‘EU’s darkest hour’ Bloc’s response to Russia savaged as Putin threat explodes

Johnson: Clear evidence that Russia is planning to invade Ukraine

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The threat of a new war has exploded with fears surging Russia is preparing to invade Ukraine as part of a long-running feud with its eastern neighbour. Russia has massed around 130,000 of its own troops along the border with Ukraine – despite President Vladimir Putin insisting he has no plans to escalate the crisis any further. This has not deterred Western powers, who are warning an invasion could be imminent and warning Russia that such a move would see it hit with crippling sanctions from all over the world.

But the EU has come under furious attack over its lacklustre response to the threat from Russia by Colonel Richard Kemp, a former infantry commander and chairman of the Cobra Intelligence Group.

He lashed out at Emmanuel Macron, highlighting that since his meeting with Mr Putin last week, he has been pressing Ukraine to implement the Minsk accords, brokered by France and Germany in 2015, “as Russian forces and their proxies fought in eastern Ukraine”.

Colonel Kemp argued an implementation of the Minsk accords “would see an end to Kiev’s sovereignty” and would give Russia a say in running the country and its foreign policy and hand seats in parliament to Moscow’s proxies”.

The chairman of the Cobra Intelligence Group raged in an article for The Telegraph: “It is extraordinary that Macron, whose country now holds the EU Council presidency, should entertain such gunpoint bartering of a democratic nation’s integrity.

“He has a track record of failed conciliations with Russia and has recently suggested there is ‘legitimacy’ in the Kremlin’s concerns over a putative threat from NATO.

“It must be obvious to him that Putin will not be mollified by such appeasement and that even if President Zelenskiy were to accede to Minsk it would not end there.

“But Macron has elections in April and perhaps believes that a Chamberlain style proclamation of peace for our time might secure victory for him.”

Colonel Kemp took a swipe at Germany who he said has looked happy to go along with this “grand bargain”, and believes the German Government is “desperate to placate Putin, having allowed an increasing dependence on Russian energy supplies”.

Referring to the Nordstream 2 gas pipeline, he said: “While some have proposed the pipeline’s termination if Russia invades, Chancellor Scholz has been reluctant to express such a warning, falling back on the unsustainable excuse that it is a ‘privately managed commercial project’.

“Germany has also poured cold water on the idea of cutting Russia out of the Swift banking system, which would be a powerful deterrent, threatening to hit its economy hard.”

Colonel Kemp also argued the three EU presidents have been “remarkably quiet since Putin mobilised in November”, pointing much of his focus towards Josep Borrell, the High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy.

He said the EU boss has “spoken of European unity over this crisis as well as ‘serious consequences’ and ‘massive costs’ in the event of Russian aggression.

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“Does he think we haven’t noticed Brussels’s failure to respond to years of Russian-sponsored violence against Ukraine?”

Colonel Kemp concluded: “For eastern European states know that ultimately, America alone guarantees their security while the EU compromises it – and that America’s readiness to underwrite defence in Europe will be worn down by continued unwillingness of Europeans to confront their own enemies.

“This time of appeasement, silence, impotence and disunity in the face of one of the largest aggressive troop concentrations in Europe since the Second World War is perhaps the EU’s darkest hour.

“Putin may or may not invade in the coming weeks or months, but one thing is for sure: he will not be deterred from doing so by Brussels. Even Borrell admits that for Russia, the EU “doesn’t exist or is not relevant.

“Borrell and his fellow EU elites may think that if war comes to Ukraine, they will be protected.

“But the war would come to them as well, bringing the greatest crisis they have yet faced, with estimates of up to five million refugees fleeing westwards from Ukraine.”

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