Protracted diplomacy

Last week Ukraine and Russia were busy clearing a huge logjam of problems that have been accumulating for decades. The situation has been noticeably deteriorating in the past few months. The “explosion” of problems hidden from the general public coincided with the cabinet reshuffle and the approaching parliamentary elections. Relations have become so unpredictable today that it is not always easy to determine who provoked the gas, meat and milk, and naval lighthouse rows. Yet the impression is that not all the negotiations between the two “eternal strategic partners” are encountering difficulties. While the Black Sea Fleet situation does not seem to favor Ukraine because the Russian side has shown an unflinching determination to drag out the negotiating process, some movement was noted in the border issue during a meeting of the expert group of the sub-commission dealing with the Azov-Kerch problems. But even this progress is of a rather uncertain nature.

The talks between Ukraine and Russia have been dragging on for almost 10 years. Occasionally they became overly politicized and sometimes turned into disputes of crisis-like proportions, for example, the Tuzla conflict. Aware of the inevitability of the complete determination of borders between the two countries, the Russian side has been doing its utmost to drag out the talks, alleging via official and unofficial channels that official Kyiv is trying to erect a new “Berlin Wall” between the two nations. No matter what arguments Ukraine offered, easing tensions sometimes resembled a Sisyphean task.

What progress was achieved at the latest talks? First of all, Russia agreed to the demarcation of the border’s land segment (marked on location). At least this is the conclusion that can be drawn from the words of Leonid Osavoliuk, Ukraine’s Charge d’Affaires in Russia. Summing up the talks, he said last Thursday that President Yushchenko has approved the composition of the Ukrainian expert demarcation group, and the two sides have agreed that after the Russian group is formed, they will hold a meeting of the “mixed demarcation commission.” “As for demarcation, for the first time we have agreed today that this border must be demarcated. We have handed over a solid package of draft documents on demarcation, including the provisions on demarcation and technical instructions. So I think we’ve reached considerable progress about the beginning of demarcating the border’s land segment. We are going to take practical steps shortly to set this process into motion,” Interfax-Ukraine quotes Osavoliuk as saying.

However, the talks have produced no other results. Important as it is, the demarcation problem does not seem to be one that will be difficult to resolve. Demarcation is a completely logical thing because the border has already been delimited (marked on the map), which is attested by the appropriate ratified documents. More questions are raised by the demarcation of the border in the Azov Sea and the Strait of Kerch. Here the two sides take different positions, especially with respect to the Strait of Kerch. In simpler terms, the Russian side opposes drawing a borderline that would put the Kerch-Yenikal Canal on Ukrainian territory. (This is an important transportation route that Russia would not like to cede to Ukraine, although all Soviet-era documents point to Kyiv’s advantage over Moscow in the negotiating process.)

“We expected the Russian side to submit its own proposals about drawing the state border line in the Azov Sea, which we agreed upon during the previous rounds of talks. Unfortunately, we failed to receive such proposals and we agreed that the Russian side would still submit them in the nearest future,” Osavoliuk noted. As for the Strait of Kerch, the charge d’affaires said that the two sides’ positions remain the same. “Ukraine’s position is understandable, and Ukraine insists, in compliance with the norms of international law and bilateral agreements, that the existing borderline in the Strait of Kerch be recognized. So far the Russian side is not prepared to recognize the border between ex-Soviet Ukraine and Russia as the official border between the now independent states,” he said. Asked about the course of the negotiations, Osavoliuk said, “I cannot say that the negotiations are going smoothly. They are definitely tense. We have been negotiating the demarcation of the Azov Sea for nearly 10 years.” It appears that this won’t be the end of it. Protracted diplomacy is in full swing.