Tension in Ukraine is dangerously high, with a supposed aid convoy stalled on the Russian side of the border under suspicions that Moscow is seeking to re-arm the rebels. It is time for Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko to use their regular contact to take the steam out of the dangerous situation in east Ukraine where Russian-backed separatists are being surrounded by Ukrainian armed forces and face possible defeat.
If the hoped-for Ukrainian military success happens, it is important that the victorious Ukrainians remember that they nonetheless need a political accommodation with their much larger neighbour who also sells them most of their energy. The European Union needs to support the sensible Poroshenko government but also recognise that Ukraine’s geography requires the country to look both east and west at the same time. This means that Ukraine’s eventual political answer will be very different from the Nato answer in which Nato Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen is talking about realigning Nato back to a Cold War footing and treating Russia as a adversary once more.
A political solution will also have to happen given that more than 2,000 civilians and combatants have been killed since mid-April, when Ukraine’s new government sent troops to put down the pro-Russian uprising. And the situation has not been helped by Alexander Zakharchenko, the embattled rebel leader in east Ukraine’s Donetsk region, who has proudly announced that the separatist forces include 1,200 fighters who underwent four months training in Russia, which completely denies Putin’s lies about Moscow having no link with the separatists.
