Eastern Europe/Ukraine

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Philip
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Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by Philip »

There is no thread for the crises that have afflicted E,Europe after the fall of the USSR.The events happening in Ukraine are threatening to erupt into major civil war with the West and Russia on opposite sides as they are on Syria.If the situ deteriorates further,the govt. will have no alternative but to resort to martial law.The West is poised to impose eco sanctions which will further drive Ukraine into the Russian fold.proxy fifth columnists and saboteurs are already at work creating anarchy to prevent the govt. from functioining. Are we going to see another Hungarian or Czechoslovakia redux as we saw during the Cold War? Cold War warriors will do everything to keep the Ukranian pot boiling and wish for another military intervention by Russia so that the ghosts of the Cold War may be brought back to life.This is the trap being laid out by western CW strategists who are doing everything to denigrate Putin who has with steely resolve restored much of Russia's prestige and former military capability.

That the Ukranian crisis is heating up during the Sochi Winter Olympics is no coincidence.It is a carefully orchestrated move by the West's CW warriors who want attention to be diverted from the hugely successful Sochi games ,universally accclaimed to be an outstanding success despite the best efforts prejudiced western media before the games.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/blog/2 ... ve-updates

Ukraine crisis: deadly clashes shatter truce – live updates

Dozens killed and injured in gunfire
Bloodiest day in modern Ukrainian history
White House: ‘We are outraged’
EU foreign ministers to decide on sanctions

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 40428.html

Ukraine protests: At least 22 dead amid reported 'sniper attacks' as fresh clashes erupt

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 40428.html
At least twenty-two people in Ukraine have reportedly died as live rounds were fired in fresh clashes this morning, after a truce agreed on Wednesday collapsed.

The country's interior ministry said protesters are holding 67 policemen hostage in the capital. Earlier the ministry said "Berkut" riot policemen had been armed with combat weapons to regain control of the protest site.

"To free the hostages police have the right to use their weapons," the ministry said in a statement posted to its website.

Eyewitnesses told The Associated Press they had seen 22 bodies near the main protest camp, and a police officer is believed to be among those dead. Dozens of protesters have been using the lobby of Hotel Ukraine as a triage centre to treat the wounded.

At least 50 people in total have been killed in the escalating violence this week after a truce with opposition leaders collapsed. Shocking video footage has emerged today claiming to show snipers firing at protesters, some of which appear lying on the pavement.

One video appeared to show an opposition militant firing from behind a tree.

Anti-government protesters hold riot policemen (C) captive In Independence Square, protesters have been throwing petrol bombs and police have been responding with water cannons and tear gas.

Kiev's mayor has resigned over the bloodshed and residents in the capital are being told to stay indoors by Ukrainian police, according to AFP. EU foreign ministers will meet later to discuss sanctions on those responsible for violence in the capital. Britain's Foreign Secretary William Hague will be among those

present.

An EU source in Moscow said the ministers saw a chance for a compromise between the authorities and the opposition.

A draft EU statement prepared for the meeting called for "targeted measures" against individuals, an arms embargo and a ban on equipment for internal repression.

President Viktor Yanukovich has released a statement accusing protesters of "going on the offensive" and "working in organised groups".

"They are using firearms, including sniper rifles" the statement said. "They are shooting to kill. The number of dead and injured among police officers is dozens."

An anti-government protester shows a bullet after violence erupted in the Independence Square (Reuters) The Ukrainian skier Bogdana Matsotska announced she will be withdrawing from the Olympics in response to the violence in her country, with her father saying she did so in "solidarity with the fighters."

TV pictures showed protesters seizing back Independence Square and surging forward into areas that were on Wednesday occupied by riot police after a day of violence.

The French, German and Polish foreign ministers have not left Kiev today without seeing the President after the violence broke out, as previously reported by diplomatic sources.

They had been preparing to hold crisis talks over the escalating violence in Ukraine an EU meeting in Brussels to determine whether to impose sanctions. "They are meeting him now," one diplomat said.

The EU talks come after Ukraine’s president had announced a truce with the opposition.

President Barack Obama had warned “there will be consequences” for Ukraine if the violence continues, but expressed hope that the truce would hold.

Responding cautiously to Mr Yanukovych’s statement, President Obama deemed the truce a “welcome step forward,” but said the White House would continue to monitor the situation closely to “ensure that actions mirror words.”

Protesters carry a wounded fellow protester Many victims of the violence died after swathes of central Kiev were transformed into fiery battlefields on Tuesday when police attacked the anti-government protest camps which have occupied Independence Square for nearly three months.

Mr Yanukovych declared Thursday a day of mourning for the dead.

On Wednesday, EU ambassadors discussed a series of possible steps including asset freezes and travel bans in talks on Wednesday, even though some diplomats have doubts about the effectiveness of such sanctions.

“The European Union will respond to the deterioration on the ground, including via targeted measures,” European Council President Herman Van Rompuy said in a statement, while holding out the possibility of trade and political agreement with Ukraine if it meets goals agreed on with the EU.

Late on Wednesday, Washington also imposed US visa bans on 20 Ukrainian government officials it considered “responsible for ordering human rights abuses related to political oppression,” a senior State Department official announced.

Additional reporting by Reuters and Associated Press
Philip
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by Philip »

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/fina ... ntrol.html

Financial crisis hits Russia,with the Ukranian crisis.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 39662.html
Ukraine protests: President Yanukovych agrees 'truce' with opposition as EU ministers prepare to discuss sanctions.
Kiev
Wednesday 19 February 2014

Ukraine’s President Viktor Yanukovych announced that he had agreed a truce with opposition leaders on Wednesday night, amid global outrage over the deaths of 28 people in the government’s offensive against protesters.
Fires continued to burn overnight in Kiev's Independence Square, but no violence has been reported.

EU ministers are due to meet today to agree a package of sanctions and it was not immediately clear what effect the truce would have on those negotiations. Foreign ministers from France, Germany and Poland will meet with President Yanukovych this morning before flying to Brussels to join the rest of the EU ministers.

Mr Yanukovych said he and the opposition leaders had agreed to try to stabilise “the situation in the state in the interests of social peace”.

This came shortly after the president sacked the head of the armed forces, Col Gen Volodymyr Zamana, in a surprise move. He was replaced by the commander of Ukraine’s navy, Admiral Yuriy Ilyin, according to the president’s website. No official explanation was given for the move.

Swathes of central Kiev were transformed into fiery battlefields on Tuesday when police attacked the anti-government protest camps which have occupied Independence Square for nearly three months.

As violence stretched into Wednesday evening, explosions from police stun grenades echoed throughout the city centre and tear gas and black smoke filled the air. Protesters hurled fire bombs and rocks at riot police as they were encircled. Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich

Dozens of injured protesters, many with bloody head wounds, were taken to makeshift medical centres, with more than 600 injured in total on both sides. The 28 confirmed dead include 10 police officers and one journalist.

A statement on the Ukrainian health ministry website said 88 police, six journalists and four foreigners were among the 287 hospitalised. Opposition activists, who have been treating wounded protesters in a downtown monastery, say the number injured is actually much higher.

