Europe made mistake over war in Ukraine in 2022 – Estonian president

Europe had an opportunity to start peace negotiations with Russia in spring 2022, when the Armed Forces of Ukraine pushed Russian troops back from the outskirts of the capital, but missed that chance, said Estonian President Alar Karis.

Source: European Pravda, citing an interview with Yle

Details: Karis said that when Russian troops had been pushed back from the outskirts of Kyiv, quite close to Russian territory, Europe had had the opportunity to bring the aggressor to the negotiating table, but now no one was sitting down for negotiations.

He added that Europe needed to develop a plan both for peace negotiations and for the post-war period.

The Estonian president said that the European Union had invested a great deal in Ukraine and that it could not be the case that, when the time came, the United States, Russia and perhaps some third country would be at the negotiating table while Europe would not be there at all.

He also expressed the view that relations with Russia would remain difficult for a long time, even if the war in Ukraine ended, stressing that it was important for Russia to change, as had happened with Nazi Germany.

Karis said that Nazi Germany had been an aggressor state and that after the Second World War, when the country's leadership had been punished, Germany had changed, joining NATO and the European Union in less than ten years.

Background: Earlier this year, Karis and Latvian Prime Minister Evika Siliņa called for the appointment of an EU special envoy for talks with Russia.

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