The EU and Russia: A fragile neighbourhood [What Think Tanks are thinking]

Russia’s military build-up along its border with Ukraine, and its masterminding – alleged by many politicians and analysts – of the refugee crisis on the borders of Belarus with Poland and Lithuania, have sparked concerns over the implications of Moscow’s aggressive foreign policy. Russia has amassed nearly 100 000 troops near the Ukrainian border, provoking renewed fears that Moscow is about to invade, seven years after it annexed the Crimean peninsula and destabilised the eastern regions of Ukraine. In Belarus, President Alexander Lukashenko, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, has allowed migrants to take flights into the country to purposely transfer them on to Belarus’s borders with neighbouring EU Member States. This note gathers links to recent publications and commentaries from many international think tanks on Russia’s foreign and security policy and its implications for neighbouring countries, the European Union and global geopolitics.