The ferocity of the police assault provoked the strongest international criticism yet, with EU leaders promising sanctions after months of tiptoeing around the issue to avoid sending Mr Yanukovych deeper into Russia’s embrace. It was Mr Yanukovych’s decision to ditch a trade pact with the EU and turn to the Kremlin for economic aid that sparked the unrest.

“It was with utter dismay that we have been watching developments over the last 24 hours in Ukraine,” said Jose Manuel Barroso, the European Commission President. He vowed to pursue “targeted measures against those responsible for violence and use of excessive force”.

Poland’s Deputy Foreign Minister said the bloc had reached a consensus on sanctions. An extraordinary meeting of EU foreign ministers in Brussels today is expected to formalise exactly who will be affected by which measures.

While sanctions such as assets freezes can take months to take effect, visa and travel bans can be implemented quickly. The European Investment Bank has already suspended loans to Ukraine, and the US Secretary of State, John Kerry, said Washington was also considering sanctions.

Mr Kerry said he was hoping for a peaceful solution to the crisis. But with the opposition demanding the resignation of the government and Mr Yanukovych standing firm, there appeared to be little appetite for compromise in Kiev.

The Ukrainian President and his allies in Moscow have accused the opposition of trying to seize power by force. But many European leaders blamed the authorities for the escalating violence and said riot police should pull back.

President Yanukovych “has blood on his hands,” said Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt. An EU spokesman refused to say whether the Ukrainian President would be the target of sanctions, but French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said: “There may be a whole scale of sanctions, including personal sanctions.”

However, analysts warned that the punitive measures may be too little, too late, however,. Until now, the EU has focused on offering financial incentives to Kiev. It has been competing with less nuanced pressure from Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, who is keen to see the protests swiftly brought under control so a pro-Moscow regime remains in place. A wounded protester is evacuated during clashes in Independence Square A wounded protester is evacuated during clashes in Independence Square

“If targeted measures had been used earlier, the EU might have been able to speak up more clearly and more robustly now,” James Sherr, an associate fellow at the Chatham House think-tank, told The Independent.

Defending its approach, an EU spokesperson said that it had been careful throughout the political crisis to respect “the European ambitions that Ukraine has” and to try to offer a path to greater integration “which would enable the Ukraine in the longer term to introduce a series of political and economic reforms”.

Loading gallery...


Russia kept up the pressure on Wednesday, with President Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov calling the events of the past 48 hours a “coup attempt”. A Foreign Ministry statement blamed interference from Europe for the escalation of violence, saying politicians had “turned a blind eye to the aggressive actions of radical forces in Ukraine”.

While the public face of the opposition is the former boxer and moderate, Vitali Klitschko, and allies of the jailed former prime minister, Yulia Tymoshenko, nationalist and far-right groups have also been active around Independence Square.

The scale of the violence has provoked fears that the nation of 46 million could be heading into civil war, with much of the east still backing the government and favouring close ties with Russia.

The Ukrainian security service said that they were launching an “anti-terrorist” operation after claiming that protesters had seized hundreds of firearms. The Defence Ministry warned that soldiers could be deployed.

On Wednesday night, protesters remained in control of about two-thirds of Independence Square, also known as the Maidan. Despite the city’s metro system and many bus routes being shut down for a second consecutive day, protesters continued to spill on to the square.

Dozens appeared ready to go to battle, wielding baseball bats, metal pipes and an array of makeshift weapons. Several were carrying what appeared to be air rifles.

“We are revolutionaries, and this is a revolution,” Vitaliy Moroz, a 21-year-old Kiev university student, told The Independent as he prepared another Molotov cocktail. “We are fighting for our future.”

Nearby, pensioner Olga Shevchenko gathered paving stones dug up by protesters and passed them to an elderly man next to her, sending them up to the front lines where others were heaving them into the police ranks.

She said she left her home with her husband in Ternopil Oblast in western Ukraine and joined the protest movement in late January. “I can’t throw these stones, but I can carry them,” she said.
Lilo
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by Lilo »

Philip wrote:Singha,you've spotted the same strategy with events in Ukraine.I've started anew td. for the same,that the escalation is taking place exactly at the same time as the Sochi Winter Olympics is no coincidence,The Western media has tried very hard unsuccessfully to rubbish the Games,which have thus far been a spectacular success.The Cold War warriors of the West/US are determined to cause trouble for Putin,who has rescued Russia from reverting back into a backward mediaeval peasant entity,with a vodka soaked neo-Yeltsin western puppet signing off Russia's wealth to western MNCs and their oligarch partners.
Philip ji today I heard on Al Beeb See Radio the interview of one Bogdana Matsotska of Ski team withdrawing from representing Ukraine in Sochi supposedly in solidarity with protestors back in Ukraine.

The briturd interviewer on Radio was as usual up to his usual farce of giving long pauses as if soaking up full import of her each and every "heroic" statements against Ukrainian Govt and was projecting her to his audience as some Joan of arc incarnate - actually too much feigned drama to bear in an obviously rehearsed interview .

And Voice of Massa radio has covered Sochi with its perpetual cynical approach picturizing that behind the glitter of Sochi the discontent is only skin deep in every second Russian citizen after interviewing him supposedly caught up in some random bar .
chanakyaa
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by chanakyaa »

Were these squares named after respective uprisings or coincidence or something else

Egypt - Tahrir square protests 2011 (Taḥrīr, is a word of Arabic origin, meaning Liberation)
Image

Ukraine Independence (Liberation) Square
Image
Philip
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by Philip »

What about our very own AAP?! See the pattern emerge and understand who is behind them! The strategy.Conduct huge (well funded) demos in the centre of the nation's capital,seize the space,seize govt. buildings if possible,defy the police,etc., from being evicted,as a violent removal of tens of thousands will lead to large scale casualties horrifying the nation,and lead to charges of human rights crimes.Similarly,get the Opposition to paralyse parliament from functioning using methods that we are seeing in our very own House,and you have deadlock.Weak and/or unpopular regimes will hesitate to use decisive force,as Mrs.G did with Bhindranwale and accept the consequences.

Incidentally,just see the commonality between Ukraine and India (the name for the square,the Maidan) ,
that so many historians tend to ignore-our close historic relationship with eastern and Central Europe.The "Romany" gypsies who originated from India,taking their "Indian" music all the way to Spain.

Ukraine has been the key nation that the West/US has been manipulating ever since the Berlin Wall fell.Germany was swiftly unified,but the animosity and sens e of being cheated remains and rankles in those Germans of the eastern sector,who lost everything,their security of jobs,health benefits,etc.,to the economic system of the western half.It is the innate hardworking and disciplined nature of the German people that has rescued reunification and turned Germany into Europe's most powerful economy,which is now dictating events in the EU.The attempt to drag Ukraine into the EU at catastrophic economic that would bankrupt it was defeated by the current regime,which depends upon Russia for energy supplies as well as eco aid.Russia guaranteed large -scale eco aid to Ukraine that would stabilise its economy.The West/US is trying to do everything to defeat the regime by the anarchist acts which we are seeing today.If they cannot defeat the regime,they want to destroy Ukraine and try and beggar Russia who will have to pick up the pieces.

