Tag Archive for: Ukraine Russia Conflict

 

1. Why a Negotiator Must Look at Ukraine Differently Today

Anyone trying to understand today’s European policy toward Ukraine will not get far with moral categories alone. Terms such as “defending democracy,” “the rules‑based order,” or “the struggle of autocracy versus democracy” may be domestically useful, but they do not explain why European leaders continue to cling to the mantra “we will support Ukraine for as long as it takes,” even as the military situation steadily tilts in Russia’s favor.

The balance of power at the front has been shifting continuously: Russia now controls a little over 19% of Ukraine’s territory, has made further, albeit limited, gains in 2025, especially in the Donbas and is exerting massive pressure around key nodes such as Pokrovsk. The Ukrainian armed forces are suffering from manpower and ammunition shortages and have had to retreat on several sectors of the front, while Russia, despite its own losses, maintains a strategy of slow, grinding advance. Western analysts note that although Russia conquered less than 1% of additional territory in 2025, Putin interprets these incremental movements as confirmation of a long‑term attritional strategy.

For professional negotiators this implies a clear logic: Ukraine’s BATNA (Best Alternative to a Negotiated Agreement) worsens every day; Russia’s BATNA improves steadily. Russia is, with ruthless consistency, achieving the declared objectives of its “special military operation,” and yet many European actors continue to insist on surreal maximalist demands and a support regime designed for the long haul. To understand this apparent paradox, three deep layers must be considered together:

• The Minsk agreements as a blueprint and as a deterrent template for today’s ceasefire debates.
• Nord Stream, raw materials and geo‑economics as the engine of Europe’s Ukraine policy.
• Corruption as a continuous vulnerability. From oligarchic political economy to today’s energy scandals and as a lever of hybrid conflict strategy.

Only through this triangulation does it become understandable why European policy sometimes appears detached from battlefield facts—indeed “mad”—while at the same time following an internal political and geo‑economic logic in certain circles. The horrific human losses remain, cynically, almost ignored.

2. Understanding Minsk Correctly — From Peace Plan to Lever of Influence

2.1 What Minsk I and II Formally Were

The Minsk agreements of 2014 (Minsk I) and 2015 (Minsk II) were essentially designed as a two‑level package:

• Security level: immediate ceasefire, withdrawal of heavy weapons, creation of security zones, OSCE monitoring.
• Political level: a “special status” for parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, amnesty provisions, local elections under Ukrainian law and subsequent restoration of Ukraine’s control over its state border.

On paper this reads like a classic sequencing model: first de‑escalation, then reintegration. The UN Security Council even endorsed Minsk II through Resolution 2202 (2015), giving the agreements considerable formal weight.

2.2 Why Minsk Was Structurally Doomed to Fail

Chatham House captured the core problem crisply: the agreements rested on a “Minsk conundrum”—the irreconcilable question of whether Ukraine may be fully sovereign or must accept a limited sovereignty co‑defined by Russia.

• Kyiv’s reading: ceasefire → Russian withdrawal → restoration of border control → then local elections and limited decentralization.
• Moscow’s reading: immediate special status, de facto veto rights for the separatist territories and a form of “soft federalization” before Kyiv regains border control.

These opposing sequences made Minsk practically impossible to implement. In addition, the ceasefire never truly held; the battles around Debaltseve in February 2015, already after signature, illustrate how little the military reality matched the negotiation text.

2.3 Minsk as a Textbook Case of Hybrid Conflict Strategy

The later‑published “Surkov Leaks”, hacked emails from the environment of Vladislav Surkov, a key architect of Russia’s Ukraine policy, show how Moscow, in parallel to Minsk, systematically financed and steered local parties, NGOs, media campaigns and “protest formats” inside Ukraine.

Minsk therefore constituted part of a broader hybrid approach:

• military: controlled escalation in the Donbas;
• political: forcing structural veto rights for pro‑Russian actors;
• informal: building a network of dependent elites, media outlets and NGOs.

Carnegie’s retrospective judgment is clear: Minsk phased down fighting at times, but neither prevented Russia’s full‑scale invasion in 2022 nor the long‑term militarization of the conflict.

2.4 The Lesson for Any Ceasefire Debate Today

Current expert debates about potential new arrangements—often shorthand as “Minsk III”—are shaped by that experience:

Any arrangement that grants Russia territorial gains and political leverage without simultaneously embedding robust security guarantees, effective monitoring and sequencing favorable to Ukraine will, with high probability, again be used as a pressure instrument.

