Don't create drama over Brexit deal, Rishi Sunak tells Tory MPs - BBC

Reuters

By Becky Morton & David Wallace Lockhart

BBC Politics

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has urged his MPs not to create "another Westminster drama" as he sought to win their support for his new Brexit deal.

He told backbench Tories to give the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) the "time and space" to consider the deal.

The agreement with the EU aims to address issues with post-Brexit trading arrangements for Northern Ireland.

The DUP's support will be key to restoring Northern Ireland's power-sharing government.

The party has been boycotting Stormont and preventing the devolved government from functioning because of its concerns over the current arrangements for Northern Ireland.

DUP leader Sir Jeffrey Donaldson said the new deal goes "some way" to addressing his party's concerns but some issues remain.

He said the party would take time to study the details and come to a collective decision.

On Tuesday, Mr Sunak addressed the influential 1922 committee of Tory backbenchers to sell his deal after unveiling the breakthrough in Northern Ireland a day earlier.

Following the meeting, Northern Ireland minister Steve Baker told reporters the deal was "as good as we're going to get", indicating the government would not be reopening negotiations with the EU.

• Northern Ireland Brexit deal: At-a-glance
• Pressure builds on DUP over new Brexit deal
• Invest in NI to get single market access - Tory MP

Meanwhile, the European Research Group (ERG) of pro-Brexit Tory MPs, which heard from Sir Jeffrey at a meeting on Tuesday, have commissioned what they have called a "star chamber" of lawyers to scrutinise the deal.

ERG chairman Mark Francois said it could take about a fortnight or even longer for the group's "legal eagles" to go through it "with an extremely fine tooth comb".

He added that it was sensible for the prime minister to give the DUP time.

In contrast, the former Brexit minister, David Frost, has already drawn some of his own conclusions about Mr Sunak's deal.

In a column for the Telegraph, Mr Frost said while Mr Sunak's deal would help, "it remains a bitter pill to swallow".

Mr Frost said the new arrangements were "oversold" and do not change the fundamentals of the Northern Ireland Protocol, which was signed by former Prime Minister Boris Johnson and came into force in 2021.

Under Mr Sunak's new agreement:

• Goods from Britain destined for Northern Ireland will travel through a new "green lane", with a separate "red lane" for goods at risk of moving on to the EU
• Products coming into Northern Ireland through the green lane will see checks and paperwork significantly reduced, while red lane goods will still be subject to normal checks
• A "Stormont brake" allows the Northern Ireland Assembly to raise an objection to "significantly different" new EU rules which would apply in Northern Ireland
• Northern Ireland would also no longer have to follow certain EU rules, for example on VAT and excise for some drinks and goods

At his meeting with the 1922 committee, Mr Sunak is understood to have told Tory MPs he had "spent a lot of time" with Sir Jeffrey.

"And I would just say one thing to you all: we should give him and the DUP time and space," he said, adding that there was a "spectrum of views" within the party.

"So let's not pressure them for an instant answer," Mr Sunak added.

"Let's also remember that the last thing the public want is another Westminster drama."

The response from Tory MPs to the Windsor Framework since it was announced on Monday has been broadly positive.

Following Mr Sunak's speech to the 1922 committee, one ally of former Prime Minister Boris Johnson said "he did a good job", while another Brexiteer said the PM's words had gone down very well.

Another Tory MP, who last week had been deeply sceptical that Mr Sunak could reach an acceptable deal, told the BBC they should probably "eat humble pie" as it looked like the prime minister had done it.

The MP said negotiators had "squared the circle" and the "Stormont brake" mechanism, which aims to give the Northern Ireland Assembly a greater say on how EU laws apply, was a creative solution that should be welcomed.

Sinn Féin, the largest party in the Northern Ireland Assembly, has urged the DUP to return to the devolved government.

The nationalist party has welcomed the Windsor Framework, although it said it still needed to examine the details.

