Ivo Mijnssen and Philipp Casula: The fact that Russia’s takeover of Crimea occurred without any resistance has historical reasons. Crimea had belonged to the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union since the 18th century. As a result of Russian colonization and the migration of ethnic Russians and Ukrainians to the peninsula, Crimea’s population is today made up of a Russian majority. Ukraine in general and Crimea in particular are part of what Russia considers its Near Abroad, a term describing parts of the former Soviet Union with large concentrations of ethnic Russians outside of Russia’s state borders. Moscow clearly allots to the former Soviet republics a special place in its foreign policy, based on a shared history, common language and close economic ties. The Ukrainian question has been turned into a zero-sum game in which Ukraine, apparently, either has to choose sides or face division. For countries like Ukraine, Georgia or other former Soviet republics caught between Russia and the West, it should, however, not be an either/or issue to belong to a Russian or to a European-led institutional framework. It should be possible to belong to both, because they cannot ignore either one of their neighbors. Additionally, the West should finally provide for a European Security model that includes Russia and does not assign only a secondary role to Moscow. Only this will induce the Kremlin to pursue a different foreign policy and change Russia’s image in the West, finally defusing Moscow’s fears of NATO and superseding Western Cold War imageries.
Posted on: Thu, 06 Mar 2014 13:04:31 +0000
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