As a consequence of the military action initiated on February 24, 2022 by Russia against Ukraine, the Council of Europe decided to expel that country on March 16 after 26 years of belonging to this international organization. Never during the 73 years of existence of the Council of Europe had any country been expelled, which highlights the seriousness of the act of aggression carried out by Russia. This expulsion has had a direct impact on the multilateral system for the protection of human rights which represents the European Convention on Human Rights to the extent that it ceased to apply to Russia on September 16, 2022. Since then, people under the jurisdiction of Russia will no longer be able to invoke the rights recognized by the Convention and there are many doubts about the current execution of the pending judgments delivered by the European Court of Human Rights for violations of human rights by Russia. Russia is the country that has accumulated most judgments from the European Court of Human Rights since its accession in 1996, with a total of 2,943. Aside from the individual applications and as a consequence of Russia's leading role in the frozen conflicts in Transnistria, Georgia, Crimea, Lugansk and Donetsk, various interstate applications against Russia are pending before the ECtHR. The expulsion of Russia from the Council of Europe and the absence of jurisdiction of the ECtHR implies a weakening not only of the multilateral system of cooperation in Europe which represents the Council of Europe, but also in the protection of fundamental rights in Russia since the execution of the judgments delivered by the ECtHR for the pending cases will be impossible. The aim of this paper is to analyze the impact that the expulsion of Russia from the Council of Europe has had on the interstate cooperation initiatives adopted within the framework of the Council of Europe and on the protection of fundamental rights in Russia.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine constitutes a unique opportunity for testing the existing epistemologies, theories and concepts framing peace and war in international relations. Consequently, it produces a strong incentive to put forward novel concepts aspiring to set cognitive frameworks which help to close the gap between ontology of contemporary security and the interrelated epistemological uncertainty. This paper introduces ‘security protocol’ as a concept loaded with significant explanatory power and considerable potential for inquiries into security epistemology.

The concept of protocol is proposed as an analytical and cognitive formula which tackles the diagnostic and explanatory deficits of the leading theories in security studies. Protocol is conceived as a formative set of codified rules and standards which simplify, rationalize, legitimize and explain the complex forms, means and methods employed in order to master the security imbroglio.

The concept of protocol is proposed as an analytical and cognitive formula which tackles the diagnostic and explanatory deficits of the leading theories in security studies and related disciplines, incorporating insights and lessons learned into an emergent framework for a theory of protocolarization. Protocol is conceived as a formative set of codified rules and standards which simplify, rationalize, legitimize and explain the complex forms, means and methods employed in order to master the security imbroglio.

The argument developed throughout this paper holds that Russia enacted a security protocol in response to the progressive degeneration of the Russian authoritarian regime, hollowing out of the (neo)imperialist identity, decline in the international position and erosion of the socio-economic system. Russia under Putin activated that protocol as a heuristic tool to help the state navigate increasingly perilous ontological conditions. The security protocol enacted, reproduced and implemented by the Russian apparatus (conceived after Althusser as an institution of an oppressive state) generated narrow and cognitively biased mindset patterns which legitimised the practices of coercion, violence and force. That protocol questioned the value of liberal order and overturned the notion of international peace.

The research presented in this paper is based on qualitative analysis of policies, discourses and frames reflecting the progressive degeneration of the Russian Federation. Concept mapping, process tracing, and data sampling are used as key research techniques.

Strategic narratives have become an important tool with which states define their geopolitical reality and shape the types of foreign policy decisions that emerge. In order to build a more favourable international environment, China has deployed substantial resources to disseminate its strategic narratives and communicate its role, identity and vision and legitimise the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) rule. Despite the obvious importance of narratives on conflict and global security, there has been a remarkable lack of studies examining China’s strategic narratives on security-related issues. This article is the first effort to systematically map out China’s strategic narratives in the case study of the ongoing conflict in Ukraine. Through a corpus linguistics approach and qualitative content analysis, this article finds that China does not project itself as a neutral player and, that its strategic narratives have often echoed Russia’s portrayal of the Ukrainian war. Yet, the analysis also reveals that China tries keep distance from Russia and, from the US/West-Russian rivalry presenting itself as an equidistant player belonging to the wider international community and as the most suitable actor to manage a peaceful global order.

One of the many important consequences of the current war in Ukraine is a profound reshaping of Europe’s security architecture. Virtually all European EU and NATO members have announced increased military spending. The EU is, for the first time, providing military assistance to a state actively engaged in a war against another state, and has made diplomatic efforts to keep Ukraine within the European sphere. Sweden and Finland are joining NATO. In the so-called Zeitenwende, Germany's security and defence policy role is supposedly rapidly changing. The new strategic environment requires a rethinking of elements of EU-NATO relations, an uplift in European military capabilities and a more concrete discussion of how much and what type of strategic autonomy Europe requires via-a-vis the United States. While the first weeks following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine resulted in widely shared EU commitments to expanding defence policy, the persistence of the war has opened important gaps in European countries’ preferences, strategies, and priorities. This paper examines these gaps and assesses the extent to which they damage a joined up approach by the EU and NATO to the future of European security.

The paper is an attempt at showing how the operations of contemporary Russia on the international arena aim at restoring the status quo ante, as shown in the example of the war with Ukraine. In the 1990s, we witnessed a weakening of the international position of Russia – the successor to the USSR. In the 21st century, on the other hand, Russia’s policy towards its neighbours, and in the future, perhaps towards more distant countries as well, has become aggressively driven by imperialistic goals. In order to tackle the research problem effectively, the following questions will be discussed: What will be the outcome of the revisionism for Ukraine, Europe, and Russia itself? Does the Ukrainian conflict constitute the end of the post-Cold-War cooperation period between Russia and the West? Is the Ukrainian conflict a symbolic end of the post-Cold-War world order? Is Ukraine a hostage in the game between Russia and the West? Is the armed conflict destroying Russia’s plot for the reintegration of the post-Soviet space which pivots around Ukraine?