Related Topics

• NI Brexit
• Rishi Sunak
• Brexit

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Opposition parties in Nigeria call for fresh elections as ruling party takes the lead - CNN

Lagos, Nigeria CNN  — 

Nigeria’s main opposition parties are calling for fresh elections, describing results currently being announced by electoral body as “heavily doctored and manipulated,” in a joint press conference in the capital, Abuja.

They said their parties would no longer be part of the ongoing collation process in the capital Abuja and added they had lost confidence in the electoral body Chairman Mahmood Yakubu, said a joint statement from the Peoples Democratic Party, Labour Party, and African Democratic Congress in Abuja on Tuesday.

The parties called for new polls to be held under a new chairman for the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).

“We call on the international community to note that the results being declared at the National Collation centre have been heavily doctored and manipulated and do not reflect the wishes of Nigerians expressed at the polls on February 25, 2023,” they said.

‘Lacked transparency’

The election process has been dogged with controversy, and the announcement at the national collation center in Abuja has seen some tense moments, with opposition party members walking out of the collation center as the results were being announced Monday.

Several observers including the European Union have said the election fell short of expectations and “lacked transparency.” 

“The election fell well short of Nigerian citizens’ reasonable expectations,” said a joint observer mission of the International Republican Institute (IRI) and National Democratic Institute (NDI).

Bola Ahmed Tinubu, Peter Obi, and Atiku Abubakar

AFP/Getty Images

Nigeria is about to hold Africa's largest democratic exercise. Here's what to know about its presidential election

Ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) party candidate Bola Ahmed Tinubu is so far leading the race with nearly half of the vote already tallied Tuesday, according to the country’s Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) results.

23 out of 36 states have declared their results at state level. The leading opposition party PDP’s Atiku Abubakar is in second place, according to INEC figures.

Despite his shock win over Tinubu on his home turf in Lagos State, Peter Obi, the much-touted ‘third force’ candidate is trailing in third place. 

According to INEC’s iRev results portal, 83.798 out of 176.846 polling units have submitted their results. 

Labour Party presidential candidate Peter Obi (C) talks to the media at outside a polling station in Amatutu on February 25, 2023, before polls open during Nigeria's presidential and general election.

Patrick Meinhardt/AFP/Getty Images

Nigerian election results trickle in as Peter Obi lands surprise win in Lagos

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo was also among those who have criticized the electoral process in a strongly-worded letter late Monday where he alleged results had been doctored.

But the government warned him not to truncate the elections with “his inciting, self-serving and provocative letter on the elections,” in a statement from Minister of Information, Lai Mohammed. 

APC has however dismissed Obasanjo’s allegations as “frivolous, unfounded, and baseless,” emphasizing that the former leader did not offer any evidence to back up his claims that the electoral technology was manipulated.

APC blasted Obasanjo’s statement as tantamount to “subtly calling” for “a coup against democracy and the constitution.”

The party acknowledged Tinubu’s loss in his stronghold state of Lagos and questioned Obasanjo’s queries into the outcome.

INEC meanwhile continues to announce results coming in, despite the criticism of the commission.

Meanwhile Yakubu asked any candidate with complaints to seek redress in the courts during a results announcement in Abuja Monday. 

Yakubu says he plans to continue with results announcement despite complaints. 

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Rishi Sunak strikes post-Brexit Northern Ireland deal with EU - Reuters UK

• Summary

• Sunak and von der Leyen agree deal terms
• Sunak hails 'Stormont brake'
• All focus on reaction from the DUP
• Groups say they will study the detail first

LONDON, Feb 27 (Reuters) - British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak struck a deal with the European Union on post-Brexit trade rules for Northern Ireland on Monday, saying it would pave the way for a new chapter in London's relationship with the bloc.

Standing alongside European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen at a news conference in Windsor, Sunak said the two sides had agreed to remove "any sense of a border" between Britain and its province - a situation that had angered politicians on both sides.

He immediately won plaudits from business groups who welcomed the easing of trade rules, and an EU promise that it would be willing to allow British scientists to join its vast research programme if Sunak's party accepts the deal.

