Showing posts with label Ukraine conflict. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ukraine conflict. Show all posts

Monday, February 23, 2015

23/2/15: Russian Sanctions: Round 4 Looming?..


Big change in EU official language marks a major departure from the past diplomatic practice: https://euobserver.com/foreign/127667. Let's see if this continues, but at the very least, it lays foundations for renewed pressure on Moscow in relation to Ukrainian conflict.

Both the U.S. (see https://euobserver.com/foreign/127754) and the EU (see here: https://euobserver.com/foreign/127703) have stepped up pressure for new sanctions.

Here is my take on the prospect of the latter.

Rumours of the U.S. (and by proxy EU) sanctions extension include, once again:

  • Cutting Russian bank's access to SWIFT system (spearheaded in EU by the UK and Poland back in August 2014 and backed by the EU Parliament resolution from September 2014);
  • Widening sanctions against imports of Russian goods and services across broader categories and applying more pressure on the emerging markets (traditionally more important to Russian exporters of industrial machinery and capital goods) to abstain from dealing with Russian suppliers (though it is hard to see what can be added to the current list); and
  • Expanding the lists of Russians banned from travel to the U.S. and Europe (which would be a weak form of response, unless it starts explicitly impacting travel for ordinary Russians - a suggestion that was floated in late 2014 by a number of former U.S. high ranking officials and analysts, with some going as far as suggesting the U.S. should ban all travel for Russian citizens, regardless of circumstances or their residency). In addition, expanding the list of sanctioned individuals to cover members of their families (to allow arrests of their property abroad, especially in those cases where such property ownership is de facto linked to the originally sanctioned officials and business leaders).

All of these proposals, at their extreme, will be firstly painful, but secondly non-reversible in the short- and medium- run.

The latter would signify that any restoration of normal relations between the U.S. (and Europe) and Russia will no longer be feasible even in the medium term and will demonstrably fail President Obama's own test of sanctions as being a tool for influencing short term policies' outcomes without directly adversely impacting ordinary Russians or sacrificing the objective of long-term normalisation.

In financial terms, cutting Russian banks off SWIFT will compound the already significant pressures on Russian corporates and banks, leading to retaliatory measures that will likely see Russian banks and companies suspending repayment and servicing of forex loans to non-affiliated entities based in the U.S. and the EU. This, financially-speaking 'nuclear' retaliation, is feasible given the downgrades of the Russian sovereign debt by Moody's and S&P: the lower the ratings go, the lower is the cost of counter-measures.

In return for this, Western lenders are likely to ask for (and easily receive) court orders to cease Russian assets abroad.

In effect, the worst case scenario here will be an all-out unwinding of Russian economic integration into the Western European and U.S. economies - a process that will make all sanctions irreversible in the medium term. The tail end of this risk is that a more isolated Moscow will face even lower future costs from taking a more aggressive stance in Ukraine or elsewhere. Economic escalation, at this stage, will most likely result in a political escalation along the lines of 'cornering Russia' into retaliation.

But beyond the Russian-U.S./EU theatre of confrontation, there looms another shadow.

In explicitly deploying economic agents and institutions in a geopolitical conflict against a significant global economic player, the U.S. is risking undermining the very foundation of its own economic power and with it, the power of the West. A long-term economic conflict with Russia is putting all emerging markets and non-Western economies on notice: the U.S. markets and institutions can be a high risk counter-parties, controlled and driven by the political considerations. Until now, targeted nature of sanctions has avoided this risk. And until now, SWIFT and its backers in Europe have made a cogent argument that excluding Russia from the system of banks payments clearance risks undermining the system itself. If Russia, in partnership with China, were forced to develop own system of parallel clearance to rival SWIFT, the West will lose control over the financial transactions pipeline that can be monitored and used to combat illicit trade, financing of terrorism and tax evasion. With time, we will also risk losing major transactions flows between other emerging markets and the West, with resultant de-internationalisation of the global financial flows and a reduction in the West's ability to tap emerging markets surplus savings and liquidity to underwrite long-term Western pensions and investment needs.

Similarly, tax evasion has been put on the declining trend by enhanced international cooperation - a process that is now driving the likes of the OECD reforms efforts in corporate taxation. This too will become more difficult to deliver if the global economic systems, largely based on Western institutions, revert toward regionalisation.

As I said, these are tail risks, but they are risks nonetheless.

