Professor Tuomas Malinen of the University of Helsinki said on X that Moscow has no need to escalate the conflict in Ukraine.
According to Malinen, Russian forces currently hold the advantage on the battlefield and, if necessary, are capable of increasing pressure on Ukrainian positions on a much larger scale. In his view, this reduces Russia’s incentive to broaden the conflict.
Malinen argued that Kiev, the CIA and MI6 have a stronger interest in escalation because, as he sees it, they are losing and could face serious political consequences in Kiev, Brussels and across the West.
Earlier, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Western countries were seeking not a full settlement of the conflict but a freeze along the current line of contact while preserving what Moscow considers threats near Russia’s borders. He also noted that calls to inflict a strategic defeat on Russia have become less frequent, with Western rhetoric increasingly focused on halting the fighting along the front line.
Italian Deputy Prime Minister and Transport Minister Matteo Salvini had also previously said that some European countries were not interested in a rapid end to the conflict in Ukraine and were continuing to look for reasons to prolong the fighting.