Poroshenko orders terminating Russia partnership, announces Merkel visit

Ukrainian President
Petro Poroshenko announced on Aug. 28 that he has ordered Ukraine’s Foreign
Ministry to terminate its friendship, cooperation and partnership agreement
with the Russian Federation “that long ago became an anachronism at Russia’s
fault.” Addressing foreign diplomats in Kyiv, Poroshenko said he is waiting for
the corresponding documents from the ministry. Among other things, the
agreement provides for strategic partnership on the inviolability of existent
borders, mutual respect for territorial integrity and prohibitions on using
one’s own territory to harm the other’s security, the pravda.com.ua news site
reported. The same day, an official with the Commonwealth of Independent States
(CIS) confirmed that Ukraine has already withdrawn its representation at its
statutory bodies this month, Interfax said.

In April, Poroshenko
had said canceling the entire agreement was not possible. He said the articles
that could be denounced are related to military cooperation and ending
participation in the statutory bodies of the CIS. In January, the Russian State
Duma considered denouncing the agreement’s articles regarding borders. The
agreement was signed in 1997, took effect in 1999 and is renewed every ten
years until a side acts to cancel it. In response to Poroshenko’s announcement,
Russian Duma MP Leonid Kalashnikov, the head of its Eurasian integration and
CIS committee, said the agreement’s cancelation would have “no special, real or
practical consequences.” Nor will Russia have any moral or political
requirement to fulfill it, he said.

German Chancellor
Angela Merkel will visit Kyiv in early November, Poroshenko told foreign
diplomats at the same Aug. 28 meeting in Kyiv. “This demonstrates Berlin’s
exceptional attention to the development of its mutually beneficial partnership
with Kyiv,” he said. This week, Merkel had a telephone conversation with U.S.
President Trump on the armed conflict in Ukraine. She also had two closed
meetings with Russian President Putin last month.

Zenon Zawada: Considering that Russia has already
violated the foundations of this partnership agreement, the Russian Duma MP
Kalashnikov is correct in stating that its cancelation won’t have many
practical consequences. Moreover, the CIS has long ceased to be a forum to resolve
Russian-Ukrainian conflicts so Ukraine’s withdrawal has more symbolic
implications than practical.

It’s a particularly
symbolic gesture for the president to announce the cancelation the same day
that he announced the visit of Merkel, who seems to be intensely working on a
deal with Russian President Putin to introduce UN peacekeepers in Ukraine. Not
only is he posturing before Ukrainian voters during his re-election campaign,
but he is also sending a message to powerful leaders that Ukraine is committed
to cutting its ties with Russia.

We don’t think this
action will affect Merkel’s efforts to reach an agreement with Putin on UN
peacekeepers, which will depend more on the details of who will be selected,
the schedule of their introduction and the conditions they will operate under.