Furthermore, broadening of sanctions to target explicitly Russian entities and citizens regardless of their affiliation or position vis-a-vis Moscow political regime will have another hefty long-term risk premium. The West is hoping for the sanctions to drive significant economic decline across Russia to effect a regime change, if not in terms of the physical head of Russian state, then in terms of his core policies. However, broadly anti-Russian (as opposed to counter-Kremlin) sanctions are likely to trigger more nationalist revival in Russia and any regime change in such circumstances is likely to lead to an even more bellicose stance from Moscow. Current political opposition within Russia, even theoretically capable of asserting control over power systems in the political and executive systems, is simply much more nationalistic and anti-Western than we, in Europe and the U.S., would like to believe.


None of this should override the consideration of the urgent need to restore peace in and territorial integrity of Ukraine, first and foremost. And, as I said on numerous occasions before, the onus is on Russia to act decisively to make this possible: by forcing the Eastern Ukrainian separatists to implement Minsk accord pro-actively, ahead of the Ukrainian counterparts and with fully verifiable results.

But, in the game of sanctions escalation, longer term losses for both, Russia and the West, will be significant.


It is worth noting that even Mikhail Khodorkovsky - hardly a supporter of the current regime in Moscow - has repeatedly warned against sanctions being deployed as a tool against the ordinary Russians and the Russian economy at large. See here: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-27513321 and here: http://www.enpi-info.eu/eastportal/news/latest/39323/EU-needs-to-differentiate-sanctions-against-Russia,-Mikhail-Khodorkovsky-tells-MEPs.

Another prominent - and actually more important in terms of his popularity and position in Russia - opponent of the current Government, Alexey Navalny also called for strongly targeted sanctions that avoid damaging the economy and, thus, increasing nationalist axis power within the country: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/20/opinion/how-to-punish-putin.html although Navalny did contradict himself in some later statements (see for example a report here: http://joinfo.com/world/1001120_Alexei-Navalny-if-not-for-sanctions-Putins-army.html).

Beyond that, there has been significant enough analysts' coverage of the sanctions trap risks - the adverse impact of sanctions on the West's own objectives: the more effective the sanctions are in destabilising Russia, the more they reduce Western capacity to effect change in Russia in the longer run (see here: http://www.ecfr.eu/page/-/ECFR117_TheNewEuropeanDisorder_ESSAY.pdf).

Thursday, September 11, 2014

11/9/2014: Some Recent Links on Ukrainian Conflict


Here is an interesting compendium of academic and analysts' voices dissenting from the prevalent Nato/US rhetoric on the long-term prospects for Nato's role in Ukraine.

Note: some of the links come via RIA Novosti, a Russian news agency, which is hardly surprising, given the consistent spin in the opposite direction that we get from the traditional Western media.

Another note: this collection of links is not a comprehensive reflection of the reality. It is not designed to be such. In reality, nothing is/can be comprehensive, especially when it comes to the conflict in Ukraine. My point is that much of what we are bombarded with in the social media and traditional media is one-sided. Here is a different side to the same stories.


Ukraine and Nato:

"The world could plunge into a new Cold War with Russia and China emerging as a new financial centers, unless the West changes the existing financial structures, a professor at University of California, Davis Wing Thye Woo said ...at the discussion at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.
“I think that if changes do not occur in the international [financial] institutions of today, I think that we are basically encouraging a China-Russian alliance to formulate an alternative center to the US,” Woo said." http://en.ria.ru/analysis/20140807/191797049/International-Financial-Shake-Up-Contributing-to-New-Cold-War--.html

Note: I highlighted this possibility in the context of the UK proposal for barring Russian banks' access to SWIFT system: http://trueeconomics.blogspot.ie/2014/08/2982014-while-new-financial-sanctions.html

University of Chicago University political scientist John Mearsheimer: “There’s no question that Ukraine is interested in becoming part of NATO and be protected by the United States and the West more generally, and who can blame them? But the fact of the matter is that this is a prescription for disaster. …The West should have told Ukraine that incorporating Poland or the Baltic states into NATO was possible, but trying to incorporate Ukraine and Georgia was a bridge too far. We ended up precipitating a crisis and that crisis would lead to the destruction of Ukraine – and that’s obviously not in Ukraine’s interests… We should have stopped NATO expansion, given up the idea of incorporating the Ukraine into the West and instead said that we’re interested in maintaining a neutral Ukraine that effectively serves as a buffer state with NATO on one side and Russia on the other.”
http://en.ria.ru/analysis/20140905/192649988/Scientist--Ukraine-NATO-Membership-Prescription-For-Disaster.html

