Category: Russia & Former USSR

Posted on

Ukraine should sell its gas pipeline to stabilize the region

From OilPrice.com

Gas supply, and the threat to that supply for Europe, is what has forced Russia to move aggressively on multiple fronts to defeat Ukraine in its efforts to modernize and westernize its economy, its future, and its way of life.

So, how to start the liberalization process? Ukraine has argued that its gas transportation system is a strategic asset. Business-minded people take issue with this interpretation, which ignores the commercial potential of the pipeline system. Now that we have come full circle in a long-brewing Ukraine-Russia gas war, perhaps the pipeline should be considered “strategic” — if not in the way the Ukrainian authorities have long understood. The pipeline system, worth $20 to $30 billion, can indeed play a strategic and tactical role in resolving Ukraine’s crisis with Russia, but only if it’s sold off.

Ukraine should sell 50 to 75 percent of it for cash to a consortium involving the EU, U.S. and Russia and operated by a U.S. business enterprise, preferably based in Houston. This can only happen if Russia agrees to remove troops and other proxies in eastern Ukraine and then works with Ukraine to secure the border and cease all low-intensity conflict efforts, including on the ground, and in cyberspace and the trade arena….

Read more at EconoMonitor : EconoMonitor » 5 Things Ukraine Must Do to Become Energy Independent.

Posted on

Putin’s strategy: Turning Russia into China’s Ukraine

What is starting to dawn on Vladimir Putin is that, in a free-market system, one is more beholden to one’s customers than to one’s suppliers. It is easier for customers to take their business elsewhere than for suppliers to do so.

China’s biggest customers are Europe and the United States. Russia is attempting to switch their customer from Europe to China. That would move them further down, not up, the supply chain. As Prof Timothy Snyder points out:

…Putin would have to fall back on China, and Russia would become China’s Ukraine.

Posted on

What Ukraine Crisis Means for Future of Europe | SPIEGEL ONLINE

Interesting extract from Spiegel interview with Prof. Timothy Snyder from Yale:

SPIEGEL: What motivates Putin?

Snyder: I think Putin is playing an all-or-nothing game, geopolitically speaking. He no longer cares about tolerable relations with the EU or about a solid relationship with Ukraine. Putin has opted for something else, a much larger project, to destabilize Ukraine and the EU. It’s an all-or-nothing game because there is no going back, now that he has embarked on this path.

SPIEGEL: Can he win?

Snyder: There are two options now: Either he achieves his goals, or the European Union achieves political unity and ideological stringency. It would have to define itself as Russia’s adversary and, most of all, develop a joint energy policy with which it could affect Putin. If the EU could do that, there would be radical consequences for Russia. Then Putin would have to fall back on China, and Russia would become China’s Ukraine.

via Experts Discuss What Ukraine Crisis Means for Future of Europe – SPIEGEL ONLINE.

Posted on

Ukraine crisis offers lessons in how to handle China’s ambitions

Chilling analysis by Simon Leitch of the use of force by Russia and China to achieve political objectives:

Because China and Russia are major powers with nuclear weapons, dangerous conventional forces and economic leverage, states seeking to deter them from territorial challenges lack credible threats. To address this they must learn the Cold War lessons of manipulating risk or forfeit the initiative to opponents.

This is a high-stakes game of chicken which could encourage smaller states to pursue their own nuclear deterrent and indulge in aggressive, irrational, North-Korean-style behavior in order to discourage aggression from their larger neighbors.

Read more at Ukraine crisis offers lessons in how to handle China's ambitions.

Posted on

Challenging Putin’s Values | NYTimes.com

Thomas L. Friedman’s opinion at the NY Times:

…….Ukraine is not threatening Russia, but Ukraine’s revolution is threatening Putin. The main goal of the Ukraine uprising is to import a rules-based system from the E.U. that will break the kleptocracy that has dominated Kiev — the same kind of kleptocracy Putin wants to maintain in Moscow. Putin doesn’t care if Germans live by E.U. rules, but when fellow Slavs, like Ukrainians, want to — that is a threat to him at home.

Don’t let anyone tell you the sanctions are meaningless and the only way to influence Russia is by moving tanks. (Putin would love that. It would force every Russian to rally to him.) If anything, we should worry that over time our sanctions will work too well. And don’t let anyone tell you that we’re challenging Russia’s “space.” We’re not. The real issue here is that Ukrainians, as individuals and collectively, are challenging Putin’s “values.”

We couldn’t stop them if we wanted to. They’ve been empowered by globalization and the I.T. revolution. Get used to it, Comrade Putin.

Read more at Challenging Putin’s Values – NYTimes.com.

Posted on

Russia ‘Tourists’ Fighting in Ukraine | The Daily Beast

From Oleg Shynkarenko at The Daily Beast:

A journalist from Russia’s Moskva FM Radio broadcasting from Donetsk asked a local rebel commander, “Can you tell me your name?” He answered: “Of course, I am Paramonov Pavel Vladimirovytch.”

“Are you from Donetsk?”

“Of course not. I am from Yefremov, Tula region [Russia].”

“What are you doing in Donetsk?”

“I am helping brotherly people to defend their rights, do you have another questions?”

Read more at Russia Tells ‘Tourists’ How to Go Fight in Ukraine – The Daily Beast.

Powered by WordPress / WordPress Maintenance By WPSmart