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As the world watches the Russian invasion of Ukraine unfold, UkraineAlert delivers the best Atlantic Council expert insight and analysis on Ukraine twice a week directly to your inbox.

editor’s picks

Latest analysis

UkraineAlert

Nov 11, 2021

Time to rediscover eastern Ukraine’s surprisingly cosmopolitan past

By Peter Dickinson

Moscow has long cultivated the myth of eastern Ukraine as an indivisible part of Russia’s ancestral heartlands but in reality the region has a surprisingly cosmopolitan past that makes a mockery of Kremlin propaganda claims.

Conflict Disinformation

UkraineAlert

Nov 9, 2021

Nord Stream 2: Germany must listen to Ukrainian security concerns

By Olga Bielkova

Ukraine has requested a role in the German process to certify Nord Stream 2 amid fears in Kyiv that the pipeline could pave the wave for an escalation in ongoing Russian military aggression against Ukraine.

Conflict Energy Markets & Governance

UkraineAlert

Nov 8, 2021

De-oligarchization of Ukraine is President Zelenskyy’s top priority

By Andriy Yermak

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's anti-oligarch agenda holds the key to Ukraine's reform ambitions and is vital for the country's future national security, argues presidential chief of staff Andriy Yermak.

Corruption Democratic Transitions

UkraineAlert

Nov 6, 2021

Ukraine’s anti-oligarch law could make President Zelenskyy too powerful

By David Clark

President Zelenskyy has trumpeted the country's new anti-oligarch law as a meaningful step towards curbing the power of Ukraine's oligarch class, but critics fear it may actually make Zelenskyy himself too powerful.

Corruption Democratic Transitions

UkraineAlert

Nov 6, 2021

Disarming Putin’s energy weapon: Ukraine must connect to EU grid

By Anders Åslund

With Vladimir Putin seeking to restrict energy supplies to Ukraine, it is increasingly clear that Kyiv must connect to the European electricity grid in order to reduce its vulnerability to Kremlin blackmail tactics.

Conflict Energy & Environment

UkraineAlert

Nov 4, 2021

Ukraine faces energy crisis as Putin weaponizes gas and coal supplies

By Aura Sabadus

As the winter season draws closer, Ukraine faces a looming energy crisis on multiple fronts which could lead to domestic political instability and deepen the country’s dependence on Vladimir Putin's Russia.

Conflict Energy & Environment

UkraineAlert

Nov 4, 2021

Ukraine MPs fight back against fake Covid vaccination certificates

By Oleksandra Ustinova

As Ukraine grapples with a mounting Covid-19 death toll and low vaccination rates, the country's MPs aim to adopt tougher regulations targeting the thriving Ukrainian black market for fake vaccination certificates.

Coronavirus Corruption

UkraineAlert

Nov 2, 2021

Putin’s Ukraine War: Russian MP recalls efforts to push civil war myth

By Peter Dickinson

Russian MP Alexander Borodai's frank recent comments about Russia's responsibility for the war in Ukraine underline the current sense of impunity in Moscow and expose the absurdity of Russia's ongoing denials.

Conflict Disinformation

UkraineAlert

Nov 2, 2021

Ukraine’s dangerous Winter Olympic obsession

By Nicholas Bell, Lukas Straumann

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has declared his intention to bring the Winter Olympics to the country, but environmentalists fear the initiative will cause irreparable damage to some of the most valuable mountain ecosystems in Europe.

Climate Change & Climate Action Energy & Environment

UkraineAlert

Nov 2, 2021

Two years of Lifeline Ukraine

By Paul Niland

Since it was launched in October 2019, Lifeline Ukraine has evolved from its original focus on support for Ukrainian combat veterans into a fully-fledged national suicide prevention hotline.

