prepared by Weronika Papiernik today, 15:28
You will read this text in 2 minutes
Republican candidate for US president Donald Trump said on Thursday that he believed the war in Ukraine started because Russia ignored warnings about Ukraine’s possible entry into NATO. The former president ruled out Ukraine’s accession to the Alliance and said it would be “madness”.
Trump appeared on Thursday evening on the podcast of David Sacks , a financier and partner of Elon Musk known for his pro-Russian views, “All In”. When asked whether he would agree to exclude Ukraine’s accession to NATO as part of negotiations to end the war in Ukraine, he suggested that the issue of Ukraine’s potential accession to NATO had provoked Russia to attack the country.
Trump on the Russian invasion
For 20 years I have heard that NATO is a real problem for Russia. “I’ve been hearing this for a long time, and I think that’s really why this war started ,” Trump said. He accused US President Joe Biden of causing the conflict with “provocative” statements during tensions ahead of the Russian invasion.
If you look at Biden’s rhetoric, he was saying the opposite of what I think he needed to be saying. The things that he said, that he still says, he says things that are crazy, ” he said. He added that initially he thought that Putin was grouping his troops near the border with Ukraine for negotiation purposes.
But then suddenly he attacked. Then I said: What is going on here? – he continued.
Sacks replied – without citing any source – that during talks before the Russian invasion, US Foreign Minister Antony Blinken told his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov that Ukraine had the green light to join the Alliance and the US could deploy its nuclear weapons on its territory .
Open door policy
It is unclear where Sacks got these reports. In the months leading up to the Russian attack, the U.S. administration, including Biden and Blinken, expressed readiness to talk about nuclear arms control. She did not talk about Ukraine joining NATO, but about maintaining the Alliance’s “open door policy”. A week before the invasion, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said that Ukraine’s membership was “not on the agenda,” and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said it was a “distant dream.”
Responding to Sacks’ words, Trump said that if he ruled Russia, he would not be “too happy” to hear Blinken’s alleged statements. He added that “it was always understood, even before Putin’s rule,” that Russia did not want NATO and its forces on its border.
Trump to France: Good luck
It was always clear that this was something they did not agree to and could not be done against their will. And that doesn’t mean they’re right when they say it, but it was very provocative, and it’s even more provocative now. And they say – I hear it often – about Ukraine joining NATO, and now I also hear that France wants to enter there (Ukraine -) and fight. Well, I wish you good luck , concluded the Republican candidate.
In other parts of the interview regarding foreign policy, Trump said, among other things, that war with China is unlikely, and at the same time he accused Biden of being a “Manchurian candidate” (an allusion to a film from the 1960s about a presidential candidate controlled by communist China). . He also claimed that, as with the war in Ukraine, there would never have been a war in the Gaza Strip if he had been president.
Fragments of Trump’s conversation about Ukraine were posted, among others, by the Kremlin news agency Sputnik. The Biden campaign staff also used them to attack Trump.
The Minsk-2 agreement
The Minsk Conundrum: Western Policy and Russia’s War in Eastern Ukraine
- Summary
- Introduction: the ‘Minsk conundrum’
- The background to the Minsk agreements⌄
- The Minsk-1 agreement
- The Minsk-2 agreement
- Minsk implementation⌄
- Why not jettison the Minsk agreements?
- Conclusions
- About the author
- Acknowledgments
As fighting raged at Debaltseve, emergency negotiations, brokered by Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and President François Hollande of France, took place in Minsk. These produced a ‘package of measures for the implementation of the Minsk agreements’ (‘Minsk-2’). This document, signed on 12 February 2015 by representatives from the OSCE, Russia, Ukraine, the DNR and LNR, has been the framework for subsequent attempts to end the war.51
Minsk-2 is not an easy document to grasp. The product of hasty drafting, it tries valiantly to paper over yawning differences between the Ukrainian and Russian positions. As a result, it contains contradictory provisions and sets out a convoluted sequence of actions. It also has a gaping hole: although signed by Russia’s ambassador to Ukraine, Mikhail Zurabov, the agreement does not mention Russia – an omission that Russia has used to shirk responsibility for implementation and maintain the fiction that it is a disinterested arbiter.
