(...) Ukraine has suffered enormously over the centuries because of its indeterminate position between east and west. In the middle of the 20th century it was put on the rack of history, pulled eastward by Stalin and westward by Hitler. Putin is no Stalin and Merkel is no Hitler, but the current dynamic has some unpleasant historical resonances. When Ukraine joined the Eastern Partnership six years ago, it no doubt imagined that it had found an elegant solution to its perennial dilemma. It aspired to have the best of both worlds—Russian markets to the east and European investment from the west. Up through 2013, it enjoyed the closest trade and economic cooperation with the EU of the Eastern Partnership countries even as Russia remained its largest trade partner. -- Now it’s looking at potentially the worst of both worlds -- Ukrainians are not the only ones who are dying to get into Europe. Of the million or so new immigrants to Europe every year, approximately 100,000 try to get in illegally over land or by sea. Over the last two decades, as many as 20,000 people have died in their attempts to slip into Europe from the south, including over 1,500 people in 2011 at the time of the Arab Spring. Compare that with the deaths at the U.S.-Mexico border, which number in the low hundreds annually (...)
Posted on: Thu, 03 Jul 2014 18:27:56 +0000
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