For negotiators, the takeaway is blunt: a frozen conflict without enforceable security architecture is not a stable compromise, it is a platform for the next escalation cycle.

3. Nord Stream and Raw Materials — Geo‑economics as a Hidden Driver

3.1 Nord Stream as a Political Instrument, Not Just Infrastructure

Nord Stream 1 and 2 were never merely technical pipelines; they were strategic projects. They bypassed Ukraine as a transit country and tied German industry directly to Russian gas. Think tanks such as Brookings and several European security institutes warned early on that Nord Stream 2 was less a business project and more an instrument to “weaponize” energy and weaken Ukraine.

After 2022, Nord Stream 2 was politically halted and later physically damaged by sabotage. Clean Energy Wire described the pipeline in retrospect as a symbol of Germany’s failed bet on cheap Russian energy. The strategic lesson: energy policy is power politics—and transit countries like Ukraine are integral to security calculations.

This becomes particularly evident in the historical and current corruption cases.

3.2 Ukraine as a Raw‑Material Hub for Europe’s Future Industries

In parallel, the EU has been reshaping its raw‑materials policy to reduce dependence on China for critical inputs. A key building block is the Strategic Partnership on Raw Materials with Ukraine, signed in July 2021.

EU analyses and World Economic Forum studies emphasize:

• Ukraine holds deposits of 22 of the 34 materials the EU classifies as “critical,” including lithium, graphite, rare earths and titanium.
• Many of these deposits lie in the East and South—regions Russia already controls or is heavily attacking. Media and think tanks reported in 2023/24 that Russia has occupied important lithium deposits in Donetsk.

For Europe’s battery, aerospace and defense industries this geography is highly relevant: whoever controls these deposits holds leverage over the entire value chain of the Green Deal and substantial parts of the defense supply base.

3.3 Geo‑economic Implications

From a negotiation perspective, this means: in any sustainable conflict settlement, the control, development and regulation of these raw materials will be central—even if rarely mentioned in public discourse.

For European actors, a scenario in which Russia permanently controls a large share of these deposits is strategically unacceptable. Hence the strong incentive to support Ukraine at least until a political solution secures these geo‑economic interests—or alternative supply chains are built. In my view, this could be negotiated with Russia far more intelligently.

4. Corruption as Continuum — From “Rotterdam+” to Operation “Midas”

Ukraine’s political economy has for decades been shaped by oligarchic rent systems and regulatorily enabled windfall profits. This is not accidental; it constitutes a structurally exploited entry point for hybrid conflict strategy.

4.1 Rotterdam+ — How a “Technical” Model Became Political

Between 2016 and 2019 Ukraine used the Rotterdam+ formula to set the price of hard coal for power generation. Officially, it was meant to create transparency and reflect an import‑parity price:

• The base was the average spot price for power‑station coal in the Amsterdam–Rotterdam–Antwerp (ARA) ports over the previous twelve months.
• Added to this were fictitious logistics costs: sea transport from Rotterdam to a Ukrainian port, transshipment costs and rail transport to the power plant—regardless of whether the coal actually traveled that route.

In practice, this meant:

• The regulator applied the relatively high derived reference price to almost the entire relevant coal volume, around 25.5 million tons per year, even though only about 130,000 tons were actually imported via Rotterdam.
• A large share of coal was in fact sourced from Ukrainian mines, from the Donbas, or imported cheaply from Russia -with far lower real production and transport costs.

The consequence: electricity tariffs were calculated on the basis of an artificially inflated “Rotterdam reference price plus.” Oligarch‑linked generators, especially DTEK owned by billionaire Rinat Akhmetov, captured substantial additional profits, while households and industry paid higher prices. Anti‑corruption organizations and the Specialized Anti‑Corruption Prosecutor’s Office estimate the potential damage to consumers and the state at roughly 38–39 billion hryvnia.

Even though the case remains legally contested and politically charged, Rotterdam+ illustrates vividly:

• how technical regulatory formulas can be turned into rent‑extraction machines;
• how oligarchs and decision‑makers can profit jointly from that machine;
• how such structures undermine state resilience and make the country maximally vulnerable to targeted external influence.

4.2 Continuity Under Conflict Conditions: Operation Midas

Today, amid the conflict, Ukraine is confronting Operation “Midas,” the largest corruption scandal since the beginning of Russia’s “special military operation.” NABU and the Specialized Anti‑Corruption Prosecutor’s Office uncovered a kickback system around the state nuclear power operator Energoatom.