Note: I agree. And it looks like majority of the Nato members agree too: http://uk.reuters.com/article/2014/09/04/uk-nato-summit-ukraine-idUKKBN0GZ0SI20140904 Nonetheless, Ukrainian Government is keen on reviving its bid to join Nato: http://en.ria.ru/world/20140906/192681097/NATO-Pretends-Ukraine-Membership-Request-Never-Happened.html


Azov Battalion: 

In other news, an interesting article in the NY Review of Books: http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/nyrblog/2014/sep/05/ukraine-catastrophic-defeat/ that covers the aftermath of last weeks' fighting in Eastern Ukraine, summing it up as "the devastation suffered by Ukrainian forces in southeastern Ukraine over the last week has to be seen to be believed. It amounts to a catastrophic defeat and will long be remembered by embittered Ukrainians as among the darkest days of their history."

The article also contains a passing reference to something that is being increasingly whitewashed in the Western Media, the role of the neo-Nazis in backing Kiev's military operations: "As we sped away from the “Russians” we could see a column of black smoke rising from the sea. When we got to the Ukrainian checkpoint the men told us that it was a coastguard cutter that had been hit, they thought by a tank. They were from the Azov Battalion, one of the Ukrainian volunteer militias. On their vehicles and their arm flashes they had the “wolfsangel,” a neo-Nazi symbol, which is their insignia and which tells you much of what you need to know about their background."

In a related news, NBC report on German channel showing a video of Azov soldiers with nazi insignias on their helmets: http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/ukraine-crisis/german-tv-shows-nazi-symbols-helmets-ukraine-soldiers-n198961

The Guardian article on Azov's central role in Ukraine's Government campaign: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/10/azov-far-right-fighters-ukraine-neo-nazis

And on related, an Amnesty International USA post on the "on-going abuses and war crimes by pro-Ukrainian volunteer forces": http://www.amnestyusa.org/news/news-item/ukraine-must-stop-ongoing-abuses-and-war-crimes-by-pro-ukrainian-volunteer-forces

This has to be an uncomfortable reality for the US and EU politicians: Azov was formed on foot of a large number of Maidan 'activists' and represents the strongest pro-Ukrainian force that, in part, has influence with Kiev and business elites. Azov is not the only (but is the most notorious) regiment of similar nature. Explicit US and EU support for Maidan and post-Maidan interim Government is clearly tarnished by the Azov abuses and neo-Nazi base.

Note, personally, I doubt that President Poroshenko or PM Yatsenyuk welcome or support these extremists. I suspect they fear their impact and are concerned about the spread of the Azov-styled groupings in parts of Ukraine. But they have little room to clamp down on these groups in the current environment when the post-Maidan activism is still shaping internal Ukrainian policies to some extent. It is their tragedy as much as the Ukrainian tragedy that Azov is so prominently featuring as a symbol Ukrainian nationalism.


US Public Opinion vs US Political Elites:

Another interesting post is via Politico, covering American public vs political elites' opinions on various topics, including Russia as a threat: http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/09/the-politico-50-survey-110555.html#.VAy5erywJ9m


Historical Map of Russian Expansionism:

Last, but not least, a good info graphic tracing out evolution of the Russian borders from the IXth century AD through the beginning of the 2000s: http://en.ria.ru/valdai_mm/20100906/160481013.html

Wednesday, July 30, 2014

29/7/2014: Vera Graziadei Interview: Ukraine, Russia, Maidan...


This is a very insightful, personal-level interview with Vera Graziadei, who is a British TV presenter with Russian and Ukrainian roots, born in Donetsk, raised first in Eastern Ukraine, then in the UK, educated in LSE and so on...

http://www.bne.eu/content/interview-graziadei-anger-towards-euromaidan-passionate-%E2%80%93-no-act

Many personal feeling she narrates in the interview are shared by other people who have personal and familial ties to Ukraine and Russia. I would count numerous instances where reading her interview led me to think: "Me too! I felt the same." As an analyst, I too often hide behind the numbers, stats, expert opinions. But to all of us, there is also a personal connection that Graziadei develops strongly in her interview.


