No Recognition of Redrawn Ukraine Borders, G7 Says, as Russia Ramps Up Aerial Attacks

Ukraine’s borders are inviolable and must be respected as such: This was the message from a meeting of the Group of Seven industrialized nations at Weissenhaus in Germany over the weekend. “We will never recognize borders Russia has attempted to change by military aggression and will uphold our engagement in the support of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine, including Crimea, and all states,” according to a joint statement. The G8 became the G7 after Russia’s membership in the group was suspended following its illegal annexation of Crimea in 2014. In a measure of the far-reaching repercussions of Russia’s war on Ukraine, the host of the G7 meeting, Germany’s foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock, also said that “25 million tons of grain are currently blocked in Ukrainian ports, particularly Odessa,” jeopardizing food supplies for “millions of people around the world.”The statement pertaining to Ukraine’s borders, issued by Ms. Baerbock and her counterparts from Canada, France, Italy, Japan, Britain, and America, will likely draw more scrutiny in the weeks to come amid relentless Russian attacks in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region.As of Monday morning, Russian aircraft were firing on civilian and military infrastructure as well as industrial facilities deep inside Donbas. And west of the Donbas, at Izium, Russia was massing forces and preparing a fresh offensive, the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine posted on Facebook.President Putin’s failure to take Kyiv in the early stages of his invasion of Ukraine is widely seen as powering his persistence with respect to a land grab in Ukraine’s Donbas, comprising the separatist regions of Donetsk and Luhansk. Throughout the weeks of the Russian offensives and Ukrainian counter-offensives there have been whispers of the eventual possibility, if not likelihood, of some kind of compromise on territory to secure a lasting ceasefire, underpinned by security guarantees. On Friday, the New Voice of Ukraine reported that President Zelensky said that the French president, Emmanuel Macron, suggested Ukraine give up some of its sovereignty to allow Mr. Putin to save face. Mr. Putin may wish for an off-ramp, but Ukraine “isn’t prepared to save someone’s something by ceding territory.” Mr. Zelensky made the statement on the Italian TV channel RAI’s “Porta a Porta” talk show broadcast last Thursday and also said that Ukraine’s recognition of Russia’s annexation of Crimea was out of the question.While the G7 statement implicitly backs that stance, an editorial in the Financial Times notes that while at the moment there is no zone of possible agreement on territory that both Mr. Putin and the Ukrainian people could accept, such zones are “dynamic” and “what may be unacceptable at the beginning becomes acceptable as negotiations progress.”By any measure the fighting in eastern Ukraine, far from Kyiv — where one foreign embassy after another is re-opening its doors — is currently so furious that the word “dynamic” is an understatement. Ukrinform reported that 17 Russian attacks in Donetsk and Luhansk directions were repulsed over the past 24 hours and that Russian losses included men as well as tanks, armored personnel vehicles, and at least one artillery system. Russian troops were also reportedly advancing in several directions.The Moscow Times reported Monday that Russia had announced airstrikes in the east and in Lviv in the west, without specifying details. In Mariupol, “the enemy continues massive artillery and air strikes,” and “the main efforts of the Russian army were focused on blocking and eliminating Ukrainian units in the area of the Azovstal steelworks,” according to Ukraine’s armed forces.A correspondent for Le Monde, Emmanuel Grynszpan, tweeted on Sunday that Russian forces were taking ground in the main plant complex, “which likely means the defenders are running out of enough ammo, manpower or both to hold the plant.”In the meantime, NATO allies “cannot and will not stop to help” Ukraine to defend itself against Russia,” Ms. Baerbock said. She also said that Germany and the West were ready for talks with Moscow but claimed that Russia had ruined all forms of dialogue, and said that it is “clear to all of us that this war will not end quickly.”

No Recognition of Redrawn Ukraine Borders, G7 Says, as Russia Ramps Up Aerial Attacks

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