Putin’s desire for a new Russian empire won’t stop with Ukraine | Pavlo Klimkin

My country has suffered terribly from the Kremlin's obsession with restoring Soviet hegemony. But the entire security of Europe and the west is at stake
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Over the past decade Europe has sleepwalked into an increasingly precarious and less safe place. The postwar order that provided so much peace and stability across the continent appears to be breaking up.

Sergey Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, as much as rejoiced in this at the recent Munich security conference when he spoke of the a new "post-west" era in Europe. Reversing the breakup of the Soviet Union and restoring the Russian empire have now become an obsession for the Kremlin. There are three things central to understanding what motivates Russia, and how Vladimir Putin's government works.