Yatsenyuk With Merkel in Berlin Out to Sabotage Ukraine Settlement

Victoria Nuland’s “Yats” (Ukraine’s Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk) was in Berlin meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel Thursday, with an obvious objective of wrecking any chances of a political settlement of the Ukraine crisis. Yatsenyuk, standing next to Merkel in a press conference after their meeting, accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of everything from sending “bandits” into eastern Ukraine to aid separatists, to being behind the recent hacking of computers in the Chancellor’s office and other government units. For her part, Merkel told reporters that, despite some “progress,” she was pessimistic about being able to ever lift sanctions tied to the Russian “annexation” of Crimea. She said lifting sanctions tied to the conflict in eastern Ukraine would be contingent on full implementation of the Minsk Accords of September 2014.

In point of fact, unless the Yatsenyuk-Merkel antics kill the chances for a diplomatic success, there is important progress towards a settlement. On Friday, Jan. 9, Khazakstan President Nazarbayev is in Berlin with Merkel. He has offered to host talks between the “Normandy Group” heads of state (Russia, Ukraine, Germany, and France) aimed at breaking the impasse on the eastern Ukraine situation.

On Monday, Jan. 5, the political directors of the foreign ministries of the four countries met in Berlin. According to a phone conversation today between German Foreign Minister Steinmeier and Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov, those talks were productive, and could lead to the convening of the Khazakstan heads-of-state session, originally scheduled for Jan. 15. In her press conference with Yatsenyuk, Merkel said she would only attend the meeting if there were clear evidence that a breakthrough would occur. The US State Department this week offered its own luke-warm statement of support for the Normandy Group diplomacy, while making clear that President Obama would not attend (thank God).

On the ground in Donetsk and Lugansk, Russian humanitarian aid convoys arrived today with fresh supplies and medicine.

Given that Ukraine is one of the several hair-triggers for global war, it can be expected that there will be strong efforts to wreck the Normandy diplomacy effort in the coming days. The Yats-Merkel meeting was one such effort.