The Black Sea Security Space in Perspective: Ukraine's Non-alignment as a Challenge to the '"New" Euro-Atlantism'

Ukraine, as part of the Black Sea region, found itself on the crossroads of the great powers' interests long ago. Having had little chance to develop its current official status as a non-aligned state, on the way to neutrality, by its own resources, Ukraine brought itself into a peculiar, almost deadlocked, situation: it appears to be outside existing security spaces in Europe. Always being 'in between' helps little in defending national interests. The concept of the '"New" Euro-Atlantism' 2 gives a theoretical chance to combine different security spaces in Europe in order to share the security interests of Ukraine, together with those of the other European countries, including the Russian Federation and EU members. Such an agenda is also a challenge to the Black Sea region, which, on the one hand, is part of the Euro-Atlantic security space, but on the other is still a divided European periphery.