On December 10, New Europe Center organized presentation of the results of opinion poll “Foreign Policy and Security: Opinions of Ukrainian Society”. The event was attended by representatives of the diplomatic, expert and media environment.

The detailed results of opinion poll are available on New Europe Center site.

The opinion poll covered a broad range of foreign policy and security issues: security guarantees for Ukraine, formats of NATO accession, EU accession, preconditions for potential negotiations to end the war, levels of trust in foreign institutions and leaders, and more.

Fredrik Wesslau, Distinguished Policy Fellow, Stockholm Centre for Eastern European Studies (SCEEUS), Senior Adviser, Rasmussen Global, performed as speaker-expert during the presentation. Find below the most interesting thoughts:

• What really struck me with this poll is a mix of optimism and pessimism, but I would really say it’s a mix of realism and hope. It’s quite impressive how, for the most part, the Ukrainians have a very solid understanding of the situation at hand and a very good intuition about what’s doable and not doable and what’s needed as well.
• The notion that NATO membership for Ukraine is the best security guarantee is absolutely correct. Sweden and Finland, after February 2022, quickly came to the conclusion that existing in a grey zone between Russia and NATO meant an unacceptably high risk of being invaded. The sense of being neutral or non-aligned after February 2022 was no longer the case and if it holds true for Sweden and Finland it so obviously holds true for Ukraine.
• The key question is of course how to get to NATO membership for Ukraine because the country is at war now. What’s important, and what I think this poll shows, is which the path is for getting to membership and how you actually get there. There’s a sort of pedagogical exercise that needs to be done here to show how an invitation, how accession process, and how membership leads to war termination and that it’s actually de-escalatory rather than escalatory.
• In this poll there’s the question of gradual or partial accession to NATO with a geographical limitation on the application of Article 5. This is also an extremely important discussion that needs to be had. I don’t think anybody in the West is expecting Kyiv to formally relinquish the territories under Russian occupation. But still, the reality is that Russia controls these occupied territories. So, how do you relate to that? Here I think the West Germany model is the way to go.
• Referring to the question of EU and NATO membership, obviously, there’s no formal requirement for a new EU member to be a member of NATO as well. It’s not a prerequisite in any sort of formal legal sense. But if we imagine a few years from now, we have the final decision to make Ukraine a member of the EU. And if Ukraine is under the threat of a Russian attack again, it’s very difficult to see that European leaders would go through with this. So, from a political, practical point of view, you need to make Ukraine a member of NATO as well, in order for it to also become a member of the EU.
• Trump has promised that he will end the war in 24 hours, without really providing any details. This has been his promise. But I think he will quite soon realize that in Moscow they have far-reaching demands which even the Trump administration could not accept. So, you may very quickly end up in a situation where the Trump administration will provide additional support to Ukraine, for instance, more military assistance in order to put more pressure on Russia to enter into agreements.
• In order to make sure that the Trump administration continues supporting Ukraine, Europe needs to step up and be more engaged. This is the key because it shows that we’re relevant. It will show us having leverage as well, and will mean that in terms of any future negotiations, the Europeans will actually be able to be part of this, which is essential, given that this is all about European security at the end of the day. So, the best way to invest in European security is to invest in Ukraine’s security.

Full news report about the event is available via link.

Photo report is here.

The record in English is here.

The record in Ukrainian is here.

Let us remind that this is the third opinion poll initiated by the NEC. The results of the first opinion poll can be found here, the second – here.

The presentation of the poll results is organized within the framework of a project supported by the International Renaissance Foundation. The poll was conducted by the research agency Info Sapiens at the request of the New Europe Center.