La bonne intervention en Ukraine

Jul 15, 2015 Carl Bildt

STOCKHOLM – Le drame grec en cours a peut-être captivé l'Europe et le monde, pourtant la grande crise au Sud-Est de l'Europe n'a pas disparu. L'Ukraine reste sous occupation partielle par les séparatistes soutenus par la Russie et des combats intermittents ont encore lieu malgré l'accord de cessez-le-feu de Minsk II.

L'arrêt et la reprise des combats dans la région du Donbass en Ukraine depuis la signature de l'accord de Minsk en février a établi clairement une chose. Si la Russie envisage sérieusement une solution au conflit, elle doit se préparer à approuver le déploiement d'une mission et d'une force internationale de maintien de la paix. Une telle mission pourrait entamer un processus de réhabilitation de la région, autoriser les personnes déplacées par les violences à revenir et faciliter la réintégration de la région du Donbass en Ukraine par des garanties appropriées et par la décentralisation des pouvoirs.

Un modèle utile pour cette approche est à portée de main. Il y a deux décennies de cela, la communauté internationale entrait dans la phase finale de ses efforts pour garantir la paix en Bosnie. Mais il y avait également des conflits persistants en Croatie, notamment dans la région orientale de Slavonie, proche de la Serbie.

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Carl Bildt

Writing for PS since 2009
92 Commentaries

Carl Bildt was Sweden’s foreign minister from 2006 to 2014 and Prime Minister from 1991 to 1994, when he negotiated Sweden’s EU accession. A renowned international diplomat, he served as EU Special Envoy to the Former Yugoslavia, High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina, UN Special Envoy to the Balkans, and Co-Chairman of the Dayton Peace Conference. He is Co-Chair of the European Council on Foreign Relations.

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0 Comments on this paragraph, 19 Comments on this article

Andrei Yanovski Aug 17, 2015

Any positive comparison to Milosevic is totally counterproductive. He was a leader who lost a war to NATO, was arrested and died in prison in Hague. I am quite sure that Mr. Putin would NOT like to follow in his footsteps. As modern history shows, when the conflict has gone so far there is no way back for a leader if he's the enemy of the US. Milosevic lost a war and died in prison, Hussein lost a war and was hanged, Gaddafi lost a war and was beaten to death. Any leader daring to set course for conflict with the Western Powers is sure to be determined to fight to the last breath.
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Allan Bleiken Jul 22, 2015

This is an interesting and perhaps a useful suggestion. What should be remembered however, is that Yugoslavia as a nation split into seven different nations before peace was possible. Therefore, while a peace keeping effort might be useful, it should be followed be free elections of people in the Ukraine to determine if they want to remain united as a single country, or split off into separate countries, thus eliminating the basis of the conflict. Remember, both the Crimia and the Donbas region were part of Russia before it was transferred to the Ukraine in 1953. To eliminate the fighting, you need to eliminate the cause of the fighting.
- Alex Leo Jul 26, 2015
  
  No, only Crimea was part of the Russian Soviet Republic. Donbass and Kuban, a very large territory to the east of Donbas, was all Ukraine. You are not familiar with either the conflict in Ukraine or with the main theories why people fight in post Helsinki Europe.
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j. von Hettlingen Jul 18, 2015

Carl Bildt sees a parallel between the pro-Russian separatists in the Donbas region of Eastern Ukraine and the Serbs in Eastern Slavonia, a sliver of Croatia, which fell into their hands in 1991 and was incorporated into the Republic of Serbian Krajina, a self-proclaimed Serb parastate within Croatia during the Croatian war of independence in 1992.
In the 1995 Dayton peace talks an agreement was reached between the Serbian President, Slobodan Milosevic, and the Croatian President, Franjo Tudjman, calling for the 150,000 Serbs living there to remain. It also stated that there would be an international force in the region for a year or two before Eastern Slavonia were to return to Croatia. It would also provide human rights guarantees for those who chose to remain.
Bildt believes that the Minsk II ceasefire agreement will only work if Russia would "endorse the deployment of an international peacekeeping mission and force" to Easter Ukraine. He suggests the warring parties to replicate a "useful model" adopted twenty years ago - UNTAES (United Nations Transitional Administration for Eastern Slavonia, Baranja, and Western Sirmium). The mission was a succeess. Although it hadn't solved all problems in Eastern Slavonia, the ethnic groups can co-exist, and Croatia and Serbia "now enjoy constructive bilateral relations".
No doubt the ebbing fortunes of the Serbs were behind their willingness to sign the Dayton agreement. Milosevic wanted to carve a "Greater Serbia" out of the ruins of Yugoslavia and seized huge chunks of Croatia. The Serbs there were only needed to ignite the fuse in order for the war to be spread to Bosnia Herzegovina.
But is there a "political will there to make such an arrangement work" in the conflict between Russia and Ukraine? Such a peacekeeping mission may require a resolution from the UN Security Council, where Russia is a veto power. It's clear that the Kremlin has no desire to respect "Ukraine’s sovereignty in the Donbas", but it seeks to resume "normal relations with the West". The question is when Putin will realise that his intervention in Ukraine is as much a folly as "George W. Bush’s misadventure in Iraq". Meanwhile Bildt urges the West to stand by Ukraine "to block further Russian efforts at destabilization".
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Nick Koblov Jul 17, 2015

