1. COMMENTARY
march 22, 2014 vol xlIX no 12 EPW Economic & Political Weekly24
Ukraine’s Conflict and
Resolution
Anuradha M Chenoy
The West – the European Union
and the United States – has shown
no qualms in supporting a coup
led by ultranationalists to achieve
geopolitical aims in Ukraine.
The Russian actions in the
semi-autonomous region of
Crimea may be illegal de jure, but
seem driven by the need to
counter the West’s influence in
the country’s “near abroad”. As
things stand, the events portend
to a far from ideal conclusion to
the Ukrainian crisis.
Anuradha M Chenoy (chenoy@gmail.com) is at
the Centre for Russian and Central Asian
Studies, School of International Studies,
Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.
T
he immediate crisis in Ukraine
seems to have been de-escalated.
Russian President Vladimir Putin
has commanded that the 1,50,000 Russian
troops mobilised along the Ukraine-
Russia border in early March be pulled
back. He said that the use of force to
save the Russian-speaking nationalities
in southern and eastern Ukraine would
only be the “last, very last resort”. Putin
claimed that the allegations that the
Russian military had seized installations
within Crimea were wrong and only the
local ethnic Russian Ukrainian nationals
were involved. Moreover, Russia has
legally signed bilateral agreements with
Ukraine that gives it obligations and
rights in Crimea and grants it a lease for
a naval base in Sevastopol on the Black
Sea that is critical for the Russian naval
fleet. The presence of Russian soldiers is
not new in this region but such aggra-
vated tension certainly is.
Putin’s statements came after US
President Barack Obama threatened
Russia with “costs” which mean unilat-
eral sanctions and trade barriers. This
war of words and Russian actions plum-
meted the world markets into a brief
spin. The European Union (EU) huddled
into emergency talks even as Russia said
that it would impose counter sanctions
on Western countries. Moscow even
talked to China and other countries, and
the Western media started the rhetoric
of a “New Cold War”. More is likely to
follow, but what is the reality? What
impact will it have on the international
political system and what are the avail-
able options?
There are multiple reasons for the
current crises. The Ukrainian economy
is in dire straits. It needs $35 billion to
stay afloat. $13 billion are due as debt
repayment this year. Besides it has huge
gas bills to pay Russia. In these circum-
stances the Ukrainian regime was faced
with two options. One option was pro-
vided by the EU-US-International Mone-
tary Fund (IMF) troika. An agreement
was initialled between the EU and
Ukraine in March 2012. The EU offered a
trade deal to Ukraine as a step to eventu-
ally incorporate it into the EU. Ukraine’s
finance minister was meeting IMF offi-
cials for a loan. This loan would have
come with conditionalities including the
devaluing of the Ukrainian currency,
cutting subsidies for gas and energy, be-
sides transparency in governance.
The second option was offered by
Russia in December 2013. This included
a $15 billion loan, besides concessions on
the desperately needed gas supplies to
this gas-deficit region. It included a
customs union with Russia, Kazakhstan
and Belarus that will facilitate economic
movement but will also integrate Ukraine
more with Russia.
Furthering Polarisation
These two choices have divided an
already polarised people, where those
in the West want to opt for the EU and

2. COMMENTARY
Economic & Political Weekly EPW march 22, 2014 vol xlIX no 12 25
a liberal form of government, even at the
risk of further economic crises, especially
at a time when the EU is a phantom of its
earlier self where a social welfare system,
constructed after the second world war,
has broken down. Those in the pre-
dominantly industrialised south and east
of the country see that their economic
interests are heavily integrated with Russia
and have preferences for the Russian
option. President Viktor Yanukovych
rejected the EU plan that would have
imposed harsh austerity on an already
impoverished Ukraine. He accepted a
more generous $15 billion loan from
Russia in addition to natural gas on
concessional rates. This decision sparked
protests in the capital city of Kiev which
falls in the western part of Ukraine.
But the economy is not the only reason
for such polarisation. The Ukrainian
Parliament, some time back, eliminated
a law to protect the use of minority
languages, particularly the use of
Russian as an official language in those
sectors of the country where it is
spoken. President Yanukovych vetoed
this and retained the status of the
Russian language. The ultranationalist
groups who wanted to change the Con-
stitution to suppress Russian language
and minorities led sustained protests in
Kiev, in the common space called the
Euromaidan. They called for immediate
regime change.
Yanukovych, whose regime, like that
of many other former Soviet Republics is
intolerant of dissent, is not embedded in
democratic culture and is corrupt to
boot, had lost legitimacy. Weeks of pro-
tests and street conflicts led to firing and
killing of almost a hundred people,
including some policemen. The legally
electedPresidentYanukovychwasblamed
and forced to flee. A temporary presi-
dent, representing the protestors, was
hastily appointed. Only a few days later,
the release of a taped conversation on
26 February between the high repre-
sentative of foreign affairs of the EU,
Catherine Ashton, and Estonia’s Foreign
Minister Urmas Paet confirmed that
snipers hired by the new coalition and
neo-Nazi gangs were responsible for
much of the violence from hurtling fire-
bombs to shootings, and not Yanukovych
(Voice of Russia, Tass, 6 March 2014).
