Ukraine. It has been a disappointing week of escalating violence in Ukraine.
(THIS ARTICLE IS MACHINE TRANSLATED by Google from Norwegian)
Over two dozen lives on Wednesday night were lost in the conflict that has gradually intensified over the past three months. There is no doubt that President Viktor Yanukovych has overall responsibility for the situation in the country. The problem arose not so this week, but by the fact that this oligarch-like power politician had to both come to power and stick to it.
When Ukraine hosted the 2012 Football Championship, the protests against the hair-raising imprisonment of, and the long-term judgment against, Julia Timoshenko were very deficient. Both Norway and the EU failed. Trade and stability have been more important than democratic governance. That is why the EU also tried to lure Ukraine over, so Putin, with more direct methods, will keep the former Soviet Republic on the right side of the new iron curtain.
For it is a new type of Cold War we are seeing through Eastern Europe now, as we also see similar Cold War features in Russia's and the United States' strategies towards Syria. The germ of this new Cold War began as early as the early 1990s – with Russia's emotional, Slavic-Orthodox relationship with Serbia during the Balkan wars.
But it became more obvious when Russian and Western forces in the spring of 1999 raced to Pristina in Kosovo – after the Slobodan Milosevic regime capitulated to the NATO bombs. And when former KGB agent Vladimir Putin took over after Boris Yeltsin on New Year's Eve, much of the race was over.
In the war on Georgia in the fall of 2008, we could see much of the same: Both Russia and the NATO powers use these former Eastern bloc countries or satellite states in a major superpower game. And they adapt the rhetoric to what benefits them strategically. NATO and EU countries are for West-friendly Georgia to liberate itself from Russia, but they oppose Russian-friendly forces in, for example, Abkhasia to liberate itself from Georgia.
NATO has also long sought an ever closer relationship with Ukraine, in its attempt to win the battle for Russia's so-called "backyard" or forecourt. The Cold War idea dominates both in the east and in the west. It is thus naive when, for example, Deutsche Welle (see p. 3 in this week's edition of Ny Tid) claims: «Russia accuses the West of interference and blames Europe for the violence in Kiev. There are insane accusations, which lack any basis in the facts. It is Russia rather than the EU that has actively intervened in Ukraine. "
It should be obvious that the EU, the USA and NATO also interfere in Ukraine, as much as possible when there is interest in it. There are therefore interesting formulations when the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) this week sends out this press release, to Foreign Minister Børge Brende (H):
"The authorities must take their responsibility to prevent further deaths and injuries. Norway is coordinating with the EU, which is now considering targeted measures against those responsible for the violence and use of excessive force, says the Minister of Foreign Affairs. "
Norwegian foreign policy should have been based on something other than just "coordinating with the EU", a party that is deeply involved in Ukraine and Eastern Europe. It could be that the EU could also want and need an independent Nordic voice. That time is over, though. It is not independence from the EU and NATO that is central to the current government.
We live in the age of addiction.
DH
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