CED POLICY BRIEF The Weekly Round-Up: Developments on Ukraine and Geopolitical Impact

Ukraine and Russia each claimed progress in the six-month fight for Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine; Ukraine destroyed a bridge near the town in an attempt to prevent its capture by Russia before the anniversary of the invasion on February 24. [...] Starmer said that in his meeting with President Zelensky, “[w]e spoke about the need for that justice to cover both the use of Russian state assets for reconstruction and the need for there to be prosecutions for war crimes.” As a barrister, Starmer had represented victims of the Balkans War at the International Court of Justice. [...] Sixty-eight percent of Europeans believe the war is an “attack on the whole of Europe,” and 62 percent agree with the statement that “Ukrainians are also fighting for Europe’s freedom and prosperity.” Analogy to 1973 Yom Kippur War: CED Trustee Ed Cox published an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal “Ukraine: What Would Nixon Do?” recalling the efforts of President Nixon and Secretary of Stat. [...] The Washington Post reported that the US had tracked the original surveillance balloon from its launch in Hainan island in southern China and that it may have been blown off course by the weather so that rather than focusing on US military bases in the Pacific, it reached the continental US, at which point the Chinese sought to gather intelligence on other military sites; according to the Post, “i. [...] visited Japan shortly after he hosted US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin in Manila, he revealed that the US, Japan, and the Philippines are considering a tripartite defense pact to respond to rising tensions with China in the South China Sea and a possible conflict on Taiwan.