UkraineAlert

UkraineAlert

UkraineAlert is a comprehensive online publication that provides regular news and analysis on developments in Ukraine’s politics, economy, civil society, and culture. UkraineAlert sources analysis and commentary from a wide-array of thought-leaders, politicians, experts, and activists from Ukraine and the global community. UkraineAlert has become a major publication in Ukraine’s news landscape and has established itself not only through its quality of content but also significant partnerships with English, Ukrainian, and Russian-language media through the country.

Stay Updated

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

Ukraine’s got talent: Engineer turned restaurateur turned politician breaking the old system

UkraineAlert Sep 3, 2026

Putin cannot defeat NATO but he could divide and discredit the alliance

By Peter Dickinson

If Russian President Vladimir Putin decides to attack NATO, his goal will be to divide and discredit the alliance rather than actually defeating it, writes Peter Dickinson.
Conflict Defense Policy
Ukraine’s got talent: Engineer turned restaurateur turned politician breaking the old system

UkraineAlert Aug 27, 2026

Ukrainians are not superheroes with endless powers of resilience

By Lauren Van Metre, Elena Davlikanova

By celebrating Ukrainian resilience as an almost superhuman quality, the international community risks obscuring the much less glamorous reality that Ukrainians are actually ordinary people who have endured extraordinary violence for far too long, write Lauren Van Metre and Elena Davlikanova.
Civil Society Conflict
Ukraine’s got talent: Engineer turned restaurateur turned politician breaking the old system

UkraineAlert Aug 25, 2026

A cultural renaissance is reshaping national identity in wartime Ukraine

By Davis Richardson

Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine is fueling a defiant cultural outpouring that is redefining and strengthening Ukrainian national identity in ways that challenge centuries of Kremlin imperialism, writes Davis Richardson.
Civil Society Conflict

Latest analysis

UkraineAlert

Nov 9, 2020

LGBTQ rights in Ukraine and the false dawn of Zelenskyy

By Bogdan Globa

Today’s Ukraine finds itself in an increasingly homophobic neighborhood with a president whose approach to LGBTQ issues has so far failed to match his liberal rhetoric on the subject.

Human Rights Resilience & Society

UkraineAlert

Nov 8, 2020

Why a Biden presidency is very good news for Ukraine

By Anders Åslund

After Joe Biden’s US presidential election victory was declared, President Zelenskyy was one of the first foreign leaders to congratulate him. He was wise to do so. Ukraine has much to gain from a Biden presidency, as does Zelenskyy personally.

Conflict Democratic Transitions

UkraineAlert

Nov 5, 2020

Ukraine caught between constitutional crisis and counter-revolution

By Mattia Nelles

Ukraine finds itself caught between a constitutional crisis and a counter-revolution after the country's Constitutional Court canceled key anti-corruption reforms passed following the 2014 Revolution of Dignity.

Corruption Democratic Transitions

UkraineAlert

Nov 4, 2020

Why war-torn east Ukraine votes for pro-Russian parties

By Mykhaylo Shtekel

Pro-Russian parties did well in eastern Ukraine during local elections on October 25 as Kremlin-friendly politicians continued to dominate the region despite six years of undeclared war with Moscow.

Conflict Elections

UkraineAlert

Nov 3, 2020

Ukrainian local election results reflect country’s decentralized democracy

By Michael Druckman

Ukraine's recent local elections were primarily a referendum on the quality of local governance in the country, and the result was a resounding vote of confidence in the existing municipal authorities.

Elections Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Nov 2, 2020

Winners and losers of Ukraine’s local elections

By Brian Mefford

Incumbent mayors emerged as the big winners of Ukraine's recent local elections with voters preferring familiar faces to rival candidates representing the country's major national political parties.

Elections Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Nov 1, 2020

Zelenskyy vows to thwart Kremlin counter-revolution

By Anders Åslund

A new ruling by Ukraine's Constitutional Court threatens to dismantle the entire anti-corruption framework established since 2014 and derail years of historic progress towards Euro-Atlantic integration.

Conflict Democratic Transitions

UkraineAlert

Oct 29, 2020

Reform-minded Russian industrialists can help the US contain Vladimir Putin

By Stephen Blank

Independent and reform-minded Russian industrialists are potentially important allies for the United States and other Western powers as they seek to push back against Vladimir Putin's foreign policy adventurism.

Oil and Gas Russia

UkraineAlert

Oct 29, 2020

Kremlin memory wars and the search for a unifying Ukrainian national identity

By Olesya Khromeychuk

Ukraine's post-Soviet quest for an inclusive national identity capable of uniting the country has had to contend with memory wars fueled by domestic political rivalries and renewed Russian imperial ambitions.

Conflict Disinformation

UkraineAlert

Oct 25, 2020

Ukrainian local elections: Zelenskyy fairytale is over

By Anders Åslund

Ukraine's October 25 local elections served as a vote of no confidence in President Zelenskyy's ruling Servant of the People party and reflected a deep sense of disillusionment with all national political parties.

Democratic Transitions Elections
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spotlight

Resilience in the face of adversity

Ukraine’s transformation

Ukraine has moved tentatively toward an open society and market economy since independence. The country has held several democratic elections and made halting progress in addressing corruption and state control in its economy. Since the 2014 Maidan Revolution, Ukraine has undertaken significant governance and economic reform and moved decisively toward a Europe-Atlantic foreign policy. Since 2022, Ukraine has resiliently continued to advance some reforms despite fighting for its very existence against the full-scale Russian invasion.

