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Beyond any shade of a doubt, the event that has
cast the longest shadow over Europe during
2014 has been the Ukrainian crisis, which has
provoked the most serious conflict to take place
on European soil since the breakup of Yugoslavia
in the 1990s. The year began with protestors oc-
cupying Kyiv’s Independence Square, which
swiftly became known as the “Euromaidan”,
and drew to a close with a death toll in the thou-
sands attributable to a military confrontation that
has left wounds that will be very difficult to heal.
The intervention of Russia, which has an-
nexed the Crimean Peninsula and provided mil-
itary and economic support to the secessionists
in the Donbass, has had an additional and even
more dangerous long-term consequence: a bit-
ter confrontation between Russia and the
European Union, which came out as an early
supporter of the new government in Kyiv and
continues to defend the concept of Ukraine’s
territorial integrity. The EU has opted to exert
economic and political pressure on Moscow to
reach a negotiated end of the conflict.
Nevertheless, this political standoff has negative
implications for both parties, and a fair and re-
alistic resolution to the Ukrainian situation that
would set the stage for a renewed dialogue
must be found as soon as possible.
The Ukrainian crisis
Ukraine means “borderland”, a good, basic de-
scription for a country that for historical, ethnic,
and linguistic reasons finds itself divided into two
clearly distinguishable zones: one in western part
of its territory in which the majority of the popula-
tion speaks Ukrainian and looks toward Europe,
and another to the east where the country’s indus-
trial and mining activities are concentrated, much
of the population speaks Russian and there is a
closer affinity with Russia. Since it gained inde-
pendence in 1991, the country has been caught
between these two political poles of attraction,
and any attempt on the part of one faction to get
the upper hand has resulted in an upheaval such
as the 2004 “orange revolution” that swept pro-
European Viktor Yuschenko into power.
The crisis in Ukraine and
relations between the
European Union and Russia
Enrique Ayala