Putin's defence spending,very affordable with Russia's huge energy exports,of $600+B by 2020 alarms the West's Cold War warriors,who desperately want to cut Russia down to size.Sadly,they haven't learnt anything from history.Napoleon tried,so too did Hitler.They were giant figures,not pygmies like drone specialist O'Bomber ,randy M.Hollande and confused Mr.Cameron.Barring Frau Merkel,who is keeping the EU's economy afloat,the rest of the pack of western EU leaders make pygmies look like giants!

Ukraine protests: Bloodshed on Europe's doorstep as EU tries and fails to stop killing

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 40428.html

Dozens killed, hundreds injured, scores of police officers taken hostage by protesters as EU agrees sanctions over ‘unacceptable’ violence, but Moscow urges regime to assert itself

Blood and black ash smeared the once-pristine floors of Kiev’s Hotel Ukraine. Dining tables, hastily shoved together, became makeshift hospital beds for the injured; the cold ground was a crude morgue. A priest knelt next to one man, offering what small comfort he could.

Blood and black ash smeared the once-pristine floors of Kiev’s Hotel Ukraine. Dining tables, hastily shoved together, became makeshift hospital beds for the injured; the cold ground was a crude morgue. A priest knelt next to one man, offering what small comfort he could.

On the bloodiest day in modern Ukrainian history, the 12 lifeless, unnamed men who lay on the floor of the hotel lobby this morning, their bodies loosely covered with sheets, were just a few of the dozens killed in a conflict that has transformed the centre of Ukraine’s capital into a brutal battleground.

Standing yards away from the bodies, Olga Bogomolets, one of Ukraine’s leading doctors, told The Independent that they had been hit by police sniper bullets in the head, heart, lungs and neck.

Police, she said, had prevented doctors from treating the injured immediately. “We may have been able to save the lives of some of them.”

Dressed all in black, their faces hidden behind balaclavas, men in police uniform were seen firing shots into the crowds that flooded the streets around the protest camp at Independence Square, also known as the Maidan. From fortified positions on the ground and on the roofs of buildings, some appeared to take time to line up their targets. Others fired indiscriminately, taking shots at groups of men recoiling under metal shields. Teams of protesters and volunteer medics carried the injured away on planks of wood.

Amid the chaos on the streets, political leaders met with Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych to try to stem the bloodshed. He insisted that police were not armed and “all measures to stop bloodshed and confrontation are being taken.”

Soon afterwards, the acting interior minister, Vitaly Zakharchenko, issued a statement saying: “Police have been given combat weapons, which will be used in accordance with the law.” The Interior Ministry warned the residents of Kiev to stay indoors because of the “armed and aggressive mood of the people”.

Ukrainian authorities said that more than 75 had been killed in the clashes this week.

Some of the anti-government protesters had come to the Maidan wielding clubs, axes and guns to face off against the country’s feared elite police units known as the “Berkut”. Radical protesters, including members of far-right groups, have been active in the violence.

But others – the students, the young professionals, the “babushkas” (grandmothers), who had begun their protests peacefully in November – are now gathering rocks to use as ammunition for the men at the towering barricades that defend the protest camp. As fighting continued on the square, a group of six elderly women worked under the cover of a bus stop to prepare Molotov cocktails.

Prayers are held for victims who have died during anti-government protesters,clashed with police in Independence square Prayers are held for victims who have died during anti-government protesters,clashed with police in Independence square (Getty Images)

“This is extremism,” one of the women said, refusing to give her name. “Our president has driven us to this. No more cooking in the kitchen for us. Now we make these.”

The violence that has brought the country’s capital to its knees has been long in coming. Outside Ukraine, this is seen by many as a clash of East versus West, a power battle between Russian President Vladimir Putin’s controlling Kremlin and an expanding EU, played out in a deeply divided post-Soviet nation. While parts of the country – mostly in its western cities – are in open revolt against Mr Yanukovych’s government, many in the mostly Russian-speaking east favour strong ties with Russia.

Although the protests began after Mr Yanukovych spurned a historic trade and political deal with the EU in favour of a £9bn financial bailout from the Kremlin, for many Ukrainians this is a fight for basic freedoms.

Opposition leaders have called for the reinstatement of the country’s 2004 constitution, to strip the president of sweeping powers, and they demand early elections, currently scheduled for 2015. On the streets, protesters demand the resignation of Mr Yanukovych, and elections to establish a new government, one that they hope will not unleash lethal force on its own people. Some say they want a just police force. Many say they are fighting for healthcare and education systems that do not operate on bribes.

Protesters shape a defence line in Kiev, Ukraine Protesters shape a defence line in Kiev, Ukraine (EPA)

There were some signs that Mr Yanukovych’s grip on power may be slipping. Volodymyr Makeyenko, the chief of Kiev’s city administration and a former Yanukovych loyalist, said that he was leaving the ruling Party of Regions. “We must be guided only by the interests of the people. This is our only chance to save people’s lives,” he said. Serhiy Tyhipko, another influential party member, said both Mr Yanukovych and opposition leaders had “completely lost control of the situation”.

After a security scare earlier in the morning, parliament convened in the afternoon, with some pro-government MPs showing new willing to work with the opposition to find a solution to the crisis.

A few hundred yards from the Hotel Ukraine, on the freezing ground, eight more bodies were laid out on Khreschatyk Street near the Maidan. Crowds gathered around them trying to identify the faces. One or two appeared to be no more than 20 years old.

One of the wounded was reported to be a volunteer medic named as Olesya Zhukovskaya, who had sent out a brief Twitter message after being shot in the neck. It simply said: “I’m dying”. She was in a serious condition after being operated on.

Unconfirmed reports put the total number of dead on both sides at more than 100 this week.

EU officials said they would stay in Kiev for “a night of difficult negotiations” with Mr Yanukovych. The Kremlin, which has been applying behind-the-scenes pressure on Mr Yanukovych to crush the protests, said Mr Putin was sending the country’s human rights chief Vladimir Lukin, a former ambassador to Washington, to act as a mediator.

Ukrainians paid respects to those killed in the violence around Kiev’s Independence Square Ukrainians paid respects to those killed in the violence around Kiev’s Independence Square (EPA)

The Interior Ministry claimed that 67 police officers had been captured by protesters, although this too could not be verified. Protesters were reportedly seen leading men in police uniform around the Maidan.

EU officials said they would stay in Kiev for “a night of difficult negotiations” with Mr Yanukovych. The Kremlin, which has been applying behind-the-scenes pressure on Mr Yanukovych to crush the protests, said Mr Putin was sending the country’s human rights chief Vladimir Lukin, a former ambassador to Washington, to Ukraine to act as a mediator between Mr Yanukovych and opposition leaders.

