The European Dilemma

By Volodymyr Kish

A summit meeting held this week [on February 25] in Brussels will go a long way in determining whether Ukraine’s bid to join the European Union is successful or not. At the moment, Ukraine’s European integration is an extremely controversial issue, one that is not only bringing divisiveness and discord to the current members of the Union, as well as to Ukraine’s political players, but also to the Ukrainian diaspora community.

The interesting thing about the whole controversy is that virtually everyone, with the exception of Russian President Vladimir Putin and the Russians, want to see Ukraine establish strong ties with Europe and eventually become part of the EU. The fly in the ointment is the current corrupt and kleptocratic regime of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych and his Regionnaire cohorts. Symbolic of all that is wrong with it in particular, is the continued imprisonment of former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko and scores of other opposition politicians that the regime has put out of commission by the selective and shameless manipulation of Ukraine’s prosecutorial and judicial systems.

On the one hand, many current members of the EU as well as certain number of the more nationalistic Ukrainian diaspora organizations have taken a firm and uncompromising stance being that, until all political prisoners in Ukraine are freed and the current regime demonstrates a real commitment to transparency and justice, the door to European integration should remain shut. While this approach may be ideologically moral and commendable, in the current world of geopolitics it is simplistic and hopelessly nave. That same approach has been tried with North Korea and Iran for decades and proven to be an utter failure. Dictatorships are notoriously impervious to moral or even economic persuasion. What such a stand is likely to do is drive Ukraine into the only other political-economic option it has, namely some form of union with Russia.

The Ukrainian World Congress has recognized this reality and is urging the European Union to agree to some form of association with Ukraine, but use this as a lever to negotiate the release of the political prisoners, as well as to embark on a program of real political and economic reform. It justifiably recognizes that taking the stance of absolute positions and issuing ultimatums bears no hope of improving the current situation in Ukraine. It is only through some tough political bargaining and negotiations that progress can be made in civilizing the political forces in Ukraine.

This strategy also reflects the fact that they recognize that the current regime in Ukraine is also caught on the horns of a dilemma. The Regionnaires and the oligarchs who stand behind the current regime have become very rich and powerful because they have had free reign for their operations within an independent Ukraine. They are under no illusions as to what would happen should Ukraine revert to being just another satrap state under Russia. In an independent Ukraine, they have had the freedom to become fabulously wealthy and do pretty well whatever they want. Under a Putinocracy, their wings would be considerably clipped and they would likely lose most of their wealth and power. The exploited riches of Ukraine would flow not to Donetsk and Luhansk but to Moscow. Most of the corporate structures in Ukraine would be taken over and subsumed into Russian business empires, which in reality are controlled by Putin’s political and economic machine. Likely, many of the richest Ukrainian entrepreneurs and oligarchs would wind up in Siberian prisons, or be made to disappear. Putin runs a tight ship, one that has no room for independent Ukrainian operators.

Most of the oligarchs in Ukraine understand this and have little real appetite for becoming part of a Great Russia once again. To date, they have been playing a delicate balancing act, trying to wrest as much as they can economically by playing off the Europeans against the Russians. However, time has now all but run out, and they will have to decide one way or another as to which is the least dangerous future option. I am convinced that ultimately, there is but one real choice for them that offers any kind of future, and that is to take their chances with Europe, though they may need to cede some of their control. After all, their prime motivation isn’t really political, but consists essentially of trying to preserve as much of their wealth as they can, not to mention their lives.

At this juncture, it would not be in the best interests for the future of Ukraine to urge the Europeans to slam the door on Ukraine by issuing ultimatums. There would be far more room to manoeuvre for progress and reform once Ukraine is committed to being a part of Europe. The Ukrainian World Congress has taken the right stand on this.