The Old World and the New are full of talk about the need to adhere to common values and take principled decisions, and the West’s representatives constantly urge countries that want to join the European club to use these values as their guidance. However, from the outside, it looks like major Western countries themselves do not follow their own principles. Examples of this are becoming more numerous as the time goes by. At first, the West talked about isolating Russian president Vladimir Putin as a punishment for the annexation of the Crimea, and later the invasion of Russian troops in the east of Ukraine. Russia has been expelled from the G8, the EU-Russia summit cancelled, and the country was not invited to the NATO summit in Wales. Still, all observers remember well how French President Francois Hollande broke Putin’s isolation in spite of all lofty principles, treating the Russian leader as a host at the 70th anniversary celebration of the American troops’ landing in Normandy. It was explained by the fact that the invitation had been sent well before the annexation of the Crimea and the purported need to communicate with Putin, to explain to him that he was in the wrong. As a result, the Russian side has not complied with any of the agreements it entered into to resolve the situation in the Donbas, both in the Geneva format (USA, EU, Ukraine, Russia) and the Normandy one (France, Germany, Ukraine and Russia).
It turns out now that the host of the coming G20 summit, Australia, which strongly condemned the Russian aggression in Ukraine and accused Russia of involvement in downing of the Malaysian airliner, also sees no reason to deny its hospitality to Putin, as invitation to attend the event was sent to the Kremlin long ago. Again, the statements of Australian senior officials stressed the need to have the Russian leader in attendance at this forum, so that he was forced to listen, among other things, to the international condemnation of his behavior towards Ukraine.
This is more than strange, because Putin is indifferent to condemnation or its absence, and his chief objective is to demonstrate that no major issue anywhere can be resolved without Russia. He wants to confirm it by his presence at such forums. Editor-in-chief of Ezhednevny Zhurnal Aleksandr Ryklin characterized in a Facebook post Putin’s desire to participate in the G20 summit as follows: “It is a strange situation... It looks like someone was invited to visit... Invited long ago... A lot has happened in the meantime... Like, this invitee threw his wife out of a sixth floor window... Of course, no one expects him to visit now... Almost everyone is telling him it directly... But he still is going to visit...”
The Day asked former minister of foreign affairs of Ukraine Volodymyr Ohryzko to comment on the invitation for the Russian president to attend the G20 summit which will be held in November in Brisbane, Australia, especially considering the fact that many members of this group oppose Putin’s arrival.
“To be frank, I was upset to learn about the invitation sent to Putin. The logic put forward by some Australian officials, I think, is not quite correct, because everything about summit depends on the host. Even though G20 is a collective body indeed, if the organizer does not want to see a particular guest at the event, it can prevent the latter’s attendance as the host of the summit. I understand that perhaps not all decision makers, including Australian ones, have followed a hard line on Russia. This is a shame to see it happening against the background of a very clear positive stance taken by Australia, which it adheres to except for this affair.”
Australia’s Minister for Foreign Affairs Julie Bishop explained her country’s position thus: “I sounded out our partners about the situation and found that the countries are determined to ensure that the G20 stays the main forum for discussing global economic problems. Also, it is believed that President Putin must come and listen to international condemnation of his behavior towards Ukraine.”
“There is some substance to this argument, and it is hard to disagree with it. But you know, when it comes to isolation, it must be isolation without exceptions. Therefore, one can, of course, follow that logic, but I think it would be more appropriate still to show Putin that he is an unwanted guest at the civilized nations’ meet-ups and his opinion will not be taken into account. What would happen now, on the other hand, is another surge of the Kremlin lies and propaganda. This would actually mean that the door is reopened slightly for Putin. The G8 has closed its door, but the G20 is opening its for some reason. The logic is really absent from it, to be honest.”
A recent article by German expert Judy Dempsey clearly states that another frozen conflict has emerged in Europe, that is, in eastern Ukraine. How should we take it, is it a statement of the fact and expression of the US and the EU’s unwillingness to do something in this situation?
“Easing of sanctions by the West is an indication of this unwillingness. While our territory is still occupied, while the crimes continue, and the so-called truce is only observed by the Ukrainian military, when gangsters attack and fire upon our troops and take over new areas, under such circumstances, any conciliatory steps towards the aggressor actually mean legitimizing its actions. Therefore, the West once again demonstrated inadequacy of its response to the aggressor. This is true. There has been a lot of talk about it, and it really looks like the policy of appeasement before World War II. Should the West stay on its current unreasonable course, it will get World War III.”
A meeting of the UN General Assembly will be held in New York before the G20 summit. President of Poland Bronislaw Komorowski has promised to raise the issue of depriving Russia of its veto on the UNSC there. Will it help us, because all UNSC decisions on the Ukrainian issue are blocked by Russia?
“This issue can be discussed indeed. But there will be a fantastically long way between the discussion and the decision in this case. It would take a wholesale rethink of the UNSC decision-making to do it. That is, it must be actually modernized, and a new statute adopted in a way that would exclude Russia from the process. It would require not just complicated diplomatic negotiations, but super complicated diplomatic negotiations, which, I believe, could not achieve a quick solution. The issue of reforming the UNSC is probably several decades old. The ongoing consultations aim to expand its membership somewhat, and expand representation of some regions, and there has been no real progress on it. Therefore, the issue that Komorowski will raise is much more complicated, as it will need some very important political decisions to be taken. Now, starting a discussion on it is fine, but getting it done is impossible by definition, especially in such a short time.”
How would you comment on the fact that Radoslaw Sikorski, who served as foreign minister of Poland and is a very capable diplomat, has been promoted to the marshal of the Sejm, reminiscent of the Soviet era, when disgraced politicians were kicked upstairs, while his portfolio has been given to Grzegorz Schetyna, obviously inexperienced diplomat who speaks no foreign language?
“Polish appointments are an internal issue of Poland, and we cannot influence it. They have made their mind on it, and we have to accept. I certainly understand that Donald Tusk and Radoslaw Sikorski have been the most active of our advocates in Europe. I do not think that their reassignments, or likely reassignment in Sikorski’s case, to other important positions will weaken support for us in Europe. As for the new leaders of the government and the foreign ministry, they, in my opinion, regardless of who they are personally, understand the importance of an independent Ukraine to Poland’s security. So, I hope that the new minister and the new prime minister will do everything in their power to have Ukraine join the European community, as it would be a guarantee of the security of Poland, which in fact its leaders have long been stating.”