Nine of the agreement’s 13 points cover conflict management: a ceasefire and the pullback of heavy weaponry from the contact line (articles 1 to 3); an amnesty for those involved in the fighting (article 5); an exchange of hostages and unlawfully detained persons (article 6); humanitarian assistance (article 7); the resumption of socio-economic links between Ukraine and occupied Donbas (article 8); the withdrawal of ‘all foreign armed formations, military equipment and also mercenaries’ from Ukraine, and the disarmament of ‘all illegal groups’ (article 10); and the activities of the TCG (article 13).
Four other sections address political matters:
- Article 4: elections in Donbas. The day after the pullback of heavy weaponry from the contact line, a dialogue on local elections will start in accordance with Ukrainian law and the temporary law on special status adopted in September 2014. No later than 30 days after the signing of the Minsk-2 agreement (i.e. by 14 March), Ukraine’s parliament will adopt a resolution defining the area in which the temporary law on special status will apply (to be based on the delineation line in the memorandum of 19 September 2014).
- Article 9: the process of re-establishing ‘full control’ over the Ukraine/Russia border by the Ukrainian authorities. There is now no reference to Poroshenko’s buffer zone or an OSCE-monitored security zone. Instead, the process of returning the border to Ukraine’s control begins the day after local elections have been held and concludes ‘after’ the ‘comprehensive political settlement’ (i.e. local elections plus constitutional reform providing for decentralization) due by the end of 2015 – but ‘on condition’ that article 11 (next bullet) has been implemented ‘in consultation with and upon agreement by’ the DNR/LNR.52
- Article 11: constitutional reform. A new Ukrainian constitution will enter into force by the end of 2015. Its ‘key element’ will be ‘decentralization’, which will take account of the ‘peculiarities’ of occupied Donbas, as agreed with the DNR/LNR representatives. Ukraine will also adopt ‘permanent legislation’ on special status before the end of 2015. This law will include: an amnesty; ‘the right of linguistic self-determination’; the involvement of the local authorities in the appointment of prosecutors and courts; agreements between Ukraine’s central authorities and the local authorities covering ‘economic, social and cultural development’; state support for the socio-economic development of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts; assistance from the central authorities to support ‘transnational cooperation’ between the occupied regions and regions of the Russian Federation; rights for local parliaments to create ‘people’s militia units’; and no early termination of the powers of local parliaments and elected officials.
- Article 12: elections in Donbas. Election-related questions will be dealt with on the basis of the temporary law on special status adopted in September 2014 and agreed with the DNR/LNR. Elections will be held in accordance with the relevant standards of the OSCE’s Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR).
The political sections of Minsk-2 are weighted heavily in Russia’s favour. In particular, the provisions on special status go way beyond the brief reference in Minsk-1. Exceptionally far-reaching in scope, they would be enshrined in a permanent law and an amended constitution. Putin homed in on this point at a press conference in Budapest on 17 February:
Perhaps not everyone has yet noticed, but this is extremely important – the Ukrainian side, the authorities in Kyiv, in fact, have agreed to implement a deep constitutional reform so as to satisfy requests for the self-dependence [samostoyaltelnost] – however it’s called: decentralization, autonomization, federalization – of certain regions of their country. This is the essential, deeper meaning of the decision taken by the authorities.53
Russia was not finished. Surkov coordinated the drafting of extra demands (published on 13 May as proposals from the DNR/LNR). These would give the occupied regions even greater powers: responsibility for legal regulation of the Ukraine/Russia border; the right to conclude agreements with foreign states; their own charters (which would, for example, prevent the president of Ukraine from dismissing local executive organs); their own budgets to ensure ‘financial autonomy’; and rights to introduce states of emergency and hold elections and referendums. Lastly, Ukraine would write a neutrality clause into its constitution.54
Implementation of these measures would in effect destroy Ukraine as a sovereign country. The DNR and LNR would be reincorporated into Ukraine but as distinct political, economic and legal entities tied to Russia – thus introducing a constitutional Trojan Horse that would give the Kremlin a lasting presence in Ukraine’s political system and prevent the authorities in Kyiv from running the country as an integrated whole. Indeed, radical devolution to Donbas might well prompt other regions to press for similar powers, causing central authority to unravel and effectively balkanizing Ukraine.55
The implications for Ukrainian foreign policy would be far-reaching. A neutrality clause in the constitution would rule out NATO accession.56 (56 The chances of Ukrainian accession to NATO are close to zero in any case, given the opposition of several NATO members.) Yet the DNR and LNR would be able to sign agreements with other countries (i.e. Russia), perhaps establishing Russian military bases on their territories.57 Fresh doubts would also surround EU integration. The adoption of Russia’s demands might so weaken the central authorities in Kyiv that implementation of the AA would be rendered impossible.