The agreement marks a high-risk strategy for Sunak just four months after he took office. He is looking to secure improved relations with Brussels - and the United States - without angering the wing of his party most wedded to Brexit.

Latest Updates

• United KingdomcategoryA risk taken, UK's Sunak announces the Windsor Framework, article with image
• United KingdomcategoryFactbox: UK says 'Stormont Brake' gives UK unequivocal veto over some EU laws, article with image

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The deal seeks to resolve the tensions caused by the Northern Ireland protocol, a complex agreement which set the trading rules for the British-ruled region that London agreed before it left the EU but now says are unworkable.

Its success is likely to hinge on whether it convinces the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) to end its boycott of Northern Ireland's power-sharing arrangements. These were central to the 1998 peace deal known as the Good Friday Agreement which mostly ended three decades of sectarian and political violence in Northern Ireland.

"I'm pleased to report that we have now made a decisive breakthrough," Sunak said of his new "Windsor Framework". "This is the beginning of a new chapter in our relationship."

The issue of Northern Ireland has been one of the most contentious related to Britain's 2020 departure from the European Union. A return to a hard border between the province and Ireland, an EU member, could have jeopardised the peace deal.

But it remains to be seen whether the new terms will go far enough to end the political deadlock in Northern Ireland, where perceptions that the protocol loosened ties with Britain have angered many unionist communities.

Sunak is likely to talk up the fact he has secured a so-called "Stormont brake", which he said would allow Stormont - the regional assembly - to stop any "changes to EU goods rules that would have significant and lasting effects on everyday lives". He said that would give London a veto on new rules.

Von der Leyen said she hoped the brake could be avoided if the two sides consulted each other extensively when introducing new laws and regulatory changes.

FUTURE REBELLION?

DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson said "significant progress" had been made but they would not be rushed into a decision. Another DUP lawmaker, Ian Paisley, told the BBC it did not go far enough, and more talks were needed.

The European Research Group, which brings together pro-Brexit Conservative lawmakers, will work with lawyers to examine the details before giving a verdict, a process that could take around a week.

David Davis, a former Brexit minister, said Sunak had pulled off a "formidable negotiating success", although there has been speculation in Westminster that Boris Johnson could oppose the deal. A source close to the former prime minister said he was studying and reflecting on the proposal.

If the deal is accepted, the new changes would be phased in over the next few years. A parliamentary vote will take place once all parties have had time to study it.

Victory would strengthen Sunak's hold over his Conservative Party and enable him to move past the thorniest issue on his agenda as he seeks to catch up with the opposition Labour Party, now well ahead in opinion polls, before a national election expected in 2024.

Were he to fail, he would probably face a rebellion from the eurosceptic wing of his party, reviving the deep ideological divisions that have at times paralysed the government since the vote to leave the EU in 2016.

Sunak could have left the stand-off unresolved, but officials in London and Belfast say he has been motivated to act ahead of the 25-year anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement, which could entail a visit from U.S. President Joe Biden.

Biden, who often speaks with pride of his Irish roots, on Monday welcomed the deal and described it as an "essential step" to ensuring that the peace from the Good Friday Agreement was preserved.

U.S. officials had previously warned that any action which endangered the peace agreement could harm the prospects of a U.S.-UK trade deal.

"I appreciate the efforts of the leaders and officials on all sides who worked tirelessly to find a way forward that protects Northern Ireland's place within the UK's internal market as well as the EU's single market, to the benefit of all communities in Northern Ireland," Biden said in a statement.

Sunak is hoping that a successful outcome will improve cooperation with the EU in areas beyond Northern Ireland, including the regulation of financial services and in helping to stem an influx of migrants in small boats across the Channel.

Raoul Ruparel, a one-time special adviser on Europe to former prime minister Theresa May, said the new terms were much better than he had expected.

"It is worth saying the EU has moved massively," he said on Twitter. "Credit where its due. They look to have listened and taken on board concerns of UK, businesses and unionists in NI."