Conflict Human Rights

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Content

UkraineAlert

Jun 24, 2019

What Ukraine’s new parties bring to the table

By Vitalii Rybak

June has been challenging month to keep up with Ukraine’s vibrant politics. Numerous new political parties—Servant of the People, Holos, Might and Honor, Ukrainian Strategy, and others—held party conventions and presented their candidates and programs for snap parliamentary elections slated for July 21. Let’s take a look at the three most important newcomers to the […]

Corruption Elections

UkraineAlert

Jun 24, 2019

Zelenskyy starts off on the right foot with the business community

By Andy Hunder

“I obviously mistook the dress code,” confessed Viacheslav Klymov standing tieless onstage where Ukraine’s president sat clad in his Sunday-best in Kyiv, Ukraine, on June 20. The newly-elected president replied to the head of the Union of Ukrainian Entrepreneurs not to fret and instantly removed his own tie in front of the audience of seven […]

Inclusive Growth Political Reform

UkraineAlert

Jun 20, 2019

An incomplete end to the MH17 tragedy

By Michael Bociurkiw

Aside from the blowback from Russia and its refusal to cooperate, there are a couple of storm clouds on the horizon for the resolution of the MH17 tragedy.

Conflict Disinformation

UkraineAlert

Jun 17, 2019

One month into the Zelenskyy presidency and Ukraine’s still here

By Steven Pifer

Volodymyr Zelenskyy became Ukraine’s sixth president on May 20. The political neophyte’s election raised a host of questions about lack of governing experience, connections to oligarch Ihor Kolomoisky, the composition of his inner circle, and his priorities once in office. One month into Zelenskyy’s presidency, those questions still require answers, and we have yet to […]

Conflict Corruption

UkraineAlert

Jun 17, 2019

What Zelenskyy should say in Berlin

By Diane Francis

Ukraine’s independence from the Soviet Union broke up the empire and its people have paid a monstrous price for generations. It’s time that Europe finally recognized its responsibility to this worthy nation, yearning to be free from Russian tyranny.

Energy Markets & Governance Eurozone

UkraineAlert

Jun 17, 2019

Why are donors afraid of the prosecutor’s office?

By Yuri Polakiwsky

It’s no secret that the Prosecutor General’s Office of Ukraine has failed to be transformed in the post-Maidan period. But who is to blame? A high-level diplomat representing a G-7 country recently lamented that Ukraine’s major western partners deserve a large share of the blame for not providing direct assistance to the office. “You don’t […]

Corruption Elections

UkraineAlert

Jun 13, 2019

One Ukraine? Think again.

By Roman Solchanyk

Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s recent landslide victory in Ukraine’s presidential election over incumbent Petro Poroshenko has spawned intense speculation. The most intriguing is the assertion that we are witnessing the long-awaited emergence of a “new” Ukraine that is no longer divided along overlapping regional, ethnic, and linguistic fault lines because Zelenskyy won in all of the country’s […]

Elections Nationalism

UkraineAlert

Jun 9, 2019

Zelensky, Zelenskiy, Zelenskyy: spelling confusion doesn’t help Ukraine  

By Peter Dickinson

It would be unfair to expect Ukraine’s novice president to take over the reins of Europe’s largest country seamlessly. However, knowing how to spell his own name in English would seem a more realistic expectation. This did not appear to be the case during the first days of his administration, or at least that was […]

Disinformation Media

UkraineAlert

Jun 4, 2019

How Kolomoisky does business in the United States

By Anders Åslund

The PrivatBank case shows that dirty money is not necessarily concentrated in the big cities and in real estate but can penetrate the real economy.

Corruption Financial Regulation

UkraineAlert

Jun 4, 2019

Seven dangers of engaging with the occupied Donbas—and opportunities for the new Ukrainian president

By Petro Burkovskyi

Ukraine’s new president says he wants to end the Russian-backed war in the country’s east. However, it won’t be easy. There are at least seven dangers of engaging with the occupied territories of the Donbas. The first danger is that a class of highly educated and trained leaders is completely absent. All key positions, whether […]

Conflict Corruption