Latest Articles about Europe's East
NATO-Ukraine Partnership Hobbled Ahead of NATO’s Anniversary Summit
NATO's most ambitious, most highly developed, and for a time most promising partnership, the one with Ukraine, is sliding backward despite efforts at NATO headquarters to keep it on track. Ukrainian authorities and certain West European governments within NATO share responsibility for the backsliding. The... MORE
Yushchenko Criticizes Tymoshenko for Gas Accords and Plea for Loan from Moscow
Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko has accused Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko of betraying national interests in the gas agreements concluded in Moscow on January 19 and 20 and by turning to Russia for a loan. Yushchenko used the February 10 meeting of the National Security and... MORE
Gongadze Murder Still Casts a Shadow over Yushchenko Presidency
On January 27 the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) issued another damning report about the poor state of Ukraine's investigation into the murder of opposition journalist Georgi Gongadze in the fall of 2000 (www.assembly.coe.int). The involvement of senior Ukrainian leaders in the... MORE
Tymoshenko Defeats Yanukovych in Parliament
Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko survived a no-confidence motion in parliament on February 5. The motion was backed by 203 votes, 23 short of the number required in the 450-seat chamber to oust the government. This was another victory of this kind for Tymoshenko, who... MORE
Will Lukashenka Be Welcomed in Prague?
Since last October, the European Union, through an Eastern Partnership Program originally initiated last summer by Poland and Sweden, has taken several steps to normalize relations with Belarus. For some members of the opposition, the maneuvers appear to abandon the EU's former insistence on democratization... MORE
Who Owns the Gas in Ukraine’s Underground Reservoirs?
The gas dispute that left half of Europe without gas in early January was officially settled by accords signed by Gazprom and Naftohaz Ukrainy in Moscow on January 19 and 20. The clash, however, is apparently not over. Ukrainian businessman Dmytro Firtash, who owns the... MORE
Ukrainian Chief Banker in Legal Limbo
The Ukrainian parliament has exacerbated both the political and economic crises in Ukraine by voting to dismiss National Bank (NBU) head Volodymyr Stelmakh. Consequently, it is not clear who is running the central bank in a country that has been among the hardest hit by... MORE
Commentary – Territorial Claims Can Work Two Ways: Russia and Ukraine
The majority of Western comments on territorial claims arising from the breakup of the USSR focus on Russia’s demands against its neighbors. The best known, such as the Crimea and frozen conflicts in the Caucasus, are frequently mentioned in the Western media. Added to this... MORE
The 18-Day Gas War – Why was it fought? Who Won?
A preliminary, and possibly premature, report of the 18-day Russian-Ukrainian “Gas War” of January 2009 might read as follows:This war should never have taken place. The conflict had little to do with “commercial disagreements” between Gazprom and Naftohaz Ukrainy—these were resolved by the “Memorandum of... MORE
Commentary: The Russia-Ukraine Gas Crisis: The Big Picture
By now it should be clear that there is no quick fix for the current Europe-wide energy debacle caused by the vicious Russian-Ukrainian spat. Behind the seemingly intractable dispute over debts, gas pricing, and terms of transit lies a complex post-imperial situation in which Russia... MORE