The NATO aid package for Ukraine announced on April 2, 2020, was welcome news in the midst of the current global crisis, the repercussions of which will further weaken global peace and security. For the sake of peace, NATO can and must do more. Since Ukraine’s independence, the West has followed the political and economic developments in Ukraine with varied degrees of interest and involvement depending on the global political climate.
However, the West’s mindset was mostly Russo-centric.
When Ukraine chose its own course of development and categorically turned away from the Russian Federation towards Europe and the West, Western countries were faced with a dilemma.
On the one hand, democratic principles and the rule of international law dictated the full acceptance of Ukraine as an independent country; but, on the other hand, the West’s economic ties with the Russian Federation, mostly due to its vast energy resources, made such a political position inconvenient.
The Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline is a prime example of domestic interests trumping global security. The construction of Nord Stream 2 has benefited national and local economies and will offer European countries direct access to Russian gas supplies eliminating transit countries, including Ukraine. Clearly underestimated has been the inevitable dependence of Europe on Russian gas supplies opening wider the door to exploitation and interference, boosted resources to support President Vladimir Putin’s expansionist policies and the opportunity for the Russian Federation to increase its military presence in the Baltic Sea. Ukraine, on the other hand, will lose a key source of income and geopolitical leverage while being further isolated from Europe.
Global political considerations were also conveniently disregarded with the reinstatement of all the rights of the Russian Federation in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) without the fulfillment of any of PACE’s demands related to the Russian Federation’s brutal aggression against Ukraine. Democratic values and principles, the foundation upon which PACE was established, were not only blatantly betrayed but also dangerously undermined for crass short-term financial considerations to make up PACE’s budgetary shortfall resulting from the Russian Federation’s refusal to fulfill its budgetary commitments.
This vacillation continues to define the West’s current position and policies towards Ukraine and reminds us how Western democracies tried and failed to contain the aggressive and expansionist actions of Nazi Germany. A lack of a firm, timely and principled stance against Nazi aggression and an ill-fated policy of appeasement led to an enormous catastrophe – World War II.
The now infamous “Twelve Steps Toward Greater Security in Ukraine and the Euro-Atlantic Region” issued by the Euro-Atlantic Security Leadership Group (EASLG), and published on the website of the 2020 Munich Security Conference, is further testimony to this attempt at appeasement for the sake of political convenience. Not only was the document flawed at its core since it assumed – wrongly – that the Russian Federation actually wants peace and security in Ukraine and the Euro-Atlantic Region, it blatantly ignored the fact that Russian military forces continue to attack Ukraine. The relentless military attacks against Ukraine by Russian military forces since the Munich Security Conference further confirm this fallacy.
The Russian Federation’s military aggression against Ukraine is a direct and egregious breach of the Budapest Memorandum, raising serious doubts about the viability and effectiveness of this type of international agreement meant to promote global peace and security.
The Russian Federation has paid lip-service to, but in reality disdained, five years of initiatives by the West, including NATO, to end the Russian military aggression in the Donbas, including Minsk I, Minsk II and the Normandy Four Summit in Paris.
Incredibly, even at a time when the world is trying to unite for the sake of fighting the COVID-19 global pandemic, the Russian Federation continues to exhibit its shameless contempt for the obligations it has undertaken toward Ukraine and the international community by continuing to violate its ceasefire commitments.
NATO and its member states should counter the Russian Federation’s ongoing aggression against Ukraine, namely by:
- strengthening sanctions by NATO member states against the Russian Federation until it fully ceases its hybrid aggression against Ukraine;
- providing Ukraine with the necessary support, including military aid, to enable it to counter successfully Russian aggression; and
- offering Ukraine the NATO Enhanced Opportunity Program and NATO Membership Action Plan to accelerate Ukraine’s accession into NATO.
Nothing short of this will permanently end the Russian Federation’s brazen attacks against Ukraine and its open defiance against the West. Only at such point can long-term policies be developed fairly with the participation of all concerned parties.
The plummeting oil prices create the right conditions for NATO to make those important geopolitical decisions in order to achieve lasting peace and stability in that very critical part of the world.
NATO and its member states must now accelerate Ukraine’s accession into NATO and ensure thereby greater security in the whole Euro-Atlantic region.
Eugene Czolij is president of Ukraine-2050, a nongovernmental organization and was president of the Ukrainian World Congress from 2008-2018.
