show Russian troops fighting near Latakiya,
in which a latest-model Russian APC is seen and what sounds like Russian
instructions being shouted among soldiers over the radio.
Russian military supply ships were spotted passing through the Bosporus
in early September, and the New York Times reported on Sept. 5 that Russia had
sent prefabricated houses for 1,000 troops to Syria, as well as a mobile
air-traffic control system for a Syrian airbase.
Groups fighting the regime of Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad have also
reported the activity of Russian drones and warplanes in the skies over Syria,
although this has not been confirmed.
Some analysts have suggested a link between the decrease in Russian
military activity in Ukraine, and the alleged increase in Russian military
activity in Syria.
Karl Volokh, writing in Ukrainian news magazine Novoe Vremya on Sept. 7,
said “Russia’s actions in Syria create a good bargaining chip in negotiations
with the West on Ukraine. If Europe wants to get rid of Assad or ease the flow
of refugees, it has to deal with the Kremlin.”
Kirill Martinov, writing in Russian independent newspaper Novaya Gazeta
on Sept. 5, agreed with Volokh.
“The Russian expedition is an attempt to form an international coalition
in which Russia could cooperate with the West, ease Western (sanctions)
pressure on Russia, and gain concessions on Ukraine,” Martinov wrote.
“If the plan is successful, at least in part, the Rusian
authorities will have everything that they could dream of: Normalization of
relations with the West, and the prospect of negotiations on the status of
Crimea. At the same time, Russia can make a show of force in the world,
(saying) ‘in contrast to the weak-willed Western democracies we are even able
to attack the terrorists in the Middle East.’ Pride in the country will push
the president’s approval ratings to new heights.”
But Russian open-source investigative journalist Ruslan Leviev, who published
his team’s investigation into Russia’s involvement in Syria on LiveJournal on
Sept. 5, sees more pragmatic reasons for Russia upping its military activities
in Syria.
According to Leviev and his team, in the face of advances by Syrian
rebels, Russia is moving to protect Latakia airbase, from which Russian
warplanes and drones are launched in support of the Assad regime’s military.
The loss of Latakia would also threaten Russia’s naval depot at Tartus, and
Russia is taking preemptive measures to guard against this, Leviev wrote.
“For (Russian
President Vladimir) Putin it is especially important not to allow the loss of
Latakia and to maintain Assad’s control over it. Should Assad lose Latakia,
he’d also lose the airbase near it, and the fighting would move to Tartus. In
that case, Russia would have to fully commit to fighting to defend the Tartus
depot.
“We believe
Russian servicemen in military vehicles are taking part in the fighting, since
Putin realizes that Assad won’t hold Latakia on his own.
“The Tartus depot
has suddenly become important for Russia once again, and there is renewed talk
of turning it into a naval base; Tartus is seeing an influx of military vehicles
and Russian soldiers. The Tartus depot used to house just four Russian seamen,
who serviced it. Now it has hundreds of soldiers and heavy vehicles.”
Kyiv Post editor Euan
MacDonald can be reached at [email protected]. Kyiv Post writer Antti Ruahala can be
reached at [email protected]
