The results achieved so far in implementing the Association Agreements in Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia do not seem to alarm the Russian authorities, political pundit Dionis Cenușa says in an analysis article for IPN Agency.
According to him, the democracies of these countries stagnate under the pressure of oligarchic groups, while the rule of law is fragile owing to corruption and/or politicized anti-corruption institutions.
On the contrary, Russia is looking for methods to benefit from access to the European market that is offered by the Agreements, especially because the economic sanctions affect an increasing number of Russian companies and businessmen.
Moldova seems to be the first country to which Russia would like to return, most probably after the parliamentary elections of February 2019, while Georgia could be the next if the tendency to soften the official positon towards Moscow continues, estimates the expert.
Russia’s influence weakens Ukraine the most. In this country Russia wages a hybrid war designed to collapse the country modernization and Ukrainian national-building policies meant to separate from the Russian civilizational monopoly.
The politologist noted Ukraine’s weaknesses reside not in the power of Moscow, but in the endemic corruption whose rooting out necessities financial resources, reformed institutions, upright political parties and time. For these reasons, the Kremlin will keep the military intervention in Donbass and will try to replicate the “Transnistrian model”.
The Association Agreements with the EU will meet with additional impediments if the geopolitical alternative provided by Russia becomes attractive or at least compatible. This way, the latent integration of Moldova into the Eurasian Union and of Armenia in advanced formats of cooperation with the EU could become a source of inspiration for those political forces that aim to reach the economic benefits available in the EU, but inspire themselves actively from non-democratic political practices that are usual in Russia, concluded Dionis Cenușa.
