Moment of truth

As the Vilnius summit is coming up, there are more and more forecasts about its success or nonsuccess for Ukraine. Some experts forecast that the coveted Association Agreement will not be signed due to the Ukrainian leadership’s failure to meet the demands. Others argue that the agreement should be signed in any case, as this will promote Ukraine’s rapprochement with the European Union and its overall Europeanization.

And what looks strange in this context is the statement of James SHERR, Senior Fellow of the Russia and Eurasia Program at the Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House) in London, that “for Ukraine, Vilnius-2013 must not become Bucharest-2008.” This is the headline of an article on Radio Liberty’s website about Sherr’s program paper, “Ukraine and Europe: Final Decision?”, on the prospects of Ukraine signing the Association Agreement at the Vilnius Summit to be held in late November in the capital of Lithuania.

This headline is a reminder of the 2008 events. Our newspaper has written a lot about the role Europe played to prevent Ukraine from being granted the NATO Membership Action Plan (MAP) at the Bucharest summit of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in April 2008. Incidentally, Ukraine stood good chances to take a step towards membership in the Alliance at the NATO summit in 2004. At the time, the “bad” Kuchma was denied the MAP on the US side’s insistence. But when the MAP was denied to the “good” Yushchenko, was Ukraine to blame for this situation? The BBC film Putin, Russia and the West, clearly shows what role Europe played in denying Ukraine the MAP. This happened after Russian President Vladimir Putin had visited Paris and Berlin on the eve of the NATO Bucharest summit to negotiate with Nicolas Sarkozy and Angela Merkel. So granting Ukraine the MAP was put on hold. And in the summer of that year, as is known, Russia attacked Georgia and, at the same time, began a verbal campaign against Ukraine.

Even now, more than three and a half years after an allegedly pro-Russian government came to power, Ukraine is still in dire straits. It is a common perception in this country that the current government is as far from perfection as all the previous ones.

Our newspaper has repeatedly carried Sherr’s articles and interviews. But now the impression is that the British expert was affected with the “Stockholm syndrome” which weakened his eyesight.

The British analyst, who has studied our country for dozens of years and, particularly, deals with security matters, claims that Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych does not share European values and, for this reason, the EU should not rush to sign the Agreement on Association and a Free Trade Area with Ukraine.

Radio Liberty quotes Sherr as saying that Kyiv is still making no serious efforts to change the existing rules, reform the existing institutions, and transform the system. Instead, people are making the worst ever mistake, hoping that the very fact of supporting the process of European integration will make all these changes automatically.

In the British expert’s view, President Yanukovych will not meet the commitment to reform Ukraine, for these steps pose a threat to the governmental structure he has built for himself. Accordingly, Sherr suggests in conclusion of the program paper:

“The Vilnius summit is unlikely to lead to a situation similar to the one that existed after the Budapest summit of 1994, when Yeltsin threatened a ‘cold peace’ and did nothing. Rather, it is more likely to resemble the Bucharest summit of 2008, when NATO promised Georgia and Ukraine what it had no means to deliver. The West needs the wisdom to avoid a repetition of that scenario and the vision to construct a system that, in the long term, will strengthen both Ukraine and Europe.”

Unfortunately, this report in fact lacks the vision of what system is to be constructed to strengthen Ukraine and Europe. Nor does the author take into account the particularities of the situation in Ukraine and the condition of civil society which is still feeling the aftereffects of the traumas caused by genocide and the totalitarian Stalinist regime.

What is more farsighted in this context is the view of the British analyst Edward Lucas, International Editor of The Economist, author of the book The New Cold War: Putin’s Russia and the Threat to the West.