The narrative dubbing the regime’s over-
throw by “democratic forces”, however,
has not been fully punctured, even
though Ukraine’s most organised neo-
fascist group called Svoboda (freedom)
which target Ukrainian Russian speakers
and other minorities were a critical part
of the protestors who overthrew an
elected president.
The chaos that followed the violence,
the flight of the president, and installation
of an acting president, who appeared to
represent only the Ukrainian-speaking
western-oriented mass, led to increased
threat perceptions in the south and east,
especially in Crimea. Crimea has a semi-
autonomous status, earlier within the
Soviet Union, now within Ukraine.
Groups in east Ukraine and in Crimea
took over government buildings and the
risk of civil war seemed imminent. A
referendum had been planned for greater
autonomy in Crimea, to be held on
30 March. Moreover, when the pro- and
anti-Russia protests broke out, the pro-
Russian regional prime minister of Crimea,
Sergey Aksyonov, claimed control of the
military and police in Crimea and asked
for Russian help for keeping peace and
for the conduct of the referendum on
16 March with obvious conclusions.
The Crimean Situation
In these circumstances, Putin took sanc-
tion from the Russian Duma to mobilise
troops along the Russia-Ukraine border
and in Crimea on 1 March, in the belief
that the Russian-speaking nationalities
in Crimea and eastern Ukraine were
under siege. Putin claimed international
legal sanction on the grounds that
Russian military deployment in Crimea
has remained within limits set by bilat-
eral agreements for a Russian military
base that entitles it to deploy up to
25,000 troops in Crimea. Ukraine had
a 22,000 strong force in Crimea that
Putin says is now “dissolved” and its
arsenal is under the control of the
local Crimean government. Putin has
stated that he has no sympathies for
Yanukovych, but blames the EU for try-
ing to split the country. He warned that
any sanctions would backfire (Associated
Press, 5 March 2014).
Any intervention by one country into
another is a violation of international
law. But in the case of Crimea, several
historical factors need to be weighed in.
Russia and Ukraine have special treaties
on multiple subjects and one of these re-
quires Ukraine to ensure linguistic and
other minority rights within Ukraine,
particularly in Crimea, and there would
be Russian obligations. This obligation is
being violated by Ukraine and the popu-
lation of Crimea is thus asking for pro-
tection by Russia, which already has
troops there. So it is not sending in
troops, but the Base Agreement provides
the legal bases for this. Crimea is part of
Ukraine through historical accident,
when Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev
gifted it to Ukraine in 1954, when people
hardly had any choice in such matters.
At the same time re-carving states can
be a gruesome exercise.
From the Russian perspective, the North
Atlantic Treaty Organisation’s (NATO)
expansion into former Warsaw Pact
nations has gone on unilaterally. Also, at
the time of the Soviet break-up, George
Bush Sr and James Baker promised
Mikhail Gorbachev that the West would
never expand to Russia’s borders. But
NATO started wooing Ukraine by 1995
and then the EU started considering
Ukraine for EU membership. The US has
supported regime change and instability
in Ukraine for some years. Former
Secretary of State Paul Craig Roberts
has stated that the US has spent billions
in undermining authoritarian but elec-
ted regimes in Ukraine. The “Orange
Revolution” of 2004 deposed an elected
but discredited president and brought
in Yulia Tymoshenko as two-time prime
minister. She was later jailed, has now
been freed, and will add to this melee.
Ukraine itself is a Soviet construc-
tion, and there is no single Ukrainian
people. The state was made up by
putting together different nationalities
at different historical periods. This began
during the prolonged feudalism under
Catherine “the great”, extended to Lenin’s
reorganisation in 1922 of the eastern
part of the country, with largely Russian
speakers. Josef Stalin added Galica,
which was part of Poland, as an
outcome of the Molotov-Ribbentrop

3. COMMENTARY
march 22, 2014 vol xlIX no 12 EPW Economic & Political Weekly26
pact. The Ukrainian ultranationalists
come from this tradition and region.
Later Crimea was added in 1954. So
Ukraine’s divergent histories are like
many other nation state constructions,
like India, Pakistan and most of the
African states. Ukraine can have no
single identity that matches its boun-
dary, as the ultranationalists project
desires and the West is using for its
geostrategic agenda.
Geostrategic Competition
The current discourse is focused domi-
nantly on the geostrategic competition
between the US and Russia. Putin esca-
lated the crises, but the West has persist-
ently meddled in Ukraine’s domestic
politics and actively contributed to Russia’s
determination to safeguard its “near
abroad”. Secretary of State John Kerry
denounced Russia’s intervention in Crimea
stating: “It is not appropriate to invade a
country and at the barrel of a gun
dictate what you are trying to achieve.
