Europe
Putin Announces Pullback From Ukraine Border
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MOSCOW
— President Vladimir V. Putin, faced with rising violence in
southeastern Ukraine that threatened to draw in the Russian Army at
great cost and prompt severe new Western economic sanctions, pressed
pause on Wednesday in what had started to look like an inevitable march
toward war.
But
it remained unclear to analysts and political leaders on both sides of
the Atlantic whether he was truly reversing course on Ukraine or if this
was just another of his judo-inspired feints.
Using
a far less ominous tone than in previous remarks about Ukraine, Mr.
Putin told a news conference at the Kremlin that Russia had withdrawn
its troops from along the border and that he had asked separatists to
drop plans for a referendum on sovereignty this Sunday. Russia would
even accept Ukraine’s presidential election on May 25, he said, if
demands for autonomy from the country’s east were recognized.
Mr.
Putin said Russia wanted to spur mediation efforts led by the
Europeans. He said he did not know whether talks between the warring
sides in Ukraine were “realistic,” but was determined to give them a
chance, in particular a suggestion from Chancellor Angela Merkel of
Germany that the factions engage in a round-table discussion.
“I
simply believe that if we want to find a long-term solution to the
crisis in Ukraine, open, honest and equal dialogue is the only possible
option,” he said.
While
Western governments welcomed Mr. Putin’s apparent about-face, there was
also abundant skepticism, based in part on his record in Crimea. Mr.
Putin repeatedly denied that Russia’s soldiers were involved in the
region, only to admit later that they were.
A
White House spokesman, Josh Earnest, told reporters traveling with
President Obama aboard Air Force One that while the United States would
welcome a Russian military pullback, “there has been no evidence that
such a withdrawal has taken place.” NATO officials confirmed that on
Wednesday, saying they saw no troop movements.
Senior
British officials also reacted warily to Mr. Putin’s announcement,
noting that he had once before announced a sizable troop withdrawal from
the border, in a phone call with Ms. Merkel, but moved only one
battalion a modest distance. One official said that satellite photos
that would better verify Mr. Putin’s assertions would take a while to
come through.
Nevertheless,
British officials regarded Mr. Putin’s comments as positive. They
suggested that he wants to avoid a larger economic confrontation with
the United States and the European Union and that some of the concerns
of Russian businessmen may finally be getting through to the tight
circle around Mr. Putin.
While
the world was caught off guard by Mr. Putin’s sudden peace offensive,
analysts in Moscow cited several robust military, economic and political
reasons he might be inclined to switch tracks.
First,
there has been an increasing sense here, as elsewhere, that conditions
in Ukraine were rapidly approaching the situation in Yugoslavia in 1991,
when the former Soviet satellite broke into pieces. The violence among
various factions was creating facts on the ground, they said, that
nobody could predict or manage.
Paradoxically,
some added, this dynamic was nurtured in large part by round-the-clock
reports on Russian state television that Ukraine was heaving with
violence instigated primarily by neo-fascist cells emanating from
western Ukraine. But with the notable exception of some 40 deaths in
riots last week in Odessa, far from the separatist hotbeds of Slovyansk
and Donetsk, the violence was mostly confined to small skirmishes.
There were worrying signs that was changing, however.
“The
problem is that in all these types of conflicts, once the black swans
have started to fly, you will never control the situation,” said Sergei
A. Karaganov, dean of the School of International Economics and Foreign
Affairs at the Higher School of Economics in Moscow and a periodic
adviser to the Kremlin on foreign policy.
Putin Withdraws Troops From Border
President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia said
troops close to the Ukraine border have pulled back. He also asked
separatists in eastern Ukraine to postpone a referendum on independence.
Credit Pool photo by Sergei Karpukhin
In
modern international relations and finance, “black swans” refer to
random, unexpected events with unforeseeable consequences. “Law and
order was beginning to fall apart, and more and more groups were
fighting each other,” Mr. Karaganov said.
The
other reasons follow a certain logic. Mr. Putin wants to shape
Ukraine’s future, but an invasion of Ukraine by the Russian Army would
be wildly expensive, bloody and unpredictable. Even a nominally
successful invasion could breed an insurgency in the east by
pro-Ukrainian militants, while the partition of the country would stick
Russia with a failed state in southeast Ukraine that would take tens of
billions to restructure. It would also create an implacably anti-Russian
and pro-European state in western Ukraine that would most likely join
NATO as fast as it could.
And
an invasion would almost certainly galvanize the European Union into
joining the United States in imposing much tougher sanctions that might
target entire sections of the Russian economy, like banking, energy or
steel.
The
Russian aim in Ukraine has always been clear, analysts said. Mr. Putin
wanted to annex Crimea with minimal cost, which he appears to have done.
Generally, Washington and the European capitals have been so focused on
the possible dismemberment of Ukraine that Crimea was shunted to a back
burner.
