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

Poroshenko Not Serious About Fighting Corruption, Says Anticorruption Reformer

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

Poroshenko Not Serious About Fighting Corruption, Says Anticorruption Reformer

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

Poroshenko Not Serious About Fighting Corruption, Says Anticorruption Reformer

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

Jan 29, 2019

Time to Shame Putin Again

By
Maksym Eristavi

Chechnya is at it again. Recent reports indicate that there’s another anti-gay pogrom underway in the Russian region of Chechnya. It is said to include kidnappings, secret torture chambers, and arbitrary executions. Violence against these individuals is escalating, and it’s the biggest spike of targeted attacks against gay Chechens since 2017 when 100 LGBTQ people […]


Russia


UkraineAlert

Jan 29, 2019

Why the Hungarian Link in Russia’s Grand Strategy Is Overblown

By
Gergely Varga

Editor’s Note: This article is a response to Stephen Blank’s essay, Putin’s Energy Strategy Is More Ambitious than You Think, which we published on January 4, 2019.   Energy policy is a crucial part of Russia’s strategy to maximize its influence in Europe and divide the European Union. As highlighted by critics of Russia’s assertive energy […]


Hungary

Ukraine


UkraineAlert

Jan 28, 2019

Five Key Takeaways from Davos 2019 for Ukraine

By
Andy Hunder

“No other event has the same global appeal,” commented Andy Christie, private jets director at Air Charter Service, predicting up to 1,500 individual private jets flights to be made in and out of this year’s Davos summit. Top global business leaders, political leaders, economists, celebrities, and journalists turn up year after year to the World […]


Ukraine


UkraineAlert

Jan 25, 2019

Ukraine’s Slow but Steady Strangulation Is Taking Place in Plain Sight

By
Peter Dickinson

Russia’s war against Ukraine is about to enter its sixth year, but many remain in denial over the true nature of the conflict. There is still widespread international reluctance to acknowledge the global significance of Vladimir Putin’s invasion, leading to a preference for the kind of euphemistic language that blurs the lines between victim and […]


Germany

Russia


UkraineAlert

Jan 25, 2019

Here’s How to Nurture Risk-Taking Among Ukraine’s IT Sector

By
Maksym Bakhmatov

Ukraine is a country of opportunity and talent. Home to one of the fastest-growing IT industries in the world, Ukraine has over 4,000 technology companies and about 2,000 startups. In 2018, investment in startups reached almost $300 million. Additionally, the country has roughly 184,000 software developers, and Ukrainians register over 12,000 patents annually for various […]


Ukraine


UkraineAlert

Jan 24, 2019

Are Things Really Changing at Ukroboronprom?

By
Melinda Haring

Pavlo Bukin has been on the job for nearly a year, and he’s in good spirits. It’s not the most enviable position: he’s the general director of Ukroboronprom, the state-owned defense company, and has been charged with cleaning up the company and making its business practices market friendly. Ukroboronprom (UOP) has serious reputational issues. Ukraine’s […]


Ukraine


UkraineAlert

Jan 22, 2019

Who wanted Boris Nemtsov dead? New book offers new look at evidence

By
Anders Åslund

Boris Nemtsov was jollier and more outgoing than most. Unlike most of Russia’s reformers, he abstained from wealth, choosing to live modestly as an opposition politician. He could work with anyone. On February 27, 2015, he was murdered just off the Kremlin.


Russia

Ukraine


UkraineAlert

Jan 21, 2019

Ukraine emerges from isolation

By
James Brooke

Transportation links provide advance warnings as to where a society is going physically and mentally. Until five years ago, all of Ukraine’s roads led to Moscow. Now they go west. On land, more Ukrainians traveled by train to Europe than to Russia last year for the first time since Czarist railroads were built in the […]


Macroeconomics

Russia


UkraineAlert

Jan 17, 2019

Trump Doesn’t Have to Quit NATO to Undermine It, Expert Warns

By
Melinda Haring

On January 14, the New York Times confirmed that President Donald Trump talked about pulling out of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization more than once in 2018. But can the president quit NATO unilaterally?


NATO

Russia


UkraineAlert

Jan 16, 2019

Putin’s dream scenario for Ukraine

By
Alexander J. Motyl

Ironically, by failing to acknowledge that everything has in fact changed, Ukrainians could wind up with the worst of all possible worlds—a reversal to the status quo ante and a return to Russia’s embrace.


