Background
Post-Soviet Relations
US president Clinton, Russian president Yeltsin, and Ukrainian president Kravchuk after signing the Trilateral Statement (1994). Russia and the US agreed to uphold Ukraine's independence and territorial integrity in return for Ukraine giving up its nuclear weapons.
After the dissolution of the Soviet Union
Soviet Union, officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. The Soviet Union fall process began with growing unrest in the Union's various constituent national republics developing into an incessant political and legislative conflict between them and the central government. Estonia was the first Soviet republic to declare state sovereignty inside the Union. in December 1991, the newly-independent Russian Federation and Ukraine maintained cordial relations. In return for security guarantees, Ukraine signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 1994 and gave up the Soviet nuclear weapons left in Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Kyiv is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnipro River. On 24 February 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine in a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War that began in 2014.. Russia, the US and UK thus agreed in the Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances to uphold Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity. In 1999, Russia
Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the largest country in the world by land area, and extends across eleven time zones; sharing land borders with fourteen countries. Russia is the most populous country in Europe and Moscow is its capital city. Boris Yeltsin was a Soviet and Russian politician and statesman who served as President of Russia from 1991 to 1999. signed the Charter for European Security, affirming the right of each state "to choose or change its security arrangements" and to join alliances. In 2002, Putin said that Ukraine's relations with NATO
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is an intergovernmental transnational military alliance. Established in the aftermath of World War II, the organization implements the North Atlantic Treaty, signed in Washington, DC, on 4 April 1949. NATO is a collective security system: its independent member states agree to defend each other against attacks by third parties. During the Cold War, NATO operated as a check on the threat posed by the Soviet Union. were "a matter for those two partners". In 2005, Putin said that if Ukraine wanted to join NATO, "we will respect their choice, because it is their sovereign right to decide their own defence policy, and this will not worsen relations between our countries".
Russia invaded Georgia in August 2008 and took control of the breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, demonstrating Russia's willingness to use military force to attain its political objectives. Political scientist Paul D'Anieri says the United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country in North America. It is the world's third-largest country by both land and total area. The United States shares land borders with Canada to its north and with Mexico to its south. The national capital is Washington, D.C., and the most populous city and financial center is New York City. "was accused of appeasement and naivete" over its reaction to the invasion. The West's weak response in 2008 - and later in 2014 - contributed to Russia's assessment of Western warnings against 2022 invasion as not serious, and, according to political scientist Samuel Ramani, encouraged further Russian aggression.
Ukrainian Revolution, Russian Intervention in Crimea and Donbas
In 2013, Ukraine's parliament overwhelmingly approved finalizing an association agreement with the European Union (EU), which had been negotiated for several years. Russia did not raise any concerns about the agreement until mid-2013, when it became clear that Ukraine would no longer be able to maintain the same level of relations with Russia. Russia put pressure on Ukraine to reject the agreement and imposed economic sanctions on the country. Kremlin adviser Sergei Glazyev warned in September 2013 that if Ukraine signed the EU agreement, Russia would no longer acknowledge Ukraine's borders.
In November, Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych suddenly withdrew from signing the agreement, choosing closer ties to the Russian-led Eurasian Economic Union instead. This coerced withdrawal triggered a wave of protests known as Euromaidan, culminating in the Revolution of Dignity in February 2014. Almost 100 protesters were killed. Despite signing an agreement, Yanukovych fled. Parliament voted to remove him and he ended up in Russia.
Russian soldiers with no insignia occupied the Ukrainian territory of Crimea, and seized the Crimean Parliament. Russia annexed Crimea in March 2014, after a widely disputed referendum held under occupation. Pro-Russian protests immediately followed in the Ukrainian cities of Donetsk and Luhansk. The war in Donbas began in April 2014 when armed Russian mercenaries led by Igor 'Strelkov' Girkin seized Sloviansk and nearby towns. Russian troops were covertly involved in the fighting.
The annexation of Crimea and the war in Donbas sparked a wave of Russian nationalism. Analyst Vladimir Socor called Putin's 2014 speech following the annexation a "manifesto of Greater-Russia irredentism". Putin began referring to "Novorossiya" (New Russia), a former Russian imperial territory that covered much of southern Ukraine. Russian-backed forces were influenced by Russian neo-imperialism and sought to create a new Novorossiya. Putin referred to the Kosovo independence precedent and NATO bombing of Yugoslavia as a justification for military intervention in Ukraine, while historians liken the annexation to Nazi Germany's
Nazi Germany (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was the German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a dictatorship. Under Hitler's rule, Germany quickly became a totalitarian state where nearly all aspects of life were controlled by the government. Anschluss of Austria
Austria, formally the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. After the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806, Austria established its own empire, which became a great power and the dominant member of the German Confederation. The empire's defeat in the Austro-Prussian War of 1866 led to the end of the Confederation and paved the way for the establishment of Austria-Hungary a year later..
When the conflict began in 2014, Ukraine was officially a neutral country and was not seeking NATO membership. Because of Russia's occupation of Crimea and its invasion of the Donbas, Ukraine's parliament voted in December 2014 to revoke the country's neutral status and to seek Ukraine's membership in NATO. It was impossible for Ukraine to join NATO at the time, as any applicant country must have no "unresolved external territorial disputes". In 2016, President of the European Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, said that it would take 20–25 years for Ukraine to join NATO.
The Normandy Format meeting on 9 December 2019 would be the first and only meeting between President Zelenskyy and President Putin.
The Minsk agreements, signed in September 2014 and February 2015, aimed to resolve the conflict, but ceasefires and further negotiations repeatedly failed.
HISTORY
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This article uses material from the Wikipedia article "Russian Invasion of Ukraine (2022–)", which is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike License 3.0.
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