Meanwhile, hundreds of protesters were rebuilding the fortified barricades that surround that Maidan, in preparation for further violence.
Read more:
As Kiev burns, the West’s politicians haggle over sanctions
Comment: violence will soon acquire unstoppable momentum
Editorial: Dark days in Kiev
panduranghari
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by panduranghari »

Hah, Russia would love the rouble to depreciate. What a god send opportunity to do that. The markets will use Rouble as a proxy for Ukraine too.

The global currencies are at a race to the bottom. Russia will depreciate rouble. Short term inflation will shoot up. Russia will make up for this loss by increasing the energy prices. Europe will pay more for the energy now. As the winter is ending, the strategists perhaps feel they can allow this to play on a bit longer as the population in western Europe will not get restive with increasing energy prices.

I am willing to take a bet that on cue Chinese will depreciate their Yuan too.

Lets see who will blink first after this. The west would love to engineer a 1998 Russian financial crash again. They however do not see that a energy rich russia is unlikely to go down the same route. The Euroland needs Russia more than Ukraine.
Philip
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by Philip »

President hails 'peace deal' – while shots ring out in Kiev streets and MPs brawl in parliament
http://www.independent.co.uk/?CMP=ILC-refresh
Shots again began to ring out in Kiev's Independence Square and fights broke out among deputies in Ukraine's parliament this morning, despite the president's assurance that a peace deal had been reached with opposition leaders in overnight crisis talks.

Support for the president appeared to be weakening, as reports said the army's deputy chief of staff, Yury Dumansky, was resigning in "disagreement with the politics of pulling the armed forces into an internal civil conflict." Late on Thursday, the Ukrainian parliament passed a measure that would prohibit an "anti-terrorist operation" threatened by Yanukovych to restore order, and called for all Interior Ministry troops to return to their bases.

But it was unclear how binding the move would be, as the mechanism for carrying it out would have to be developed by the president's office and the Interior Ministry.
Read more:
Bloodshed on Europe's doorstep as EU tries to stop killing

This morning, several thousand protesters milled around Independence Square, known as the Maidan, which earlier this week was rocked by street battles between protesters and police.

No visible police forces remained on the square, and volunteers walked freely to the protest camps to donate food and other packages. The scene in Kiev's Independence Square on Friday morning The scene in Kiev's Independence Square on Friday morning

Yanukovych and the opposition protesters are locked in a battle over the identity of Ukraine, a nation of 46 million that has divided loyalties between Russia and the West. Parts of the country — mostly in its western cities — are in open revolt against Yanukovych's central government, while many in eastern Ukraine back the president and favour strong ties with Russia, their former Soviet ruler.

Protesters across the country are also upset over corruption in Ukraine, the lack of democratic rights and the country's ailing economy, which just barely avoided bankruptcy with a $15 billion aid infusion from Russia.

In Brussels, the 28-nation European Union decided in an emergency meeting yesterday to impose sanctions against those behind the violence in Ukraine, including a travel ban and an asset freeze against some government officials.

The White House said US Vice President Joe Biden spoke by telephone with Yanukovych on Thursday afternoon and made clear that the US is prepared to sanction those officials responsible for the violence.

Despite the violence, defiant protesters seemed determined to continue their push for Yanukovych's resignation and early presidential and parliamentary elections.

"The price of freedom is too high. But Ukrainians are paying it," Viktor Danilyuk, a 30-year-old protester, said yesterday. "We have no choice. The government isn't hearing us."

Yesterday was the deadliest day yet at the sprawling protest camp in Kiev. Snipers were seen shooting at protesters there, and video footage showed at least one sniper wearing a Ukraine riot police uniform.

One of the wounded, volunteer medic Olesya Zhukovskaya, sent out a brief Twitter message — "I'm dying" — after she was shot in the neck. Dr Oleh Musiy, the medical coordinator for the protesters, said she was in serious condition after undergoing surgery.

Opposition protesters build barricades overnight Opposition protesters build barricades overnight

Musiy told The Associated Press that at least 70 protesters were killed on Thursday and over 500 were wounded in the clashes.

In addition, three policemen were killed Thursday and 28 suffered gunshot wounds, Interior Ministry spokesman Serhiy Burlakov told the AP.

A statement on the website of the Health Ministry said 77 people had been killed between Tuesday morning, when the violence began, and this morning. The statement said 577 people had been wounded and 369 hospitalized.

There was no way to immediately verify any of the death tolls.

French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius, along with his German and Polish counterparts, said after a five-hour meeting with Yanukovych and another with opposition leaders that they discussed new elections and a new government, but gave no details. The three resumed meeting with Yanukovych late last night.

Video footage on Ukrainian television showed shocking scenes yesterday of protesters being cut down by gunfire, lying on the pavement as comrades rushed to their aid.

Protesters were also seen leading policemen, their hands held high, around the sprawling protest camp in central Kiev. The Interior Ministry said 67 police were captured in all. An opposition politician said they were being held in Kiev's occupied city hall.

Interior Ministry members in plain-clothes are escorted out of Independence Square Interior Ministry members in plain-clothes are escorted out of Independence Square

German Chancellor Angela Merkel spoke with Russia's President Vladimir Putin and President Barack Obama about the crisis yesteday evening. All three leaders agreed that a political solution needs to be found as soon as possible to prevent further bloodshed.

Saying the US was outraged by the violence, Obama urged Yanukovych in a statement to withdraw his forces from downtown Kiev immediately. He also said Ukraine should respect the right of protest and that protesters must be peaceful.

The US State Department on Thursday issued a statement warning citizens "to defer all non-essential travel to Ukraine due to the ongoing political unrest."

The Kremlin issued a statement with Putin blaming radical protesters and voicing "extreme concern about the escalation of armed confrontation in Ukraine."

The Russian leader called for an immediate end to bloodshed and for steps "to stabilize the situation and stop extremist and terrorist actions." He also sent former Russian ombudsman Vladimir Lukin to Ukraine to act as a mediator.

Russia appeared increasingly frustrated with Yanukovych's inability to find a way out of the crisis.

Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said Russia will "try to do our best" to fulfill its financial obligations to Ukraine, but indicated Moscow would hold back on further bailout installments until the crisis is resolved.

"We need partners that are in good shape and a Ukrainian government that is legitimate and effective," he said.
UlanBatori
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by UlanBatori »

Dang! Ukraine festivities are already off the news headlines, since the Russian figure-skater won the gold at Sochi, doing seven triple-jumps and 15 fire-hydrant maneuvers wearing, well, a few pieces of orange strings and skates. But sorry, for those of us who have watched The Best, nothing will replace the sight of Katarina Witt on the ice. :((

But would you look at the size of these tires that they have been using? Monster SUVs or tractors?
The Germany Foreign Ministry announced in a Twitter message that the leadership council of the Ukrainian protest movement had authorized the signing of the deal, which calls for early presidential elections, a coalition government and reduction of presidential power through constitutional reforms.

A spokeswoman for the protest movement told The Associated Press that opposition leaders were headed for the president’s office to discuss the agreement.