Key features:

• Contractors had to pay systematic kickbacks of 10–15% of contract value (“toll‑gate model”) to retain contracts or obtain payments.
• The system functioned as a high‑level organized structure; NABU speaks of a “high‑level criminal community” in the energy and defense sectors that allegedly siphoned around 100 million USD.
• The suspected ringleader is businessman Tymur Mindich, a long‑time partner of President Zelenskyy. Extensive audio recordings exist; Mindich has fled.

The political blast radius is immense:

• President Zelenskyy was compelled to dismiss the energy minister and the justice minister and to announce a sweeping purge in the energy sector.
• EU partners and neighbors, such as Poland’s prime minister, demand “zero tolerance,” because scandals of this magnitude directly undermine Ukraine’s EU accession credibility.

From the standpoint of hybrid conflict strategy, one point is striking: Russian propaganda uses Midas and similar cases aggressively to reinforce the narrative—often accurate in its core—that Ukraine is hopelessly corrupt and therefore an unreliable partner.

4.3 Corruption as a Strategic Weak Point in Hybrid Conflict

The continuity from oligarch‑dominated energy corruption before 2022 (Rotterdam+) to Midas today shows:

• actors may change; incentives remain.
• high margins in regulated markets (energy, infrastructure, defense) systematically generate temptation for insider networks.
• for Russia this vulnerability is doubly attractive:
  • it creates real weaknesses (under‑investment, inefficient procurement, reduced defense capacity);
  • and it provides legitimizing material to politically erode Western support (“why should we pay for this corrupt system?”).

Anyone thinking about negotiations on security guarantees, reconstruction funds, or energy reforms must recognize: without a hard, enforceable anti‑corruption architecture, any political settlement will rest on unstable ground.

5. The Current Conflict Situation — Power Balance, Time Factor and Sunk Costs

5.1 The Military Picture at the End of 2025

In condensed form, the situation looks like this:

• Russia occupies about one‑fifth of Ukraine and has made further gains in the East in 2025; around Pokrovsk, intense advances are underway, including urban fighting.
• The front, over 1,000 km long, has turned into a technologically saturated positional conflict: drones, precision artillery and electronic warfare dominate; Russian forces increasingly use infiltration teams in poor weather to breach Ukrainian lines.
• Russia continues massive missile and drone campaigns against Ukraine’s energy system. Late‑November waves caused severe damage to power plants and infrastructure, producing nationwide blackouts.
• Despite pressure, Ukrainian units have so far held key cities such as Pokrovsk, conducted counterattacks and use drones to disrupt Russian supply lines.

Western assessments are notably ambivalent: Russia is strategically weakened and pays a huge blood price for small territorial advances, yet many argue that without sustained Western support Ukraine may, over time, lose the ability to hold key nodes.

For professional negotiators the core variable is time. Russia calculates that a long conflict will erode Western backing; Ukraine must endure each month under air attacks while preserving defense capability and internal stability.

5.2 Sunk Costs and Political Self‑binding

Western leaders are now deeply self‑bound to their Ukraine policy:

• Ursula von der Leyen has made support for Ukraine a defining benchmark of her presidency, openly warning that a Ukrainian failure would weaken both Europe and the U.S.
• Baltic leaders view Ukraine as a buffer zone; every resource consumed there is a resource not used against Tallinn or Riga.
• In Berlin, Paris and London the conflict acts as a catalyst for overdue defense reorientation and for building a European arms industry whose new production lines require long‑term utilization.

This creates a bizarre but classic sunk‑cost lock‑in: the more political capital, budget and reputation already invested, the harder it becomes to step back from maximalist goals.

What many citizens perceive as “Russophobia” or “denial of reality” can therefore be read as an attempt to defend a bundle of geo‑economic aims, security self‑assertion and political credibility—though, factually, this trajectory is increasingly untenable and humanly intolerable.

6. Negotiation Alternatives — How a Professional Negotiator Reads This Situation

A negotiator must consider not only normative questions (“what would be just?”) but hard parameters:

• relative power positions;
• time preferences;
• domestic political constraints;
• structural levers (energy, raw materials, capital, sanctions);
• and shadow negotiations over corruption networks, oligarchic assets and security guarantees.

From this angle, three alternatives can be sketched, each with distinct risk profiles.

6.1 Alternative A: Armed Ceasefire with Hard Security Architecture

Logic: Acknowledge the military reality of a frozen but asymmetric conflict while maximizing security guarantees for Ukraine.

