The world must encourage a diplomatic settlement that halts further bloodshed
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s rigid stance has left his country with limited choices, pushing Ukraine further into crisis. His approach to diplomacy has been confrontational, straining relations even with key allies. His refusal to negotiate and his aggressive posture have closed doors that could have led to a peaceful resolution of the ongoing conflict.
Zelenskyy’s Background and Rise to Power
Andrey Kortunov:
A Failed Journey to the West
Born on January 25, 1978, in ...
There’s an irony of fate as the old rivals again look for common ground
For years, Russian-American relations seemed to be in an irreversible coma. Diplomacy was dead, overtaken by hostility, sanctions, and a growing risk of military confrontation. Many insisted that nothing could break this trajectory — Moscow and the Washington were locked into an unchangeable course of conflict.
Yet today, the ...
... contingents of individual NATO countries on Ukrainian territory. They could play a supporting role and not appear on the line of combat contact, but the prospect of any agreements given such conditions becomes quite illusory.
Ivan Timofeev:
Why Multilateral Diplomacy Is in Crisis
Fourth—the emptiness of individual “chips” in the negotiating game. For example, Washington may agree that Ukraine will not be invited to NATO. However, in the current conditions, Kiev is unlikely to receive such an invitation ...
... field of resolving security issues and responding to common challenges. UN, as the only universal international organisation, was the key institutional structure for multilateral diplomacy. The end of the bloc confrontation between the USSR and the USA gave hope that multilateral diplomacy would not be hampered by the contradictions of the leading centres of power. Thirty years later, multilateral diplomacy is in crisis, and has yielded to “classical” balance of power diplomacy.
Andrey Kortunov:
Multilateralism in the Era ...
... live in response to the American policy of containment, which includes the building of anti-Chinese alliances. Here, American diplomacy will try to place its bets, including in India. However, India is too large and powerful a country to play a passive ... ... contradictions. Apparently, we are only at the beginning of an exacerbation. After all, the real fight between the two key rivals—the USA and China—is yet to come. One can argue for a long time about what is the root cause of the increase in deterrence—mistakes ...
... the mainstream expert community in Russia to open up to the West anytime soon
At the height of the Cold War, the Esalen Institute made a difference in Soviet-US relations, initiating and maintaining some of them through Esalen Track-2 and Track-1.5 Diplomacy.
Today Multi-Track Diplomacy remains of interest. Track-2 and Track-1.5 Diplomacy seem to complement and support Track-1 efforts by creating a favorable environment for negotiations, generating creative ideas, building trust, and generating ...
The growing gap between the ends that the US seeks in international relations and the means that it has available is particularly striking in the case of the so-called dual containment policy that Washington now pursues toward Russia and China
A couple of days ago, a Quad summit meeting in Sydney scheduled for May 24 was abruptly canceled. The US president had to pull out of his long-anticipated trip to Australia and Papua New Guinea. Instead, the heads of the four Quad member states got together...
... possible in 1958, whereas in 2023, as things stand now (although there’s no harm in dreaming, to be sure), it appears unrealistic. Who knows, maybe the ghosts of science diplomats of the postwar era would suggest a way to remedy the situation?
Science diplomacy is about people
The final stage of negotiating the Lacy-Zarubin agreement commenced on October 28, 1957 and took three months. On the U.S. side, the senior official was William Sterling Lacy, East-West Exchange Advisor to U.S. Secretary of State ...
... transformation stage some 10 years ago, anticipating global changes in the overall international system. As a global leader in the number of conflicts and potential crises, nations of the Middle East know the price of the current changes and strive to use diplomacy, mediation, and pragmatism to mitigate crises, including in the conflict in Ukraine.
Mediators
Aleksandr Aksenenok:
U.S. Policy Case for Middle East under New Conditions
On September 21–22, Russia and Ukraine exchanged the largest number ...
... well as threats to send more American and NATO troops to Eastern Europe. By doing that, the West doubles down on its initial refusal to accommodate Russian demands to stop the “military cultivation” of Ukraine and amassing NATO infrastructure on the ... ... “credibility of deterrence”, something that the parties are so willing to demonstrate to the other side, may turn from a buttress of diplomacy to its kiss of death.