Writing by Kate Holton; Additional reporting by William James, Kylie MacLellan, Sarah Young, Alistair Smout, Andrew MacAskill, Farouq Suleiman, Muvija M, Michael Holden and Kanishka Singh; Editing by Angus MacSwan and Rosalba O'Brien

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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‘Massive’ violations in Ukraine a focus as UN rights body meets - Al Jazeera English

Russia faced strong criticism over its invasion of Ukraine on Monday as the top United Nations rights body and a global disarmament forum met, amid warnings that human rights worldwide were backsliding.

Days after the United Nations General Assembly in New York voted overwhelmingly to demand that Russia withdraw from Ukraine immediately, Moscow’s war also dominated the opening of the UN Human Rights Council and Conference for Disarmament sessions in Geneva.

“The Russian invasion of Ukraine has triggered the most massive violations of human rights we are living today,” UN chief Antonio Guterres told the rights council on the first day of a record six-week session.

Seventy-five years after the signing of the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights, UN rights chief Volker Turk meanwhile decried the re-emergences of “the old destructive wars of aggression from a bygone era with worldwide consequences, as we have witnessed again in Europe with the senseless Russian invasion of Ukraine”.

Montenegro’s President Milo Djukanovic, among nearly 150 ministers and heads of state and government set to address the Human Rights Council this week, cautioned that “Russian aggression is a test for the entire world.”

“It is Ukraine today, but tomorrow it might be some other neighbouring country. We cannot be neutral.”

Roughly half of the 50 or so dignitaries who took the floor on Monday mentioned Ukraine.

Echoing the alarm expressed by many, French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna decried “rapes used as a weapon of war, torture, executions” in Ukraine, insisting that “those responsible for such crimes must be held accountable”.

Kyiv and its allies were unhappy with the participation of Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, who will address the council on Thursday.

It will be the first time a Russian official from Moscow has attended in person since the war began a year ago. Russia, which denies committing war crimes or targeting civilians in Ukraine, was suspended from the council over the invasion in April, but can still take part as an observer.

Western diplomats have been publicly tight-lipped on their reaction to Ryabkov’s presence after staging a walk-out of a speech by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov at the council last year.

Yevheniia Filipenko, permanent representative of Ukraine to the United Nations Office in Geneva, said Ukraine did not welcome Russia’s presence and would “act accordingly”, without giving details.

‘Dramatically unstable’

At the opening of the nearby Conference on Disarmament, British minister for Europe Leo Docherty meanwhile delivered a statement on behalf of 44 countries slamming Russia’s actions.

“Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine is a threat not only to Ukraine, but to international peace and security and to the rules-based international order,” he said.

Bonnie Jenkins, the United States undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, criticised Russia for suspending its participation in the New START Treaty, the last nuclear arms control pact between Moscow and Washington.

“Russia is once again showing the world that it is not a responsible nuclear power,” she said, warning that “we now face a dramatically unstable security environment”.

In her speech to the conference, German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock also denounced Russia for “undermining the arms control architecture we all depend on.”

She also made an impassioned appeal before the rights council, quoting a man who last March saw 15 children taken from the children’s home he ran in the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson and “didn’t have a chance to stop it”.

These 15, she said, are “among countless Ukrainian children, that Russia has reportedly abducted“.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is due to address the UN rights council remotely on Thursday, while Russia’s Ryabkov will be there in person the same day.

War crimes probe

There is no shortage of other pressing human rights issues for the council to address, with the situations in Iran, Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Syria and Israel on the agenda.

Guterres warned Monday that the Ukraine conflict was just one example of how rights around the world are “under assault from all sides”.

“Some governments chip away at it. Others use a wrecking ball,” he said, noting that the past century of astounding progress in human rights and development had “gone into reverse”.

A long line of resolutions will be voted on before the UN rights session is due to close on April 4.

One key resolution will be on extending a high-level investigation into crimes committed in Ukraine since Russia’s invasion.

The so-called Commission of Inquiry (COI), which has already determined that Russia is committing war crimes on a “massive scale” in Ukraine, is due to present a comprehensive report to the council in late March.

