ROME, March 22./TASS/. European Union leaders have been taking action to escalate the conflict in Ukraine instead of trying to settle it, Alessandro Orsini, Director of the Observatory on International Security at Luiss University, said in an interview with the Libero newspaper.
Orsini posted the full text of the interview on his Facebook page (a social media site banned in Russia since it is owned by Meta corporation deemed extremist by the Russian authorities).
"Up until now, Brussels has been working only towards a war - supplying weapons to Ukraine, spreading Western propaganda and using sanctions. This does nothing for achieving peace," Orsini said. "Russians and Europeans should be brothers, while Italy should be a bridge between them," the expert pointed out. According to him, the conflict must be settled through negotiations, and as a result sanctions against Russia should be lifted or mitigated.
Orsini stressed that he did not support the Russian military operation in Ukraine. "But I also condemn Brussels, which manages the crisis inadequately. [European Commission President] Ursula von der Leyen does not protect the interests of the Europeans. She and [former German Chancellor Angela] Merkel must bear responsibility for many things," Orsini believes.
He was among the first to come up with a reasoned condemnation of the West’s role in the Ukrainian crisis. He came under attacks from the media and politicians, while the prestigious LUISS University in Rome suspended him from work. "I introduced a new paradigm - many people look at the war with different eyes due to my counter-narrative <…>. It scares me that universities censor teachers in accordance with the up-to-the-minute mood of social networks. This is a new form of totalitarianism," Orsini stressed.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said on February 24 that in response to a request by the heads of the Donbass republics he had made a decision to carry out a special military operation in Ukraine, stressing that Moscow had no plans of occupying Ukrainian territories. Putin said that the goals of the operation are demilitarization and denazification of Ukraine. Subsequently, the United States, the European Union, the United Kingdom and some other countries started imposing sanctions on Russian individuals and companies.