Tellingly, the word ‘sovereignty’ does not appear in Minsk-2. The German and French leaders seem to have been so keen for a ceasefire that they assented to political provisions at odds with Ukraine’s existence as a sovereign entity and, probably, its EU integration. This explains why the Kremlin used military power so demonstrably as talks were in session: to intimidate Western interlocutors who, it judged, lacked the stomach for confrontation – and who might be induced to get Ukraine to fold.58
Yet despite Russia’s efforts, Minsk-2 was not just the product of intense pressure on Ukraine. It also marked the ignominious collapse of the Novorossiya project. Confounding predictions in Moscow in the spring of 2014,59 few Ukrainians threw in their lot with Russia. On the contrary, Ukrainians fought back en masse, probably killing several hundred Russian troops and irregulars60 and nearly overrunning the DNR/LNR until they were stopped by Russia’s army at Ilovaisk and, to a lesser extent, at Debaltseve. As they fought, they created a toxic problem for Russia, whose leaders still insist that it is not at war with its neighbour and that Russians and Ukrainians are ‘one people’. Russia could have had little doubt by early 2015 that even if it inflicted mass casualties on Ukraine, it would incur further heavy losses itself. This was a price that its leaders were unwilling to pay for sensitive domestic reasons – indicated by the harassment of Russian journalists and activists investigating this subject, and by the classification of data attesting to Russian casualties in peacetime ‘special operations’.61 Ukraine could not destroy Russia’s proxies, yet Russia was unwilling to sustain further high-intensity war with Ukraine; Ukraine was unable to prevail, but its readiness to fight to defend its sovereignty gave Russia pause.62
It is precisely because Minsk-2 reflects this stalemate on the battlefield that it is an inherently contradictory document. As noted, the agreement makes the return of the border to Ukrainian control contingent on a political settlement agreeable to Russia and its proxies. However, it also includes provisions favouring the re-establishment of Ukrainian control over Donbas before a settlement has been finalized. Articles 1 and 2 envisage a lasting ceasefire and the pullback of heavy weaponry from the contact line before a dialogue on elections is held. Article 4 is ambiguous about whether the dialogue begins the day after the pullback has started or the day after it has finished; Ukraine can credibly argue that the pullback of heavy weaponry must be completed before election preparations begin. More important still, Russia has yet to withdraw its troops, equipment and irregulars from Ukraine, as article 10 in effect requires it to do without preconditions – thus relinquishing control over the border.63 Russia has meanwhile strengthened the DNR/LNR’s armed formations and tightened its control over them, such that they are now effectively appendages of its own military.64 Taken together, these circumstances make it impossible to hold elections in Donbas according to OSCE/ODIHR standards, as stipulated in article 12.
Furthermore, special status as set out in Minsk-2 – let alone the even more extreme demands made by Russia in May 2015 – is simply unworkable. It far exceeds what most Ukrainians consider an acceptable price for peace, as polls repeatedly show.65 Any Ukrainian leader who even appeared open to these ideas would probably commit political suicide. When, on 31 August 2015, Poroshenko put to the Rada a draft permanent law amending the constitution, rioting in Kyiv led to the deaths of four law enforcement officers; this despite the fact that the draft did not refer to special status.66 Poroshenko’s successor, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who made ending the war central to his election campaign in 2019, has also had to tread carefully. He proposes folding a reintegrated Donbas into the nationwide decentralization programme launched in 2014.67 Under the terms of a draft law on decentralization submitted to the Rada in December 2019, however, the DNR and LNR would not receive anything like the powers listed in Minsk-2; nor would they gain constitutional ‘special status’.68 This is unacceptable to Russia.
Minsk-2 can therefore be read in quite different ways. Ukraine’s version puts the re-establishment of control in the east before a political settlement. Russia would evacuate its troops and return the border to Ukraine. Elections would be held according to OSCE/ODIHR standards. Donbas would be reintegrated in line with the national decentralization programme (with some extra powers) and subordinated afresh to the authorities in Kyiv. As a result, Ukraine would be restored as a sovereign state. Russia’s version of Minsk-2 reverses key elements of this sequencing. A finalized political settlement would come before Ukraine retakes control of Donbas: elections would be held in the DNR and LNR; and Kyiv would agree a comprehensive devolution of power to these regimes. This would entrench Russian-controlled statelets, breaking the back of the Ukrainian state, preventing the central authorities from running the country as an integrated unit and torpedoing its westward integration. Only then would Ukraine regain control over the border, although whether Russia would allow that is moot.69 In short, Minsk-2 supports mutually exclusive views of sovereignty: either Ukraine is sovereign (Ukraine’s interpretation), or it is not (Russia’s interpretation)70 – this is the ‘Minsk conundrum’.