Any deal that does not include the president’s departure, however, is unlikely to get the approval of the mass of protesters and it was uncertain whether, in the event of a final deal, the protest movement’s political leadership could deliver the support of an angry base comprising many different groups and factions.
Pretty blatant, isn't it? The German connection? Wonder if anyone remembers Babi Yaror other Ukrainian sites of German kindness.
Victims of other massacres at the site included thousands of Soviet prisoners of war, communists, gypsies, Ukrainian nationalists and civilian hostages. It is estimated that between 100,000 and 150,000 lives were taken at Babi Yar during the German occupation.
KLNMurthy
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by KLNMurthy »

UlanBatori wrote:Dang! Ukraine festivities are already off the news headlines, since the Russian figure-skater won the gold at Sochi, doing seven triple-jumps and 15 fire-hydrant maneuvers wearing, well, a few pieces of orange strings and skates. But sorry, for those of us who have watched The Best, nothing will replace the sight of Katarina Witt on the ice. :((

But would you look at the size of these tires that they have been using? Monster SUVs or tractors?
The Germany Foreign Ministry announced in a Twitter message that the leadership council of the Ukrainian protest movement had authorized the signing of the deal, which calls for early presidential elections, a coalition government and reduction of presidential power through constitutional reforms.

A spokeswoman for the protest movement told The Associated Press that opposition leaders were headed for the president’s office to discuss the agreement.

Any deal that does not include the president’s departure, however, is unlikely to get the approval of the mass of protesters and it was uncertain whether, in the event of a final deal, the protest movement’s political leadership could deliver the support of an angry base comprising many different groups and factions.
Pretty blatant, isn't it? The German connection? Wonder if anyone remembers Babi Yaror other Ukrainian sites of German kindness.
Victims of other massacres at the site included thousands of Soviet prisoners of war, communists, gypsies, Ukrainian nationalists and civilian hostages. It is estimated that between 100,000 and 150,000 lives were taken at Babi Yar during the German occupation.
A Ukrainian forgetting Babi Yar and craving Deutschland Uber Ukraine would be like, let's see, an Indian and Punjabi forgetting Jalianwallah Bagh and touting the wonders of British occupation. But that would never happen.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

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It appears Yanukovich has capitulated. Long live the colour revolution.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

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+++++++1 :)
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

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Ze Anschluss ist here!!!

Why do they call it the Maidan Revolution? Ukrainian = Gypsies = Indians to use the term "maidan"?
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

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it's a farsi word that has crept into ukrainian usage, apparently via ottoman turks.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

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I Am a Ukrainian

Viral video
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

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A Ukrainian forgetting Babi Yar and craving Deutschland Uber Ukraine would be like, let's see, an Indian and Punjabi forgetting Jalianwallah Bagh and touting the wonders of British occupation. But that would never happen.
You will be surprised how many in their 50s through 70s think we should forget Birteesh atrocities and move on. There is no shortage of losers. But I digress ....
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http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 45523.html
Robert Fisk: Ukraine’s future is tied up with Syria’s – and Vladimir Putin is crucial to both
Friday 21 February 2014

No one in the Middle East will be studying Ukraine’s violent tragedy with more fascination – and deeper concern – than President Bashar al-Assad of Syria.

He won’t care a fig about Obama’s critics – who are already chastising the US President for giving Vladimir Putin the green light to support the Ukrainian President by flunking his threat to bomb Damascus last year – nor will Assad care very much about the future political career of Viktor Yanukovych, whom he happens to know well.

He will instead be dwelling upon the remarkable similarities between Yanukovych’s besieged government and his own Syrian regime, which is still battling an armed struggle against insurgents. The parallels are by no means exact, as Assad’s enemies claim them to be when they suggest that he and Yanukovych are “blood brothers”. But they are close enough to persuade the Syrian President and his Talleyrand – the Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem – to study the degree of support Putin gives to his ally in Kiev.

Without Russian and Iranian support, Assad could scarcely have survived the past three years of war in Syria. Nor could Yanukovych, without Moscow’s “brotherly” friendship, have withstood opposition forces – and the EU’s flirtation with Ukraine – as long as he has. The Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has been using almost the same words of irritation and anger towards the US over Ukraine as he did towards America when it was threatening to bomb Syria. If Ukraine constitutes Russia’s eastern defensive wall against Europe, Syria – fighting against Islamist rebels every bit as ruthless as Putin has faced in Chechnya – is part of Moscow’s southern flank.

There are other, more intriguing comparisons. The initial Syrian opposition to Assad – following revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt – was peaceful, although armed men did occasionally appear even in the early days of the revolt. Then military deserters formed an armed opposition that was swiftly taken over by radicals more interested in replacing Assad with a caliphate than the “free Syria” which the opposition originally demanded. So, too, in Kiev: Yanukovych’s opponents found themselves, after several weeks, uneasily linked to small, right-wing, neo-Nazi groups who had – in the eyes of their enemies – more in common with the Ukrainian fascists who helped the Germans in the Second World War than with the Soviet resistance to Nazi occupation.

Just as Assad’s first opponents were idolised by the West – and its media – as freedom fighters, so were the Ukrainian opposition regarded as anti-regime rather than anti-constitutional by the same powers and their newspapers. Once Syria’s unrest became weaponised on both sides, the West and its Arab allies sent military equipment to Assad’s enemies. There is no evidence that the West has done the same for Yanukovych’s opponents, some of whom are now also armed, but be sure it is only a matter of time before the Russians claim that they have.

There are differences, of course. Yanukovych was elected in a rather more convincing poll than Assad. Ukraine is not ethnically divided: Catholicism and Christian Orthodoxy outline the internal borders, although the Catholic/Croat-Serb/Orthodox civil war in ex-Yugoslavia does not suggest a happy outcome to Ukraine’s suffering. Syria’s war has created areas of conflict in which Sunnis are largely fighting Shia Alawites, Christians, Druze and others, along with middle-class Sunnis and Sunni army officers who support the government.

There have, of course, long been contacts between Syria and the Ukraine. Just before the revolution in Syria, Assad visited Kiev, signed a free trade agreement and heard Yanukovych praise his country as Ukraine’s “gateway to the Middle East”. There are closer ties: the large number of Syrian students who have been attending Ukrainian universities and the larger number of Ukrainian citizens born to Syrian and Soviet parents before the collapse of Communism in eastern Europe. The older Syrian generals also know Kiev well from their early training in Soviet military schools.

But the real question for Syria is this: will Putin be able to support Yanukovych if US and EU pressure continues to build? Is the survival of Yanukovych worth a new Cold War? If it is, Assad is safe: the Russians will not abandon Syria since this would demonstrate how easily they might turn their backs on “Russian” Ukraine. But what if the US offered Putin carte blanche in the Ukraine in return for his abandonment of the Assad regime? Obama could once more make his fraudulent claim that it was American military threats – rather than Russian mediation – that forced Assad to hand over his chemical weapons to the UN. And insist that Assad must bow to the transitional government which the Americans and British and other EU nations have been trying to foist upon his regime at Geneva.

