Could Ukraine become Austria or Sweden? The model of neutrality that Russia aspires for Ukraine

While the bombing of Russia continue on Ukraine, both parties continue negotiating to establish a ceasefire to end the slaughter. One of the vital points is to achieve a status of neutrality for Ukraine that definitively distances it from the option to join NATO and to receive foreign military bases on its territory.

Russia has set an example Austria and Sweden as models of neutrality, something that has already been ruled out by kyiv, which advocates its “own model”.

How have both countries stayed out of the war?

Austria after Nazism

The debate on Austrian neutrality has flared up again in the country. Although the head of government, the chancellor Karl Newhammerhas pointed out that “Austria will remain neutral”, Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg was more incisive: “Even if Austria is a neutral state from a military point of view, we are not when it comes to violence.”

In 1945, after the end of World War II, Austria -in its capacity as an ally of Nazi Germany- was occupied by the allied forces who divided the country into four zones: the Soviet, British, American and French zones.

Vienna, the capital, went through the same process, and the city center was declared an international zone where the Allied forces rotated control each month.

But ten years later, Austria paid for its independence with an agreement, the , approved by the allied forces that gave the country the status of neutralitywhich it maintains until now.

This means that the Austrians cannot join a military alliance -for this reason, they are not part of NATO- allow the establishment of foreign military bases or participate in a war, except for UN missions, as the Austrian media recalls ” TheLocal”.

“Neutrality is part of the Austrian identity”Martin Senn, a political scientist at the University of Innsbruck, explains to AFP.

At the end of 1955, Austria joined the UN and became a key territory of historic negotiations and meetings during the Cold War. Like when Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev met John F. Kennedy there in 1961; and Leonid Brezhnev with Jimmy Carter in 1979.

Austria It joined the European Union in 1995 and as part of it participates in the common security and defense provided for by the Lisbon Treaty of 2009.

The country only spends 0.7% of its GDP on defense, while neighboring Switzerland, another neutral country in the European heartland, has three times as many soldiers and fighter jets.

Still, it maintains blue helmets – soldiers on peacekeeping missions who are part of UN detachments – in Kosovo, Lebanon, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Mali and Moldova.

Sweden, Nordic neutrality

Sweden is one of the few countries in Europe that has not been at war for more than two centuries.

The Nordic country bases its neutrality policy on tradition rather than on an international treaty. This status was formally proclaimed by King Gustav XIV in 1834, staying out of military conflicts since the mid-19th century.

However, in 1941 it allowed the transit of German forces through Swedish territory to the Finnish front, and at the same time protected refugees from Nazism.

But after the end of World War II, Sweden chose to preserve its neutral status.

It was not until 1995 that it decided to enter the European Union and, like Austria, is part of the common security of the European bloc.

It is also not a member of the Atlantic alliance (NATO), but it has been a collaborative partner of the group since the 1990s, something that Russia does not like either, which shares a border with Finland, a neighbor of Sweden.

In May 2017, Putin himself warned the Swedes that if they joined NATO, Russia “I would take military action to eliminate the threat.”