Central & Eastern Europe Archive

While Ukraine continues to fight Russian-sponsored separatists in its eastern Donbass region, it is also facing an internal challenge equally threatening to its sovereignty: a small but powerful right-wing nationalist movement prepared to use violence to achieve its goals. If Ukraine’s pro-democracy supporters from the Maidan movement and in President Petro Poroshenko’s government don’t aggressively confront Ukraine’s ultranationalists, the far right could destroy Ukraine’s nascent democracy. This threat became clear Sept. 1 when nationalist protesters, many from the Svoboda (Freedom) party, attacked police guarding the Rada, Ukraine’s parliament. Protesters threw bricks, Molotov cocktails and even grenades, killing three officers from […]

In early September, Serbia, an aspiring European Union member, conducted a military drill with two people on the EU’s bad list: Russia and Belarus. In Novorossiysk, Russia, in an exercise known as “Slavic Brotherhood,” paratroopers from the three countries played war games and practiced crushing a Maidan-style revolt. “Who can lecture us?” said Serbian Foreign Minister Ivica Dacic, responding to questions about what impact the drill would have on his country’s image in Brussels. “The European Union is not a military bloc. Let them mind their own business.” The EU was not impressed, given the diplomatic energy it has expended […]

Belarus will hold a presidential election on Oct. 11, but one needn’t bother staying up for the result: The incumbent, Alexander Lukashenko, Europe’s so-called last dictator, traditionally claims 80 to 90 percent of ballots, with the result fixed both beforehand by mass early voting and afterward via a completely invisible counting process. But in a region gripped by the turmoil caused by Russia’s proxy war in Ukraine, Belarus’ election still matters. Lukashenko has been in power since 1994. The last election in 2010 culminated in mass protests against election fraud and almost 700 arrests. That isn’t likely to be the […]

Under Chancellor Angela Merkel, the longest-serving head of government in the European Union, Germany has assumed a central role in a changing Europe. But in both the EU and the world beyond, Berlin often seems a reluctant power, even as Merkel’s popularity at home masks underlying challenges. All of the articles linked below are free for non-subscribers until Sept. 17. The View From Berlin: In winning a third term as chancellor in 2013, Merkel extended the Christian Democratic Union’s hold on power and cemented her dominance of German politics. But she was once again forced to form a coalition government […]

On Tuesday, Ukraine’s right-wing Radical Party announced that it was leaving the ruling coalition over a bill that would give more power to the country’s regions, including in eastern Ukraine, which is currently controlled by pro-Russian rebels. Russia insisted on the decentralization of power as a condition for the truce that was agreed upon in February between Ukrainian troops and separatist rebels, which has unraveled bit by bit. The bill has sparked controversy across Ukraine and put President Petro Poroshenko in a tight spot. Russian-backed separatists say it does not give them sufficient sovereignty in the east, while nationalists claim […]