Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has had a brutal few weeks. Earlier this month, his justice and energy ministers were caught in a corruption investigation in which they allegedly obtained kickback payments totalling $100 million (€87 million) from companies that built defences against the Russian invasion. The scheme was reportedly overseen by Tymur Mindich, a longtime associate of Zelensky’s.
Things got worse for the Ukrainian president as parliamentary opposition forces called for the dismissal of his entire government, his chief of staff, and the formation of a unity government. Currently, Zelensky’s party – Servant of the People – has a slight majority in the parliament. But that majority was built on an election in far-off 2019; while Zelensky has argued Ukraine cannot hold elections in wartime, pointing to the United Kingdom, he has ignored the fact that the UK had a cross-party coalition during that time.
Finally, a leaked peace proposal – reportedly hashed out between the Trump administration and the Kremlin – would see Ukraine turn the entirety of the Donbas over to Russia, halve its army, and force the adoption of Russian as an official language, in return for vague American security guarantees.
The backdrop to this has been Ukraine’s accession to the European Union; while the EU has never formally said it must wait until the end of the war, it is clear that the Union cannot take in Ukraine while Russia is actively invading it. This may lead some in Brussels quietly to encourage Ukraine to take the deal, even if it is painful, as it will allow accession to take off.
This would be a mistake. Whether they take the deal or not, it is long past time for the country’s boosters in Brussels and Washington to take a long look at some hard truths about Ukraine.
Firstly, they need to understand the depths of the country’s corruption. Ukraine has been, for the entirety of its independence, been a deeply, deeply corrupt country. Many establishmentarians may blanch at this claim; after all, it is one of Russia’s primary allegations. Russia has launched many false allegations, many of which I have refuted repeatedly; but this allegation is correct. Ukraine’s corruption is long and deep. Even its positive figures have been corrupt: After a visit to the country in 1994, Richard Nixon wrote to President Bill Clinton declaring that then-President Leonid Kravchuk was “unusually honest,” but quickly added a sidenote that he did “not refer to financial honesty but to political honestly”. Blatant corruption was commonplace, and was so bad that Nixon felt the Ukrainian parliament was “worse” than Russia’s.
By the end of the 2010s, before Russia’s full-scale invasion, things had gotten only marginally better. Officials were constantly found to be corrupt, and in 2018 at least one-third of Ukraine’s economy was estimated to be part of the “shadow economy” (a nice phrase for “black market”). The cause for this is arguably similar to the issues faced by post-colonial African states, which are likewise extremely corrupt. Ukraine – which itself is essentially a post-colonial state – was suddenly created after its colonist had drawn artificial borders. Those who could quickly seize money and power did so, and while those initial figures have passed on, the illegal structures and means they established have continued.
By taking Ukraine into the EU, Brussels will also be taking Ukraine’s incredible corruption. That Zelensky’s team is corrupt is telling: He came into the office promising a completely new way of being, and his party politically eviscerated the Ukrainian old guard. His team likewise turning out to be corrupt indicates how deep the rot is in Ukraine’s governance.
Which brings us to the second hard truth: Ukrainians do not want to stay in Ukraine. Millions have fled during the conflict, and less than half of those refugees desire to return. While most of those were initially women and children, men are now also increasingly fleeing; One Ukrainian politician revealed that up to four out of five draftees are fleeing the army. And now, Zelensky is allowing men 18 to 22 to leave the country, ensuring that millions more will likely depart as well.
This will have two effects: One, effectively to kneecap Ukraine’s ability to prosecute the war long-term. But secondly, it will make a real recovery nearly impossible. Ukraine has lost at least eight million people in total. Before the war, it had 42 million in its internationally-recognised borders; now, that number stands at 34 million. In the territory it actually controls, the number is even lower, at 29 million. That is a precipitous 13 million person drop, and there is no reason to think that – in a post-war, destroyed country which has lost its industrial regions to Russia – it will not get even lower. If Ukraine joins the EU, it will cause two simultaneous events: One, to allow all Ukrainians to travel throughout the EU at will, encouraging even more to leave. And two, it will leave the EU almost entirely on the hook for rebuilding Ukraine (why would the United States pay anything to help an EU member develop?).
Ukraine is a deeply corrupt state with a rapidly diminishing population. EU accession now will make rebuilding hard, as it will likely allow for a larger refugee flow into the European Union, and will put Brussels on the hook for rebuilding a practically empty country. This is not even to mention that Brussels would be on the hook for defending Ukraine from any further Russian incursions. If Russia deemed such actions possible, and Brussels failed to act, it could undermine the integrity of the Union itself, causing a chain reaction which could end the entire project.
Is the potential end of the European Union really worth accession? For the past three years, Brussels has been able to entertain fantasies to this end. But it’s now time to face the tragic reality.
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