In 2014, Russia illegally annexed Crimea, six years after the NATO summit in Bucharest – where members signaled that Ukraine and Georgia should be made NATO allies in the future – and immediately following then Ukraine President Viktor Yanukovych’s ouster, stemming from public upheaval over Yanukovych’s refusal to sign an association agreement that would draw Ukraine closer to the European Union. Today, Ukraine still seeks NATO membership. Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration, Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze, tells The Cipher Brief that progress is being made and that the U.S. is helping prep Ukraine for full NATO membership.
The Cipher Brief: What is Ukraine’s historical and current relationship with NATO?
Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze: Ukraine and NATO have been developing our partnership since the 1990s. In 1997, we signed the Charter on a Distinctive Partnership between Ukraine and NATO. The relationship was developing pretty intensively, but unfortunately, during 2013 and the beginning of 2014 under the Yanukovych presidency, a lot of our cooperation with NATO was destroyed. And unfortunately at that point, our relationship became more protocol in nature, rather than substantive.
Only after the start of the Russian aggression against Ukraine (which began with the illegal annexation of Crimea in late February/beginning of March 2014) and Yanukovych fled the country, was there renewed impetus to our cooperation with NATO. Since then, our relationship has been developing pretty extensively in different spheres – both militarily and in non-military spheres. For example, quite a few programs to develop capabilities in scientific fields were conducted with NATO and the Russian Federation. At some point, NATO stopped doing this with Russia, and now quite a few of those programs have been used in cooperation with Ukraine.
NATO has also been providing us with quite a lot of advisory assistance to develop our strategic documents here in Ukraine, like a national security strategy, a military doctrine, and a concept of the development of armed forces and the security sector. The crowning moment of this advisory work – in terms of strategic documents – was the preparation of the strategic defense bulletin that was finished at the end of May 2016. It was presented to our allies in mid-June during the meeting of Ministers of Defense at the NATO-Ukraine Commission, where it was well-received by our partners in the alliance.
Meanwhile, five new trust funds have been established that are tackling the needs of the defense, military, and security sectors – like helping Ukraine build a new logistics system for its armed forces, helping Ukraine establish the command and control system, and dealing with those issues that appeared after the aggression of the Russian Federation (for example, the rehabilitation of wounded soldiers). Another trust fund was established on cyber security.
Each of the trust funds has a lead nation. That doesn’t mean that country is necessarily providing most of the finances to that particular trust fund, but the lead country is responsible for conducting all of the cooperation with Ukraine on the behalf of NATO and for raising additional financial contributions from other member states. Each of the trust funds has its own pool of resources that different member states pledge to it. For example, in the trust fund on cyber security, Romania is the lead nation. In the trust fund for medical rehabilitation, Bulgaria is the lead nation. Then the other member states, NATO partner nations, and even other nations not typically associated with NATO contribute additional money to the funds, depending on the needs of each fund.
At the NATO heads of state meeting just a month ago in Warsaw, the new Comprehensive Assistance Package (CAP) for Ukraine was approved by the heads of state gathered there. That package includes all of the ongoing programs between Ukraine and NATO, and at the same time, it provides for the establishment of additional trust funds and initiatives. In addition, a meeting of the NATO-Ukraine Commission on the highest level took place during the Warsaw Summit.
But our cooperation with NATO is not exclusively limited to the alliance as a whole; it is also developing in terms of our relationship with particular NATO member states. And that constitutes a pretty big number of activities and initiatives. For example, the U.S. and Canada are training our officers and our soldiers, as well as helping us establish special operations forces. We are also establishing the Ukraine-Polish-Lithuanian brigade, which will be able to participate in different activities and different trainings of the alliance. And over more than 20 years of cooperation, we’ve always been part of the different out-of-area operations that NATO conducts. For example, we are continuing to be part of the training and advisory mission of NATO in Afghanistan. We highly value this kind of cooperation, and we believe even at the present moment in time – when we’ve had the aggression of the Russian Federation on our territory and we have to focus predominantly on defending ourselves – we still believe it is extremely important to be a part of other NATO activities, and that’s why we are keeping our presence in all of those.
