On February 24, 2022, Russia launched a large-scale invasion of Ukraine. This unprovoked act of aggression has caused and continues to cause horrific scenes of death and destruction in Europe’s second-largest country. The war has also taken its toll on Russia, militarily as well as politically and economically. Encountering fierce resistance since day one, Russia has taken heavy casualties on the battlefield and will likely continue to do so for as long as the war goes on.
It is important to bear in mind that Ukraine has been at war with Russia for a lot longer than six months, in the Donbas. In April 2014, shortly after the Russian occupation and annexation of Crimea, Russia supported an armed uprising in the east Ukrainian counties of Donetsk and Luhansk. This rapidly turned into a vicious war between Russian-backed separatist forces and Ukrainian government forces, causing more than 14,000 casualties in the subsequent eight years.
Since the start of the Donbas war in the spring of 2014, numerous efforts have been made to establish a viable ceasefire and a process toward political normalization. The intensity of the diplomatic efforts to end the war has varied over time, much like the intensity of the fighting itself. Following the signing in September 2014 of a 12-point ceasefire agreement, known as “the Minsk Protocol”, the level of violence gradually subsided, but only temporarily. In January 2015, the forces of the self-proclaimed “people’s republics” of Donetsk and Luhansk embarked on a new offensive. Heavy clashes followed and the number of civilian and military casualties surged.
Again, the parties were brought to the negotiating table in Belarus. The Minsk summit in February 2015 culminated in the signing of a new package of measures aimed at revitalizing the first Minsk Protocol. The “Minsk II” agreement encompassed 13 articles, many of which were carryovers from the first Minsk agreement – ceasefire, heavy weapons withdrawal, monitoring and verification by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), release and exchange of illegally detained persons, pardon and amnesty for militants, disarmament and pullout of illegal/foreign armed formations, and measures to improve the humanitarian and economic situation in the region. Unlike Minsk I, Minsk II provided specific timeframes for the implementation of many of the agreed-upon measures.
However, as time went by, it became increasingly clear the Minsk agreements would never be implemented, not even partly. I wrote an article about this in Post-Soviet Affairs in January 2020, essentially arguing that the Minsk agreements were bound to fail. In order to get a better understanding of why and how the Minsk process failed, we need to consider factors such as the complex nature of the conflict, the vague and ambiguous language of the agreements, and practical challenges related to the timing and sequencing of the measures listed therein.
The Minsk negotiations were complicated by Ukraine and Russia’s widely diverging views of the conflict’s nature and causes, and of who should or should not be present at the table as parties. The Ukrainian government had, very reluctantly, accepted to conduct direct talks with the leaders of the “people’s republics”. Russia considered itself a third-party “mediator” on a par with Germany and France and was not willing to acknowledge any responsibility for the conflict as such or admit to the presence of Russian troops and arms on Ukrainian soil. Finding a mutually acceptable language under these circumstances was a tremendously difficult task.
The negotiators decided to opt for loose formulations that allowed for more than one interpretation. The Ukrainians saw the agreed-upon withdrawal of “all foreign armed formations, military equipment, as well as mercenaries” (article 10 of Minsk II) as a reference to Russian regular troops and paramilitaries. The Russians, for their part, would take this formulation as a reference to Ukrainian government forces and volunteers. The vagueness and ambiguity of the language included in the Minsk agreements impeded and complicated its implementation.
Another major obstacle concerns the issue of how to sequence the agreed-upon measures. When the Minsk agreements were signed, Russia’s preferred roadmap to peace would start with political measures such as the holding of local elections in the separatist/occupied areas and the adoption of a “special status” law, later to be enshrined in the Ukrainian Constitution. Conversely, the Ukrainian side insisted on full implementation of the agreements’ military provisions (ceasefire, withdrawal of illegal forces, exchange of prisoners, and restoration of Ukrainian border control), before implementation of the political measures. Lack of clarity on the order of implementation undoubtedly contributed to the deadlock and ultimately the demise of the agreements.
As for lessons that may be learned from the unsuccessful diplomatic efforts to resolve the Donbas conflict by peaceful means, one of the most striking features of the Minsk process is the apparent tension between the short-term goal of stopping the fighting and the longer-term goal of finding a lasting political settlement. The use of ambiguous language may have served the first purpose, but it may simultaneously have undermined the second by allowing the parties to believe that they were owed things that were, objectively speaking, incompatible.
Given the generally pro-Russian terms of the Minsk agreements, it is tempting to ask how Kyiv could agree to them in the first place. The answer to this question seems to be that Ukraine in February 2015 had no good alternatives to a negotiated political settlement. The most realistic alternative at that point in time would have been a large-scale war with what appeared to be a militarily superior counterpart. Since then, Ukraine has undertaken a comprehensive military modernization, with the support of Western partners. This may have had an impact on Ukraine’s willingness to compromise and make territorial concessions to Russia.
Today, six months after the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion, the prospects of a “Minsk-type” settlement appear more remote than ever. First, the idea of trading territory for peace enjoys little or no support in Ukraine. Second, the failure of the Minsk process has rendered many Ukrainians skeptical about French- and German-led diplomatic efforts to resolve the conflict. And third, the Ukrainian military has been able to stall many of Russia’s territorial advances and mount successful counterattacks on a number of fronts.
While continuing to supply Ukraine with the weapons it needs to defend itself, the West should continue to put pressure on Russia to end the war. The West is not in a position to tell Ukraine when and how to negotiate a ceasefire agreement with Russia, or on what terms. This decision rests entirely with the Ukrainian people and its leaders. But Ukraine’s Western partners should stand ready to facilitate negotiations if and when Ukraine determines the time is right.
Kristian Åtland
Kristian Åtland is a Senior Research Fellow at the Norwegian Defence Research Establishment (FFI) and Adjunct Professor of Political Science at Nord University.
