Russia working to remove Poroshenko as president, Coats says

Russia is working to remove Petro Poroshenko as
Ukrainian president in the elections this spring and boost Russian-oriented
forces in the October parliamentary vote, U.S. National Intelligence Director Dan
Coats told the U.S. Senate on Jan. 29. There is no favorite in the presidential
elections scheduled for March 31, he said, with a large portion of the
electorate undecided.

A large-scale Russian attack on Ukraine is
operationally possible, but not likely, Coats said. Tensions between the two
countries are intensifying in the Azov and Black seas because each side is
going to affirm its sovereign right to use the sea, he said. In the mid- to
long term, Russia will continue to destabilize Ukraine politically and
economically to prevent its integration into the EU and improving ties with
NATO, he said.

Russia’s capture of Ukrainian ships in the Kerch
Strait and detention of their crews in November demonstrate Russia’s readiness
to restrict Ukraine’s free navigation in the regions and apply political
pressure on the country’s leadership, particularly ahead of the elections this
year, Coats said. The Kremlin is trying to hold onto, and wherever possible
widen its influence in the former Soviet countries, which it believes belong to
its sphere of influence, he said.

Zenon Zawada: Coats’s
testimony confirms what we have long said, which is
that the U.S. government is tacitly supporting Poroshenko for re-election (with
the IMF even openly endorsing him). What’s most important about this is that
the U.S., and those organizations it influences (like the OSCE and UN), will be
willing to give the Poroshenko administration the benefit of the doubt on the election
results, as long as any alleged vote fraud doesn’t exceed acceptable standards.

It is inevitable that the Tymoshenko campaign will
allege vote fraud, particularly when (and not if) Poroshenko is declared the
winner of the second-round runoff. Given that she is incapable of mounting a
mass protest, the Western authorities are likely to brush aside her fraud
claims unless the elections violations are so egregious that they can’t be
ignored. But we believe the Poroshenko administration – with its highly
experienced experts in election technologies – won’t make that mistake.

The Kremlin will be tacitly backing Tymoshenko,
despite her pro-EU and pro-NATO positions, in the hopes that she is more
flexible to its interests than Poroshenko has been. But the value the Kremlin
sees in her candidacy lies not only in her possible victory, but in the ability
to provoke Yellow Vest-style riots once Tymoshenko rejects the second-round
runoff results (which we view as inevitable). And rather than sponsoring her supporters,
we see the Kremlin as taking advantage of the chaos to activate its pro-Russian
radicals in cities like Kharkiv, Odesa and Zaporizhia.