TCB: Was there any kind of timeline discussed at the Warsaw Summit for when Ukraine could become a full NATO member?
IK: There were two very important outcomes of the Summit for Ukraine. The meeting of the NATO-Ukraine Commission at the highest level during the Summit was already a demonstration of the high importance that NATO is placing on Ukraine. Approval of CAP – the Comprehensive Assistance Package – is an important part of that, because it tackles about 40 different strategic directions in which NATO will be providing either financial or practical or advisory assistance to Ukraine.
Another outcome of that commission meeting was that we have a common political statement by the NATO countries that expresses full support of the territorial integrity, sovereignty, and independence of Ukraine within the internationally recognized borders. It also expresses that NATO views the Russian Federation as responsible for the aggression in the Crimean territory. These are very important messages.
There was no specific discussion on either the Membership Action Plan (MAP) or membership timing for Ukraine during this particular summit, but I’m glad that in the documents there is a referral to the decisions of the previous NATO summits, including the Bucharest Summit of 2008, where it was very clearly stated that Ukraine and Georgia will become NATO members.
Right now we trying to reach NATO standards internally here. Once we have achieved this, then we believe it will be up to the Ukrainian people to decide about NATO membership in a referendum, and then it will be up to NATO to decide to grant Ukraine a MAP and full membership. It’s very important that all of the reforms we are conducting right now are according to our documents that have been adopted and have been prepared in cooperation with NATO advisors. That is to say, Ukraine is conducting the internal reform that is needed to be eligible to at some point apply for membership.
TCB: What is the relationship within NATO between Ukraine and the U.S.? What specific activities is the U.S. conducting with Ukraine?
IK: With regards to the U.S.-Ukraine relationship, I think it has probably been the most intensive cooperation out of NATO member states in areas connected to defense and security sector reforms. In this area – as I said – we have assistance from the U.S. in establishing special operations forces. We also have assistance with not only NATO advisors, but with specific advisors from the U.S. who are here on the ground, and with the training of our officers and our soldiers.
The U.S. also participates in different trust funds. I’m talking specifically about the defense sector now. But U.S. engagement to support Ukraine and Ukraine’s reforms is really a wide-scale exercise. It covers a lot of areas: in judicial reform, in customs reform, in police reform, with the electoral system, in strategic communications – and I’m afraid that I’m not naming even half of them right now.
We are also getting defensive weapons – like active radar equipment and military gear equipment for soldiers, such as night vision goggles – from the U.S. But so far, we have not yet been successful in securing assistance with lethal weapons, which we believe are important to be able to defend our country.
TCB: So you’re still attempting to secure lethal weapons from the U.S.?
IK: Yes.
TCB: With the recent events in Europe – the Brexit (Britain’s vote to leave the European Union), the attack in Nice, the attempted coup in Turkey – how do you see the future of NATO developing?
IK: Unfortunately, all of these events that are happening right now in Europe are undermining the strength of the European Union. It’s up to European Union nations to demonstrate solidarity and unity with each other and to try to get out of these challenges they are facing – including the migration waves, the terrorist attacks, and the Brexit vote. They must see their future in concert with each other and come up with clear goals and procedures for overcoming those challenges together.
But I think that in terms of NATO, all of these challenges are actually making NATO stronger. This is being demonstrated by the response that we are seeing right now to multiple challenges and by all of those decisions made during the latest two NATO summits, in Wales and in Warsaw. I think that NATO nations are very serious about their obligations and their earlier decisions to provide protection to each other and create additional capabilities to protect and defend themselves, in order to play this role of a highly organized military-political alliance (the political part is also very important to remember). So I do not foresee any attempts for breaking or destructing NATO from within.