After years of tension, Russian President Vladimir Putin reignited the conflict between his country and Ukraine – led by Volodymyr Zelensky – by announcing, on February 21, 2022, “recognizing the independence of the Donetsk People’s Republic and the Lugansk People’s Republic”, two pro-Russian separatist regions of Donbass. In the process, the Kremlin leader launched a large-scale military operation in Ukraine on February 24 to officially defend these separatists. “We will strive to achieve a demilitarization and denazification of Ukraine,” he said. The Kremlin specified that this operation, aimed at imposing a “neutral status” on Ukraine, would last as long as necessary, depending on its “results” and its “relevance”. This Russian offensive comes eight years after Moscow annexed Crimea and sponsored the takeover of regions of Donbass by pro-Russian separatists, triggering a regional conflict that has left more than 14,000 dead. Ukraine, for its part, has denounced the start of a “large-scale invasion by Russia”. This operation aims to “destroy the Ukrainian state, seize its territory by force and establish an occupation”, reacted the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Just after Vladimir Putin’s speech, explosions rang out in kyiv, in Kramatorsk, the eastern city serving as headquarters for the Ukrainian army, in Kharkiv (northeast), Ukraine’s second city, in Odessa, on the Black Sea, and in Mariupol, the main port in the east. The Chernobyl power plant, scene of the worst nuclear accident in history in 1986, later fell into the hands of Russian soldiers. From the early hours of the day, Kiev residents crowded into the metro to seek shelter or try to leave the city, while cars full of families fleeing the capital created huge traffic jams. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky issued a decree ordering the general mobilization of people subject to “military conscription and reservists” within 90 days in all regions of the country. The leader regretted that Ukraine was “left alone” facing the Russian army while the Atlantic Alliance (NATO) indicated that it would not send troops to support it. Many countries nevertheless condemned the Russian invasion. US President Joe Biden, for whom the master of the Kremlin will become “a pariah on the international scene”, imposed restrictions on the export of technological products to Russia. The number two of the Russian embassy in Washington was expelled. The leaders of the 27 EU countries have also taken “massive” sanctions against Russia in the energy, finance and transport sectors, but without immediately excluding it from the Swift banking network, which allows payments to be received or issued worldwide. Sanctions that will have consequences for the European economy. Emmanuel Macron announced that France would accelerate the deployment of soldiers in Romania as part of NATO. “France will continue to fully play its role of reassuring NATO allies by sending a new contingent to Estonia as part of the enhanced forward presence, by anticipating its participation in the Baltic air police from March, and by also accelerating its deployment in Romania,” declared the French president at the end of an exceptional EU summit in Brussels.
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