We have arrived at a critical moment about the interests of Europe and the United States in Ukraine.
The annexation of the Crimea to Russia and the occupation of the Donbass, have irrevocably altered the delicate balance of power in Ukraine at both regional and national level is the relative balance among the most powerful oligarchs in the country.
Ukrainians seem to have little confidence in the current constellation of political leaders and their promises.
For over 25 years the United States has supported the Ukraine on the basis of common values and interests.
January 26, 2015. Nine months and eleven days have passed since Ukraine’s acting President Olexander Turchynov announced the beginning of an anti-terrorist operation on April 15 (2014) aimed “to protect Ukrainian citizens, to stop the terror, to stop the crime, to stop the attempts to tear our country [Ukraine] apart”[1]. Whoever thought it could have been a fast and easy campaign, has been proved wrong.
April-June 2014. Ukrainian forces initially focused on Donetsk. Then, on April 22, a military operation was launched to take back separatist-controlled territory in the East. The heaviest fighting involved the cities of Sloviansk and Lugansk and Donetsk.
July 2014. Ukrainian military forces succeeded in retaking control over Sloviansk while separatists were reported fleeing the city. (July 5). Until the end of July, the army and pro-Russia rebels kept engaging each other mainly near Donetsk and Lugansk. According to the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine (NSDC), separatists were slowly losing their positions near Donetsk as well as in mid-southern areas of Lugansk Oblast.
August 2014. By the end of August, on the one hand, Ukrainian army progressively retook control over relevant portions of southern previously separatist-controlled territory (near Donetsk) but, on the other hand, Ukraine progressively lost control over part of its border with Russia. At the same time, separatist forces succeeded in obtaining a bridgehead in southern Ukraine and took control over Novoazovsk.
Relating to the Crimean crisis, two norms of international law must be taken into consideration. The first one is known as “the right to self-determination” and states that every people has the right to choose its own political status and that it can be done, for instance, by gaining independence or by full integration within another state. The second one is called “domestic sovereignty”: it means that a state has actual control within its borders and a violation of this norm occurs whenever a foreign presence in its territory is proved real and unauthorised.
President Vladimir Putin says that he had the right to invade Ukraine to protect Russian interests as well as Russian citizens after months of popular unrest , and the fall of Yanucovich , denies the intention of " annexing " the Crimea and adds that only citizens can and must decide their future.
After having assisted to the “political elimination” of former Ukrainian president Yanukovyc, the focus of international public attention switched from Kiev to the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, the Ukrainian peninsula on the northern coast of the Black Sea, a region in which about the 60% of its population belongs to the Russian ethnic group.
