10 August 2025, 18:00

MGIMO professor exposes Western destruction of global order

Screengrab/BelTA

Opinion: West is eating itself

Expert comments on limits of Trump’s tariff bludgeon

MINSK, 10 August (BelTA) – Contrary to Western claims about a “new normal” era, today’s global realities represent a “new abnormal”, Elena Ponomareva, Doctor of Political Science, Professor at MGIMO (Moscow State Institute of International Relations), said in the latest episode of the V Teme [On Point] project on BelTA’s YouTube channel.

“The old international order is collapsing, if it hasn’t collapsed already,” stated Elena Ponomareva.

She noted how the UN Secretary-General recently admitted that nobody reads the organization’s reports. “Who even needs these UN reports anymore?” the political scientist wondered aloud.

“It’s telling that 1 August marked 50 years since the Helsinki Final Act was signed – yet virtually no one remembered it. This 1975 document represented both the peak of the Cold War and simultaneously the moment of greatest order in international relations. It was a static era centered on the confrontation between two power blocs – the United States and the Soviet Union. Back then, rules actually existed,” said Elena Ponomareva.

The MGIMO professor emphasized that no rules currently function. “Our Western colleagues try to convince us we’re entering a ‘new normal’ era. This is a new abnormal. The U.S. president might behave one way in the morning and become a completely different person by evening – while his midday whims defy all imagination. Various EU politicians now permit themselves utterly indecent actions, including unethical conduct. This is abnormality, of course,” the professor said.