Assad, however, is a survivor. His Baath party was schooled in self-preservation by Putin’s predecessors. Assad may understand Yanukovych; yet he knows Putin better. Not for nothing do the Egyptians admiringly call the Russian leader “the fox”. That’s why Putin has sent his personal mediator to Kiev. Washing its hands of Damascus would do incalculable harm to Moscow’s standing in the “new” Middle East. The Syrians realise Russia is big enough to fight on two fronts. So Putin will probably just have to go on struggling for his allies – before Ukraine turns as bloody as Syria – in the hope that Obama will turn out to be as sanctimonious – and toothless – in Kiev, as he was over Damascus.
If the truce which has heavyweight champ Klitschko for it holds,there will be some hope that the opposition will tone down the use of weapons on their side,which allows the state police to go for the kill.If they continue with the right wing elements using weapons,they will be dealt with in kind and the movement will lose its momentum as the state cracks down even harder.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

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On a side note and lessons learnt type of reflection one needs to follow how the colour revolution is carried out in practice. Both strategic and tactical questions. One strategic initiative is having enough west backed gungadin type leaders atleast leaders who have their economic interests in the west. Also these leaders also have their reputation built up in or by the west. In ukraine 2004 there was Julia Timoshenko, now discredited. In 2014 there is Klitshko. No doubt he was the most educated heavy weight professional boxer of all time. Next in the pipeline is the Koum guy from Whatsapp who's won a 19 billion lottery and board seat. No doubt there is a linguistic and religious overtone to the Ukrainian colour revolution. The lesson for India then is to find these native gungadins and expose them for the charlatans that they are.
Another aspect of the ukrainian revolution, more tactical, seems to be the absolutely total lack of control over who can enter/leave the country. An American diplomutt, a dramatis personae in the Indo-US DK affair, was personally handing out food to protestors in Euromaidan sometime in December/January. In addition foreign diplomutts from germany, uk etc were having a field day going in and out of the country at will. Even Venezuela expelled 3 US diplomutts. What does this mean for India? Just recently we have eased visa norms and are providing visa on entry to citizens of 140 countries !!!
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

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Shankar,the GOI has just issued a fatwa to govt. depts. NOT to entertain the visiting US eco team who are bullying India over trade policies.India has said that it will go to the WTO instead.

I was also surprised how the Ukranian govt. has allowed firang entities to take part in the violent protests.These diplomutts and foreign journos should be arrested/expelled for indulging in anti-national actions contrary to their status.

Here's a piece on Ukraine showing the fundamental rift within the state and the baggage of its history.


Boyd Tonkin

Friday 21 February 2014
Ukraine is a country divided against itself. Watch out, Scotland

If Scotland votes yes, supporters of the union will find themselves citizens of a country that commands none of their loyalty

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/com ... 44967.html
One summer day in Kiev, I sat in Stalin’s private cinema. It was during a tour of the grandiose Neoclassical parliament building, the Verkhovna Rada, opened as a fig-leaf national assembly in 1939 at the height of Soviet state terror. In a basement room, the dictator, who dropped in fairly often, used to sit and watch films. Our party chuckled over this weird anecdote from the barbaric past.

How long ago those dark days felt, back then – in the middle of the last decade. Kids in orange T-shirts strolled through peaceful streets. Green parks spilled down to the broad river Dnieper in a sun-dappled city that local writer Mikhail Bulgakov called “a pearl in turquoise”. At a conference in the parliament, writers and academics mocked the EU for embracing their Polish cousins while, absurdly, consigning them to the savage East. Yet they believed that this gross error would be put right. And Ukraine’s recent revolution seemed unassailable.

This week, down the road on the Maidan and around Khreshchatyk Street, scores of sniper‑targeted protesters – about 100 dead – fell amid the flames and barricades of a virtual civil war. Battles raged outside the parliament. Yesterday, riot police briefly infiltrated the building itself as deputies debated President Yanukovych’s offer of early elections, a unity government and a return to the more balanced constitution of those optimistic days after 2004.

The Slavic goddess Berehynia, on top of the kitsch gilded column where I once met the droll and brave novelist Andrey Kurkov before we sloped off to a merry diplomatic party, now overlooks a killing field.

From Moscow, Putin cracks the whip and loads the guns of his tottering henchman. The European Union belatedly wakes up. Fragmented opposition forces lose touch with the surging anger of the “Euromaidan” rebels. In the pithy words of Ukraine specialist Andrew Wilson, the EU at first “took a baguette to a knife fight”. The foreign ministers’ troika from Poland, France and Germany has at last begun to put some beef into the European sandwich. But how did it ever come to this?

In hindsight, even then – during times of hope for a Western-oriented, fully democratic future after the Orange Revolution of late 2004 – there were warning signs to heed. Despite the official cult of Ukrainian promoted by the nationalists then in power, Russian still served as a lingua franca of the streets. At any meal, the façade of nationalist unity would start to crack and the unhealed rifts between Europhiles and Slavophiles – “right bank” and “left bank” Ukraine, after the flanks of the mighty Dnieper – begin to emerge.

After a few pepper-and-honey vodkas, over plump roast river fish, some of our hosts would – if they hailed from Russophile provinces – raise doubts about the validity of the new state that came into being in December 1991 amid the wreckage of Stalin’s Soviet empire. Culture mattered to them. But then, in these parts, it always does.

Glinting above the riverbank, the gold-domed monasteries of Pechersk Lavra recall the medieval heyday of Kievan Rus – the spiritual mothership of all Russian Orthodoxy, not just this patch of it. For pan-Slav thinkers, Ukraine remains, etymologically, the “borderland” of greater Russia.

A guy from the coal-mining, Moscow-backing Donbas told me of his outrage that the Russian classics should be taught as “foreign literature” in this city. In Kiev, where so many great Russian souls had lived and written!

Now a haunting museum, Bulgakov’s beloved family home – the setting of his novel The White Guard and play The Days of the Turbins – sits halfway down the winding, cobbled Andreyevsky Descent. Bulgakov loved his home town, but he called Kiev “a beautiful city, a happy city, the mother of Russian cities”. He was never remotely a Bolshevik. Still, Ukrainian nationalism repelled him as a primitive peasant throwback.

That backwoods chauvinism has shown its face in the current unrest. Late last year, the right-wing Svoboda (Freedom) party tried to hijack the uprising with posters of the pro‑Nazi wartime guerrilla leader Stepan Bandera. They remain a small minority among protesters. Most want “Europe” as a proxy or blanket term for accountability, transparency, democracy.

Even in the east, the Euromaidan has plenty of backers – although rallies there seem to express rage at the shameless kleptocracy of Yanukovych and his “family” more than any love of Brussels. See the website yanukovich.info for some solidly documented material on corruption among the ruling clique.

Breakdowns in legitimacy and breakdowns in governance run in tandem. If a large proportion of citizens feel that their state lacks values and authority, then what’s to stop a crooked elite from treating it as a private cash machine?

Ukraine’s divisions still run as deep as the Dnieper. If you credit a range of polls, support for the anti-government demonstrations since the abrogation of an EU co-operation deal on 21 November has stayed at or just under 50 per cent. Backing for the Yanukovych camp has hovered around, or just above, 40 per cent. In some parts of the west, fewer than 15 per cent wish to toe the Russian line; in the east, it’s a mirror image – with comparable figures.

