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

Why Mariupol Will Not be the Next Frontline

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

Why Mariupol Will Not be the Next Frontline

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

Why Mariupol Will Not be the Next Frontline

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

May 15, 2017

Ukrainian Jews Find Safe Haven, Challenges in Israel

By
Larry Luxner

Every Sunday and Tuesday evening, Alena Sapiro, 26, takes the hour-long bus ride from her home in Lod to attend Ramit Avidan’s intermediate Hebrew classes at Ulpan Gordon, a Tel Aviv school for new immigrants run by the Israeli Ministry of Absorption. Sapiro, who helps develop mobile apps for a local software company, came on […]


Israel

Ukraine


UkraineAlert

May 15, 2017

Ukraine PM Groisman Visits Israel, Marking Improvement in Delicate Bilateral Relations

By
Larry Luxner

The May 14 arrival of Ukrainian Prime Minister Volodymyr Groisman to Israel signals a rapprochement of ties that suffered a temporary blow last December, when Ukraine—along with thirteen other countries—voted to support a UN Security Council resolution condemning Israeli settlements in the West Bank. Groisman is the first Jewish prime minister in Ukrainian history. He […]


Israel

Ukraine


UkraineAlert

May 10, 2017

Q&A: Will We Ever Get to the Bottom of Russian Hacking in the US Election?

By
Melinda Haring

President Donald Trump fired FBI director James Comey on May 9. Comey had been leading a criminal investigation into whether Trump’s advisers colluded with the Russian government to influence the results of the 2016 presidential election. Trump justified the firing by pointing to the way Comey handled the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s private email server, […]


Russia


UkraineAlert

May 10, 2017

Ukraine Needs Tough Love and IMF Conditionality, Leshchenko Urges

By
Diane Francis

“The IMF should not give one more dollar to Ukraine until the Anti-Corruption Court is in operation,” said Sergii Leshchenko in a May 9 telephone interview. Leshchenko is a hero of the Revolution of Dignity, a lanky and serious journalist-turned-politician who has risked his life and career for years to fight corruption in Ukraine. He’s […]


Ukraine


UkraineAlert

May 10, 2017

Russia Deploys Banned Missile and Brags about It

By
Semen Kabakaev

Thirty years ago, on December 8, 1987, Mikhail Gorbachev and Ronald Reagan signed the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF), which entered into force on June 1, 1988. The parties pledged not to produce, test or deploy ballistic and cruise land-based missiles of medium range (from 1,000 to 5,500 kilometers). Elimination of all declared missiles and […]


Russia

Ukraine


UkraineAlert

May 9, 2017

How to Win Friends and Influence People on a Global Scale

By
Alexandra Hall Hall

Dale Carnegie’s famous self-help book, How to Win Friends and Influence People, centers on investing in personal relationships in order to achieve success. President Donald Trump has demonstrated an instinctive understanding of this principle in the way he has interacted with a succession of world leaders, whether over a round of golf at Mar-a-Lago or […]


The Caucasus


UkraineAlert

May 8, 2017

How Trump Can Fix US-Russia Ties

By
Alexander Vershbow

US President Donald Trump will have his first high-level meeting with a Russian representative this week, when Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov comes to the White House following a scheduled meeting with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. The stakes are high: about the only thing on which Moscow and Washington agree is that relations are at […]


Russia

Ukraine


UkraineAlert

May 5, 2017

How Not to Become a War Criminal: A Guide for Russian Soldiers

By
Valentyn Badrak, Lada Roslycky, Mykhailo Samus, and Volodymyr Kopchak

Few Russian citizens view the Kremlin’s invasion into Ukraine as unlawful. Not many Russian servicemen realize that when they are fighting there, they fight as unnamed, faceless soldiers who lack the protection of international pacts, including the Geneva Conventions. They not only risk death, injury, or abandonment by the state that sent them there; they […]


Russia

Ukraine


UkraineAlert

May 4, 2017

Why Is the Kremlin So Fixated on Phantom Fascists?

By
Peter Dickinson

In April, reports emerged of Kremlin plans to launch a major smear campaign against Russian opposition figurehead Alexey Navalny. Within days, an expensive-looking attack video had appeared anonymously on YouTube, comparing Navalny to Adolf Hitler. The Russian authorities denied any connection to the video, but few believed them. After all, branding opponents as fascists is […]


Russia

Ukraine


UkraineAlert

May 3, 2017

Will Ukrainians Ever Trust the Press?

