Putin tries to advance in Ukraine while world focuses on Gaza

Carl Bildt, former prime minister of Sweden, shares his perspective on European politics from Stockholm.

What's been the reaction so far of the European Union to the war in Gaza?

Well, the vote in the UN General Assembly the other day, the Jordanian-sponsored one on protection of civilians and legal unitarian obligations, you saw the European Union countries all over the place. You had eight of them voting in favor of the resolution, four voting against, and the rest simply abstaining. So it was not the most glorious moment. This is a highly divisive issue, and we'll see where it goes from here.

What's been the effect of the Gaza war on Ukraine?

The war in Ukraine is going on. At the moment, there has been, for the last week, a very large attempt by Russia to conduct offensive operations in the vicinity of Donetsk. They've been throwing a lot of men and a lot of material into that, making some small gains, but they've also had horrendous losses. We'll see how that continues. It's evidently that Mr. Putin wants to be able to say that he's making some advances, not very credible so far. And the day entries of course, that the attention of the world is going to be elsewhere and that a large part of the world is going to see the Western reaction to Gaza and Ukraine combined as if we see international law that is something that is there for a la carte, which it shouldn't really be.