Section: Atlantic Council (USA)
Why Is Ukraine’s Political Class Trying to Roll Back Reforms?
Since the Euromaidan revolution, Ukraine’s leaders have repeatedly committed themselves to fighting graft. Former Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk promised that all corrupt officials would be prosecuted, current Prime Minister Volodymyr Groisman vowed an “intolerance of corruption,” and President Petro Poroshenko campaigned as a...
More Proof Ukraine is Changing: Opaque Defense Sector Embraces Reform
In December 2015, the anticorruption watchdog Transparency International warned that Ukraine’s defense sector faces “a high risk of corruption.” TI named the country’s opaque procurement process as the highest-risk area for corruption. Assessing the defense spheres of NATO members and partner states, TI gave Ukraine a D on an A to F...
Don’t Expect Quick Resolution to Europe’s Only Active War
The most disputed point about the Minsk agreements has been whether to hold local elections in the Donbas before Ukraine regains control of its border with Russia, or after. Ukraine has insisted that security and the return of the border should precede elections, while pro-Russian separatists and Moscow have been pushing for the opposite, as...
The Doctor Is In: Ukraine’s New Health Minister Already Shaking Up Sclerotic System
Health care in Ukraine has not worked in the past—not for hospitals, clinics, doctors or nurses, and most important, not for the Ukrainian people, regardless of where they live or work, unless they are fortunate enough to pay under the table to receive the most basic care.Entrenched, bureaucratic, and corrupt interests, wielding a combination of...
With Pipeline, Russia Sustains Dominance of Turkish Gas Market
Russia’s decision to go ahead with Turkish Stream, an offshore pipeline that will bring Russian gas to Turkey, cements its dominance of the Turkish gas market. In political terms, the revival of Turkish Stream—or TurkStream as Gazprom, Russia’s state-owned energy company, now terms the project—epitomizes the entente developing between...
Old Ukraine Launches Campaign against Ukraine’s Most Influential Woman and Top Banker
An attempt is underway in the Ukrainian parliament to deprive the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) of its independence and oust its governor, Valeriya Hontareva. This would be a major reversal of Ukraine’s economic reforms and must be stopped.In the last two years, Ukraine has carried out its most fundamental economic reforms since its...
There They Go Again: International Media Enables Russian Aggression in Ukraine
When does a Russian warlord become a “pro-Russian separatist?” Newsrooms around the world may want to ask themselves this question following Russian militant leader Arsen Pavlov’s assassination in Donetsk in mid-October. In the wake of the killing, one news report after another ran with headlines referring to Pavlov as a pro-Russian...
No Peace without the People: A Case for Grassroots Reconciliation in Ukraine
This week’s meeting in Paris of the Normandy Four is a critical one. If there is no measurable progress there to advance a framework for peace in Ukraine, public sentiment that Minsk is exhausted as a peace process will only grow. (Editor’s note: France, Germany, Russia, and Ukraine agreed to a preliminary roadmap for implementing the...
Only KGB Generals Stand between Putin and Absolute Power
Russia’s President Vladimir Putin rules supreme. On September 18, his United Russia party won its largest-ever majority—enough to change the constitution—in the parliamentary elections. He seems to be running circles around the West in both Ukraine and Syria.Yet, Russia’s stability must not be overestimated. Last year, retail sales...
Why Ukraine’s New Ultranationalist Party Will Not Last
On October 14, the Azov Battalion—Ukraine’s controversial ultranationalist paramilitary group that has been fighting in the Donbas as part of the National Guard—entered the political fray. Registered as a political party under the name National Corps, the new party proposes an ambitious military and nationalist agenda, including a...
