Ukraine needs to heed PM Modi’s April 2022 peace appeal

The war in Ukraine is having several unintended and unforeseen effects that are damaging to even the economies of the countries urging Ukraine to fight on.

 

New Delhi: As early as April 2022, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had publicly called for peace in Ukraine. It was clear from the absence of a rebuttal that President Vladimir Putin of the Russian Federation was open to such a call. Had President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine agreed with the Prime Minister rather than with the champions of war, Boris Johnson and Joe Biden, much blood

on the Ukrainian side would have been saved. A peace agreement between Ukraine and Russia that same month, that was acceptable to the Kremlin, was scuttled by then UK PM Boris Johnson and the President of the US, Joe Biden. Not that Zelenskyy was hesitant in turning down the peace offer, given the volumes of assistance in money and weapons Washington and London had promised to give him so as to continue the war. At the very onset of the Russia-Ukraine war, which began on 24 February 2022, the writer had said that NATO was ready to fight (Russia) to the last Ukrainian. NATO has now been split into pro-war and anti-war camps, the US being prominent in the latter and France and the UK in the former. Hence an amendment needs to be made, which is that Volodymyr Zelenskyy, President of what is left of Ukraine, appears determined to remain in office to the last Ukrainian. Now in the third year of the war, Ukraine is facing a demographic crisis as a consequence of men conscripted into the army losing their lives or limbs on the battlefield. Should the war get prolonged much longer, Ukraine would undergo the same demographic disaster as Germany did during the 1939-45 war begun by Hitler. While Chancellor Konrad Adenauer, followed by Ludwig Erhard, stabilised the shattered German economy and set it on the path to high growth, it is unlikely that Ukraine will follow a similar path. What is more likely is that the country will descend further into chaos, and lose still more citizens to relocation in other countries than has already taken place so far.

Despite being aware of such a reality, both the “Coalition of the Willing” (in effect, those countries assisting the process of Ukraine disintegrating) as well as Zelenskyy as yet  seem determined to press on in the search for a peace agreement which would suffer the fatal blow of being a peace agreement unacceptable to the Kremlin. The people of Ukraine have no say in such a decision, as Zelenskyy claims that it is impossible to conduct an election during wartime, thereby giving him another reason for continuing a war that he claims only his leadership will ensure continued EU support for. Meanwhile, although continuing the war appears to be the prevailing sentiment in those parts of Europe that remain fixated on the “Russian threat”, ignoring the much bigger one from China, few of their citizens are willing to accept the additional tax burden involved. Paying out of the interest collected by Russian assets in European banks is an easy way out, but this is getting exhausted. Should the principal follow in part or in whole, the global reputation of UK and European banks being safe havens for foreign depositors would be severely affected. Russian funds today, my funds tomorrow would be an understandable sentiment. This would principally benefit Chinese banks, including in Hong Kong, thereby giving the CCP a lever to blackmail such depositors, in the cases where doing so would promote CCP interests. The war in Ukraine is having several unintended and unforeseen effects that are damaging to even the economies of the countries urging Ukraine to fight on.

Three years on, it is clear that PM Modi was right as early as in April 2022 to urge an immediate peace. In the meantime, Ukraine has lost much territory besides the land lost after the Russian reaction to the 2014 Maidan coup. Given the loss of lives and treasure in Russia as well, President Putin clearly has expanded his April 2022 war aims. However, a new window for peace has emerged because of the peace call by US President Donald Trump. The inducements offered by Trump to Russia may be sufficient for the Kremlin to halt the war within weeks. To facilitate this, it is time for President Zelenskyy to begin the process of stopping the carnage and the ruin of what is left of his country. He could do this by changing his place of residence from Kiev to London. He could resign and hand over power to a successor who would be tasked with ensuring a free election. For only such an election would be acceptable to the Ukrainian people, rather than yet another gerrymandered outcome, as has been the norm since 2014. The problems that the “Maidan Revolution” caused would then be given a chance of getting reversed. The successor government to Zelenskyy after a free election could speedily work out a peace deal between Ukraine and Russia, while there is still a country and not a shambles left. Had Ukraine listened to PM Modi in April 2022, many Ukrainian lives could have been saved from elimination or ruin. The time has come, although three years late, for Ukrainian leaders to listen to PM Modi this time around and not to the calls for war  emanating from London and Paris. Were they to do this, a once beautiful country, Ukraine, still has a chance of escaping irreversible chaos. A chance that is getting slimmer with each passing month of a war that was unwinnable for Ukraine from the start.