MULTILEVEL GAME

Only very little of the substantive part of the four-hour talks between US Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian President Vladimir Putin held in his Sochi residence Bocharov Ruchey on 12 May has reached the media. However, the very fact of the "unexpected meeting" and the sides' statements seems to be quite sufficient for journalists and the expert community. Most observers on both sides of the Atlantic have seen a signal in these developments that the crisis in the US-Russian relations may subside and that Moscow and Washington are looking for a new cooperation formula. The dialogue is certainly not quite direct as yet. It would be so in case of a meeting between Putin and Obama who is still only sending his regards to his Russian counterpart. Nonetheless, even this is a reason for positive forecasts nowadays. The question is how correct they are. 

The Sochi talks can hardly be described as unexpected because meetings at this level (especially against the backdrop of crisis in Russia-US relations) are planned in advance. Nor can the talk in Sochi be called historic as some hastily described it, although it has already become a key event in the dynamics of international relations of the current period, especially for the Ukraine issue. The Secretary of State said now is "a critical moment for Russia and by the separatists to live up to the Minsk agreement". Kerry did not explain why that moment came right now and many linked that statement to Kiev being in limbo, financially, trying to get a second tranche of IMF aide. In order to obtain it, Ukraine needs to reach agreement with its creditors on restructuring its debt but the negotiations including with Russia are moving forward with a lot of difficulty. No-one admits that they may fail because in that case Ukraine would be faced with a default. On 21-22 May, an Eastern Partnership summit will take place in Riga where Brussels is going to specify the concessions and preferences it is ready to offer to Kiev but, for some reasons, the outlooks are not all that rosy. It is an uphill task to pull Ukraine out economically, especially in its situation of unsettled armed conflict which may flare up again with renewed vigour any moment. Russian media write that, according to their data, "the rebels are unhappy with the current line of ceasefire". Kiev is not satisfied with the situation either. President Petro Poroshenko promised to recapture Donetsk airport by force. Directly from Sochi, the Secretary of State warned the Ukrainians against the use of force. "If indeed President Poroshenko is advocating a forceful engagement at this time, we would strongly urge him to think twice not to engage in this kind of activity," Kerry said. 

Another most remarkable point at the Sochi talks was discussion of "other" most burning international problems. The media have announced that Kerry and Putin with Lavrov touched in their talk upon the situations in Yemen, Syria, Libya and around Iran. In fact, if we trace back the events, all that started exactly from Syria, while Syria and Ukraine have for a long time been regarded just as fronts in the conflict between Russia and the West. Turkish media have even come up with a theory that Kerry demanded again that Moscow should give up supporting Bashar Al Asad. Another interpretation of this sounded milder, roughly as follows: "Washington is prepared to leave the Ukraine crisis behind and re-engage with Russia on other matters more pressing to humanity".  

In Russia, however, the "Kerry ultimatum" (if there was any) was again assessed in their own way at the level of their expert community. They drew the conclusion that the West cannot do without Moscow's support in dealing with problems of the Middle East.

The Americans are indeed having quite a lot of problems in the Middle East. A breakthrough taking shape on the Iran problem is being badly spoilt by Israel's reaction and the events in Yemen where war is actually in progress between a coalition of Persian Gulf states led by Saudi Arabia and units of the rebel movement Ansar Allah (Huthis) representing the Shi'a minority of that country and believed to be supported by Tehran. The US dialogue with Iran has caused a cooling in its relations with the Gulf monarchies. Washington has suggested that member states of the Gulf Cooperation Council should create their own joint regional anti-missile defence system which is supposed to secure their safety from Iran and simultaneously reaffirm the importance of US presence in the region. But this appears to be not enough for them. 

Against this background, one can hardly expect a carefree summer and the Sochi meeting may quite possibly turn from a "step to meet the other side halfway" into a mere comparison of positions ahead of a new exacerbation in relations. Thus, John Kerry did not mention Crimea, at least on the record, in Sochi. The Secretary of State kept much tougher conditions for a meeting of the NATO member states' foreign ministers to which he went immediately after the Bocharov Ruchey meeting. 

The NATO foreign ministers gathered in Turkey's Antalya on 13-14 May to discuss steps to deal with new challenges and to strengthen collective security. Their final declaration gives much attention to the ISIL threat, to Afghanistan, Syria and the situation around Ukraine. According to NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, the Alliance sees a "more assertive Russia" in the East and "increased extremism" to the South. 

Stoltenberg urged Russia to withdraw its troops from Ukraine, to honour the Minsk accords and to have "special responsibility" to make this happen. As regards Crimea, the NATO Secretary General emphasized that Russia's annexation of Crimea is "illegal and illegitimate". Before the beginning of the meeting, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu rather sharply condemned Russia's actions in Ukraine and in Georgia. Earlier, the Turkish Foreign Minister expressed concerns about violations of the rights of Crimean Tatars in the peninsula and decided to send an independent delegation there to clear up the situation. 

The NATO summit quite explicitly warned Russia against any interference in its Baltic neighbours' affairs. One can see NATO strengthening its grouping in the region of late and holding large-scale drills. Lieut-Gen Riho Terras, the Commander-in-Chief of the Estonian Defence Forces, said in an interview to The Financial Times that the country has a clear-cut action plan to counter any "little green men". Perhaps as an extra security measure, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia addressed their joint letter to Gen Philip Breedlove, the Commander of NATO forces in Europe, asking for stationing one brigade in the Baltic states on a permanent basis, one battalion in each country. Calls were also voiced to further expand the Alliance by admitting former Yugoslav republics: Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Macedonia. Georgia's accession was also discussed. In particular, Turkish Foreign minister Mevlut Cavusoglu expressed his hopes for this. He hopes that NATO's decision on Georgia will be announced at its summit in 2015. It is though unclear how this can be done, given that Georgia has territorial conflicts and therefore fails to meet major criteria for admission to NATO membership. 

Thus, the NATO summit not only has shown that Kerry's talk with Putin in Sochi was hardly so very wonderful as it was described by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov but it highlighted once again the entire gamut of interests around the situation in Ukraine. The keynote in the Russia-West standoff is certainly sounded by the USA but, as we know, the "front line" of this struggle goes deep into the Middle East. NATO is not confined to countries of the West. At the same time, EU problems are often absolutely alien to Turkey (and vice versa) and sometimes they noticeably irritate the USA. This is why all statements of the Turkish side sounded so loud. This is why the Western media paid so much attention to Angela Merkel's visit to Moscow on 10 May, that is before Kerry's visit to Sochi. More than that, one more reason why no essential detente is to be expected in Russian-US relations in the near future is that, with every passing year, the USA will be increasingly preoccupied with its presidential race and this means only one thing: Russia, as well as the rest of the world, will have to deal not so much with the Obama administration as with different groups of influence in Washington. The game will become more intricate and multilevel. 

So, Russia demonstrates brand-new models of weapons at the V-Day parade on 9 May and is going to produce them in quantity. It holds joint drills with China in the Mediterranean and supplies anti-aircraft systems to Iran. NATO is preparing its likely expansion, consolidating its presence in the Baltic region and warning about the most serious strengthening of collective security over the past few decades. These are actions. As for words, they sound conciliatory both in open statements for the media and possibly at closed-door negotiations, saying that nobody wants a new "cold war" and that conflicts should be settled by diplomatic means. Experience proves that actions speak louder.