Even if Yanukovych goes, Ukraine will still suffer its crisis of legitimacy. Yulia Tymoshenko, the former leader jailed in 2011 whose release the parliament agreed yesterday, still has enemies enough to derail any comeback. No unifying, pacifying figurehead – a Walesa or a Havel – lurks on the horizon. And Russian tutelage still has appeal for almost half the country.

Andrey Kurkov wrote recently: “Ukraine is a country where victory for any one side is impossible.” A trial of Yanukovych and his cronies “would look a great deal more elegant” than the current carnage, but “would be sanctioned by half the population”.

A house divided, we tend to think, cannot stand. But how much fundamental disaffection can a country take? This is not just a teaser for foreign-affairs buffs. After all, the United Kingdom – that ramshackle old jalopy of a polity, tied together with string and myth – is wheezing towards an abyss of its own.


Come September, the Scottish referendum presents a painfully perfect lose-lose scenario. Given a rejection of independence (still more likely), a thoroughly disgruntled 40-plus percentage of Scots will continue to press for devo max at the highest proof available. Now imagine a – far from impossible – “Yes” vote of 51 per cent or so, secured by cack-handed, backfiring pro-union interventions by everyone from Osborne to Barroso to Bowie.

No, we shouldn’t predict barricades on Princes Street or bonfires on the Royal Mile. Edinburgh will not burn like Kiev. Yet believers in a multinational state that has – despite or because of its anomalies – lasted since 1707 will find themselves suddenly thrown into citizenship of a country that commands none of their loyalty.

At least in the early of days of independence, half the country will not care to fly its new flag. Non-unionist Scots have long-practised skills in cultural separateness. For a large, restive unionist minority, the same would not apply. Have Alex Salmond and his team planned enough for the outcomes of a narrow-scrape victory? Without alarmism, it doesn’t seem absurd to direct them to the rocky history of post-Communist Europe. Secessionists who dream of Norway and Denmark should at least take a peek not just at Ukraine but into the long nightmare of Bosnia – shaken again this month by disintegrative protests.

We don’t need to travel that far to witness the lingering misery of botched state formation. This year is the centenary not only of the First World War but also of a local uprising against the authority of the British parliament. It happened in Ireland, yes. And Ulster Protestants were responsible.

When the passage of the third Home Rule Bill of 1912, giving de facto self-government to all Ireland, became inevitable, the country’s unionists rose in arms.

Edward Carson, the firebrand barrister-politician who had destroyed his fellow Dubliner Oscar Wilde in court, raised 100,000 rebels to fight against Westminster’s decision. At the Curragh, in March 1914, army officers mutinied. The Ulster Volunteers illegally imported rifles, while in the south, the Irish Volunteers – a core component of the later IRA – came into being to oppose them. At gunpoint, Carson won his Northern Irish statelet. Ireland descended into civil wars. That collapse of legitimacy drained and wounded both islands for almost a century.

Back in Kiev, Putin’s neo-Stalinist playbook – of remote-control repression via heavy-handed puppet regimes – has come to grief. He will not be welcome for a private screening in the Verkhovna Rada any time soon. As for Bulgakov, who lived through 10 coups in Kiev after the October Revolution in 1917, he came to loathe every bloody faction.

At the end of The White Guard, he voices the hope that “all this will pass. The sufferings, agonies, blood, hunger and wholesale death. The sword will go away, but the stars will remain… So why do we not want peace, and why are we reluctant to turn our gaze to the stars?”

Peace must mean that your home – however quarrelsome – stands firm. Bungle the architecture of statehood and the repairs may last for ever, and cost the earth.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

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^^^^Would apply for the Telangana/SA fiasco too.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

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The partition of India too!! Ukraine is a classic case of the neo-imperialist "divide and ruin" policy,where states with ethnic divides with differences can be widened and even split.As the piece said,Ukraine contains much of Russia's spiritual and cultural soul.Can anyone not agree that today Pakistan physically holds some of India's greatest cultural and religious treasures like Mohenjo Daro,Taxila,the Sikh shrines of the Punjab,etc.In fact.,a year or so ago when in Paris,I viisted the Guimet Museum,repository of Asian art,where an exhibition of "Pakistani art" was being featured.Everything inside was anything that we associate with modern pakistan.It was all the Buddhist and Hindu art spanning thousands of years of India's cultural history,including the Gandhara style and Grecian influence post-Alexander's arrival.

In order to preserve their military and economic stranglehold over the globe,the splintering of powerful strong nations wherever possible is actively pursued,especially if these countries are not US allies or are potential rivals/enemies.In India,the attitude of the TN supremo JJ towards the Eelamists,changed after a meeting with Hillary Clinton.Since that meeting,she has taken a pro-active anti-Lankan attitude,perhaps in the hope that it will result in electoral gains.Her astonishing decision to release the murderers of Rajiv G has shocked the nation.TN fundamentalism is on the rise again,with the LTTE entrenching themselves in TN after their defeat in Lanka.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/f ... h-election
Ukraine protests: end nears for Viktor Yanukovych despite concessions
President's election promise may not be enough to satisfy protesters after violence leaves dozens dead
Pitched battles between riot police and protesters have turned central Kiev into a war zone. Photograph: IBL/REX

Ukraine's President Viktor Yanukovych signalled concessions to the street campaign seeking to topple him, agreeing to early presidential elections, the quick formation of a coalition government with the opposition, and ruling out a state of emergency after the worst bloodshed the country has seen in almost 23 years of independence.

A marathon negotiation that went through the night, non-stop for 20 hours, resulted in settlement terms aimed at ending a three-month stand-off between Yanukovych's administration and tens of thousands of street protesters occupying central Kiev.

The confrontation exploded this week into pitched battles between riot police and opposition that turned central Kiev into a war zone, with the police resorting to widespread use of live ammunition for the first time, leaving at least 77 dead within 72 hours. The escalation shocked the country and the international community, raising fears of a descent into deeper conflict.

Laurent Fabius, the French foreign minister, spoke of Ukraine veering towards "civil war", while Radek Sikorski, his Polish counterpart, warned that Yanukovych was on the brink of declaring martial law. Both were in Kiev, with Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the German foreign minister, to mediate the terms of the compromise aimed at pulling Ukraine back from the edge of the abyss.

Yanukovych agreed to early presidential elections by December at the latest. That, however, is only three or four months before the next scheduled ballot. It remains unclear whether he will survive in office another 10 months. A trio of the main opposition leaders agreed to those terms and won backing from the organisers of the mass protests focused on Kiev's central Independence Square, or Maidan.

But, with the opposing sides entrenched and highly polarised as seldom before as a result of this week's bloodshed, it was also not clear whether the core of the protesters, who have camped out in winter conditions for three months, would accept anything less than Yanukovych's resignation.

Yanukovych's position looks increasingly untenable. Parliament promptly moved to consolidate the agreement.

