NATO, Good Bye!

It happened at last. Ukraine's parliament will change Ukraine's status from potential member of NATO to a neutral status. Ukraine's president Yanukovich said that he would look forward to the parliamentary session and he supported the decison of status change. If anyone keeps score in terms of US and EU foreign policy in the FSU region, Putin's Russia is leading in the series with a pretty large handicap. Here is a piece about Ukraine's NATO bid.

Eastern Europe’s Love Triangle: NATO, Russia and Ukraine

The Foreign Policy's Simon Shuster has a really good piece about a relationship between Ukraine and NATO. In brief, Mr. Shuster writes that, despite Ukraine's decade-long efforts to join NATO, Russia and NATO seem to get closer while leaving Ukraine aside.

Here is a great quote:

"At the Bucharest summit, even if Ukraine had had Britain's democracy, Germany's economy, and America's army, they would still not let us in, because for [Russia] it was too early," says Anatoliy Grytsenko, head of the Ukrainian parliament's defense committee and a former defense minister. "Russia's voice today is not exactly a veto on NATO decisions, but it is a deciding factor for some of the key members of the alliance."