Tuesday, July 22, 2014

22/7/2014: Shaping a Road Map for Resolving the Ukraine Impasse


With the conflict in Ukraine is tumbling toward a breaking point (http://trueeconomics.blogspot.ie/2014/07/2172014-conflict-over-ukraine-is-now.html), it is heartening to see the Guardian wading into Ukrainian crisis dimension with a proposed solution that actually attempts to bridge the gap between Eastern Ukrainian separatists, Kiev, Moscow and the West:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jul/21/putin-save-face-mh17-russian-leader-ukraine-rebels

As readers of this blog know, I have called for a staggered reforms approach based on "elections + Aid & Development Programme + referendum" formula since February this year:
http://trueeconomics.blogspot.ie/2014/02/1922014-ukraines-political-economy-is.html and http://trueeconomics.blogspot.ie/2014/02/622014-what-does-future-hold-for.html

The dynamics have changed a bit since the original suggestions, but the nature of the required compromise did not. To move on from the civil war situation toward peaceful resolution of the political and economic crises Ukraine faces, the nation needs:

  1. Immediate bi-lateral ceasefire agreement backed solidly and enforced by EU and Russia; both acting as guarantors and enforcers of the agreement on the sides of, respectively, Kiev and Donetsk;
  2. Following the ceasefire, Ukraine needs structured and facilitated peace talks;
  3. Peace talks must start with the opining positions of both sides recognising ex-ante: secured national integrity of Ukrainian state, full recognition of the legitimacy of the current Government in Kiev, recognition of the need for regional-level direct democratic decision making in shaping the future political configuration of Ukraine;
  4. Kiev must, up front, recognise the need for local referenda in determining the future outlook of political institutions in Ukraine, while separatists must recognise that the future referenda cannot be held on the basis of secession, but must be grounded within the confines of the united Ukraine. Kiev also must recognise the need for full recognition of the rights of Russian and other ethnic minorities and there has to be external monitoring group set up to oversee such recognition is implemented. Much of this already enshrined in law in Ukraine, but Ukrainian laws are held in low regard in the East;
  5. The talks must produce a road map - including timings - for: A) local referenda on the structure of regional relations with Kiev; and B) constitutional - nationwide referendum - aiming to reform and confirm constitutional institutions of the state; 6) Before any referenda can be held, there is a need for a normalisation period, during which reconstruction and development of the regions can take place. Funding for this should be supplied by the guarantors of the peace process (EU and Russia) on the basis of the World Bank-administered loans with referential conditions (Marshall Plan);
  6. EU and Russia must engage in a multilateral (EU, Ukraine, Eurasian Union) coordination of trade and investment policies aiming to prevent disintegration of Ukraine's trade and investment capabilities in either market.


The above are not the only conditions for launching a successful institutions-building exercise in Ukraine, but they are the central ones.

The key point is that, as the Guardian puts it: "we cannot afford a decade of cold war. It’s time to swallow hard, and bring the region’s dominant powerbroker inside the tent, to help ensure the integrity of Ukraine – and peace in Europe."

Monday, July 21, 2014

21/7/2014: Conflict Over Ukraine is Now Heading for a Breaking Point


So far in the Ukrainian civil war, my view of the Russian economy has been that
  1. We are witnessing a structural slowdown in economic growth that has little to do with Ukraine;
  2. Sanctions imposed on Russia have been largely indifferent to the Russian economy;
  3. Reputational damage from the Ukraine conflict was manageable; and
  4. Despite the above, Russian economy is starting to show stress arising from the country increasing isolation in the advanced economies' markets (finance and trade).
Events of last week - the downing of MH17, most likely by the Eastern Ukrainian separatists, and prior to that a new set of escalating U.S. sanctions, based on what may or may not be reasonable demands for more Kremlin pressure on separatists - are changing the overall risk outlook.

Specifically, the economic and geopolitical risks are now mutually reinforcing and this pushes us into the final spiral of conflict before we either see a major active de-escalation or a massive spiralling of the conflict out of control.

