‘We’ll Talk About This Later’: EU’s Borrell Sweeps Aside Security Guarantees for Russia

In late 2021, Moscow sent Washington and its allies two draft treaties on security guarantees designed to dramatically reduce tensions between Russia and the Western bloc. Weeks later, Kiev massed troops along the contact line in Donbass and began to intensively shell the region, prompting Russia to kick off a military operation in Ukraine.

The end of the crisis in Ukraine will be achieved through “security guarantees for Ukraine,” not Russia, European Union foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell has said.

“As for Russia, we’ll talk about that later,” the EEU’s top diplomat told attendees of a symposium in Paris on Monday. “The end of this conflict will have to be done in compliance with international legality,” Borrell added, claiming this would include Moscow being made to pay “reparations” to Kiev, face “war crimes” trials, and withdrawing its forces.

Borrell also said that the crisis in Ukraine has solidified its “place in the EU.”

“It is written. History has decided for us,” he said.

Borrell’s comments appeared to be a direct rebuke of French President Emmanuel Macron, who said Saturday that he and his US counterpart Joe Biden sought to flesh out “the security architecture in which we want to live tomorrow,” and discussed “guarantees of security for Russia” if and when Moscow “returns to the table” for talks.

“One of the essential points is the fear that NATO will be at its door, and the deployment of weapons that can threaten Russia,” Macron said.

The French president received flak from Kiev over his comments, but slapped down Ukrainian officials’ objections. “I think we should not…try to create controversy where there is none,” he said at a summit in Tirana on Tuesday.

Borrell’s latest remarks weren’t the first time the top EU diplomat has called for an aggressive approach in Ukraine. In April, as some Western leaders encouraged Moscow and Kiev to resolve the crisis through negotiations, Borrell instead called for a military solution, saying “this war will be won on the battlefield” and pledging another €500 million in military support to Ukraine. Since then, the EU has sent over €29 billion in aid to Kiev.

Russian officials have repeatedly slammed Borrell for his "undiplomatic" approach. In May, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov reminded him that he was the bloc’s “top diplomat, and not the European Union’s military leader.”

Security Guarantees

Next week will mark the one year anniversary of Russia’s delivery of a pair of draft security treaties to the US and NATO designed to dramatically reduce tensions between Moscow and the Western bloc. The documents, released publicly by the Russian Foreign Ministry, proposed legally binding commitments by each side not to deploy troops, equipment, warships, missile systems, and aircraft in areas where they may be seen as a threat to the other side, and asked Washington to pledge not to continue NATO’s eastward expansion, including in Ukraine. The document also asked parties to explicitly affirm that they do not consider one another adversaries.

NATO and Washington rejected the proposals in January, and stressed that the bloc’s “open door” policy will not change. Weeks later, the Donbass republics reported an unprecedented escalation in shelling, sabotage, and sniper attacks by Ukrainian forces along the line of contact, and began the evacuation of hundreds of thousands of civilians to Russia. The Kremlin expressed concerns that Ukrainian troops were amassing in apparent preparation for an all-out assault on Donbass, while NATO announced plans for new battle group deployments in the region. On February 24, 2022, citing threats to Donbass posed by the Kiev regime, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a special military operation in Ukraine aimed at demilitarizing the country and "de-Nazifying" its leadership.

In the nine-and-a-half months since, Moscow has repeatedly expressed readiness to restart talks, with Russia's core conditions including no NATO membership for Ukraine, security for Donbass, and recognition of Crimea as Russia. Kiev and its benefactors have rejected these conditions.