Ukraine preparing new Kerch provocation with NATO, Lavrov says

The Ukrainian government is preparing “a new
provocation” in the Kerch Strait with NATO involvement, Russian Foreign
Minister Sergei Lavrov told a briefing with European business representatives
on Feb. 21. “They are currently preparing the latest break in violation of the
rules of transiting this complicated maritime area,” he said, as reported by
the tass.ru news site. Ukraine’s navy forces are planning the Kerch Strait
passage without submitting requests to Russian officials, upholding safety
measures and involving boatswains, Lavrov said. Ukraine’s Armed Forces have
sent invitations to NATO countries to join this passage, he said.

Two Ukrainian armored navy boats were dispatched into
the Black Sea the morning of Feb. 21, reported the timer-odessa.net news site,
with the boat named the Centaur being loaded with a crew of fully armed navy
personnel. The official reason for the dispatch was training exercises, though
the website speculated about another attempt to cross the Kerch Strait.

Zenon Zawada: We saw the
likelihood of the Poroshenko administration seeking out another conflict with
Russia – which Lavrov falsely characterizes as provocations – in Ukraine’s
maritime zone in order to disrupt inconvenient election results. But the
emergence of comedian Volodymyr Zelenskiy as a leading contender creates new
opportunities for the president in dealing with inconvenient election results,
replacing the likelihood of another maritime conflict being used as a “break
glass in case of emergency” option.

Poroshenko can use the mere existence of the
comedian’s candidacy – and the immense destabilization potential it creates –
to achieve his goal of producing the necessary election results, with approval
from the public both domestically and abroad (particularly among Western
authorities). His campaign can manipulate public fears of a Zelenskiy
presidency in case it sees the need to “manage” the election results. Or it can
use the threat of a Zelenskiy presidency to postpone the official recognition
results if the gap is too wide to manipulate, as it appears to be currently
(given the comedian’s 20% lead over
Poroshenko in recent runoff polls).

It’s also worth considering that no NATO
member-state will take even the slightest risk of getting its navy involved in
an armed conflict between Ukraine and Russia. If a joint Ukraine-NATO
expedition through the Kerch Strait is ever agreed upon, it will occur in full
cooperation with Russia. But of course, this defeats Ukraine’s purpose of such
a trek, which is to reaffirm the right of all ships traveling to Ukrainian
ports to cross the Kerch Strait unencumbered by Russian authorities.