Author means to bomb Donbass like NATO did it in Yugoslavia? Poroshenkos gov. doing very well without NATO.
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Eugene Haas Jul 17, 2015

"occupation by separatists"
OMG and these people forbid me to pick my nose?
Dear author, is not a bad idea to understand the terms.
- Petey Bee Jul 17, 2015
  
  ha! good catch
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Filatov Jury Jul 17, 2015

What they are interesting!
Russia offers the option of a year ago with UN peacekeepers, but NATO (probably so today should be called the United States) refused to even hear about it.
In the West, people have very short memories, well, by at least so think Western journalists

Какие они интересные!
Россия год назад предлагала вариант с миротворцами ООН, но НАТО (наверное так сегодня следует называть США) отказалось даже слышать об этом.
На западе у людей очень короткая память, ну по крайне мере так думают западные журналисты
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Bernard Fudim Jul 16, 2015

So far these comments based upon public, not secret knowledge, and certainly our State Department must have historians and academicians who can appreciate the situation. I can't the negative reaction by our State Department and the negative presidential reaction to the situation in the Ukraine. I find it a mystery as to what has driven our diplomatic reaction? What possible benefit to the Ukrainians can result from this reaction? I don't see it resulting in safer more stable area, and I don't see how it is driven by any economic gain? On the other hand there does seem to be a divide within the two major political parties in America and possibly each side is vying for electoral votes in 2016.

So far these comments are based upon public, not secret knowledge, and certainly our State Department must have historians and academicians who can appreciate the situation. I can't understand the negative reaction by our State Department and the identical negative presidential reaction to the situation in the Ukraine. I find it a mystery as to what has driven our diplomatic reaction? What possible benefit to the Ukrainians and to the USA can result from our reaction? I don't see it resulting in safer more stable regional, and I don't see how it is driven by any economic gain to us neither to the Ukrainians? On the other hand there does seem to be a divide within the two major political parties in America and possibly each side is vying for electoral votes in 2016.
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Baldur Dasche Jul 16, 2015

The demographic change in eastern Slavonia from an area proponderantlly Serbian to and area preponderantly Croat over the time of the 'war' and the subsequent UN supervised 'transfer' indicate that the area was thoroughly cleansed of Serbian occupants. In like fashion the government of in Kyiv has published objectives for their 'territory' in the dissident regions including land grants for ex-service personnel and the removal of the 'criminal element' of the 'anti-Ukrainian' population.
As in Croatia, the services of the UN 'peace force' will be used to peacefully mask what the 'national' government was unable to do militarily.
- Dave Thomas Jul 17, 2015
  
  Please provide proof to back up your claims. But I won't hold my breath since you are lying and have no proof. Instead, you are providing us with the Kremlin's lies and propaganda.
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Petey Bee Jul 16, 2015

@Dave Thomas

And Yanukovich fled from a peaceful crowd which formed spontaneously, is that right? Please.

