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Former British Prime Minister (PM) Boris Johnson. Photo/REUTERS
LONDON – The West should have pressured Russia at the beginning of the Ukraine crisis nine years ago instead of waiting for large-scale hostilities to break out in 2022.
The claim was made by former British Prime Minister (PM) Boris Johnson on Thursday (26/1/2023).
Speaking to Ukraine’s Rada TV Channel, Johnson claimed such punishment “would be serious, but we didn’t do anything about it,” referring to events in 2014 in Donbass and Crimea.
At that time, the Western-backed coup in Kiev sparked a popular uprising in eastern Ukraine and caused Crimea to secede from Ukraine and join Russia.
“What sanctions did we impose (in 2014)? They launched a diplomatic mockery called the Normandy process and achieved nothing. And (Russian President Vladimir) Putin concluded that the West would not stop him. It was a mistake,” he explained, adding that this “fundamental lesson” was learned by all parties.
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“This diplomatic process is not going anywhere. People realized one big lesson: we failed in 2014, we failed to do what was necessary,” he said.
The Normandy peace process, involving Russia, Ukraine, Germany and France, was an attempt to resolve hostilities in Donbass.
As a result, in 2014 and 2015 the parties successfully signed the now defunct Minsk Agreement.
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