Fears fighting in east Ukraine fighting will intensify after Putin move
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Russian President Vladimir Putin observes through binoculars Tsentr-2019, a military exercise that took place at Donguz near Orenburg on September 20, 2019,
Getty Images| Afp | Getty Images
The world waits with interest to see what will happen in Ukraine. Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered Russian forces to move into breakaway regionsThe eastern half of the country.
Putin declared that Russia would recognize two pro-Russian republics, which were self-proclaimed in Ukraine on Monday night, before stating that he would send Russian soldiers to the area on a “peacekeeping” mission.
Many fear that the sending of troops into the so-called Donetsk People’s Republic and Luhansk People’s Republic — areas in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine that have been backed by Russia — is a precursor to a full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
With the U.S. and EU expected to announce additional sanctions against Russia, Putin’s recent move on Russia’s neighbour has been condemned by the West.
Preliminary sanctions were quickly announced by the United States regarding separatist areas in east Ukraine. These ban Americans from investing, trading, or financing there. Elsewhere, EU leaders condemned Putin’s announcement calling it a “blatant violation of international law” and pledging new sanctions on Russia, as did the U.K.’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
Russia and Ukraine have been at war for years, mainly because of Ukraine’s recent pivot to the West and Russia’s determination to retain its Soviet-era territories under their control.
Russia recently requested that Ukraine (a country which aspires at joining NATO and EU) is not allowed to be a NATO member. NATO also wants to reduce its military deployments in east Europe. Although these demands were denied, diplomatic discussions have continued in an effort to prevent a deeper crisis.
Putin long extolled historical ties between Russia, Ukraine and Russia. He did this again Monday when he declared Moscow’s acceptance of “republics” that broke away from Russia. as he stated in a televised address that “modern Ukraine was entirely created by Russia.”
Putin will not stop at the Wall.
Putin’s close observers are now wondering what the future holds.
Andrew Wood, an associate fellow in Chatham House’s Russia and Eurasia Program and former British ambassador, said Tuesday to CNBC that Putin’s recent move showed that he was “absolutely distrusworthy.”
No one knows exactly where he is going to end up, but it seems that his goal is to have complete control over Ukraine’s politics. This means that he installed his regime to run the country and do the exact same things he did to Belarus and to take control of both the countries. This has been his goal since the beginning.
This week’s dramatic escalated crisis follows months of trouble, and possibly even years. Russia annexed Crimea to Ukraine in 2014, and since then has supported pro-Russian separatists within eastern Ukraine. This has led to low-level fighting between Ukrainian troops & separatists that has resulted in around 13,000 deaths.
Germany and France tried to broker peace between Russia, Ukraine and Belarus, but these efforts were largely unsuccessful. Each side accused the other for violating the agreements.
Wood said that former ambassador Wood stated on Tuesday to CNBC’s “Squawk Box Europe” that he does not see Russia’s latest move as an advantage, but that this development indicates that Putin has “written-off the Minsk agreement so that we can live in anarchy.”
Wood stated that Russia would send more troops to eastern Ukraine in order for military pressure to be applied within Ukraine instead of along its borders.
Tensions are rising after Putin posted upward of 100,000 troops at Russia’s Ukrainian border. He also conducted large military exercises earlier in the month, with Belarus which borders Ukraine.
However, it remains to see how the West might act to stop Russia if they invade Ukraine.
On Monday night, the United Nations Security Council met in New York for an emergency meeting to discuss Russian military operations to Ukraine. Ambassador Linda Thomas Greenfield stated that Putin’s threat to Ukraine was not only to the United Nations, but also to all sovereign members.
In the meantime, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy stated in a televised speech that his government would not react to Russian provocation. However, he added, “We will never give anything to anybody.”
We are committed to using diplomatic methods for solving this problem. “We are not responding to any provocations,” Zelenskyy stated.
This is our decision. “We are here on our land. According to a transcript from NBC News, he stated that he was not afraid of any and all.
The latest developments in Ukraine-Russia’s crisis rattled global financial markets. European stocks falling at the open.
Holger Schmieding is the chief economist of Berenberg Bank. He said that the future actions by Putin will have a significant impact on the markets in the medium, long, and short-term.
“The big uncertainty remains: Only Putin may know whether he will stop here – or whether moving Russian troops openly into Donbas is another step towards an invasion of free Ukraine,” Schmieding said in a note Tuesday.
Schmieding stated that “Russian war against Ukraine is a tragedy for humanity and the worst threat to global security since the Cuban missile crisis in 1962.”
“If he doesn’t stop, sanctions will weaken Russia over time and have very little impact on the advanced nations,” he said. He said that markets would soon return to normal, adding that the forecast is based on the assumption that Russia does not attack NATO members, something that even the Soviets did not do.
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