The war in waiting

One of the most se­ri­ous threats fac­ing the Eu­ro­pean Union today is the on­go­ing con­flict be­tween Ukraine and Rus­sia. Hav­ing left more than 13,000 dead in seven years of vi­o­lence, the con­flict is being used by Russ­ian Pres­i­dent Vladimir Putin as a stick to beat Ukraine and, at the same time, the EU.

It is not only a strug­gle over a part of the Ukraine that is mostly Russ­ian-speak­ing in the east, but also a way for Moscow to make it clear to Kiev that Rus­sia in­tends to main­tain its in­flu­ence over Ukraine and that it will not ac­cept any pact the coun­try might make with the EU under any cir­cum­stances. Rus­sia has amassed more than 100,000 troops on the bor­der, which can only be in­ter­preted as a threat of fu­ture in­va­sion.

Rus­sia had al­ready an­nexed the Crimean penin­sula in 2014, a move ap­proved by a ref­er­en­dum that the in­ter­na­tional com­mu­nity has not recog­nised. Along with the EU, the United States is a strong ally of Ukraine, and US Pres­i­dent Joe Biden has warned Putin that he will not allow an in­va­sion. Yet Rus­sia’s threat is real and, as most Eu­ro­pean coun­tries de­pend on Russ­ian gas, Moscow well knows how to keep up the pres­sure and gain ground in Ukraine.