Here are some links worth reading on the topic of changing risks:

The key takeaways from the above two links are the following:

  1. The entire conflict between Russia and the West at this stage is pure PR-war, with reports and information from all sides coming with heavy doses of assertions, conjectures and accusations, factual evidence un-collaborated and unverified by any third parties and even 'watchdog' organisations (usually self-appointed media and new media organisations) now trenchantly partisan or employing trenchantly partisan analysts and reporters;
  2. Russia is in a poor strategic [and moral] position to defend itself even in cases where it might be right; and
  3. The demands from the U.S. (and to a lesser extent, Europe) relating to future actions by Russia are rapidly becoming detached from reality (see below).
The reasons why the U.S. demands are starting to reach the realm of absurd are two-fold. 

Firstly, prior to MH17 downing, U.S. demanded that Russia compels the Eastern Ukrainian separatists to surrender to the Ukrainian forces. This, with no conditions, no prospect of peace talks and no constraints onto what Ukrainian forces might do to those surrendering. Ukrainian forces are currently carrying out strong military actions against the separatists and there is no peace talks on offer. In these conditions, no authority can compel them to voluntarily and unilaterally surrender. [Note: just to prevent a torrent of abuse from trolls, my view is they should surrender.] 

Secondly, we do not know if President Putin has any control over the Eastern Ukrainian separatists, irrespective of whether or not Russia served as a power base for them in the past. The separatists are fragmented, poorly organised and coordinated. It is doubtful if there is a central authority that can simply issue an order to stand down. Even if Russia had power of compulsion over the separatists at the times when peace talks were on the table (which is questionable as separatists did not seem to change their course when Russia recognised the Ukrainian Presidential election and when Russian Duma rescinded its authorisation of the President to use force to protect Russian-ethnic populations), today, cornered separatists are unlikely to listen to Kremlin unless Moscow can act as a credible guarantor of their safety at the peace talks.

The above implies that we are at a breaking point in the crisis:
  • The U.S. demands may be no longer feasible, and the U.S. is escalating these demands. 
  • Russia's opposition to these demands is becoming highly rhetorical and politically unacceptable to the U.S. 
  • Russian leadership costs of compliance with the U.S. demands is now rising and might, at some point, exceed the costs of non-compliance. 
  • In the mean time, there is absolutely no pressure from the European or U.S. side onto Kiev to offer any conditions to separatists that can guarantee their lives and a peace process. we have no reliable information what acts toward 'collaborating civilians' and separatists Ukrainian forces are carrying out. We have no reliable information as to the casualties on the ground in Eastern Ukraine. We have no reliable information how prisoners taken by the Ukrainian army are treated. We do know that Kiev counts on 'volunteer' units to participate in combat. And we were told before that these units have been at least rhetorically conditioned to kill 'Russians'. We have no idea is Kiev controls these units and what actions toward civilians and enemy combatants they take.
In simple terms, Russia is being forced into a corner by the U.S., separatists are forced into their own corner by all the parties involved; and everyone somehow expects the crisis to be resolved, while Kiev is left to carry out whatever it wants or can or both.

Someone needs to step back from the brink. My preference would be if de-escalation happened simultaneously from the U.S. and Russian sides, with both applying pressure on both Kiev and separatists to bring them to the peace talks. Guarantors of these talks should be EU, U.S. and Russia.

Thursday, May 8, 2014

8/5/2014: Pew Research on Public Opinion of Ukraine-Russia Conflict

Pew Research are providing some interesting data on public opinion in Ukraine relating to country geopolitical 'drift': http://www.pewglobal.org/files/2014/05/Pew_Global_Attitudes_Ukraine-Russia_Report_FINAL_May_8_2014.pdf



"Most Ukrainians have soured on Russia, with many saying Russia is having a negative influence in their country and that it is more important for Ukraine to have strong ties with the European Union. Nonetheless, Ukrainians are divided in their evaluations of the influence of western nations in their country and express doubts about German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s and U.S. President Barack Obama’s handling of foreign affairs. In addition, Russian-speakers in the east, as well as residents of Crimea, have greater confidence in Russia than either the EU or the U.S."

The significance of this can be overstated (sample is only 1,659 adults or understated (given the immense degree of uncertainty in the current situation, the divide between Western and Eastern Ukraine is striking).



In relation to the role the West-East division plays in the crisis going forward, since the past is now likely to remain the past:

So here is a series of tweets I sent out over the last two days that explain my view of the 'next step' strategy that might be playing out in Ukraine:

Starts:

My replies:



Also, in reply to today's announcement from Donetsk that pro-Russian separatists intend to continue pushing for a referendum despite Moscow standing down on one (read from bottom up):