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Latest Articles about Europe's East
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A Change in International Relations and a Thaw With the West
Belarusian analysts continue to assess the change in the international order, driven by the crisis in Ukraine, while Belarus’s relations with the West continue to gradually improve. To some extent, these phenomena are inter-related, and Russia’s worsening image in the eyes of the West may... MORE
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Romania Pushes NATO on Securing Black Sea Area in Response to Russia’s Militarization of Crimea
After meeting consistent Ukrainian military opposition in Luhansk and Donetsk, following a largely non-violent annexation of Crimea, Russian planners seemed to have reassessed Ukraine’s resolve to directly resist the Russian military. At the military college of the Russian Ministry of Defense, held on September 16,... MORE
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Political Implications of the Russia (‘Donetsk/Luhansk’)–Ukraine Armistice
The shape of any political settlement will depend on whether Russian troops and paramilitary personnel with their weaponry are evacuated from what is legally Ukraine’s territory, or remain deployed there. Point 9 of the September 20 memorandum is unfulfillable as formulated (and it is hard... MORE
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Armistice Opens Way to Russian Partition of Ukraine’s Donetsk and Luhansk Provinces
On September 20 in Minsk, negotiators from Ukraine, Russia, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE)—which together constitute the Tripartite Contact Group—as well as the Russia-installed Donetsk and Luhansk leaders finalized an agreement on the main elements of an armistice in the ongoing... MORE
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The Tale of the First Local Elections in Occupied Crimea and the End of the Mejlis Era
On September 14, 2014, Crimea held its first post-annexation local elections. Since after the takeover, all the political posts of the Crimean parliament were filled with self-appointed actors. For pro-Russia groups, these so-called democratic elections to the local legislatures of Crimea and Sevastopol as well... MORE
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Ukrainian Leaders Walk Away From Law on Self-Administration in Occupied Territories
Utter confusion surrounds Ukraine’s just-adopted law on the “special procedure of local self-administration in individual districts in the Donetsk and Luhansk provinces.” Pursuant to the September 5 ceasefire protocol, President Petro Poroshenko initiated this law, his administration drafted it, and the parliament adopted it on... MORE
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Moscow Begins Building a New Black Sea Fleet
After annexing Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula, Russia is now rebuilding its Black Sea Fleet (BSF) to ensure its regional dominance, to exclude all rivals, and to lay the foundation for further external power projection, threatening other littorals like Romania and Bulgaria. In April 2014, Putin directed... MORE
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Croatia’s Retaking of Serbska Krajina During Yugoslav War: An Example for Liberating Ukrainian Donbas?
As Ukrainian forces use the recently signed ceasefire to pause, regroup and rearm after suffering heavy losses in the past several months, officials in Kyiv are a long way from accepting the current status quo in the east as yet another frozen conflict (see EDM,... MORE
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Ukraine Grants More Powers to Localities in Russian-Controlled Territory (Part Two)
Ukraine’s law on the “special procedure of local self-administration in individual districts in the Donetsk and Luhansk provinces” (Ukraiynska Pravda, September 16; see Part One of this article) seeks to retain at least some means of influence and avenues of dialogue between Kyiv and local... MORE
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Ukraine Grants More Powers to Localities in Russian-Controlled Territory (Part One)
On September 16, the Ukrainian parliament approved a “Law on the special procedure of local self-administration in individual districts in Ukraine’s Donetsk and Luhansk provinces” (Russian version’s terminology: poryadok, samo-upravlenie, raiony). Those two provinces of Ukraine are now, de facto, partitioned into Russian-controlled and Ukrainian-controlled... MORE