Possible components:

• De facto fixing of frontlines with demilitarized zones and strong international monitoring (OSCE‑plus, a UN mandate, or a new mission).
• Phased, conditional easing of selected sanctions on Russia tied to measurable compliance indicators (withdrawal of certain systems, inspections, cessation of specific missile strikes).
• Security guarantees for Ukraine outside formal NATO membership, e.g., bilateral defense treaties with the U.S. and core EU states, with clearly defined response mechanisms if escalation resumes.

Risks:

• Russia could use the ceasefire as an operational pause, similar to 2015–2022. In my view, Russia has no interest in that now.
• Ukraine may perceive such an arrangement as “rewarding aggression,” triggering high domestic destabilization risk.

Negotiation challenge: Design sequencing and enforcement so that real costs for violations are automatic, not merely politically announced.

6.2 Alternative B: Resources‑and‑Security Deal

Logic: Explicitly integrate geo‑economic interests into a comprehensive arrangement.

Possible models (if Ukraine remains state‑capable):

• Joint, internationally monitored exploitation of selected raw‑material fields with clear revenue‑sharing.
• Linking resource access to binding security arrangements (e.g., limited Russian presence in defined zones in exchange for guaranteed export of certain materials at market prices).

These constructs are legally and politically demanding, but they reflect actual incentives more realistically than moral narratives alone.

6.3 Alternative C: Long‑term Containment without a Formal Grand Agreement

Logic: Accept that no comprehensive, durable deal is reachable with the current Russian leadership.

Elements:

• continued military support for Ukraine but with more realistic, defensive aims (protect core territory over full reconquest);
• a long‑term containment strategy against Russia akin to the Cold War, including sanctions, export controls and systematic diversification of energy and raw‑material supply chains;
• parallel construction of a robust anti‑corruption and governance architecture in Ukraine to make it EU‑compatible regardless of battlefield dynamics.

This option essentially continues the status quo, but with a clearer strategic frame. Humanitarian costs are highest; geopolitically it becomes “managed instability.”

7. What Professional Negotiators Can Take from This Case

Beyond geopolitics, Ukraine offers core lessons for complex negotiations in business, politics and organizations:

1. Analyze interests, not rhetoric. Moral frames mask concrete drivers: raw materials, industrial value creation, domestic stability, sanctions architecture.
2. Treat time as a negotiation variable. Russia, Ukraine and the EU have different time preferences. Sequencing must reflect that asymmetry.
3. Think in shadow negotiations. Corruption systems like Rotterdam+ and Midas define real levers more than formal committees.
4. Manage sunk costs actively. Exit scenarios and face‑saving bridges must be built early so actors do not trap themselves in “no alternative” narratives.
5. Hybrid conflicts require hybrid negotiation designs. Energy, raw materials, anti‑corruption and information policy must be integrated into one architecture.

Appendix: Selected Sources by Theme

(1) Minsk Agreements, Ceasefire Architecture, Hybrid Warfare

• Wikipedia: Minsk agreements — overview of Minsk I and II, core elements and implementation.
• Federal Agency for Civic Education (bpb): The Minsk Agreement of February 12, 2015 — full text and context.
• Chatham House: The Minsk Conundrum: Western Policy and Russia’s War in Eastern Ukraine — analysis of the structural contradiction.
• Carnegie Endowment: In the Shadow of the Minsk Agreements: Lessons for a Potential Ukraine‑Russia Armistice — lessons for future ceasefires.
• DFRLab / RUSI: Analyses of the Surkov Leaks — Kremlin role in steering separatist regions and “soft federalisation.”

(2) Nord Stream, Energy Policy, Critical Raw Materials

• Brookings Institution: Nord Stream 2: Background, objections and possible outcomes — geopolitical risks.
• Clean Energy Wire: Nord Stream 2 – symbol of a failed German bet on Russian gas — energy‑policy assessment.
• European Commission: EU and Ukraine kick‑start strategic partnership on raw materials — 2021 MoU and critical‑material role.
• WEF / European Parliament / think tanks: studies on Ukrainian lithium, graphite and rare‑earth relevance for the Green Deal.

(3) Corruption, Rotterdam+ and Operation Midas

• HACC / Transparency International Ukraine: Rotterdam+ case — damage assessment and judicial status.
• ANTAC / Hromadske: Rotterdam+ formula — mechanics of the formula, beneficiaries and critique.
• NABU: Operation Midas — official disclosure of the scheme.
• Reuters, Guardian, Euronews: coverage of Midas, personnel consequences in the energy sector and political impact.