Russia

Ukraine

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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

Poroshenko Not Serious About Fighting Corruption, Says Anticorruption Reformer

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

Poroshenko Not Serious About Fighting Corruption, Says Anticorruption Reformer

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

Poroshenko Not Serious About Fighting Corruption, Says Anticorruption Reformer

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

Nov 4, 2015

Poroshenko Not Serious About Fighting Corruption, Says Anticorruption Reformer

By Melinda Haring

Bogdan Yakymiuk radiates optimism. But despite his quick smile, the thirty-seven-year old reformer is deadly serious when it comes to corruption. “Over 30 percent of our yearly budget is being stolen one way or another through corruption,” Yakymiuk said in an October 27 interview in Washington.

Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Nov 4, 2015

“We Must Keep the Focus on Ukraine and Spread the Truth,” Says New Ukrainian Ambassador

By Larry Luxner

Valeriy Chaly, Ukraine’s new ambassador in Washington, sees the United States as his country’s “main strategic partner” and says he wants to use that bilateral relationship “to resolve the crisis created by Russia in Eastern Europe and find the best model of security in this part of the world.” Chaly, 45, presented his White House […]

Russia Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Nov 3, 2015

The Motivations Behind Poroshenko’s New Anticorruption Drive

By John E. Herbst

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko’s government appears to have launched a new anticorruption drive with the October 31 detention of Gennadiy Korban, a close associate of oligarch Ihor Kolomoisky and the leader of Ukrop, a political party funded by Kolomoisky. The authorities arrested Korban following an investigation that began last year into the assault on government […]

Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Nov 2, 2015

Ukraine Must Not Pay Russia Back

By Anders Åslund

On December 20, Ukraine is supposed to pay Russia $3 billion in return for a Eurobond that Russian President Vladimir Putin issued in December 2013. Ukraine has no reason to pay. In February 2014, the Kremlin launched military aggression against Ukraine, first annexing Crimea and later pursuing military subversion in southern and eastern Ukraine. For […]

Russia Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Nov 2, 2015

Why the Realists Were Wrong About the War in Ukraine

By Alexander Motyl

The ongoing ceasefire in eastern Ukraine may or may not lead to a lasting peace, but it has already had one important consequence: it has undermined both Russian and realist interpretations of the Russo-Ukrainian war. On August 29, Russian President Vladimir Putin, French President Francois Hollande, and German Chancellor Angela Merkel agreed that a ceasefire […]

Russia Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Oct 28, 2015

Five Steps to Unleash Ukraine’s Economy

By Sergiy Tsivkach

Ukraine faces numerous challenges that would be hard for any government to address. However, it must implement economic reforms to stabilize the country and show immediate positive results. Ordinary Ukrainians want to see their bottom line improve, and businesses want fair rules. Developing an effective competition policy to eliminate the poisonous influence of monopolies and […]

Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Oct 26, 2015

A New Generation for a New Ukraine

By Carl Gershman

Editor’s Note: This piece is adapted from a speech Carl Gershman gave to the Ukrainian Catholic Education Foundation on October 24, 2015. Preparing for tonight’s talk has been an unexpected process of learning and discovery. I had thought I understood Ukraine, having given a number of talks and written articles urging the US government to […]

Russia Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Oct 26, 2015

Ukraine Goes to the Polls: Kolomoyskyi Is King Again

By Brian Mefford

As the ballots are counted in Ukraine’s October 25 local elections, early returns and exit polls indicate some surprises. The big story is that oligarch Ihor Kolomoyskyi came out on top. Kolomoyskyi, former governor of Dnipropetrovsk who was dismissed in March by Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko for his overreach, backed candidates who look set to […]

Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Oct 26, 2015

As Ukraine Moves Toward Decentralization, Challenges Loom

By Alina Polyakova

Kyiv, Ukraine – On Sunday, October 25, Ukrainians went to the polls to elect mayors and representatives to municipal councils. Under normal circumstances, local elections would go more or less unnoticed by international observers, but with no elections taking place in occupied territories, including Crimea and the Luhansk and Donetsk Peoples’ Republics, these are far […]

Ukraine

UkraineAlert

Oct 23, 2015

Imperial Gamble Doesn’t Pay Off: New Book Gets Ukraine’s History Wrong

By Alexei Sobchenko

In his new book, Imperial Gamble: Putin, Ukraine and the New Cold War, the renowned American journalist Marvin Kalb touches on an issue outside his traditional area of expertise in domestic politics: the conflict between Russia and Ukraine and its implications for US-Russia relations.

Russia Ukraine
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