I'm glad you're not a troll for the right wingers in Ukraine, otherwise you'd have a hard time remembering that Crimea has been a Russian military base region for a long time, sort-of like parts of southern AZ which are home to many military families. It is very solidly Russian. They won the referendum easily without any gunpoint. I'm sure you knew that.
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Bernard Fudim Jul 16, 2015

The concept that a boundary can be drawn uniting Eastern Orthodox Russians and Catholic Ukrainians may be as unrealistic as the creation of Iraq in 1916 by Sykes and Picot. Economic interdependency between Russians and Ukrainians in Donbas might succeed if there were economic interdependency, but first there has to be a viable economic system that unites them. Was there at any time previously, the basis for such an economic interdependency upon which they could depend projecting forward?
- Petey Bee Jul 17, 2015
  
  Bernard,
  "Was there at any time previously, the basis for such an economic interdependency upon which they could depend projecting forward"
  
  yes, in the long-ago days of the year 2013.... but nobody remembers such a distant past now
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Petey Bee Jul 15, 2015

There is an alternative narrative readers should know about.

In the Donbas region, Ukrainians of Ukrainian ethnicity, and Ukrainians of Russian ethnicity got along fine until the immediate post-Maidan government, whose ministers were selected from the ultra-nationalist extremist parties Right Sector and Svoboda (aka "Freedom", rebranded from its former name, the Social-Nationalists). The immediate post-Maidan government banned political parties opposed to it, and sent armed troops to attack Ukrainians of Russian culture and ethnicity who resisted it's anti-democratic actions. Unable to overcome the relatively non-violent resistance of the locals, the immediate post-Maidan authorities then in charge in Kiev ratcheted up the level of violence, from armed men to armored vehicles to artillery attacks on villages, towns and even densely populated city centers.

In this narrative, saying things like "Ukraine and the West stand firm to block Russian efforts at destabilization" just brings the writer's memory into question.

Regardless of whether you believe the above alternative narrative, or the one offered in the article, in both cases a civil war took place, with both sides receiving help from "volunteers" from other countries. (translation: private military contractors. The days when proxy conflicts are fought by real soldiers under a national chain of command are over.)

The way to resolve the civil war is for the West to put forward a convincing argument ($$ into the appropriate pockets) that the overthrow of the Yanukovich regime is not going to harm anyone. This should've been done beforehand but someone was skipping steps. I'm sure a compromise will eventually be reached, but I have a hard time understanding why it is necessary to demonize Russia in this case.
- Eugene Haas Jul 17, 2015
  
  to Dave Thomas
  You do not have information. Girkin appeared in the Donbas after capuring of administrative buildings by the forces of the Right Sector in Western Ukraine. You just operating on what you said your media.
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- Filatov Jury Jul 17, 2015
  
  I am amazed at the depth of ignorance of journalists who called the inhabitants of Donbass separatists.
  This Kiev wants to separate them, because they are a danger to the self-proclaimed government. Western Ukraine needs only those regions that will support their candidates.
  That is why separate the Donbas sent tanks and aircraft.
  Donbas demanded unity of Ukraine and the constitutional reform.
  
  Я поражен глубиной невежества журналистов, которые называют жителей Донбасса сепаратистами.
  Это Киев хочет их отделения, потому что они представляют опасность для самопровозглашенного правительства. Западной Украине нужны только те регионы, которые будут поддерживать их кандидатов.
  Именно поэтому отделять донбас послали танки и самолеты.
  Донбас требовал единства Украины и проведения конституционнй реформы.
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- Dave Thomas Jul 15, 2015
  
  To Petey Bee
  
  "I have a hard time understanding why it is necessary to demonize Russia". You are not spreading an "alternative view", you are spreading the Kremlin's lies. You have conveniently omitted the fact that the Kremlin invaded the Crimea, held a bogus referendum at gunpoint and annexed the Crimea before anyone was killed anywhere in Ukraine, after Yanukovych fled home to Russia. EVerything yu have said is a lie or a complete twisting of the truth and facts...just like the Kremlin likes it. No one was killed in Ukraine until the Kremlin sent Girkin and his Spetsnaz to take over government buildings in Slovyansk. And only after the Russians started taking over government buildings using heavy weapons all around the Donbas did the Ukrainians government react. This is fact and if you don't remember just look at the daily papers from a year ago when it was happening. But as a Kremlin troll, I am sure that learning the truth is not what you get your pathetic rubles for.
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Dan Victor Jul 15, 2015

Any comparison between Putin and Milosevic is wrong, unnecessary and candidly malicious. Of course, Europe needs - as much as Russia, a solution to the Ukraine' s crisis, but such cannot be gas over fire rhetoric. Hitting Russia from all corners will never bear fruits, certainly not the sweet ones. It's more quid pro quo and not I'm the only holder of the truth approach...
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La bonne intervention en Ukraine

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