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Latest Articles about Europe
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What Is Next for Donbas Separatists After Fall of Debaltseve?
After weeks of intense battles, Russia-supported militants have captured Debaltseve, a strategically located town in eastern Ukraine (Interfax, February 18). In a telephone conversation with the author on February 19, the spokesman for the Ministry of Defense of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR), Eduard... MORE
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The Debacle in Debaltseve
The ceasefire agreement signed in Minsk last week (February 12) did not stop the fighting in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine (Donbas encompasses the Donetsk and Luhansk provinces). The Moscow-backed Donbas rebels concentrated their efforts on an offensive northeast of Donetsk in the so-called... MORE
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The War and the Orthodox Churches in Ukraine
On January 28, a village parish of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (affiliated with the Moscow Patriarchate) in Ternopil province published a letter to the Ukrainian Church’s primate, Metropolitan Onufriy. In the letter, the priests and lay activists strongly criticized recent controversial statements made by the... MORE
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Minsk Two Armistice Rewards Russia’s Aggression, Mortgages Ukraine’s Future (Part One)
Russian President Vladimir Putin, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Francois Hollande have jointly prevailed on Ukraine to sign another armistice with Russia’s proxy forces operating in Ukraine’s east (Kremlin.ru, Osce.org, February 12; see EDM, February 12). Signed on February 12, in Minsk, Belarus,... MORE
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Belarus’s Rising International Standing and Its Implications
Renewed high-level negotiations on the war in Ukraine, with an agreement signed in Minsk, on Thursday, February 12, further raise the stature of Belarus in the eyes of the international community. Alongside the September 2014 ceasefire agreements previously also signed in the Belarusian capital, Belarus’s... MORE
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Another Ceasefire Agreement Signed in Minsk
A marathon summit in Minsk of the leaders of Russia, Ukraine, Germany and France—which lasted for more than 15 hours nonstop, from the evening of February 11 to late morning the following day—ended with a ceasefire agreement. The warring parties agreed to stop the bloody... MORE
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Putin Weighs Conflict Escalation and De-Escalation Options
German Chancellor Angela Merkel and her French counterpart, Francois Hollande, have been leading intense diplomatic efforts to de-escalate the crisis Ukraine. Yet, as Russian media reported, the Merkel-Hollande summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin on February 6, in Moscow, following their trip to meet President... MORE
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Putin-Merkel-Hollande Meeting Yields Worse Armistice Terms for Ukraine
German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Francois Hollande held talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow during the night of February 6–7. Merkel and Hollande had conferred with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko in Kyiv during the preceding night, eliciting his consent to a... MORE
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Kadyrov Proposes Using Chechen Forces to Suppress Dissent Across Russia
Ramzan Kadyrov has warned that Chechen forces may be deployed in other regions of Russia to fight terrorism and extremism. “If there are such indications [of terrorism and extremism] in Moscow or other regions of the country, we will be at the forefront to fight... MORE
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Diplomacy Delivers Another Pause for Struggling Ukraine and Sinking Russia
The week of February 2 registered an explosion in political intrigue around the war in eastern Ukraine, and some sort of pause in hostilities is likely to ensue. Undoubtedly, this is a positive development, but it would be an overstatement to describe the late-night talks... MORE