President Volodymyr Zelensky took a two-day trip to Warsaw to participate in the commemoration of the 80th anniversary of the beginning of World War II. But business – primarily Ukraine’s need to become energy independent – took center stage during the eventful visit.
On Aug. 31 and Sept. 1, the president met with his counterparts from Poland, Georgia and Lithuania, as well as with U.S. Vice President Mike Pence and Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel.
Besides addressing energy issues, Zelensky also sought to reduce tensions in Ukraine’s relations with Poland.
During his meeting with Polish President Andrzej Duda on Aug. 31, Zelensky promised to lift the moratorium on exhuming Polish burial sites in Ukraine, which was imposed by ex-President Petro Poroshenko in 2017. The moratorium has harmed bilateral relations, as Poland wants to locate the bodies of Polish fighters killed on Ukrainian territory during WWII and return some to family cemeteries.
The same day, both presidents took part in the signing of a three-party energy memorandum with the United States, declaring their intention to import American liquefied natural gas and deliver a blow to Russia’s energy monopoly.
Commemoration
Zelensky was among 40 world leaders invited to take part in the commemoration ceremony in Warsaw, scheduled for Sept. 1.
On Sept. 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland, officially launching World War II, which took the lives of 80 million people. Exactly 80 years later, the presidents of Poland, Germany and other countries directly involved in the fighting gathered in Warsaw to memorialize those tragic events.
Nonetheless, a number of high-ranking officials did not take part in the event. European Council President Donald Tusk, who used to head Civic Platform, Poland’s largest opposition party, did not attend, saying he felt unwelcome by the ruling party in his homeland.
Russian President Vladimir Putin wasn’t invited, due to ongoing tensions over Russia’s occupation of Crimea and war against Ukraine.
U.S. President Donald Trump cancelled his planned visit, citing the threat of Hurricane Dorian, and sent Pence instead.
Trump’s absence delivered a blow to Ukraine’s plans, as the U.S. president was scheduled to have a one-on-one meeting with Zelensky.
With the presidential meeting postponed, the biggest event in Zelensky’s schedule was the meeting with Duda.
Burying history
Poland supported Ukraine after the 2014 Euromaidan Revolution, which ousted Kremlin-backed President Viktor Yanukovych, and backed Ukraine’s aspirations to ultimately join the European Union.
However, relations took a downturn after the right-wing Law and Justice party took power in Poland in late 2015.
Tensions between Ukraine in Poland escalated in 2016, when the Polish parliament passed a decree citing the murder of Poles during World War II by the nationalist Ukrainian Insurgent Army as “genocide.”
Kyiv rejected the term and claimed that the killings took place on both sides.
The rise in anti-Ukrainian sentiment led to acts of vandalism against the burial sites of Ukrainian Insurgent Army soldiers in Poland.
In 2017, in response to the Polish authorities’ failure to prevent and investigate acts of vandalism, then-President Petro Poroshenko imposed a ban on searches for and exhumations of the remains of Polish soldiers killed in Ukraine during World War II.
In 2018, the Sejm, Poland’s parliament, passed a law criminalizing the denial of crimes committed by Ukrainian nationalists against Poles, and, later that year, Poland imposed quotas on Ukrainian freight transportation trough the country.
Zelensky decided to take the first step toward reviving Ukraine’s relations with its closest neighbor.
“I’m ready to unfreeze the permits for search operations in Ukraine, while the Polish side will repair the Ukrainian memorials in Poland,” Zelensky said during a joint press conference with Duda.
Although Zelensky assured journalists that Poland is planning on making concessions to Ukraine, Duda thanked the Ukrainian president for lifting the ban, but made no promises.
No official documents were signed between the two presidents following their face-to-face meeting.
American money and gas
Nonetheless, Poland and Ukraine together took part in signing an agreement pledging to buy gas from the U.S. That document is set to expand energy cooperation between the three countries and increase both Ukraine and Poland’s energy independence from Russia.
Poland pledged to begin sending 6 billion cubic meters of gas to Ukraine starting in 2021, compared to the current 1.5 billion it sends.
Warsaw is also planning on expanding its gas transmission infrastructure, which will enable the country to increase purchases of liquefied natural gas from the United States and sell it to Ukraine.
“We will make every effort to diversify gas supplies to Ukraine, which is now completely dependent on Russian deliveries,” said Piotr Naimski, the Polish government official responsible for energy infrastructure, during the signing of the document on Aug. 31.
The document is part of a U.S. policy to boost oil and gas exports to allies and trade partners.
Ukraine stopped purchasing gas directly from Russia in 2015, but remains heavily reliant on gas imports from neighboring countries, some of which still purchase large amounts of Russian gas. Often, the gas purchased by Kyiv initially comes from Russia even though it is sold by other countries.
Russia, on the other hand, has been building the controversial $12-billion Nord Stream 2 pipeline through the Baltic Sea. It will bypass transit through Ukraine and increase Russia’s ability to supply gas directly to the EU to 110 billion cubic meters annually.
Today, more than a third of Russia’s gas exports cross Ukrainian territory on their way to the EU.
Before the signing of the trilateral agreement, Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council secretary, Oleksandr Danylyuk, met with U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry.
“One of the steps to ensure the energy independence of our country will be to facilitate the supply of liquefied gas through Poland,” Danylyuk wrote on Facebook.
Pence and Zelensky also had a face-to-face meeting, discussing the security situation in the Donbas region, where Ukraine has been fighting a war against Russia-backed insurgents since 2014.
The U.S. will not change its position of supporting the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Ukraine, Pence said, pushing back against ongoing speculation that Washington might cancel its defense support for Ukraine.
A week earlier, American media reported that Trump intended to block a $250-million assistance package to Ukraine. Meanwhile, the U.S. president argued for Russia to be readmitted to the G7, an annual meeting of the world’s largest advanced economies.
That move was not supported by other world leaders, and the funds promised to Ukraine weren’t blocked.
“The U.S. has stood, and will continue to stand, with the people of Ukraine on their security and territorial integrity,” wrote John Bolton, the U.S. national security adviser, on Twitter, following the meeting between Zelensky and Pence.
