Europe seeks peace, not war. But will it be ready if war comes to Europe? | Volodymyr Yermolenko

To survive Russia's neo-imperialism, Europe's democracies must find a balance between their desire for peace and their own defence

In 2003, the philosophers Jurgen Habermas and Jacques Derrida published a joint article in Germany's and France's leading newspapers. In it, they criticised the American invasion of Iraq and called on Europeans to assume a reflexive distance from themselves", in particular their imperialism and colonialism.

The pair's criticism of George W Bush's imperialism was justified; and their suggestion that Europe could lead the world towards a post-imperial future was a nice idea. Today, however, confronted with Russia's genocidal invasion of Ukraine, the question is whether such a post-imperial world can be achieved through the means that the two philosophers proposed.

Volodymyr Yermolenko is a Ukrainian philosopher, journalist and writer. He is the president of PEN Ukraine.