Putin tightens his grip in Europe’s neglected war zone

Bloomberg

As world leaders commemorate a century since the war that was supposed to end all wars, a conflict on Europe’s eastern periphery is getting more deeply entrenched.
The breakaway region of Donbas in eastern Ukraine will hold elections on Sunday, the same day as the World War I Armistice event in Paris. Separatists backed by Russia are seeking to legitimise—and normalise—their control of two self-declared republics, Donetsk and Luhansk, after four years of fighting. The US has called the votes “phony.” Russia has called them a necessity.
Billboards in Donetsk are urging people to “vote for Donbas with a Russian heart.” Citizens are given promises of a more affordable life and decent pensions in “a peaceful republic.” The election is “just another step in what Russia has been doing as a process in the Donbas,” said Otilia Dhand, an analyst at political-risk consultancy Teneo Intelligence in Brussels. “This is replacing the first order of revolutionaries and separatists” with a group of “political nominees they want to administer the territory.”
Ukraine marks the fault line between Russian power and western influence, particularly since millions took to the streets in two revolutions in 14 years. But in the new world order of Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, the conflict in the former Soviet state is an increasingly forgotten one, frozen in time with no peace in sight and with Russia tightening its grip.
The armed confrontation has left at least 10,000 people dead and derailed any vague hope of Ukraine’s accession to the European Union and NATO. Daily shelling still occurs. At least 39 civilians were killed and 166 wounded so far this year, the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe said
last month. Russia rejects calls for a UN peacekeeping force on the border between the two countries.
While international sanctions against Russia remain in place, Ukraine hasn’t been a priority for Trump in his relationship with Putin. Both men will be in Paris this weekend, though it’s unclear if they will hold any talks before a fuller meeting at the Group of 20 summit at the end of this month.
Whatever happens, Ukraine is unlikely to be high up the agenda and the country has turned into collateral damage in the shift in US foreign policy.
The man expected to become head of state in the self-declared Donetsk People’s Republic is Denis Pushilin, the Kremlin-backed interim leader.
In neighbouring Luhansk, it’s Leonid Pasechnik, who was formerly in charge of the anti-smuggling department at Ukraine’s security services and talks about integrating with Russia.
Pushilin replaced Aleksandr Zakharchenko after he was assassinated by a bomb at a cafe in August. Unlike Zakharchenko, the 37-year-old doesn’t wear army fatigues and doesn’t boast about his military abilities.
Before becoming a politician, he worked for a successor of a Russian Ponzi scheme company MMM, which cost its clients millions of dollars in the early 1990s.