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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

Jul 8, 2019

Will Zelenskyy succeed?

By
Mykola Vorobiov

In many ways, Zelenskyy’s presidency embodies the “Ukrainian dream,” when a new politician and self-made showman can be elected president and slay the many bad forces that hold Ukraine back.


Democratic Transitions


Political Reform


UkraineAlert

Jul 5, 2019

Zelenskyy shines in Toronto, but his plans need right people and right priorities

By
Anders Åslund

The mentality of the people has to change, and the government has to listen to its citizens and reject corruption.


Political Reform


Politics & Diplomacy


UkraineAlert

Jul 2, 2019

Five reasons why investors are giving Ukraine another look

By
Daniel Bilak

The ambitions of Ukraine House Toronto arise from what UkraineInvest has witnessed over the last year: a renewed confidence in and interest among investors for exposure to the Ukrainian market.


Democratic Transitions


Fiscal and Structural Reform


UkraineAlert

Jun 28, 2019

Finally a new window of investment opportunity in Ukraine?

By
Basil Kalymon

The fight against corruption, linked to a continued commitment to EU integration and general system reform, could greatly boost Ukraine’s economic strength.


Conflict


Corruption


UkraineAlert

Jun 27, 2019

Everything you know about the Donbas is wrong

By
Melinda Haring

Many Western experts avoid the Donbas because it’s a knotty problem without an easy solution, and there’s plenty in Kyiv to keep one busy. I was one of those experts until a few weeks ago, when I finally jumped into a car and sped to Kramatorsk.


Civil Society


Inclusive Growth


UkraineAlert

Jun 27, 2019

Putin finally tells Russians the truth (sort of)

By
Anders Åslund

In his annual television marathon “Direct Line with Vladimir Putin” on June 20, the Russian president did something unusual. To my knowledge, this is the first time he specified the impact of Western sanctions on Russia, which he usually presents as having a positive effect on the Russian economy because of import substitution. “Look, according […]


Conflict


Financial Sanctions and Economic Coercion


UkraineAlert

Jun 27, 2019

PACE sells out for 33 Million euros

By
Andrej Lushnycky

On June 25, Russia was allowed back into the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) as a full voting member, after being expelled five years ago for its aggression in Ukraine. Through an innocuous sounding measure that pledged to strengthen the assembly’s decision-making processes on credentials and voting, 118 parliamentarians agreed to let […]


Conflict


Human Rights


UkraineAlert

Jun 27, 2019

Five predictions for Ukraine’s parliamentary elections

By
Brian Mefford

With the Constitutional Court of Ukraine affirming the dismissal of parliament last week, new elections are moving ahead for July 21. Here are five predictions on what to expect. First, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s Servant of the People has a legitimate chance to form a one-party majority in the parliament. This would mark the first time since […]


Elections


Political Reform


UkraineAlert

Jun 25, 2019

How the US got rich, and Ukraine can too

By
Diane Francis

The United States invented many things, but anti-trust laws and competition policy was arguably the most profound. These laws establish fair rules for the marketplace, and are why the country became the richest and most powerful on the planet. Without these, the United States would look like Russia or Ukraine: An impoverished populace and a […]


Central Europe


Financial Regulation


UkraineAlert

Jun 25, 2019

Hard talk

By
Melinda Haring

“Some of the greatest Ukrainian patriots aren’t even Ukrainian,” the eminently quotable public intellectual Yevhen Hlibovotsky is fond of saying. While he didn’t have John Sung Kim in mind, he might have. Kim, forty-five, is a wealthy Korean-American entrepreneur who built and sold two companies (one IPO, one all cash sale) in Silicon Valley before […]


Entrepreneurship


Inclusive Growth

spotlight

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

Sep 13, 2017

Does Russia Have Hard Power in the US?

