Bipolar Europe?

In a new article for EDM, Igor Torbakov examines the situation two days before the Ukrainian presidential election and concludes that the Kremlin views Ukraine as a battleground between East and West. Quoting Harvard university professor Roman Szporluk, he says that the election is a crucial one, and will set the course for a nation that acts as a pivot between East and West: "Toward Europe or back to Russia."

Most independent analysts agree that Russian President Vladimir Putin's unprecedented three-day visit to Kyiv this week was meant to demonstrate his personal support for Russia's favorite, Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych. It also revealed at least three things. First, the Russian leadership believes it is vitally important to help set up in Ukraine what Moscow strategic planners call a "friendly and allied regime." Second, the Kremlin isn't sure of Yanukovych's victory, despite considerable financial and propaganda efforts invested in his win. Third, Putin is prepared to struggle for Yanukovych's election using almost all means -- even risking losing face if his protege eventually fails at the polls.

Some commentators suggested that Russia's backing for Yanukovych, while suiting the Kremlin politically, could paradoxically act against Russian business interests in Ukraine. The argument notes that Yanukovych's main rival, Viktor Yushchenko, while serving as Ukraine's prime minister, opened the doors for Russian business and allowed Russian companies to buy up large enterprises in Ukraine. By contrast, Yanukovych, since his appointment as prime minister in November 2002, has generally blocked Russian businesses from making acquisitions in Ukraine, the experts say. "If Putin wanted to lobby for Russian business groups, he should have backed Yushchenko," notes Anders Aslund, director of the Russian and Eurasian program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. In Aslund's opinion, Putin does not completely understand the situation. "It really seems that Putin is lost," he contends.

But Aslund and other like-minded analysts simply misinterpret the thinking behind the Kremlin policies. In fact, Putin is not "lost" -- he just thinks that the Ukrainian election is about geopolitics, not economics. According to the influential political analyst and journalist Vitaly Tretyakov, there are "far more important issues" than the opportunity for Russian business to freely buy up Ukrainian assets. Tretyakov's commentary, as well as some recent policy papers penned by Russia's leading political scientists, reveal the Kremlin's true concerns regarding the Ukrainian election.

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Needless to say, the pro-Western Ukrainian policymakers eye the emerging European divide with alarm. As Borys Tarasyuk, chairman of the Ukrainian parliament's Committee on European Integration, noted, "Ukrainians sense there is a rising threat of a new bipolar Europe, with centers in Brussels and Moscow, and with competing sets of values."

Read the whole article
here.