By Josep Borrell
February 24, 2022 will forever be remembered as the day Russia began its brutal, unprovoked and unlawful invasion of Ukraine. It was, and still is, pure and simple aggression and a flagrant violation of the United Nations Charter. This war is neither “a European question”, nor a matter of “the West against the others”. It is about determining the kind of world we want to live in: no one is safe in a world where the unlawful use of force – exercised by a nuclear power and a permanent member of the Security Council – would somehow so “normalized”. This is why international law must apply everywhere in order to protect everyone from power politics, blackmail and military attacks.
A year later, there is a risk that people will become desensitized to images of war crimes and atrocities – because there are so many of them; that the words we use begin to lose their meaning – because we have to repeat them so often; that we get tired and our determination weakens – because time passes and the task at hand is difficult.
We cannot allow this to happen. Because every day, Russia continues to violate the United Nations Charter, setting a dangerous precedent for the whole world with its imperialist policy. Every day, Russia continues to kill innocent Ukrainian women, men and children, raining its missiles down on cities and civilian infrastructure. Every day, Russia continues to spread lies and fabrications.
For the European Union and our partners, there is no choice but to maintain the course of our “triple strategy”: support Ukraine, put pressure on Russia to end its aggression illegal and help the rest of the world deal with the consequences of this war.
We’ve been doing this for a year now – and successfully. We have passed unprecedented sanctions, massively reduced our reliance on Russian fossil fuels and, working closely with key partners, cut by 50% the revenue the Kremlin gets from its energy sales to fund its assault. Working together, we have also mitigated the global impact by containing food and energy prices, including through the ‘Solidarity Pathways’ we have put in place and the ‘Community Grains Initiative’. black Sea “.
It is not enough to say that we want Ukraine to be able to defend itself, we must also give it the means to do so. Thus, for the very first time, the EU has supplied arms to a country under attack. The EU is now the leading provider of military training for Ukrainian personnel so that they can defend their country. We also provide significant macro-financial and humanitarian assistance to support the Ukrainian people. And we decided to respond positively to Ukraine’s application for EU membership. Finally, we are working to hold those responsible for Russia’s war crimes to account.
Ukraine has demonstrated remarkable resilience, not least thanks to this support. As for Russia, it has become more isolated, due to global sanctions and the condemnation of its action by the overwhelming majority of member states of the United Nations General Assembly. Our collective objective is and remains for a democratic Ukraine to prevail, repelling the invader, restoring its full sovereignty and thereby restoring international legality.
What we want above all is peace in Ukraine, a comprehensive and lasting peace in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations and international law. Supporting Ukraine and working for peace go hand in hand.
In all of this, the EU is not asking anyone to “choose sides”. We simply ask our partners to side with the UN Charter and international law, as we jointly decided at the last EU-Africa Summit. The support of many African countries, at the United Nations and elsewhere, for the principles of territorial integrity, sovereignty and international law is crucial.
Like Ukraine, our African partners are of course free to make their own choices and have the sovereign right to determine their own future. We reject any logic of countries belonging to any “sphere of influence”. On the contrary, Russia’s aggression is a typical example of an imperialist state of mind.
It is Russia’s actions that are responsible for the economic shock wave in terms of food, energy and fertilizer prices. We have always exempted Russian foodstuffs and fertilizers from EU sanctions and we are monitoring the possible unintended effects of our sanctions. The EU continues to work hard to meet food security needs and we have increased our financial support to €1.6 billion for the most affected countries in the Sahel, Lake Chad and the Horn Africa.
More broadly, the Russian invasion underscored the need for Europe and Africa to avoid excessive dependencies. And it reinforced our desire to leverage our partnership to build more resilient and inclusive economies, protect our democracies and strengthen social cohesion.
History and justice are on Ukraine’s side. But to speed up history and achieve justice, we must amplify our “triple strategy”. We know this is a collective task. This is why the EU is counting on all its partners to act together in a spirit of responsibility and solidarity, so that aggression fails and international law prevails.