What are the Minsk agreements on the Ukraine conflict?
By Reuters
February 21, 202211:33 AM ESTUpdated 2 years ago
Feb 21 (Reuters) – U.S. authorities have warned Russia not to invade Ukraine and urged both countries to return to a set of agreements designed to end a separatist war by Russian speakers in eastern Ukraine. read more
Here is a look at the agreements, which were signed in Minsk in 2014 and 2015.
MINSK I
Ukraine and the Russian-backed separatists agreed a 12-point ceasefire deal in the Belarusian capital in September 2014.
Its provisions included prisoner exchanges, deliveries of humanitarian aid and the withdrawal of heavy weapons, five months into a conflict that had by then killed more than 2,600 people – a toll that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy says has since risen to around 15,000.
The agreement quickly broke down, with violations by both sides.
MINSK II
Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the leaders of two pro-Russian separatist regions signed a 13-point agreement in February 2015.
The leaders of France, Germany, Russia and Ukraine, gathered in Minsk at the same time, issued a declaration of support for the deal.
It set out military and political steps that remain unimplemented. A major blockage has been Russia’s insistence that it is not a party to the conflict and therefore is not bound by its terms.
Point 10, for example, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk: Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, but Moscow denies it has any forces there.
The 13 points were, in brief:
1. An immediate and comprehensive ceasefire
2. Withdrawal of all heavy weapons by both sides
3. Monitoring and verification by the OSCE
4. To start a dialogue on interim self-government for the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, in accordance with Ukrainian law, and acknowledge their special status by parliamentary resolution.
5. A pardon and amnesty for people involved in the fighting
6. An exchange of hostages and prisoners.
7. Provision of humanitarian assistance.
8. Resumption of socio-economic ties, including pensions.
9. Restoration of full control of the state border by the government of Ukraine.
10. Withdrawal of all foreign armed formations, military equipment and mercenaries.
11. Constitutional reform in Ukraine including decentralisation, with specific mention of Donetsk and Luhansk.
12. Elections in Donetsk and Luhansk on terms to be agreed with their representatives.
13. Intensifying the work of a Trilateral Contact Group comprising representatives of Russia, Ukraine and the OSCE.
Get the latest news and expert analysis about the state of the global economy with Reuters Econ World. Sign up here.
Writing by Mark Trevelyan; editing by Philippa Fletcher and John Stonestreet
NATO RESEARCH FELLOWSHIP 2001-2003
I N T R O D U C T I O N
With the opening of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) to the countries of
Central and Eastern Europe, the Alliance’s eastern boundary now comprises a new line of
contiguity with the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) as well as another
geopolitical entity within—the Union of Belarus and Russia. Whereas the former states
find greater security and regional stability in their new political-military arrangement,
NATO’s eastward expansion has led Belarus and Russia to reassess strategic imperatives
in their western peripheries, partially stemming from their mutual distrust of the Alliance
as a former Cold War adversary. Consequently, security for one is perceived as a threat
to the other.
The decision to enlarge NATO eastward triggered a political-military “response” from
the two former Soviet states with defence and security cooperation leading the way.
While Belarus’s military strategy and doctrine remain defensive, there is a tendency of
perceiving NATO as a potential enemy, and to view the republic’s defensive role as that
of protecting the western approaches of the Belarus-Russia Union. Moreover, the
Belarusian presidency has not concealed its desire to turn the military alliance with
Russia into a powerful and effective deterrent to NATO. While there may not be a threat
of a new Cold War on the horizon, there is also little evidence of a consolidated peace.
This case study endeavours to conduct a comprehensive assessment on both Belarusian
rhetoric and anticipated effects of NATO expansion by examining governmental
discourse and official proposals associated with political and military “countermeasures”
by analysing the manifestations of Belarus’s rapprochement with the Russian Federation
in the spheres of foreign policy and military doctrine. Security issues surrounding the
post factum of NATO expansion have received little attention in the West, but remain
closely linked to Belarus-Russia relations. Driven in part by the realities of post-
communism, Belarus and Russia have felt the need to define and strengthen their “sphere
of influence” as well as construct joint defence, security and foreign policy models that
reflect contemporary security challenges.