That is not 21st century, G-8, major-
nation behaviour.” This is rich if not
deeply ironic. Further, US assistant sec-
retary of state, in charge of the region,
Victoria Nuland best known for her
comment “Fuck the EU”, has been plan-
ning for regime change and encouraging
protestors, regardless of the fact that
the Ukrainian protestors had hoisted a
banner of the second world war Nazi
supporter Stepan Bandera, whose militias
were part of atrocities against Jews and
Poles. Nuland was discussing who should
lead the new regime (as seen by inter-
cepted phone calls reported by Robert
Parry, Consortium News, 4 March 2014,
Readersupportednews.org). For decades,
US agencies like the National Endow-
ment for Democracy for political action,
whose business it is to promote groups to
destabilise governments for “democracy
promotion” have viewed Ukraine as a
special project (Consortiumnews.com,
“A Shadow US Foreign Policy”). This per-
sistent Western intervention in Ukraine
has strengthened Russia’s resolve to
safeguard its “near abroad”.
Meanwhile the rhetoric that compares
the situation as reminiscent of the cold
war, showing Russian military power to
be similar to the Soviet times, is untrue.
This conversation in the West calls US
President Obama a “weak president”
who needs to talk tough and the US is
projected as the “good guy”. The inter-
vention in Georgia in 2008 is being cited,
as is Moscow’s support to the Syrian
regime. Putin’s self compliance to this
macho image on one hand and his oppo-
sition to homosexuals, the Russian attacks
on dissidents and protestors make him
an easy target. Putin offered the pros-
pect of a tripartite agreement with the
US and EU on resolving the Ukrainian
crisis, which was rebuffed. Vis-à-vis Syr-
ia, it is clear that the US is interested in
weakening the country’s patron, and
Russia is the only country that chal-
lenges its geostrategic push in west
Asia. But Russia knows it can retaliate by
stopping logistic support for US troops
in Afghanistan.
If Putin is violating international law
by sending Russian troops into Crimea
after a violent coup spearheaded by
neo-Nazis militias, what about Iraq and
the weapons of mass destruction (WMD)
claims by the US and its allies? Or drone
attacks in Pakistan led by the US? Putin
has recalled the experience of US in Iraq,
Libya and others, when the US acted
without UN Security Council sanction. If
sanctions against Russia over Crimea
then why not sanctions on Israel over
Palestine, others have asked.
Meanwhile there are signs of increas-
ing militarisation all around. The US
defence budget has more than doubled
since the terror attacks on 11 September
2001, and is at a higher rate than dur-
ing the peak of the Vietnam War. The
most recent justification for streng-
thening the military industrial complex
is the “New Cold War”. Russia test-fired
a new inter-continental ballistic missile
the same week, and many EU nations
are talking about increasing defence
budgets.
Despite tough talk and rhetoric, ten-
sions have cooled as Putin clarified that
Russia had no intention “to fight the
Ukrainian people”. He accused the US of
an unconstitutional coup and installing
a new regime in Ukraine that Russia does
not recognise. Putin in a press confer-
ence on 4 March even compared the US
role in Ukraine to an experiment with
“lab rats”. Putin said Russia had no
intention of annexing Crimea, but
insisted that the residents had the right
to determine the region’s status in a
referendum. He also indicated his agree-
ment to hold a special meeting with
NATO to discuss the Ukraine situation in
Brussels. The US meanwhile is meeting
with representatives of Kiev’s new gov-
ernment with moral support and a new
$1 billion aid package.
What Can Be Done?
Clearly aggressive nationalism, vitriolic
rhetoric, retaliation, unilateral sanctions
and militarisation are not the option
that Ukraine, EU and the current inter-
secting international system can afford.
There is a need for reconciliation within
Ukraine. This is possible only where the
multi-ethnic pluralities of the region are
safeguarded by a constitution that ensures
equal rights and inclusive citizenship
laws. The oligarchic kleptocracy based on
neo-liberal agendas has to be changed.
One possibility is a reconciliation meet-
ing organised between Ukraine, EU and
Russia. The Organisation for Security
and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), that
focuses on Ukraine, can be the nodal
agency for this.
Even though the crisis in Ukraine is by
no means over, it is time the EU adopts
an independent foreign policy. If this is
not followed further polarisation will
continue and the people will remain
divided. The division of Ukraine is only
the first example. Further, unless a genuine
secular, plural politics and inclusive eco-
nomics is followed internally, narrow
geopolitics and all kinds of hegemony
will take over.
The ideal scenario is that the EU and
Russia become partners of Ukraine rather
than being opposed to each other. For
this both need to keep out of Ukraine.
Neither should suggest that it be part of
their zone or organisation. Both should
help Ukraine end its economic and energy
crises. Neither should see Ukraine only
as a market or as a geostrategic destina-
tion. All those concerned can accept col-
lective security and common public
goods for Ukraine. This alone will allow
Ukraine and indeed all of Europe to
have lasting peace.