[dfkf]

There is no need to drag shale gas into this. Ukraine is a big country, even if very poor (for now). The economic part of the association agreement was especially damaging to the economic relationship between Russia and Ukraine. The EU played zero-sum game here, hoping (and not without reason) that the government will be forced to sign it anyway. It's just the whole thing escalated well beyond anyone would expect. Apparently, it was a mistake to impose such dividing agreements on an already deeply divided nation, the lesson the EU learned too late.