On the sidelines of the conference, nearly 50 countries signed a joint statement hailing the work of the COI and other efforts towards ensuring accountability for crimes committed in Ukraine.

Speaking via video link, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba also called during that event for an extension of the investigation.

The Russians, he lamented, “have a sense of total impunity. We must put an end to this erroneous feeling.”

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Two Israeli settlers killed in West Bank shooting, days after Israeli raid kills 11 Palestinians - CNN

CNN  — 

Two Israeli settlers were shot and killed in the West Bank on Sunday, local settler leader Yossi Dagan said, calling it “an extremely serious terrorist attack.” The shooting sparked revenge attacks by Israeli settlers against Palestinians, causing at least one death and numerous injuries.

The shooting of the settlers took place in Huwara, south of Nablus in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, just days after a massive Israeli military raid into Nablus in search of wanted militants left at least 11 Palestinians dead.

The settlers killed on Sunday were named as brothers Hillel Menachem Yaniv, 21, and Yagel Yaakov Yaniv, 19, the local settler council said.

“We embrace the family and will be with them as much as necessary,” the Shomron (Samaria) Regional Council said. They were from the settlement of Har Bracha, council leader Yossi Dagan said.

Video from the scene showed that their car had crossed a median, and hit a vehicle going the other direction, suggesting they were shot while driving. 

The two Israeli men were taken to a hospital after the attack, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said, but they later died, the Magen David Adom medical agency said. The IDF added that it was pursuing the attacker.

Another local settler leader said he was present when the two were shot.

“The shooting took place right behind me. It looked terrible – the shooting was from point blank range,” said Shai Alon, the head of Beit El council, adding that Israel needed to “go to war against those who wish us harm.”

Netanyahu urges against ‘revenge attacks’

Hours after the incident, Israelis killed at least one Palestinian man and injured several others with stones or iron bars in and around Huwara, Palestinian medics and the Ministry of Health said Sunday night.

Sameh Hamdallah Mahmoud Aqtash, 37, was shot in the abdomen and killed in the town of Za’tara, between Huwara and the Israeli settlement of Kfar Tapuach, the ministry said.

In Huwara itself, at least one person was stabbed and another assaulted with an iron bar, the Palestinian Red Crescent said. The emergency service also reported its ambulances were attacked, and said Israeli military forces had prevented three ambulances from entering the town.

The Palestinian Ministry of Health said a person had been treated for a minor injury from a metal rod in the face, and another had been treated for a skull fracture from being hit in the head with a stone.

Two Palestinian firefighters said that about 50 settlers had stoned their fire engine, injuring them as they attempted to respond to a fire at a Palestinian house in Huwara, the official Palestinian news agency WAFA reported. The Red Crescent also said it had dealt with nearly 100 cases of smoke inhalation.

IDF soldiers on patrol in Huwara, south of Nablus in the occupied West Bank, on Sunday night.

IDF

Social media video which CNN geolocated to Huwara appeared to show several dozen Israeli settlers walking down a main street as at least three fires burned by the side of the road. Other photographs and videos circulating on social media appeared to show fires burning in the town.

The Palestinian Authority Presidency accused the settlers of carrying out “terrorist acts… under the protection of the Israeli occupation forces, in Hawara, Burin, Einabus and other areas, which resulted in the injury of more than 100 Palestinians and the burning of shops, homes, cars and other public property.”

Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid accused Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, the leader of the settler-based Religious Zionism party, of being responsible for the violence.

Linking the events to deconfliction talks between Israel and the Palestinians in Jordan earlier in the day, Lapid tweeted: “Smotrich’s militias set out to burn Hawara in order to torpedo the summit in Aqaba of Netanyahu and [Defense Minister Yoav] Gallant. This government is dangerous to Israel’s security.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued a statement asking Israelis not to engage in revenge attacks for the killing of Hillel and Yagel Yaniv earlier in the day.

“I ask – even when the blood is boiling – not to take the law into one’s hands. I ask that the IDF and the security forces be allowed to carry out their work. I remind you that in recent weeks, they have targeted dozens of terrorists and thwarted dozens of attacks,” Netanyahu said.

