MOSCOW, March 5. /TASS/. A ceasefire in Ukraine will not guarantee that the situation will not escalate again in a few years, so a long-term solution is necessary, Karin Kneissl, former Austrian foreign minister and head of the Geopolitical Observatory for Russia's Key Issues (G.O.R.K.I.) center at St. Petersburg State University, told TASS.
"The conflict has multiple causes and is deeply rooted in history. The US keeps talking about ‘a ceasefire,’ while Russia - for reasons that are quite clear to me - is unwilling to just declare a ceasefire because it could start all over again in a couple of years," she pointed out. "We are all aware of what happened to the Minsk Agreements made 11 years ago, so there is a need for a broader solution," Kneissl added.
She pointed to a remark by the US president’s National Security Advisor Mike Waltz who had earlier spoken about the need for new security mechanisms in Europe. According to the ex-top Austrian diplomat, "what is necessary is something similar to what existed 50 years ago, the Final Act of Helsinki Conference, which became the basis for the OSCE (Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe - TASS)." "That event had a significant impact on global politics, perhaps even preventing a larger nuclear confrontation," the former Austrian foreign minister emphasized.
Kneissl admitted that today, the situation is completely different from what it was in 1975. "However, both the rhetoric and the approach seem to be making it clear that Washington and Moscow are in search of a new way to shape their relations. If we look at the current situation, we will see that just a few countries play the dominant role in the new world order, but not the European Union," she noted, adding that it was completely the EU’s fault.
"We are witnessing highly interesting developments but no one is hiding the fact that it’s a hard way to go and the journey will be full of obstacles. Still, diplomatic channels have started working again, which is the most important thing," Kneissl concluded.