The current crisis in Ukraine is a game changer for Europe. While it has reignited a necessary public debate about collective measures to ensure Europe’s security, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) immediate neighborhood has witnessed a considerable worsening of security conditions for some time.
People have been praising the strategy of Russian president Vladimir Putin toward eastern Ukraine and the successes that it has brought him there. Yet the more I think about it, the more I wonder how much strategy there is behind his actions and whether Putin is beginning to have second thoughts about those successes. Both […]
This past weekend, Russian marines in unmarked uniforms (or possibly, but less likely, private contractors paid by Russia) seized the airports of Crimea, allowing Russian planes to fly troops into that autonomous region of Ukraine while large-scale Russian military maneuvers to the north distracted the Ukrainian army. The quick and somewhat stealthy action permitted […]
In the past several months, the world has been gripped by the graphic political drama unfolding in Ukraine, but events have often unfolded so fast that it has been difficult to put them in context. And although the violence has stopped, the future of Ukraine is more uncertain than ever before. Here we’ll break down […]
At the end of each year I tried to reflect on the most important events that took place in Europe (see my comments for 2011 and 2012). Aside from the political look down in DC, tensions in South-East Asia, instabilities in the Middle East and North Africa, among many other stories, seven stories caught my attention […]
A Lack of Credible Opposition Candidates Has Stalled Democratic Progress Along the Black Sea Since late November, ever since Ukraine’s President, Victor Yanukovych, refused to sign an Association Agreement with the European Union, protestors have congregated in downtown Kiev, defying what they see as a blatant attempt to maintain a post-Soviet world order in a […]
Days prior the Defense december summit (see Part 1 here and Part 2 here), the EU is finally trying to educate European citizens about the Common Security and Defense Policy. In a 10 minutes web documentary accessible on the EEAS website, here, the EU is finally attempting to explain CSDP the way NATO has been […]
“…President [Yanukovych] has repeatedly said he is committed to putting Ukraine on a European course. That course does not have to conflict with a robust trade relationship with Russia. This is not a zero-sum game…” U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey R. Pyatt, December 20, 2013 The statement above may be narrowly true, but if we […]
Where do European interests lay? What are Europeans’ priorities? How can Europeans influence and shape their environments? In a recent speech, HR Ashton declared that the CSDP faces several challenges; one being that “there is no agreed long-term vision on the future of CSDP.” These questions are fundamental in order to discuss the future of the […]
Slender forms in decadently jeweled red and gold glide across the stage. Delicate white flower petals cling to dark hair and long limbs grab the air in soft waves. This traditional dance marked a stunning welcome to the mid-November commencement of the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting (CHOG) in Colombo, Sri Lanka. The ceremony provided a much needed moment of glitz and […]
On December 19 and 20, 2013, the European Council will be discussing the Common Security and Defense Policy (CSDP), simply known as European defense. In order to cover such event a multi-part analysis will be adopted comporting several dimensions: context; the meeting; reflections on the aftermath of the Council meeting. All scholars and experts on […]
The European Union should provide Ukraine with the trade benefits it would have realized had Russian pressure not prompted the government of President Viktor Yanukovych to announce on November 21 that it would not sign a long-anticipated Association Agreement with the EU. That announcement set off not only pro-EU protests in the streets of […]
I recently appeared in a production of Protest. one of the better-known one-act plays written by former Czech President Vaclav Havel. It’s is an hour-long dialogue between two characters. Stanek, an outwardly prosperous writer, is a toer of the communist party line; Vanek, a fellow writer, is a known political dissident recently paroled from prison […]
The Philippines were hurt by one of the strongest typhoons ever recorded. Typhoon Haiyan hit a highly populated area of the Philippines on November 7th and 8th. Apparently an estimated 10 millions people were affected by the Typhoon, and almost 3 million people have lost their livelihood. The death toll stood at 3,974 and over […]
The snowball effect of the Snowden revelations is finally picking up. Between the revelations of the National Security Agency eavesdropping on Merkel’s cellphone and massive collection of European citizens’ emails and phone calls (as demonstrated by the illustration below), Europeans are furious and have been asking questions to a reluctant Obama administration. US Secretary of […]