"The outcome and extent of the Ukraine crisis are not foreseeable".
Putin's ambiguous threats continue to dominate current crisis diplomacy, says security expert Prof. Dr. Andreas Wenger from ETH Zurich. Military interventions in Ukraine on a local or larger scale cannot be ruled out.
According to Andreas Wenger, the upcoming meeting this Friday between the foreign ministers of the US and Russia will not be the last chance but a puzzle piece in more sessions to come. The evolution of the meetings depends on how the crisis itself evolves. The intensity and extent of a possible Russian intervention will determine the counterreaction of the US. In principle, neither the US nor Russia are interested in escalating the Ukrainian crisis.
Wenger states that the Russian threats about a possible intervention are still very unspecific. However, the ambiguity of the threats sets up the pressure. Probably, the goal is to reach control over Ukraine and Belarus without escalating the situation or the strategic relationship to the US. The insecurity about the future outcome and extent of the Ukrainian crisis is enormous, and Wenger dares not to make any predictions.
Read the whole interview (German) on external pageSRF News.