The IDF said it sent reinforcements to the West Bank after Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi, pictured, conducted a situation assessment on Sunday night.

IDF

The IDF are sending reinforcements to the West Bank to “thwart terror attacks and prevent violent riots,” it said Sunday night.

The “riots” – an apparent reference to the settlers carrying out revenge attacks against Palestinians – “are being handled by the IDF, Israeli Fire and Rescue Services, Israeli Border Police and additional security forces,” the IDF said.

On Sunday night, IDF Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi visited the site where the Yaniv brothers were shot, the IDF said, and “ordered the area to be reinforced with additional forces to thwart terror attacks and prevent violent riots, while increasing and expanding the efforts to capture the terrorists.”

Tensions rising in wake of Nablus raid

No group has so far claimed responsibility for the attack on the Israeli brothers, but Lion’s Den had vowed revenge after Wednesday’s raid in Nablus.

Six of those who died there were members of the Palestinian militant group, which emerged in the city last year.

“As big as the pain filling Nablus, the occupation will taste twice the pain,” the group said, referring to Israel. “They will know that the fighters of the honorable groups in Nablus will not take a step back.”

Dagan, the head of the Samaria Regional Council, called after Sunday’s killings for Israel to break off ongoing security talks between Israel and the Palestinians brokered by Jordan, Egypt and the United States, saying: “I demand that the Prime Minister, the Minister of Defense and all the ministers return the delegation from the idle talks in Aqaba…. We need to launch an operation against terrorism!”

Aftermath of an Israeli military raid into Nablus, the West Bank, on February 22, 2023, which left at least 11 Palestinians dead, including both militants and civilians.

Abeer Salman/CNN

Israeli incursion shatters lives in ancient Middle Eastern city

Following the rare talks on Sunday, Israeli and Palestinian representatives “affirmed their commitment to all previous agreements between them, and to work towards a just and lasting peace,” they said in a joint statement.

Jordanian, Egyptian, and US senior officials attended the summit in Aqaba following an invitation of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.

The joint statement said both sides reaffirmed the necessity of committing to de-escalation on the ground and to prevent further violence.

Israel and the Palestinian Authority confirmed their “joint readiness and commitment to immediately work to end unilateral measures for a period of 3-6 months. This includes an Israeli commitment to stop discussion of any new settlement units for 4 months and to stop authorization of any outposts for 6 months,” the statement read.

The five parties agreed to convene again in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, in March.

“Jordan, Egypt and the United States consider these understandings as major progress towards re-establishing and deepening relations between the two sides, and commit to assisting and facilitating as appropriate their implementation,” the statement said.

CNN’s Caroline Faraj, Hamdi Alkhshali and Lauren Said-Moorhouse contributed to this report.

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War in Ukraine ‘stems from the Orange Revolution, a humiliating ordeal for Putin’ - FRANCE 24 English

One year into the war that Russia launched against Ukraine, FRANCE 24 takes a closer look at the anti-Western rhetoric President Vladimir Putin used to justify the conflict, which is rooted in events in the early 2000s, according to historian Françoise Thom, an expert on post-Communist Russia.

On February 24, 2022, as a Putin speech was broadcast on television, Russian troops were penetrating into Ukrainian territory, initiating the most important military operation on European soil since World War II.

During his speech, the Russian president tried to justify the invasion with a brutal tirade against the Kyiv government, which he described as “neo-Nazi”, and against the perceived threat posed by NATO and the US against Russia.

This rhetoric, far from being new, dates back to Ukraine's Maidan Revolution in 2014 and Orange Revolution in 2004, according to historian Françoise Thom, an expert on post-Communist Russia, who spoke with FRANCE 24.

FRANCE 24: In February 2022, Putin justified the invasion of Ukraine by citing the necessity to shield Russia from NATO and the West. When was the first time the Kremlin used this rhetoric?

