JRL NEWSWATCH: “Poles and Ukrainians are at loggerheads. That’s good news for Putin; Farm exports and freight are the problems” – The Economist
“… At the start of the war, when Ukraine lost access to its deep-water ports in the Black Sea, the EU temporarily exempted Ukrainian lorry drivers from a permit system …. upset[ting] Polish drivers, who had dominated .. local freight …. [A] suspension of import duties and quotas on Ukrainian farm goods, produced by larger, more efficient outfits, posed competition to small Polish farmsteads, already pinched by EU environmental laws. A slump in world grain prices, plus politicking ahead of Polish local elections in April, heightened the tension. The protests have cost Ukraine hundreds of millions of dollars in lost farm and freight business. … The farmers’ protests are fertile ground for Russia to influence Poles with misgivings about Ukraine’s potential accession to the EU …. An investigation showed that one of the protesters appeared to be connected to the Russian embassy in Warsaw. One protest banner appealed to [] Putin to ‘restore order,’ an unlikely message in Poland …. One Ukrainian military researcher says Russia is stepping up its media-influence ambitions. …”