N A T O R E S E A R C H F E L L O W S H I P
2
N A T U R E O F P R O J E C T
Too easily dismissed in the West as a bête noire, and often taken for granted in the East
as an obedient vassal, Belarus has fallen between the proverbial cracks of mainstream
political discourse. Although interest in close military cooperation between Minsk and
Moscow predate any serious prospects for NATO expansion, evidence indicates that a
widening and deepening union between the two states was precipitated by the projection
of the Alliance’s new eastern boundary. Whereas the Kremlin has been more capable of
coming to terms with the reality of NATO expansion and compromise with the Alliance,
Belarus has not. Minsk’s relations with the West have waned and show no particular
signs of improvement. The adoption of rigid out-and-out rejection of NATO expansion
has left the republic in an ambiguous, and at times, hostile relationship with Brussels.
Prospects for a constructive dialogue have been seriously eroded by the Belarusian
leadership’s rigid anti-NATO rhetoric and anti-Western views, which often accuse
NATO and the United States of harbouring intentions to invade Belarus. NATO hopes
for accommodation with Russia, but is unwilling to ameliorate relations with the
Lukashenko administration, considering Minsk’s poor human rights record and US
claims of alleged Belarusian weapons sales to states that support terrorism. Conversely,
NATO’s expansion to the borders of Belarus and Russia has given the Kremlin an
incentive for “reabsorbing” its western flank. Although Russia is often accused of
harbouring imperial ambitions, in the case of Belarus it has been Minsk and not Moscow,
that is the main initiator behind integration, or more accurately, reintegration of the two
former Soviet republics. Yet, the area with real momentum is defence.
The dual projects of NATO expansion and Belarus-Russia rapprochement have
fundamentally influenced contemporary security aspects of the region. Bearing this in
mind, the level of political-military integration that Belarus will undertake with the
Russian Federation may ultimately have a significant impact on the geopolitical map of
Eastern and Central Europe. As a vital conduit in the western periphery of the CIS,
Belarus remains an area of key geostrategic and military importance to Russian national
security. Belarus provides tactical leverage within the Eastern European sub-region by
providing Russia with a forward axis on its western flank, direct access to the borders of
Central Europe, as well as a channel to project Russian influence over a region which is
increasingly looking towards NATO for its security. In addition, Belarus brings Russia
within closer proximity to its non-contiguous enclave of Kaliningrad. For these reasons,
Belarus maintains a high profile in Russian strategic planning.
In addition to operating joint air defence forces [PVO], Russia has acquired long-term
basing rights to Belarusian military infrastructure, including access to newly upgraded
early warning radar sites, Soviet-era airfields and communication centres. Accordingly,
these former Soviet early warning radar and communication bases have become integral
parts of Russia’s defence system. These facilities fill gaps in Russia’s defence system
left by the loss of Soviet military bases in the Baltic States. Other evidence points to
coordinated military activities such as the Zapad-99 [West-99] manoeuvres held in
European Russia and Belarus. Subsequently dubbed a “response in the event of NATO
aggression,” the exercises were the largest of its kind in post-Soviet history.1 Belarus
played a tactical role as the forward “wedge” in a counter-offensive to a hypothetical
NATO attack, as well as the staging ground for a series of simulated retaliatory nuclear
and conventional strikes on undisclosed new NATO members.2 A collective weapons
procurement programme is also well under way, in addition to a joint military corps
encompassing the Belarusian Army and Russia’s Moscow Military District—all under
the framework of a projected Belarus-Russia military doctrine.
In the highly charged atmosphere that prevails in the Belarusian political arena, rhetoric
has tended to complicate objective developments and analysis. Analysis is obstructed
further still by Soviet habits of secrecy and a general lack of government transparency.
Reality lies somewhere between the rhetorical statements and the more mundane details
of circumstance. Considering the high stakes and the new security challenges the region
faces—the manipulation of information is itself a subject worthy of study.
1 Vladimir Georgiev, “S sovetskim razmakhom” [With Soviet grandeur] Nezavisimaya gazeta. 19 June
1999.
2 Yuri Golotyuk, “Voyennye ne priznayutsya, po komu oni nanesli uchebnyi yaderny udar” [The milit ary
will not admit who it hit with a simulated nuclear strike] Izvestia. 29 June 1999
Newsessentials Blog 
Posted on June 21, 2024
0