Josep Borrell: “Russia wants to turn Ukraine into the Syria of Europe”


“The misfortune of mankind is in Ukraine. The Russian army wants to make it the Syria from Europe“. The Vice President of the European Commission, Joseph Borrellhas once again denounced the military invasion launched by Vladimir Putin and has asked European citizens to make a greater effort to deal with the consequences of the conflict.

He has done it in a video recorded from Sarajevo, where he is, and broadcast in an act that the Partit dels Socialistes de Catalunya (PSC), his training, held this afternoon at the Casal Socialista Joan Reventós to analyze the geopolitical and humanitarian crisis that is being experienced in the east of the continent.

Borrell has recognized that the European Union (EU) erred in not believing “the warnings of the United States that war was imminent”. “We thought that the deployment of troops would be an instrument of pressure and not the start of such a brutal war”, he pointed out. He also lamented that, after the Russian invasion of crimea in 2014, “we have only increased our dependence on Russian oil and gas. We have to turn back.”

The diplomat has celebrated that the community club has “broken taboos” with the use of European funds to arm Ukraine, which “is also defending us.” Still, he has stressed that “we are not at war with Russia” and has refused to create a no-fly zone. “We do not want to provoke or give any excuse to Putin to start the third World war“, has finished.

“turn down the heat”

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Likewise, the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy has launched a “call for Europe to wake up from a certain comfortable dream in which we have settled since the end of the Cold War“. On March 9, he already asked the Europeans “turn down the heat” to reduce the consumption of Russian gas, some words that raised controversy. “It amuses me that people have taken it as a joke (…) Reducing dependency has to be done from the governments, but it can also be done by level of each one of us in the whole of Europe. The ones who are really cold are the refugees.”

In that sense, Borrell has asked citizens for “more commitment and effort” with the harsh economic consequences that the conflict is already dragging. “Energy and food prices will rise, economic growth will be affected,” he pointed out.


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