Ukraine

Lord Anderson of Swansea Excerpts

Monday 13th October 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend, and I have of course read his contributions earlier this year to the debate on the crisis in Ukraine. In direct answer to his question, I understand that the Russians are now pulling back some of their troops from the border with Ukraine. There have been some thousands of Russian troops on the Russian side of the border with Ukraine, and we are of course aware that there are hundreds of Russian troops within Ukraine. Unfortunately the Russians are seeking to do a bit of smoke and mirrors and will not admit that they are there, but they are there. My understanding is that those on the Russian side of the border have been told that they will be pulling back, and some have moved; let us see how many. Is this really the end of a summer exercise or are they there just waiting for a return?

[Lord Anderson of Swansea (Lab)]

My Lords, senior Russians have said that Ukraine is not a real country and have been very ambivalent about the democratically elected President. If that is so, and if there had been negotiations at the outset, what would have been the purpose? Is it the Government’s view that, from the outset, Russia had the intention to annex Crimea and to destabilise those parts of eastern Ukraine that have a Russophone majority?

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

My Lords, the position of Ukraine is clear, it is a sovereign state, and Russia has sought to undermine that by its illegal annexation of the Crimea. The noble Lord tempts me to try to go into the mind of Mr Putin as regards his ultimate plans not only for Ukraine but for all the other countries that were once within the USSR. Clearly, from the very beginning, we entered into negotiations in good faith to try to ensure that the sovereignty of Ukraine was maintained. It is Russia that has broken the UN declaration. It is in breach of the UN; it is also in breach of international law. In all the discussions that we have carried forward, what we have tried to achieve is to give the Ukrainian people and the Ukrainian Government space within which, in a ceasefire, they can work to have elections. President Poroshenko said that those parliamentary elections will be on 26 October.