Does Putin Have A Point On Ukraine?

Ukraine: EU Considers Cooling-Off Period

Updated: 2:12pm UK, Thursday 06 March 2014

By Adam Boulton, Political Editor, in Brussels

The European Union has invited Arseniy Yatsenyuk, the interim leader of the Ukrainian government, to attend this emergency summit in Brussels.

The Ukrainian country won't sit in on the final deliberations by the 28 EU member states but he is taking part in preliminary meetings.

Yatsenyuk's presence is an expression of solidarity with the popular uprising which threw out the Yanukovych government in Kiev and a direct rebuff to Russia, which is still insisting that Yanukovych is the true leader of Ukraine.

The EU Leaders meeting today will have no difficulty repeating their condemnation of what they regard as the illegal occupation of the Crimea by Russian forces. There is a unanimous view that the Russian action is illegal under international law and that Russian forces should return to barracks.

But as the US and the EU seek "to de-escalate" a crisis which is seeing pro and anti Russian civilians and militia confronting each other across Ukraine, the bigger question is whether the EU will go further today and impose sanctions directly against Russia.

Beyond denunciation of President Putin, the measures taken so far by Europe against Russia have been paltry. Preparatory talks have halted ahead of the G8 Summit he is due to host in Sochi this summer. Negotiations on further trade and visa liberalisation have been halted. And today the EU confirmed targeted sanctions freezing the assets held in the EU of deposed President Yanukovych and 17 of his close associates from Ukraine.

Officials are cautioning against suggestions that targeted sanctions on assets and freedom of travel could be extended today against named Russian citizens including Putin. We know from an accidentally revealed official paper that the UK, for example, is worried about the impact which a crackdown on oligarchs could have on London - a key base for so many of them.

It is much more likely that the EU will instead threaten sanctions unless Russia backs down - there is talk of a two week deadline being set.

Indeed a cooling-off period is likely to be at the centre of today's European Union plan of action awaiting developments on the ground in Ukraine and talks elsewhere - most notably in Rome today between the US Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

Although the Russian action in Crimea is condemned as a violation of the 1994 de-nuclearization treaty, the EU also accepts that the area is a special case. A majority of citizens in Crimea are Russian speakers and seemingly pro-Russian and under treaty Russian has rights to military and naval bases there.

As the EU leaders gathered, the Crimean Parliament voted to hold a referendum on March 16 on whether to become part of Russia. The EU does not recognise this because - shades of the debate between Westminster and Edinburgh - it says a referendum must be endorsed by the whole Ukrainian parliament. However, there is an open acceptance that the status of Crimea may well change before this crisis is resolved.

At a minimum the EU wants to threaten Russia enough to halt any expansion of aggression beyond Crimea into other areas of eastern Ukraine where there is also some sympathy for Moscow.

With varying degrees of frankness, EU members also admit that economic sanctions against Russia could hurt them more than they hurt President Putin. Italy, the Netherlands and Germany are all big trading partners of Russia and heavily dependent on energy imports which come from Russia through Ukraine.

On the other extreme, members in Eastern Europe are much more fearful of Russia's imperial ambitions. Countries such as Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic were only able to join the EU after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Iron Curtain and have bitter memories of life under the Russian yoke. If Putin is not stopped now they worry that his appetite will be whetted for further expansion by force, into the Baltic states next most obviously.

Although Putin is playing the strong man for now, privately many western observers believe he does not have as strong a hand as it seems.

He bullied Yanukovych into switching his allegiance to Russia, but then the popular uprising ousted him as Ukrainian president. The Russian armed forces are decaying and may not be capable of sustained occupation against resistance - even the navy now blockading Sevastopol is said to be "rusting". For all its corruption, the Russian economy is now much more open and exposed than in Soviet days. Putin might not be able to survive extended sanctions which hit stock markets, the rouble and above all energy revenues.

Finally, in spite of recent repressive measures, there is still a significant level of civil dissent in Russia against the Putin regime

As so often, the most influential leader at the EU will be Germany's Chancellor Merkel. She knows all about Soviet bullying having grown up in East Germany in a period when Putin was, for a time, the KGB spy chief there. Germany also has the most intimate historical, geographic and economic ties to Russia of any of the old 'Western' European Union member states.

Merkel and Putin can communicate directly in Russian and German. After recent conversations the Chancellor was not optimistic, suggesting that the Russian President was "in another world". That suggests that Merkel will be true to character and advocate caution, not least because she believes that time and circumstances are on the EU's side.

Above all Germany wants Russia to back down and begin negotiations with Ukraine. This centres on efforts to establish a 'contact group' to go between the two sides. The contact group is likely to be made up of the US, the members of the EU who are also in the G7/G8 (the UK, France, Italy, Germany) and Poland, the biggest East European nation. They will have their work cut out - since currently neither Ukraine not Russia recognise the rights of the other.

Unity, moderation and firmness will be the watchwords for the EU today, all characteristics often attached to Chancellor Merkel. Given the concessions he is hoping to win ahead of his EU referendum, Britain's David Cameron will have no difficulty falling in line.