Françoise Thom: Vladimir Putin’s anti-Western rhetoric is long-standing. We can date the change in the Kremlin’s discourse to the colour revolutions between 2003 and 2004. At that time, a wave of anti-corruption and pro-democratic liberal movements were sweeping across several post-Soviet states, namely Georgia – the Rose Revolution – and in Ukraine where the Orange Revolution took place in 2004.

In my opinion, the ongoing war stems from the Orange Revolution, which was a humiliating ordeal for Putin. The candidate he backed, Viktor Yanukovych, lost the popular vote to a pro-European candidate, Viktor Yushchenko, in the 2004 elections.

The outcome was a slap in the face for Putin and he developed an intense hatred towards Ukraine and its people. Interpreting the turn of events as the result of US interference, the ex-KGB agent saw scheming by the US as the only reason for his candidate’s loss.

Putin’s paranoid rhetoric took root from that point on. As illustrated by Kremlin ideologist Vladislav Surkov in a 2004 text: “The enemy is on our doorsteps, we have to defend every Russian and every household against the West”.

During the 2007 Munich Security Conference, Putin challenged the West, especially the US. He then followed up by launching a reform of Russia’s military in 2008. The war against Ukraine therefore has very old roots. Far from an improvisation, the current conflict is part of a wider context tied to Russia’s row with the West.

US foundations were quite active in Ukraine and Georgia in the 1990s and 2000s. What was their role that Putin condemned?

Indeed, there were US foundations operating in Ukraine as well as in Georgia during the colour revolutions. They aimed to train a new generation of executives, which was expected to succeed apparatchiks from the Soviet era. However, we should not see them as manifestations of US foreign policy: They did not necessarily align themselves with the sitting president’s political agenda.

In order to build a starting block for the development of political parties based on liberalism, the role that these foundations played during the colour revolutions was chiefly structured around promoting various tools of election campaigning and on-the-ground organising among these new elites. Even so, the uprisings that took place between 2003 and 2004 were definitely not orchestrated: The population was incensed by post-Communist corruption and the elites were themselves divided.

Putin, who accused the foundations of anti-Russia tendencies that were not necessarily true, thus heavily exaggerated their participation in the colour revolutions. They mainly sought to lend a helping hand to the establishment of liberal democraties ten years after the fall of the Berlin Wall.

What is the relationship between the Kremlin and the EU? Did the annexation of Crimea in 2014 mark a turning point?

In 2013, an association proposed by the European Union to post-Soviet countries, namely Ukraine, set off the powder keg. The project clashed with Putin’s desire to integrate Ukraine into a customs union, the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU), led by Russia.

Putin seeks to build a large European space, from Brest to Vladivostok, where Russia can establish its supremacy while dispelling US influence. In 2013, Ukraine's then president Yanukovych, under pressure from the Kremlin, rejected the association agreement with the EU while opting to join the EEU. Massive protests erupted in Ukraine, which led to the 2014 Maidan Revolution, an insurrection that Yanukovych tried to repress but failed. He absconded and a new government, which Putin labelled as Nazi, came into power.   

Putin annexed Crimea several days later, claiming that it was to defend Russia from NATO and that Crimea has always been Russian despite the transfer to Ukraine in 1954, an error he said was committed by the USSR's then leader Nikita Khrushchev. Putin also attempted to conquer southern and eastern Ukraine, but had to settle for two separatist enclaves in the east. The armed conflict ended with the ratification of the Minsk agreements on September 5, 2014.

With the Kremlin’s hostility directed towards the US, Putin seeks to re-enact the Cold War but with a different outcome this time, one that would restore Russia to power. In this respect, Putin’s anti-European discourse is principally a consequence of the ties between the UE and the US and NATO.

Until February 2022, Europe was not considered a real political issue by Putin, but rather as an object of dispute with the US. He thought he was subjugating the region via its reliance on Russian gas, which worked until the invasion of Ukraine that month. Putin's dsicourse with regard to Europe has become more and more hostile as it became apparent in February that the continent was closing ranks around NATO.

This article is a translation of the original in French.

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