KYIV, Ukraine—Little more than two weeks ago, things were looking up for Ukraine. Fighting had tapered off in the ongoing war in eastern Ukraine and Kyiv had scored a series of diplomatic wins, including high-profile gestures of solidarity from NATO leaders at the Warsaw summit.
But the good news quickly was overshadowed by events inside Ukraine and abroad that revived, once again, the cyclical worry that events in the war-torn, post-Soviet country could spiral out of control.
Ukraine faces a worsening war in the east, a high-profile assassination of a prominent journalist on the streets of central Kyiv that portends a wave of internal violence, and a damning report of prisoner abuse and torture.
Not to mention U.S.-Russian military cooperation against the Islamic State and a NATO alliance that continually makes impassioned statements about standing up for Ukraine’s sovereignty, but repeatedly stands on the sidelines as the Kremlin orders punitive heavy artillery and rocket attack jabs in eastern Ukraine.
The Ukrainian Mission to the U.N. tweeted Wednesday that if violence in Ukraine’s embattled eastern Donbas territory did not calm down, Ukraine would “take all measures to protect its territorial integrity and security of its citizens.”
Moment of Hope
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, visiting Moscow last Tuesday, spoke glowingly of the ability of America and Russia to “come together with purpose.”
Just the week before, the NATO summit in Warsaw, Poland, on July 8 and 9 was a diplomatic win for Kyiv.
Ukraine’s ongoing war against combined Russian-separatist forces took center stage in Warsaw. It was also a chance, to Moscow’s chagrin, for Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko to highlight Ukraine’s deepening ties to NATO.
During the summit, Poroshenko’s Facebook page and Twitter feeds pumped out photos of the Ukrainian president shaking hands with leaders from the U.S., the U.K., France, Germany, and Spain.
The alliance pledged closer ties and an aid package for Ukraine, and agreed to deploy troops to NATO’s eastern flanks in numbers not seen since the Cold War, to deter further Russian aggression.
“Ukraine is key to North Atlantic security,” NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg told reporters in Warsaw during a joint press conference July 9 with Poroshenko.
“NATO stands in solidarity with Ukraine,” Stoltenberg said.
The day after the summit wrapped, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau flew to Kyiv to sign a free trade agreement.
Ukrainian officials rolled out the red carpet for Trudeau. Streets in central Kyiv were lined with Canadian flags hung on light poles. Ukraine touted the free trade deal with Canada, coming on the heels of the NATO summit, as a high-profile measure of progress after the country’s 2014 revolution, and a sign that the country had its foot in the door to long-term aspirations at membership in the European Union and NATO.
“We will stand with our NATO partners, and push on, as you’ve seen, our friends and partners, to continue to be steadfast in support of Ukraine,” Trudeau said at a joint press conference with Poroshenko on July 11.
