As the world anxiously held its breath amid threats and rising tensions between Iran and the United States, the Russian-Ukrainian war entered its fifth year - a war with no end in sight. The combined number of casualties on both sides, according to recent reports by Western defense research centers, is approaching two million.
Over the past four years, the world has witnessed several wars, the latest pitting Pakistan against Afghanistan a couple of days ago. The most horrific and bloodiest war has been the conflict in the Gaza Strip. Last summer, the “Twelve-Day War” between Iran on the one side, and Israel and the United States on the other, rocked the region.
Pakistan and India had fought a war before that, with American mediation bringing it to an end. Another clash, between Pakistan and Afghanistan, is now raging amid fighting in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in Africa. In Venezuela, as the new year began, the world saw US forces abduct a head of state and his wife from their bedroom.
Meanwhile the flames of the Russian-Ukrainian war continued to burn, with no real signs - so far- that will end soon. Mediated by the United States, negotiations between Russia and Ukraine have been stuck before a major obstacle that has yet to be overcome, the Donetsk region in eastern Ukraine. Russia demands that Ukraine withdraw from the region and hand it over in exchange for ending the war. Ukraine, backed by European states, refuses to do so and insists that any peace agreement must include guarantees of lasting security to deter future Russian aggression.
So far, the American president’s mediation efforts appear insufficient, if not they make a difference at all. That all leads to the unsettling conclusion that the fifth year of the war may prove no different from those that preceded it.
In a recent interview with a British media outlet, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that Russia loses an average of 167 soldiers for every kilometer of territory it has captured. Russia’s war in Ukraine has already gone on longer than its war against Nazi Germany. The repercussions for the Russian economy, particularly oil and gas exports, has begun to rise to the surface following Western sanctions. In the past few days, Britain issued a new sanctions list that added 300 Russian and non-Russian companies and institutions in the oil, gas, and financial sectors.
There is cause for genuine concern, as the fifth year could lead the world into a dark tunnel with no exit, especially given the tensions in various regions, notably the possibility of new fronts igniting in Asia, particularly in the South China Sea. This scenario would test the international order and present challenges it has not faced since the end of World War II, especially after Russian intelligence accused Britain and France of intending to supply Ukraine with “dirty nuclear bombs” made from uranium toxic waste, which are considered less destructive than nuclear weapons. Zelenskyy took to the media to explicitly deny those reports.
Media outlets are reporting that a new round of trilateral negotiations between Russia, Ukraine, and the US mediator could be held next month in the United Arab Emirates. Leaked reports suggest that a breakthrough could be imminent, opening the door to Ukrainian concessions in exchange for security guarantees from the United States and Europe. While optimism is necessary and desirable, prudence and the lessons of the past call for caution. Optimism must not go beyond realities and concrete developments on the ground, which we hope will materialize.
