It’s been four years since the second Minsk agreement aimed at halting the war in Ukraine was signed. Clearly, it has failed.
At the United Nations on February 12, Assistant Secretary-General Miroslav Jenca commented at the Security Council meeting on the situation in Ukraine that negotiations “appear to have lost momentum” and that neither Russia nor Ukraine appear to be willing to agree on key steps forward. Frankly, comments like those of Mr. Jenca – and others who feign evenhandedness in their approach to the Donbas war – are nothing less than blaming the victim for the actions of the aggressor.
Ambassador Volodymyr Yelchenko made it clear to the Security Council who is at fault: “… it is only Russia and its ongoing military activity in the occupied territories of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions of Ukraine as well as in Crimea that constitute for now an unsurmountable obstacle for the peaceful resolution of the conflict.” The ambassador also gave these figures: “The 35,000-strong armed force in occupied Donbas is supported by more than 2,100 members of the Russian military.” Since 2015, he continued, Russia has sabotaged implementation of the ceasefire agreements a total of 18 times and there were more than 54,000 ceasefire violations.
The acting U.S. ambassador to the U.N., Jonathan Cohen, said it’s “ironic” that Russia called the meeting to discuss the Minsk agreements “given that Russia has clearly failed to honor and implement” them and that it “continues to arm, train, lead and fight alongside its proxy forces in eastern Ukraine.” The U.S. envoy credited Ukraine for demonstrating its commitment to a peaceful resolution and implementation of Minsk’s provisions, “including by extending the law on the special status for Russia-controlled areas of eastern Ukraine.”
To be sure, Russia attempted to lay the blame for Minsk’s failure on Ukraine. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia accused Kyiv of not abiding by the ceasefire and not carrying out the agreement’s political provisions. He also accused the West of staging a coup d’état in Ukraine and called the United States the “puppeteers of the Maidan Theater.”
Those remarks elicited a strong reaction from the United Kingdom’s Ambassador Jonathan Allen, who cited the Russian envoy’s “colorful and imaginative language” and pointed out that he “said nothing about Russia’s role.” Ambassador Allen spoke also of Russia’s continuing efforts to destabilize Ukraine, including in the Black and Azov seas, the persecution of Crimean Tatars and others in illegally annexed Crimea, and its repeated refusal to support the Special Monitoring Mission of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.
The next day, Hanna Hopko, chair of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Foreign Affairs, wrote on the Atlantic Council website: “A ceasefire at the contact line …has not become a reality. Even though Russian President Vladimir Putin still maintains the fiction that Russia is not involved in the Donbas, the Kremlin continues to fund and arm separatists in eastern Ukraine.” Significantly, she added: “Putin hopes for a more pliable president after Ukraine’s spring presidential elections.”
And there’s the rub: the election is just six weeks away, and the Kremlin is already attempting to influence its outcome. Much is at stake for all of Ukraine.