EU – INSIDE RUSSIA AND EURASIA

Zelensky Seeks Leverage as Attention Shifts Abroad

By Nina Bachkatov

On March 21, President Volodymyr Zelensky said talks between Ukrainian and American negotiators would continue for a second day, underlining the urgency of the moment. Timing has become critical. A trilateral meeting aimed at ending the war, scheduled to take place in Abu Dhabi on February 28, has been postponed indefinitely for obvious reasons. Zelensky went further, stating that he was “requiring” from Washington a “clear” timetable for the next round of negotiations with Russia.

What he described as a “political delegation” has been tasked with persuading its interlocutors, including Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, that Ukraine seeks peace—unlike Russia—and that it is therefore incumbent on the US to sustain diplomatic efforts.

Russia’s Quiet Calculus as Conflict Expands in the Middle East

By Nina Bachkatov and Romain Constantin

From the first days of the war in Iran, President Vladimir Putin offered little more than formulaic statements — a response echoed by China and several members of the expanded BRICS grouping. Iran now sits in the organisation alongside Egypt, Ethiopia and Indonesia, as well as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, themselves now threatened by Iranian drones.

The easy conclusion would be that Russia’s muted reaction reflects weakness — an inability to support an ally in Iran as it once did in Syria, Venezuela or Cuba. But the reality may be more prosaic. Iran is an ally, not a friend. Their strategic partnership contains no mutual defence clause. The bilateral trade relationship is uneven, largely favouring Iranian firms, while Russian companies face obstacles through restrictive financial clearing mechanisms. Nor does the Kremlin appear eager to take diplomatic risks by openly defending a regime dominated by hardline clerics. Moscow’s earlier proposal to defuse the crisis by offering to store Iran’s enriched uranium lost much of its relevance after Israeli and US strikes on Iranian facilities.

Ukraine War: Negotiations Under Bombs

By Nina Bachkatov

There was little to expect from the trilateral summit in Geneva beyond the fact that it took place and ended without drama. Ukraine and Russia described the meeting as “difficult” — diplomatic shorthand for an inability to move forward on the two recurring obstacles: security guarantees and territorial questions. Still, Ukraine’s chief negotiator, Rustem Umerov, and later President Volodymyr Zelensky, hinted at possible progress on the concept of a demilitarised zone. The devil will be in the detail, but at least the discussion is inching forward.

Both sides travelled to Geneva largely to signal goodwill about ending the war. Above all, however, they are anxious to keep President Donald Trump engaged — as are NATO and individual European governments. They fear that the multiplicity of crises, some of his own making, could distract Trump from Ukraine in particular and Europe more broadly.

STRANGE PEACEMAKERS

By Nina Bachkatov

The American intervention in Venezuela has reverberated far beyond Latin America, including in Ukraine, and was the unspoken backdrop to the 6 January gathering in Paris of 35 representatives of the Coalition of the Willing. The sight of Nicolás Maduro in shackles before the world’s cameras was greeted with quiet satisfaction in Kyiv, if only because he had been a Russian ally. Some Ukrainians briefly imagined Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin gripped by the fear that he, too, might one day share Maduro’s fate.

That moment of schadenfreude was short-lived. What if Donald Trump were to send marines not to Moscow but to Kyiv, to depose what he might label an “illegal president” of a “corrupt country” unwilling to accept his grand peace designs?

Peace Plans for Ukraine – Trump in Majesty

By Nina Bachkatov

From plans to counter-plans, last-minute mini-summits, telephone or video round tables, the salami-slicing diplomacy deployed in the search for an end to the war in Ukraine has quickly shown its limits. One problem is that it involves too many actors with divergent — sometimes contradictory — interests, many keener to appear in the picture than to contribute to a solution. Another is that it lays bare the agony of traditional diplomacy in an age of instant media exposure.

No Thanksgiving for Ukraine

By Nina Bachkatov

Thanksgiving has passed. President Donald Trump pardoned two turkeys rather than the traditional one, but his 28-point peace plan — which he intended President Volodymyr Zelensky to sign by the holiday — has met a barrage of criticism and accusations of capitulation to Vladimir Putin. Nonetheless, it has triggered a flurry of diplomatic activity far beyond the four parties directly involved in the search for a settlement — Kyiv, Moscow, Washington and the EU. The plan has been taken seriously further afield, as shown by offers of mediation or safe venues for talks from Turkey, Arab capitals and even Belarus.

Trump’s initiative, reworked into a 19-point document drafted jointly by Ukrainian and US officials, remains at the centre of discussions. It contains two so-called “details” left for “further talks” — an odd label given they concern core issues such as security guarantees for Ukraine and territorial questions. Whatever happens, it will not be resolved tomorrow. In the meantime, the length of the war has reshaped public attitudes, political dynamics and financial calculations. These shifts are reflected in the composition of the negotiating delegations and the distribution of responsibilities among them. Yet in the end, the decisions lie with Trump, Putin and Zelensky.

Pandora’s Blades: Drones Redefine Security in Europe

By Nina Bachkatov and Romain Constantin

The use of drones has shifted from anecdotal to essential in modern warfare, largely due to the war in Ukraine. No one speaks any more of a “war of another time”, with soldiers in trenches and artillery barrages. Over the course of the conflict, drones have become indispensable on land, at sea, and in the air. They are used for everything from kamikaze strikes and aerial bombardments to delivering supplies, scattering leaflets, conducting reconnaissance, and even engaging in drone-on-drone combat. It has become an industry in its own right, as shown by the increasing number of media reports on the Ukrainian war appearing as frequently in financial pages as in international ones.

From the very first days of the conflict in February 2022, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) began to play a crucial role on the battlefield. The Turkish-made Bayraktar TB2 gained early renown for striking Russian military equipment with remarkable precision. Its success was amplified by video footage captured by the drones themselves—images that quickly became defining visuals of the war and a powerful tool of information warfare.

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