Russia-Ukraine war
RUSSIAN President Vladimir Putin has launched an unprecedented attack on Ukraine. Putin has ordered troops to move to two pro-Russian breakaway regions in eastern Ukraine.
Conflict in the Donbas between separatists, backed by Russia, and Ukrainian troops is nothing new.
Putin is at the centre-stage as Russia launches an invasion of its neighbour Ukraine.Russian military vehicles entered Ukraine from various parts of the border along Russia with a growing number of casualties being counted on both sides.
The invasion of Ukraine was feared for months, and indeed, years.When bad things happen, there has to be a response.
President Putin had already gained the world’s attention earlier this year after he ordered troops into two pro-Russian breakaway regions in eastern Ukraine, recognizing them as independent states.
The latest move could be a precursor to a larger invasion of Ukraine.Putin’s actions now, with a larger-scale attack, appear more wide-ranging than many expected.
He would decide how long the military operation would last based on its aims.Ukraine issue needs to be solved immediately but unfortunately nobody in Russia is talking about the occupation of Ukraine.
Heightened fear of a military conflict between Russia and Ukraine has been present for some time, and eastern Ukraine has been the location of a proxy war between the two countries.
Soon after Russia’s annexation of Crimea from Ukraine in 2014, pro-Russian separatists proclaimed two republics in the eastern part of the country: the Donetsk People’s Republic and the Luhansk People’s Republic — much to the Ukrainian government’s consternation.
There have been ongoing skirmishes and fighting in the region, which is known as the Donbas, between Ukraine’s troops and separatists.
Germany and France have tried to broker peace deals between Russia and Ukraine, known as the “Minsk agreements.
” Although the fighting in the Donbas has been punctuated by periods of cease-fire, both Ukraine and Russia have accused each other of violating the terms of the deals and fighting has resumed.
Russia-Ukraine crises, a hot conflict and cold war, are mixed together.The Minsk agreements were dead long before the recognition of the people’s republics.
Russia has often denied it has backed separatists in eastern Ukraine but has been accused of supplying military hardware to rebels in a bid to undermine Ukraine’s government, sovereignty and political stability.
After its invasion and annexation of Crimea, which prompted international sanctions on Russia, the West feared Putin’s eventual aim was to invade more parts of the country and to install a pro-Russian regime in Kyiv.
Russia has denied it plans to invade but the recent massing of more than 100,000 troops along the border with Ukraine, and more soldiers stationed in its ally Belarus for military drills, has only served to strengthen concerns that a full-scale Russian incursion is imminent.
Russia recognizes expanded version of two breakaway regions in Ukraine.Russia’s recognition of the self-proclaimed republics in eastern Ukraine lends an official stamp to Moscow’s support of rebels there, but it has already tried to “Russify” the region by offering Russian passports and citizenship to residents there.
Civilians arrive in the Rostov region of southern Russia after Russia’s decision to recognize the Donetsk region as an independent state.
Signaling Russia is pursuing such a strategy, Putin justified ordering troops into eastern Ukraine.
Moscow’s recognition of the republics was dictated precisely by the fact that the Ukrainian leadership had publicly declared that they were not going to abide by the Minsk agreements.
Whether Russia recognized only the borders of the self-styled republics, or beyond and including the larger Donetsk and Luhansk regions in which they are located.
Russia recognizes these republics which means it acknowledges their foundational documents, including the Constitution, and the Constitution stipulates their borders within the Donetsk and Luhansk regions at the time when they have been part of Ukraine.
The battle over Ukraine is a battle for influence and power.Ukraine’s government, now under President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, has pivoted toward the West in recent years, aspiring to join the EU and NATO and to move away from its post-Soviet orbit of Russia.
President Putin, meanwhile, has decried the dissolution of the Soviet Union as a catastrophe and over his 22-year rule in Russia he has sought to rebuild Russia’s power base and sphere of influence over former Soviet states, like Belarus, Georgia and Ukraine — something of the jewel in the crown in the USSR, and a natural buffer state against Europe.
Putin has often extolled the historical unity of Russia and Ukraine and did so again when he ordered troops into the Donbas.
Ukraine’s drift toward the West aggravates Moscow because it does not want to see NATO, or the EU, expand eastward to incorporate Ukraine despite there being no imminent prospect of Ukraine becoming a member of either body.Russia is pretty optimistic.It can survive sanctions over Ukraine crisis.
In December, Russia demanded legal assurances that Ukraine would never be admitted to NATO but those demands were refused.
Putin knew the demands would be rejected.Russia believes that its security concerns are ignored.Russia has blamed Ukraine and the West for aggravating tension in the Donbas region, accusing both of spreading misinformation and of ignoring Russia’s security demands.
Russia’s latest actions have drawn international condemnation, with the US, EU, Japan, Australia and the UK, all announcing new sanctions on Russia, although the country has already lived under sanctions for its Crimea annexation, 2016 US election interference, cyber attacks and more.
Now all-out war is in the Russian mind?Close watchers of Putin have long believed that Russia has prepared for more sanctions and that Moscow has a bigger plan in mind when it comes to Ukraine, a hypothesis apparently being proven by the latest events in Ukraine.
—The Islamabad-based writer is book ambassador, editor, political analyst and author of several books.
