A primeira-ministra lituana responsabiliza os líderes europeus pela complacência com a clique putinesca

«The West continued to do too little, too late. We blacklisted officials but we kept building pipelines. We introduced sanctions but turned a blind eye to the companies circumventing them. Western politicians danced with Mr Putin (some of them literally) and retired to chair the boards of Russian companies. These firms funded the Kremlin’s arms race and diverted billions to Mr Putin’s entourage.

The West allowed Mr Putin’s people to keep their fortunes in Western banks and spend them on Western education for their kids, villas and penthouses in Western resorts for their wives and five-star holidays with their mistresses on Western rivieras. All the while the Kremlin decried the rotten decadence and moral degradation of the West. Pecunia non olet: money doesn’t smell. Or perhaps, to the contrary—Russian money smelled too good.

We cared too much about separating sports and politics, or culture and politics—and too little about separating freedom of speech and propaganda, political correctness and hard-headed analysis. “Crisis in Ukraine”, “Russia begins military aggression”, “Ukraine-Russia war”—these were the major taglines just a week ago.

No, the crisis is not in Ukraine—it is in Russia, and it has been deepening for decades. Russia’s aggression began long ago, and not just against Ukraine. The Kremlin used energy as a means of political pressure and employed cyber-attacks, hostile propaganda, proxy wars and, eventually, missiles. What we witness now is not the Ukraine-Russia war but the continuation of Russia’s war against Ukraine that started in 2014. It was de facto declared on the entire West in December 2021, when Mr Putin issued his ultimatums. (...)

For a democratic leader, human life is more precious than anything else. For a dictator, no human sacrifice is too great a barrier to ambition. Russia’s neighbours, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Poland, have been trying to explain this for a long time. At times we have been ridiculed as solely focused on this issue. We kept warning that dictators only understand the language of brutal power—be it economic, or better yet, military—and take anything other than that as a sign of weakness that encourages them, and does not deter them. We have warned of growing security threats not just to our region but also to the eu and nato—and of the need to strengthen our defence.»

Excerto do texto de Ingrida Simonyte, primeira-ministra de Lituânia (fonte)