Mr.
Putin wants to maintain the ability, they say, to manipulate events in
Ukraine to keep the country out of a full embrace by the European Union
and, worse, NATO. Toward that end, Russia has been pushing for regional
autonomy, a slippery concept that leaves plenty of room for maneuvering
at a later date. If he can get European mediators to push through an
autonomy plan that keeps southeast Ukraine in Moscow’s orbit — without
risking his army or sanctions — so much the better.
“He
really promised nothing,” noted Kirill Rogov, an economic analyst and
political commentator in Moscow. “He demonstrated that he controls the
level of tension in Ukraine. He can return the situation to the high
levels of violence at any moment. He did not refuse the referendum, but
only proposed delaying it.”
Above all, perhaps, Mr. Putin is known to loathe chaos, and southeast Ukraine was staggering in that direction.
Analysts
suggested that if eastern Ukraine were to vote in the referendum Sunday
to join Russia, or for independence, or if they demanded Russian
protection in some orchestrated way, Mr. Putin would be forced to react,
given his past statements about Russia’s responsibility to ensure the
safety of ethnic Russians beyond its borders.
“The
decision was taken not to increase Russian involvement in Ukraine, and
not to increase the chances of major violence there,” said Konstantin
von Eggert, an independent political analyst and a commentator for
Kommersant FM radio.
Most
analysts believe that Mr. Putin wanted to avoid war, and say that a
minor armed incursion into Ukraine would not have been enough to resolve
the crisis. Instead, it could easily have developed into a long, bloody
and expensive slog, bruising the reputation he gained from annexing
Crimea with virtually no bloodshed.
U.S. Sanctions Strategy, Explained
Some background on the impact of sanctions on Russia and what could happen if the Western leaders decide to go further.
Credit Alexey Druzhinin/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
“This
one would not have been bloodless,” Mr. von Eggert said. “This would
have been a real war, not by stealth, not by new methods, but a real
old-fashioned war, and this is something that Mr. Putin does not want.”
The intense public support generated in recent months, all the glow about renewed Russian strength, would have evaporated.
Mr.
Putin repeated Russia’s longstanding demands. He said the authorities
in Kiev, the Ukrainian capital, should immediately halt all military
actions in southeast Ukraine. He demanded the release of all prisoners
linked to the uprising. He also expressed sympathy for the goals and
actions of the rebels in the southeast, where armed men have paralyzed
most of the major cities by seizing government buildings and barricading
themselves inside, with just enough weapons to fend off government
attempts to recapture them.
“I
can understand the people in southeast Ukraine, who say that if others
can do what they like in Kiev, carry out a coup d’état, take up arms and
seize government buildings, police stations and military garrisons,
then why shouldn’t they be allowed to defend their interests and lawful
rights?” Mr. Putin told the news conference, according to the official
Kremlin transcript of his remarks. The Kremlin has for months referred
to the interim government as a “junta,” called it illegitimate and
warned of its infiltration by neo-fascists.
The reaction in Kiev and among separatists in southeast Ukraine was a combination of suspicion and mistrust.
In
Kiev, Andriy Parubiy, the head of Ukraine’s national security council,
said that Mr. Putin’s remarks were “clear evidence” of what Moscow had
been denying all along, that the separatist movement was directed from
Russia.
“We
understand that the center of the Ukrainian crisis is not in Slovyansk,
not in Donetsk, not in Luhansk,” Mr. Parubiy said. “The center of the
Ukrainian crisis is coordinated in the Kremlin.”
He
added that the call to delay the referendum in Donetsk was not
surprising given that it was illegal and impossible to carry out because
the separatists control only a few public buildings in the center of a
dozen or so cities.
On
Wednesday, the militants seemed perplexed by the Kremlin’s
announcement. Both Moscow and the militants have repeatedly said that
their actions are not coordinated, despite the shadowy presence of
well-trained, well-armed men Ukraine accuses of being part of the
Russian military or special agents.
In
Slovyansk, the ground zero of some of the toughest, most militarily
experienced opposition to Kiev, the separatist mayor, Vyachislav
Ponomaryov, first claimed that he had not heard Mr. Putin’s announcement
and then confessed confusion.
“I don’t know exactly who he is appealing to with this request,” Mr. Ponomaryov said.
He
added that the militants were still ready to hold the referendum, that
the ballots were prepared and polling stations were being set up. “If a
collective decision is made not to hold the referendum, then we won’t,”
he said. “Otherwise, we’re ready.”
Correction: May 7, 2014
An earlier version of this article misstated the date on which President Viktor F. Yanukovych of Ukraine was driven from power. It was Feb. 21, not Feb. 28.
An earlier version of this article misstated the date on which President Viktor F. Yanukovych of Ukraine was driven from power. It was Feb. 21, not Feb. 28.
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