The West must respond to Putin’s defence of Nazi-Soviet pact, Minister Linkevičius tells The Guardian
Responding to recent comments made by Russian President Vladimir Putin, who defended the 1939 Soviet-Nazi non-aggression pact that included secret protocols dividing up Eastern Europe, Minister Linkevičius says that Western democracies cannot let Russia get away with such statements.
"[T]hey are part of a bigger narrative, under which the Russian leadership now seeks endorsement for its aggressive and revisionist foreign policy," Linkevičius wrote for The Guardian.
President Putin said during a meeting of young historians in Moscow that it was Britain’s and France’s policies regarding Germany that led to World War Two. Meanwhile the Soviet Union’s 1939 agreement with Germany, the so-called Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, was a legitimate foreign policy move by Moscow aimed at avoiding war, according to Putin.
"Two tiny details seem to be ignored in this evaluation," Minister Linkevičius says, "the secret protocols of the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact merely enslaved eastern Europe (by the Soviet Union, incidentally). Second, the pact led to the second world war. It was not an escape route by the Soviet Union, but instead a cold-blooded calculation to ignore Hitler’s growing appetite for territories."
Linkevičius insists that Western democracies risk becoming part of a similar pact today "by not doing enough to prevent it, and leaving the impression that anything is possible".
"The confidence with which Russia is acting now comes partly from our inability to stand by our values and principles. Russia applied similar tactics in the case of Georgia in 2008. We searched for ways to get back to normal quickly, hoping that “normal” was also the intention of the Russian regime. It turned out it was not. So unwillingly, we became part of their plan. History repeats itself now," according to Linkevičius.
He says that Moscow is breaching international rules by its actions in Ukraine. Last March, Russia annexed Crimean Peninsula and has been accused of inciting separatism in eastern Ukraine and providing military help to pro-Russian rebels.
"It is high time to put values ahead of a strategic partnership in our relations with Russia," Linkevičius insists. He suggest renewing Helsinki Accords – the 1975 agreement among 35 states aimed at establishing a basis for relations between the West and the USSR-led communist bloc – and providing Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia with opportunities to move closer to Europe, because "we need them stable and prosperous no less than they need us".
"By being steadfast in our values we can impel Russia to rethink its ambitions; by being mild we can encourage their cruellest actions," Lithuanian Foreign Minister Linkevičius concludes.
sourse: en.delfi.lt