By
Adam Tismaneanu

Journalism has changed since the Euromaidan, but most Ukrainians still don’t trust the media. Oligarchs continue to own a majority of the major outlets. Since 2014, reformers have established a public broadcasting service and are in the process of privatizing several hundred state-owned newspapers. Those steps may not be enough. The media suffers from a […]


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

Why Mariupol Will Not be the Next Frontline

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

Why Mariupol Will Not be the Next Frontline

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

Why Mariupol Will Not be the Next Frontline

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

May 21, 2015

Why Mariupol Will Not be the Next Frontline

By Ruben Gzirian

Analysts and journalists have begun to ask where the Russian-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine will go next now that the second ceasefire agreement has failed. Skirmishes on the frontline in Shyrokyne, less than ten miles from Mariupol’s city limits, have raised concerns that Mariupol will be the next target. Geographically and commercially speaking, Mariupol makes […]

Russia Ukraine

UkraineAlert

May 20, 2015

Europe Needs to Help Ukraine Now

By Anders Åslund

Ukraine bleeds, but reforms impressively, while the West ignores it. The Minsk ceasefire agreement does not hold, though the intensity of the fighting has faded. In mid-March, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) doubled Ukraine’s international reserves, but the country’s finances remain fragile. Europe’s central banks should provide a large swap credit with minimum risks to […]

Ukraine

UkraineAlert

May 19, 2015

The West’s Failure of Nerve

By Stephen Blank

Poland and the Baltic states intend to ask NATO to station a battalion or even larger units on their territory. The Baltic states—Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania—want a brigade so that each country can host a battalion or permanent rotational forces. Poland’s Foreign Minister, Grzegorz Schetyna, indicated that his government would request the permanent stationing of […]

Russia Ukraine

UkraineAlert

May 19, 2015

Remembering Roman

By Melinda Haring and Simon Hoellerbauer

Every Memorial Day, friends leave small bottles of Jack Daniel’s and an American flag on Roman Kupchinsky’s gravestone in Arlington National Cemetery. Kupchinsky was a warrior, both on and off the battlefield. A man of passion who fought for his ideals with a singular determination, he devoted his life to seeing Ukraine become free. He […]

Ukraine

UkraineAlert

May 14, 2015

Four Reasons to Be Hopeful About Ukraine’s Economy

By Yuriy Gorodnichenko

Ukraine’s current economic crisis was years in the making. Former President Viktor Yanukovych grossly mismanaged and looted the country. And it may take years for the country to fully recover. But there are signs that the economy has reached the lowest point and its prospects are brighter than commonly portrayed in the press.

Ukraine

UkraineAlert

May 13, 2015

Imposing Costs on Putin Will Deter War

By John E. Herbst

“Russia and America: Stumbling to War,” a recent National Interest article by Graham Allison and Dimitri Simes, commands attention because of the gravity of the issue and the stature of its authors. Allison is a leading authority on great power relations, and Dimitri Simes is a scholar with deep connections to the elites running Russia.

Russia Ukraine

UkraineAlert

May 13, 2015

Crimean Tatars: ‘We did not reject Russia, Russia rejected us’

By Catherine Cosman

On May 18, 1944, Joseph Stalin deported more than 180,000 Crimean Tatars to Uzbekistan. Once again this community faces major challenges. Today, 230,000 Crimean Tatars, who are mainly Sunni Muslims, represent about 12 percent of Crimea’s population. Virtually all of Crimea’s Tatars opposed Russia’s annexation of Crimea in March 2014 and refused to vote in […]

Russia Ukraine

UkraineAlert

May 12, 2015

Russia Has Complete Information Dominance in Ukraine

By James J. Coyle

Hackers have consistently used low-level cyber warfare tactics to advance Russian goals in Ukraine. A dedicated group of hackers successfully infected the e-mail systems of the Ukrainian military, counterintelligence, border patrol, and local police. The hackers use a spear-phishing attack in which malware is hidden in an attachment that appears to be an official Ukrainian […]

Russia Ukraine

UkraineAlert

May 7, 2015

‘Russian Propaganda is Really Working,’ Warns Crimean Activist

By Melinda Haring

Activist Urges US Government to Step Up Efforts in Crimea Russia has banned Taras Berezovets from visiting his family in Crimea. His crime: launching Free Crimea, a nongovernmental organization focused on disseminating impartial information about Crimea, in December 2014. Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) considers it an extremist organization.

Russia Ukraine

UkraineAlert

May 7, 2015

When the Kremlin Makes An Offer You Can’t Refuse

By Stephen Blank

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has multiple dimensions, and the energy dimension is one that has been underestimated. Russia has sought to make Ukraine dependent on its abundant energy since 2006. The reason is simple: Russia wants economic and political control over Ukraine and it wants to enmesh Ukraine’s government and elites in a web of […]

Russia Ukraine
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