Leonid Litra is a Senior Research Fellow at the think tank New Europe Center in Kyiv. He previously worked for various think-tanks in Kyiv and Chisinau and published on topics related to the post-Soviet area, European integration and frozen conflicts. Leo published and contributed in over 15 countries during his 14 years career.
The Parliament in Kiev adopted a law aiming to curb oligarchs’ influence in politics. The piece of legislation comes at a time when Ukraine’s partners have warned Kiev authorities they are doing too little to limit the informal decision-making of groups of oligarchs. Despite having already been adopted, the law rather seems to be a sort of “window dressing” designed to boost Zelensky’s influence in the runup to the presidential election. No one really knows who exactly will be on the list of oligarchs who will have to abide by the new legislation and what the long-term implications will be.
The NATO Summit in Brussels, to be held on June 14, has rekindled talks regarding Ukraine’s accession to the North-Atlantic Treaty Alliance. While the accession is being discussed overtly in Kiev, many states remain adamant.
For a brief moment Russia looked like it was going to war with Ukraine, rallying a significant number of forces on the Ukrainian border, in Crimea and the Black Sea. The crisis has passed, momentarily, but the many critical problems in the region remain unsolved.