Last Week in Eastern Europe: May 6-12, 2024
Anti-Russian protests in Georgia swelled in size, Russia launched an assault of Ukraine's Kharkiv Oblast, and a Polish judge defected to Belarus
Note: Until now, I’ve been defining the area of coverage of this newsletter as Eastern European states to the west of Russia within continental Europe. I’m changing this slightly and will now include stories from Georgia and Armenia as well. Even though most of the territory of these countries lies outside of the geographically defined European continent, it is hard to ignore how much they share politically and culturally with the Eastern European experience. I will continue to exclude Azerbaijan however, because even though it is also a post-Soviet South Caucasus state, it has much more in common with the Turkic sphere.
What You Need To Know:
This roundup combines last week’s top news with important underreported stories
1. Georgia witnessed one of the largest protest in its history while the government escalated its crackdown on opposition figures
Protests against the ruling Georgian Dream party’s foreign agent law, and against the rule of the pro-Russian party itself, continued to grow to unprecedented levels in Georgia last week. Although conservative estimates stated that around 50,000 people attended one march on Saturday night in the country’s capital Tbilisi, other estimates placed the number of attendees at nearly 15% of the country’s entire population. As demonstrations have expanded however, ample video evidence of police brutality has emerged, as have instances of attacks against opposition figures, journalists, and academics along with a campaign of intimidation against protest participants.
Why it matters: The current protests were touched off by Georgian Dream’s reintroduction of a Russian-inspired bill that would require foreign-funded organizations to be declared foreign agents, however the demonstrations have since become broadly anti-government in nature. The demonstration wave has been compared to Ukraine’s 2014 Maidan protests, and like its Ukrainian counterpart, will be crucial for determining the country’s geopolitical future — while Georgian Dream, which has become increasingly pro-Russian since its first election in 2012, appears bent on pulling the country back into Russia’s orbit, the protest opposition views this as likely the last chance the country has to avoid derailing its EU accession efforts. Georgia’s ultimate fate is likely to be critical for the extent of Russia’s future influence across the South Caucasus region.
2. Russian forces launched a ground assault against Ukraine’s Kharkiv Oblast as Ukraine thwarted Zelensky’s assassination
On Friday, Russia launched its long anticipated offensive against Kharkiv Oblast in northeastern Ukraine, crossing into the region from Russian territory and engaging Ukrainian ground forces on the outskirts of the border town of Vovchansk. The offensive threatens a part of the region that had previously been recaptured by Ukrainian forces in late 2022, and is taking place alongside concurrent Russian advances further south along the Donbas front. This comes as Ukraine continued striking energy sites deep within Russia, 1400 km from the Ukrainian border. Also last week, Ukraine’s Zelensky fired the head of his State Guard Service after two bodyguards responsible for the president’s protection were found to have been plotting with Russia to assassinate him.
Why it matters: Although Russia is unlikely to be able to capture Kharkiv city itself with the amount of troops it has amassed for this offensive according to the Institute for the Study of War, it is primarily aiming to create the so-called “sanitary zone” Russian leaders have spoken of along the Ukrainian-Russian border and to draw Ukrainian troops away from the fights in the Donbas. Russia is also likely seeking to capitalize in whatever way it can on the remaining window of time before American weapons reach Ukrainian soldiers along the front. The effort to assassinate Zelensky is only the latest one since the start of Russia’s invasion, but is unlikely to be the last.
3. A high-ranking Polish judge defected to Belarus, prompting an emergency meeting of Poland’s special security services
Polish provincial administrative judge Tomasz Szmydt crossed the border from Poland and defected to Belarus on Monday to seek asylum, claiming he had been “persecuted'“ by Poland’s new government. Under the previously Polish government, Szmydt had been accused of participating in a campaign to smear other judges opposed to the ruling PiS party. Poland’s President Donald Tusk called an emergency meeting of the country’s security services in response, framing Szmydt’s defection as a symptom of years-long Russian and Belarusian influence within the Polish state.
