Essen, Hugo von2024-10-222024-10-222023Essen H. v. Russia's Dictated Non-Peace in the Donbas 2014-2022: Why the Minsk Agreements Were Doomed to Fail / Hugo von Essen and Andreas Umland // Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine : "Zeitenwende" for German security policy / W S. Hansen, O. Husieva, K. Frankenthal (Red.). - Baden-Baden : Nomos, 2023. - Chapter 5. - P. 95-118. - https://doi.org/10.5771/9783748917205-95https://ekmair.ukma.edu.ua/handle/123456789/31929https://doi.org/10.5771/9783748917205-95The Minsk Agreements concluded between Ukraine and Russia under mediation of the OSCE, Germany, and France were an expression of international legal nihilism and aggression obfuscation. Contrary to widespread perception, the documents Moscow imposed on Ukraine in September 2014 and February 2015 were not a solution but part of the problem. The self-contradictory Minsk Agreements were signed by Kyiv under massive Russian pressure. Their conclusion followed devastating military defeats inflicted on Ukraine by regular and irregular Russian forces shortly before. The agreements were a means for the Kremlin to reap the geopolitical and regional fruits of its initially covert military aggression against Ukraine. Western states – especially Germany and France – tacitly supported the overt Russian challenge to the European security order. Berlin and Paris pressured Kyiv to implement the inconsistent provisions of the Minsk Agreements with their questionable sequences and consequences. Moscow was not sanctioned for its violations of the agreements, subversion of basic principles of international law and democracy, and uncooperative attitude in the negotiations.enMinsk AgreementDonbasOSCEUkraineRussiamonograph sectionBook chapter