Three former top Soviet officials on Friday marked the signing 25 years ago of the treaty that formally dissolved the Soviet Union, using the occasion to urge dialogue on the deadly separatist conflict in Ukraine.
On Dec. 8, 1991, the leaders of the Soviet republics of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus signed a pact that broke up the USSR. Negotiations were held in secret in a government hunting lodge in Belarus and the pact defeated the efforts of then-Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev to keep the country together.
One of the signatories, Stanislav Shushkevich, then head of the Belarussian parliament, said that the deal helped avoid civil wars and other calamities that could have resulted from the breakup of the world’s largest country and one with a huge arsenal of nuclear weapons.
“There was a nuclear power which was threatening the entire world with nuclear missiles and to say that it will cease to exist, one must be not just a philosopher, but a philosopher with a touch of heroism,” Shushkevich said at an event at the Atlantic Council think tank in Washington.
Gennady Burbulis, a close aide of former Russian president Boris Yeltsin — who signed the document with his boss — said the Soviet Union was a doomed totalitarian state.
“Historically speaking ... the Soviet Union was an inviable entity from the get-go,” Burbulis said. “The repressions of the system were an anthropological catastrophe.”
Twenty-five years later, the region is again in turmoil. In 2014, after protesters toppled a pro-Russian government in Ukraine, Russia annexed the Crimean Peninsula and threw its support behind separatist rebels in eastern Ukraine. About 10,000 people have been killed.
Former Ukrainian president Leonid Kravchuk, who also signed the Belavezha agreement, said it was important to continue talks, while also exerting economic pressure on Russia.
“My position is the same as of those countries that imposed the sanctions,” Kravchuk said.
“At the same time, I agree that you will not achieve order in the world only through sanctions,” he said.
PEACE AND STABILITY: Maintaining the cross-strait ‘status quo’ has long been the government’s position, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Taiwan is committed to maintaining the cross-strait “status quo” and seeks no escalation of tensions, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday, rebutting a Time magazine opinion piece that described President William Lai (賴清德) as a “reckless leader.” The article, titled “The US Must Beware of Taiwan’s Reckless Leader,” was written by Lyle Goldstein, director of the Asia Program at the Washington-based Defense Priorities think tank. Goldstein wrote that Taiwan is “the world’s most dangerous flashpoint” amid ongoing conflicts in the Middle East and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. He said that the situation in the Taiwan Strait has become less stable
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi yesterday lavished US President Donald Trump with praise and vows of a “golden age” of ties on his visit to Tokyo, before inking a deal with Washington aimed at securing critical minerals. Takaichi — Japan’s first female prime minister — pulled out all the stops for Trump in her opening test on the international stage and even announced that she would nominate him for a Nobel Peace Prize, the White House said. Trump has become increasingly focused on the Nobel since his return to power in January and claims to have ended several conflicts around the world,
REASSURANCE: The US said Taiwan’s interests would not be harmed during the talk and that it remains steadfast in its support for the nation, the foreign minister said US President Donald Trump on Friday said he would bring up Taiwan with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) during a meeting on the sidelines of the APEC Summit in South Korea this week. “I will be talking about Taiwan [with Xi],” Trump told reporters before he departed for his trip to Asia, adding that he had “a lot of respect for Taiwan.” “We have a lot to talk about with President Xi, and he has a lot to talk about with us. I think we’ll have a good meeting,” Trump said. Taiwan has long been a contentious issue between the US and China.
UKRAINE, NVIDIA: The US leader said the subject of Russia’s war had come up ‘very strongly,’ while Jenson Huang was hoping that the conversation was good Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) and US President Donald Trump had differing takes following their meeting in Busan, South Korea, yesterday. Xi said that the two sides should complete follow-up work as soon as possible to deliver tangible results that would provide “peace of mind” to China, the US and the rest of the world, while Trump hailed the “great success” of the talks. The two discussed trade, including a deal to reduce tariffs slapped on China for its role in the fentanyl trade, as well as cooperation in ending the war in Ukraine, among other issues, but they did not mention
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