In his article “Screwed up: hammers, nails and the Eastern Partnership,” he believes that the EU demands too much from the Eastern Partnership member states and does not try to be in their shoes. “Ukraine’s Viktor Yanukovych may be a bad man, determined to turn his country into a family-owned enterprise. That is sad. But it makes no sense to pretend that he is otherwise. Why is the EU demanding that he dismantle the system that keeps him in power, open his economy to painful economic shocks, and let his worst enemy, Yulia Tymoshenko, the jailed opposition leader, out of jail? Having set these conditions, and got empty promises in return, the EU is trying to unwind them. Subplots abound that Germany, perhaps without proper thought, has made Ms. Tymoshenko’s release a condition of the Association Agreement. Poland disagrees: she belongs in prison, if not on the exact charges that put her there. Polish officials want the Association Agreement signed with Ukraine, even if Ms. Tymoshenko is still in jail (a stance with which, it seems, she herself agrees),” Lucas writes.

“The big question, of course, is Ukraine – larger than all the other countries combined, and less amenable to pressure from either Brussels or Moscow. If its Association Agreement is not signed, a serious rethink of the whole approach is inescapable,” he believes.

“The future of the EaP should be less bureaucratic and less diplomatic. It should focus more on stoking the EU’s soft power in the EaP countries, fostering and highlighting success stories of European integration, whether economic, cultural or social. The more that process advances, the more the prevailing and dispiriting political consensus will erode – both in EU capitals, and in Baku, Chisinau, Kyiv, Minsk, Tbilisi, and Yerevan. That needs new tools and new skills. But nobody said that all we have is a hammer,” Lucas says.

The full text of the British expert’s article can be found on the website.

“VILNIUS 2013 SHOULD NOT END UP IN A FIASCO EITHER FOR UKRAINE OR FOR THE EU. ON THE CONTRARY, IT SHOULD BE A COMMON VICTORY”

Volodymyr OHRYZKO, former Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ukraine:

“On the contrary, the EU has been lately showing obvious interest in signing the agreement. I respect the opinion of Sherr as a well-known analyst, but I think he is mistaken here. For, in reality, this agreement is extremely important for both the EU and Ukraine. The two sides will be ready to sign it in Vilnius.

“The advantages of the European Union for Ukraine are obvious. This will promote economic growth in Ukraine, although there will be some negative points at the initial stage. As for the European Union, it will perhaps draw more geostrategic, rather than economic, benefits from this.

“As bringing Ukraine into line with EU standards is an extremely important issue, I do not think that the tactic of no haste is advisable. On the contrary, Ukraine should be engaged as much as possible in various EU programs. And a wait-and-see stance may be a sign of weakness rather than of long-term thinking.”

And what if I ask why Vilnius 2013 must not become Bucharest 2008 for Europe?

“I fully agree to a question like this, for Bucharest 2008 had a very negative effect, especially on the August 2008 events in Georgia. The European Union and NATO reacted rather weakly to this and thus ended in a geopolitical, political, and perhaps even personal fiasco. If no conclusions were drawn from this, then we must say that the European Union has no strategic vision. I am inclined to believe that the past few months have shown that some in the EU begin to feel the necessity of forming a new vision of relations with Eastern Europe and, above all, Ukraine as a key player in this region. So, coming back to your first question, I would like to say that Vilnius 2013 should not end up in a fiasco either for Ukraine or for the EU. On the contrary, it should be a common victory. Then both sides will show that they can rise above trivia and are taking a strategic view of things.”

Incidentally, one of Sherr’s arguments is that if the EU signs the agreement, it will lose important levers of influencing Ukraine, while Russia, on her part, will allege the EU has washed its hands as far as Ukraine is concerned. What do you think of this?

“On the contrary, if signed, the agreement will be a very serious instrument of influence, for it imposes very specific commitments on both sides. I do not think that the European side will allow flouting these commitments. We will also take the same approach if the EU violates the provisions of this agreement. We will be thus able to use these instruments to defend our interests. And if you also take into account the procedure of ratification, there will be at least 28 powerful instruments to influence and to demand that the provisions of this agreement be duly observed. With this in view, I always recall Ukraine’s accession to the Council of Europe. It is thanks to commitments to the Council of Europe that we have made progress in many fields. It is an obvious fact. The same is here: once the agreement is signed, this will start the process of its ratification and bring along a very serious moment of truth, when the Ukrainian side, bound by its obligations, will have to strictly fulfill them – otherwise, the agreement will not come into force. In my view, [what Sherr says] is philosophization rather than a serious argument.”