Irish Left With Ukraine – Neither Moscow nor Washington

The Peoples Movement, an Irish group that campaigns to defend Irish neutrality, opposes the EU, and regards support for Ukraine’s resistance to the invasion as a breach of Irish neutrality, writes regularly about the war on its Facebook page, and posted on 29th August 2024:

“EU military trainers in Ukraine! The Russians see this as indicative of EU/NATO involvement in Ukraine. The EU favours war to the last Ukrainian rather than a ceasefire and negotiations. This sort of involvement is part of a spiral of escalation. Some Irish politicians, opinion formers and lobbyists (“good Europeans all”) want to tag along with this…”

The Ukrainians see lack of support and involvement due to Western fear of escalation. And the Russians have once again rejected peace plans, even though the “ceasefire and negotiations” mantra, if acted upon as such, would freeze the invader into its current occupying positions indefinitely. Reuters reported in the Irish Times print edition the same day (29^th August):

“Ukraine’s top diplomat [foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba] said yesterday that the biggest problem faced by Kyiv as it battles Russia is that its Allies are afraid of approving new policies to support Ukraine out of fear of escalation…

‘Ever since the beginning of the large-scale invasion, the biggest problem Ukraine has been facing is the domination of the concept of escalation in the decision-making processes among our partners’, Mr. Kuleba said.

More than two-and-a-half years since Russia’s full scale invasion, Kyiv is pushing the West to give it the long-range weapons – and the authorisation – to strike targets deep inside Russian territory. It also wants help shooting down incoming missiles…

During the meeting with Mr. Kuleba, Poland’s foreign minister Mr. Sikorski said that while Russia is using long-range weapons against Ukraine, allies should ‘let Ukraine fight with whatever it has, with whatever we have delivered them and let’s deliver them more’…

The Kremlin dismissed talk by Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy about a plan he has to end the war and said Russia would continue what it calls its ‘special military operation’ in Ukraine. Mr. Zelenskiy said on Tuesday he would present his plan  – full details of which he did not publicly disclose – to US president Biden and his two potential successors…

‘This is not the first time that we have heard such statements from representatives of the Kyiv regime. We are aware of the nature of the Kyiv regime,’ Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters when asked about Mr. Zelenskiy’s plan. ‘We are continuing our special military operation and will achieve all our goals.’.. Mr. Peskov also said Russia supported India’s view on the need for a peaceful settlement, but said it was ‘more than obvious’ that there was no basis for talks.”