By Lada Roslycky

There is something naïve about many people born in democratic countries. They seem to take the human rights, values, and principles upon which their countries are built for granted. Dangerously, they have a difficult time imagining that their rights and freedoms can be manipulated in such a way as to threaten their institutions, national security, […]

Russia Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Sep 12, 2017

Russia’s Peacekeeping Proposal in Ukraine Is a Sham

By James J. Coyle

Russia has introduced a United Nations draft resolution for peacekeepers in Ukraine amid acclaim by German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel and the chairman of the Organization for Cooperation and Security in Europe (OSCE). On its face, this would appear to meet a long-standing demand of the government in Kyiv and mark a reversal of Russia’s […]

International Organizations Politics & Diplomacy

UkraineAlert

Sep 12, 2017

North Korean Missile Engines: Not from Ukraine

By Mariana Budjeryn and Andrew Zhalko-Tytarenko

A new report points to Ukraine as a possible source of liquid propellant engines (LPE) powering intercontinental-range missiles successfully ground-tested by North Korea last year and flight-tested this year. As the world grapples with the fait accompli of North Korean nuclear and missile capability, the path Pyongyang took to acquire it is of considerable interest, […]

Korea Russia

UkraineAlert

Sep 12, 2017

Ukrainians’ Stock Soars in Central Europe as Employers Vie for Labor

By James Brooke

One of this summer’s big lessons is that the image of Ukrainians has turned around in the region. As Central European governments fight to block EU-mandated quotas of asylum seekers from Syria and Iraq, Ukraine has emerged as the region’s source of desirable guest workers. Czech, Slovak, Hungarian, and Estonian governments have set up recruiting […]

Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Sep 7, 2017

Scarred: How Famine Shaped Modern Ukraine and Russia

By Diane Francis

In the 1930s, Joseph Stalin committed crimes against humanity by purposely starving to death more than four million Ukrainians for resisting his Five-Year Plan to collectivize agriculture. Millions more fled and in 1937, Stalin executed or imprisoned hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian leaders and influencers. For three more generations, Russia kept Stalin’s genocide hidden until […]

Russia Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Sep 7, 2017

Pyongyang’s Ambitions Have Nothing to Do with Kyiv and Everything to Do with Moscow

By Lada Roslycky

The North Korean leadership, headed by 33-year-old Kim Jong-un, is openly threatening its neighbors, as well as the United States, with missile strikes. How has this little country, most of whose citizens live in poverty, managed to cause such a global security issue? A recent New York Times article accused Ukraine of illegally supplying rocket […]

Korea Russia

UkraineAlert

Sep 7, 2017

Will Ukraine’s Parliament Accomplish Anything This Fall?

By Olena Prokopenko and Christina Parandii

On September 5, a new political season began in Ukraine. Parliamentary speaker Andriy Parubiy has already branded parliament’s new plenary session “the autumn of reforms” by promising to deliver results on some of the most hot-button issues, including healthcare, pension, education, and judicial reforms. Parliament is behind and needs to kick things into high gear; […]

Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Sep 5, 2017

Should the US Arm Ukraine? For the Answer, Look to the Soviet-Afghan War

By Johnny Herbst

In February 2014, Russia seized and annexed Crimea; a few weeks later, Moscow launched its no-longer-covert hybrid war against Ukraine in the Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts. It is now 2017 and the situation remains relatively unchanged. The conflict in the east is at a standstill, no side has a clear advantage, and it appears that […]

Russia Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Sep 5, 2017

Parliament Is the Problem in Ukraine

By Peter Dickinson

September marks the beginning of season 48 of “Game of Chairs,” otherwise known as the Ukrainian parliament. As the country’s MPs return for the autumn parliamentary session, few will be tuning in. While the palace intrigues and Machiavellian plot twists of HBO’s “Game of Thrones” makes for compulsive viewing, the ideological ambiguity and backroom dealing […]

Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Sep 4, 2017

How to Finish the Revolution in Ukraine

By Olena Sotnyk

More than three years after the Euromaidan, Ukraine still hasn’t successfully prosecuted any high-level crooks, and we’ve got plenty here. At Stanford University’s Draper Hills Summer Fellowship this summer, we examined how to catch a “big fish” and looked at a case study in Indonesia, where the country’s anticorruption commission had just begun. Despite being […]

Ukraine