Moscow’s Ukrainian Operation Marks the End of Multi-Polarity as Foreign Policy Principle of Former Soviet Republics, Knyazev Says

 Paul Goble

            Staunton, Mar. 27 – Since acquiring independence in 1991, the republics of Central Asia along with most of the other former Soviet republics have made multi-polarity the basis of their foreign policy, seeking to avoid taking sides between Russia and the West and hoping to win benefits from both, Aleksandr Knyazev says.

            But “February 24, 2022,” the date when Vladimir Putin sent Russian forces into Ukraine, “put an end to that,” the Moscow specialist on Central Asia says on the basis of an analysis prepared by St. Petersburg State University’s Center for Eurasian Research and the Information-Analytic Center of Moscow State University.

            Now, the possibilities for such an approach have been much reduced, and the countries of this region must make a choice between being on Russia’s side or being opposed to it (ng.ru/dipkurer/2022-03-27/11_8401_asia.html, casp-geo.ru/vozmozhnosti-ssha-v-obostrenii-krizisnyh-yavlenij-v-tsentralnoj-azii/ and ia-centr.ru/experts/aleksandr-knyazev/vozmozhnosti-ssha-v-obostrenii-krizisnykh-yavleniy-v-tsentralnoy-azii/).

            Of course, Knyazev says, it would be “utopian” to think that any of these countries would stop contacts with Western states. They may still be able to extract benefits from them; but they must all now recognize that they have no choice but to defer to Russian interests and concerns and to those of Russia’s ally, China. Failure to do so will have the most negative consequences.

            Knyazev’s remarks and the discussions on which they are based provide the most explicit discussion of Moscow’s understanding of what the former Soviet republics must accept in the new reality after the invasion of Ukraine. They must either line up behind Moscow or they must accept the fact that they too will be treated as enemies that Russia will deal with as such.