Learn more about Ukraine
Ukraine’s got talent: Engineer turned restaurateur turned politician breaking the old system

UkraineAlert Dec 5, 2024

Ukraine’s entrepreneurial class can drive the country’s economic recovery

The Ukrainian SME sector has demonstrated remarkable wartime resilience and is poised to be at the forefront of efforts to create a modern, innovative, postwar economy, writes Anton Waschuk.

Read More
Ukraine’s got talent: Engineer turned restaurateur turned politician breaking the old system

UkraineAlert Oct 1, 2024

Ukraine needs international investors to maintain defense tech momentum

By Mykhailo Fedorov

Ukraine’s rapidly expanding defense tech sector can play a game-changing role in the war against Russia but Ukrainian companies need international investment, writes Ukraine’s Minister for Digital Transformation Mykhailo Fedorov.
Artificial Intelligence Conflict
Ukraine’s got talent: Engineer turned restaurateur turned politician breaking the old system

UkraineAlert Jun 13, 2024

Ukraine officially embraces English as historic westward pivot continues

By Oleksiy Goncharenko

By officially embracing English, Ukrainians aim to support their country’s historic pivot away from Moscow and return to the European community of nations, writes Oleksiy Goncharenko.
Civil Society Conflict

The views expressed in UkraineAlert are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Atlantic Council, its staff, or its supporters.

The Eurasia Center’s mission is to enhance transatlantic cooperation in promoting stability, democratic values, and prosperity in Eurasia, from Eastern Europe and Turkey in the West to the Caucasus, Russia, and Central Asia in the East.

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Content

UkraineAlert

Oct 10, 2017

Ukraine’s got talent: Engineer turned restaurateur turned politician breaking the old system

By Melinda Haring

Few would ever dream of challenging Vitali Klitschko, the three-time world heavyweight champion and mayor of Kyiv, in any kind of competition. But Sergiy Gusovsky isn’t like most people. Nearly a foot shorter and a political novice, Gusovsky went after Klitschko in the 2015 local elections. Even though the boxing champion was reelected mayor, Gusovsky grabbed […]

Democratic Transitions Political Reform

UkraineAlert

Oct 4, 2017

How Ukraine Can Avoid a Perfect Financial Storm

By Oleksandr Kharchenko

The recent resignation of all of the independent members of the Naftogaz Supervisory Board illustrates the sad state of the reform process in Ukraine. The reasons behind these resignations, which were publicly explained by the former members of the supervisory board in a letter to the Ukrainian government, are straightforward: they resigned because the Ukrainian […]

Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Oct 4, 2017

Now Is the Time for Electoral Reform in Ukraine

By Brian Mefford

Ukraine’s parliament has a busy agenda this autumn. Not only is a sweeping healthcare reform package needed to fix the country’s broken system, judicial reform, the creation of a special anticorruption court, and land reform are also pending. In spite of these burning priorities, now is also the best time for parliament to pass electoral […]

Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Oct 4, 2017

US Wrongly Thought Nukes Were Ukraine’s Biggest Problem

By Anders Åslund

Ukraine has played an important role in US foreign policy since it became independent in 1991. So far, this topic has received scant scholarly interest. The most substantial book to date was Sherman Garnett, The Keystone in the Arch: Ukraine in the Emerging Security Environment of Central and Eastern Europe, which was published in 1997, […]

Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Oct 4, 2017

History as a Weapon in Russia’s War on Ukraine

By Peter Dickinson

The international media will embrace all things Bolshevik this autumn as the world marks the centenary of the Russian Revolution. Audiences can expect everything from gushing feature articles about early Soviet cinematography to edgy op-eds on the place of propaganda posters in twentieth century art. Amid this deluge of Communist kitsch, we are unlikely to […]

Russia Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Oct 2, 2017

Merkel’s Next Challenge: Defeating Putin in Central Eastern Europe

By Péter Krekó

Now that the German elections are over and the victorious Chancellor Angela Merkel is preparing for coalition talks with potential partners, two important questions arise: how will the political changes in Germany affect German-Russian relations, which have become embittered in the last few years? And what impact could the election have on Germany’s influence in […]

Germany Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Sep 29, 2017

Ukraine’s Got a Real Chance to Change. Will It Blow It Again?

By Diane Francis

Ukraine’s future rests on whether its judicial reforms will bring about the rule of law for the first time in its history, or whether political influence continues to contaminate its system. It appears the latter is the case. Today, 111 new Supreme Court nominees were proposed to President Petro Poroshenko for his signature to begin […]

Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Sep 28, 2017

Trump and Poroshenko: The Billionaire Boys Club

By Adrian Karatnycky

Petro Poroshenko scored a prized diplomatic plum for which most heads of state and government aggressively vie: a one-on-one meeting with President Donald Trump on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York. In addition to Ukraine’s president, Trump held only nine other private meetings with the heads of state or government […]

Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Sep 28, 2017

How to Keep the Russian Bear Out of Ukraine’s Energy Sector

By Olga Bielkova and Anders Åslund

Russia is at war with Ukraine. This is a hybrid war with many arms. One of them is energy. The Kremlin has weaponized the energy trade between Russia and Ukraine to impose a client-state status on Ukraine. Given its weak negotiating position, Ukraine had to accept Gazprom’s unjustified prices. Facing the threat of supply interruptions, […]

Russia Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Sep 28, 2017

Patriot: Working Hard to Bring Home Ukrainian POWs

By Vera Zimmerman

The situation with prisoners of war being held in Ukraine’s occupied Donbas is a tragedy. Some have been locked up for over two years, some tortured, and a few executed. Access to them by international missions is usually denied. Despairing families sometimes fall prey to swindlers seeking ransom. Since the war is officially undeclared, these […]

Russia Ukraine
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