Why it matters: Since his defection, Szmydt has praised the Russia-allied Belarusian government, and criticized Poland’s participation in the West’s support for Ukraine. Szmydt had reportedly been under a counterintelligence investigation by Poland’s security services for his ties to Belarus, and had apparently been slated for arrest. The fact that Szmydt had such connections to Belarus while actively working as a judge in Poland has raised red flags about his work and potential acts of espionage, and exposes potentially serious security lapses within Poland’s judicial architecture.
4. Chinese President Xi Jinping pledged to expand ties in Hungary and Serbia, but failed to yield on Ukraine during talks with France
In his first visit to Europe in five years, China’s President Xi Jinping made stopovers in Eastern Europe last week in Hungary and Serbia — two countries notable for their opposition to mainstream Western policies on Ukraine and Russia. Both Serbian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić pledged to expand political and economic ties with China including via new Belt and Road Initiative projects, and Xi declared Hungary to be the “the No. 1 target” in Central Eastern Europe for future Chinese investment. In France, Xi refused to change his position that the Russia-Ukraine war must be ended through negotiations, and offered no concessions on trade issues raised by France’s Emanuel Macron.
Why it matters: Xi’s visit underscores how the changes and political divides that have arisen in Europe over the last several years have impacted the continent’s relationship with China. Whereas trade disputes and China’s support of Russia since its invasion of Ukraine have tempered many Europeans’ desires to build ties with Beijing, illiberal governments that are distant from the European mainstream like Hungary and Serbia have doubled down on their economic cooperation with China. Such moves are indicative of China’s global bet on the emergence of a multi-polar world order, and Europe is just as fertile of a ground to invest in such divisions as anywhere else for Xi.
5. North Macedonia’s president reignited a diplomatic conflict with Greece by calling her state “Macedonia,” violating a 2018 agreement
After the country’s right-wing VMRO-DPMNE party made large gains in parliamentary elections in North Macedonia and saw its candidate elected president on Wednesday, president-elect Gordana Siljanovska-Davkova sparked tensions with neighboring Greece on Sunday before even being sworn in by referring to her country as “Macedonia,” the former name of the country that had officially been altered in 2019 to placate Greece. The Greek government condemned Siljanovska-Davkova’s statement, stating that it violated the 2018 Prespa Agreement during which the two countries agreed to North Macedonia’s name change.
Why it matters: For years, Greece had objected to the name “Macedonia” on the grounds that it appropriated historical Greek connections to the name, leading to years of uneasy relations between the two countries. The Prespa Agreement paved the way for North Macedonia to join NATO in 2020 and for it to begin accession talks to join the EU, so the stance of Siljanovska-Davkova and the VMRO-DPMNE, which never accepted the name change, has the potential to significantly upend North Macedonia’s international relations well beyond its relationship with Greece.
Other trends to watch:
— Tens of thousands of protestors in Armenia’s capital Yerevan called for Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan to resign on Thursday over his efforts to reach a long-term peace with Armenia’s neighbor Azerbaijan by demarcating the country’s eastern border and giving up some Armenian territory. Pashinyan has so far not yielded to protestors’ demands.
— Despite previously suspending their blockade of the Polish-Ukrainian border, Polish farmers continued to protest against EU policies and the government of Prime Minister Donald Tusk in Warsaw on Friday.
— Croatia’s far-right Homeland Movement stood positioned to form a coalition government with the ruling Croatian Democratic Union. The Homeland Movement has previously been accused of using Nazi-era chants and denying Croatian war crimes.
— The EU has taken steps to suspend Article 7 procedures against Poland, stating it was satisfied with rule of law reforms in the country since its new government took power in December.
— Apparently taking a page out of Russia’s playbook, Ukraine’s Justice Minister stated Ukraine could recruit up to 20,000 convicts to join the Ukrainian military.
— Lithuanian President Gitanas Nausėda won the first found of voting in the country’s presidential election on Sunday, securing his second and final term in office.
— Poland announced that it is building additional fortifications along its eastern border with Belarus to address migration and the Russo-Belarusian hybrid war against Poland.
— Moldova is likely to start EU accessions talks soon, according to senior European officials.