As up to dozen more deputies were said to have deserted Yanukovych's party, the legislators also went beyond the settlement terms and humiliated the president by approving moves to release his arch-rival and former prime minister, Yulia Tymoshenko, from 30 months in jail.

Late on Friday night the US state department confirmed various reports that Yanukovych had left Kiev, but said it believed he had travelled to the city of Kharkiv in the east of the country "to shore up support there" rather than fleeing Ukraine as had been rumoured in some reports and on social media.

US officials are also investigating rumours that the interior minister has fled to Belarus, but have not yet confirmed those reports.

Kharkiv is the second-largest city in the country, in a region that borders Russia and which supported Yanukovych by a 20-point-plus margin. However Kharkiv was also the scene of unprecedented anti-government protests on Friday.

In a sign of improving US relations with Moscow after the Ukrainian peace deal, Barack Obama spoke to president Putin for an hour on Friday – a call that US officials described as an "important signal that they were able to talk positively about the agreement".

The senior state department official also said that US diplomats are hopeful that a vote in the Ukrainian parliament supporting jailed opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko was a sign that the "alignment of forces within the Ukraine parliament has shifted radically over the last 24 hours".

Secretary of State John Kerry spoke to three of the four current opposition leaders on Friday by phone and vice president Joe Biden, who has been leading US efforts to apply pressure on authorities in Kiev, spoke to president Yanukovych for an hour on Thursday.

Events appeared to be conspiring to drive Yanukovych out of office. His every attempt in three months to crack down and end the crisis has led to its escalation, climaxing in this week's mass loss of life.

The agreement called for prompt reversion to the 2004 constitution, which would curb the president's powers and enhance those of the parliament. It barred the declaration of a state of emergency and said a new government of "national unity" should be formed within 10 days. It limited the police role to the protection of public buildings, but also called for the clearing of public spaces, meaning the protesters would need to disperse.

"I declare steps that must be done to restore peace and avoid more victims of the confrontation. I declare that I initiate early presidential elections," said Yanukovych. "I initiate the return of the constitution of the year 2004 with redistribution of powers [to a] parliamentary republic. I call to begin the procedure of establishing the government of national trust."

Reviled by many at home and discredited abroad, scepticism is high that Yanukovych will go peacefully.

"It would be naive to assume Yanukovych has any good will. He's up against the wall. I don't know anyone in the world who could say he trusts President Yanukovych," said Donald Tusk, the prime minister of neighbouring Poland. "I understand people who say 'we don't trust this man' and that his departure is a condition for this deal. Those people need to be understood. The bodies of people killed the other night are still there … A lack of credibility will hang over all negotiations with Yanukovych's participation."

Steinmeier and Sikorski confirmed that the lengthy negotiations were difficult and contradicted earlier declarations from Yanukovych's office that a deal had been struck.

Tens of thousands of protesters remained in control of central Kiev on Friday , highly suspicious of any agreement announced by the president.

"It was war yesterday. Terrible," said Oleg, a protester. "Today it's quiet, some kind of compromise. But Yanukovych has no chance. He has destroyed himself."

Despite police attempts to retake at least part of the central square this week, the security forces were routed and the opposition expanded and reinforced the territory under its control.

Much will hinge on how Moscow reacts in a crisis that has pitted Russia against the European Union in an increasingly brutal contest for influence in Ukraine. The crisis erupted in November when Yanukovych turned his back on years of negotiating trade and political accords with Brussels and looked to Moscow for cheap credit and gas supplies.

Russia took part in the negotiations in Kiev, but its envoy, Vladimir Lukin, left early and was the only party not to sign the settlement terms.

While the EU will be sure to trumpet the role of the three European foreign ministers in mediating a possible way out of the crisis, President Vladimir Putin in Moscow is widely seen to have the upper hand. "Putin holds all the cards," admitted a senior EU official. "We can only hope Putin is not going to push the Ukrainian system into total collapse, because we don't have real instruments to counter-react."

The Russians offered Yanukovych $15bn in favourable bond purchases. It has lent $3bn and froze remaining purchases last month when Yanukovych sacrificed his pro-Russian prime minister, Mykola Azarov.

Earlier this week, Moscow said it would supply a further $2bn this week but on Friday that appeared to be in the balance, with Moscow saying the money depended on the shape of the new government and Kiev saying it was no longer selling the bonds.

That suggested a weakened Yanukovych was yielding to opposition and European pressure on the contours of the new government to be formed within 10 days.

But it remains entirely within Moscow's power to tighten the screws on Yanukovych in the months ahead.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by sooraj »

Is Ukraine drifting toward war, power confrontation?

http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2014/02/21 ... civil-war/
People ask for solutions, but no solutions are possible in a disinformed world. Populations almost everywhere are dissatisfied, but few have any comprehension of the real situation. Before there can be solutions, people must know the truth about the problems. For those “few” inclined to be “messengers,” it is largely a thankless task.

The assumption that man is a “rational animal” is “incorrect.” He and she are emotional creatures, not Mr. Spock of Star Trek. Humans are brainwashed by enculturation and indoctrination. Patriots respond with hostility toward criticisms of their governments, their countries, their hopes and their delusions. Their emotions throttle facts, should any reach them. Aspirations and delusions prevail over truth. Most people want to be told what they want to hear. Consequently, they are always “gullible” and their illusions and self-delusions make them easy victims of propaganda. This is true of all “levels of societies” and of “the leaders” themselves.

We are witnessing this today in western Ukraine where a mixture of “witless” university students, pawns in Washington’s drive for world hegemony, together with “paid protesters” and “fascistic elements” among “ultra-nationalists” are bringing great troubles upon Ukraine and perhaps a deadly war upon the world.

Many of the protesters are just the unemployed collecting easy money. It is the “witless” idealistic types that are destroying the independence of their country. Victoria Nuland, the American neoconservative Assistant Secretary of State, whose agenda is US world hegemony, told the Ukrainians what was in store for them last December 13, but the protesters were too “delusional” to hear.

In an eight minute, 46 second speech at the National Press Club sponsored by the US-Ukraine Foundation, Chevron, and Ukraine-in-Washington Lobby Group, Nuland boasted that Washington has spent $5 billion to foment agitation to bring Ukraine into the EU. Once captured by the EU, Ukraine will be “helped” by the West acting through the IMF. Nuland, of course, presented the IMF as Ukraine’s rescuer, not as the “iron hand” of the West that will squeeze all life out of Ukraine’s struggling economy.

Nuland’s audience consisted of all the people who will be enriched by the “looting” and by “connections” to a Washington-appointed Ukrainian government. Just look at the large Chevron sign next to which Nuland speaks, and you will know what it is all about.

Nuland’s speech failed to alert the Ukraine protesters, who are “determined” to destroy the independence of Ukraine and to place their country in the hands of the IMF so that it can be “looted” like Latvia, Greece and every country that ever had an IMF structural adjustment program. All the monies that protesters “are paid” by the US and EU will soon be given back manyfold as Ukraine is “adjusted” by Western “looting.”

In her short speech the neoconservative agitator Nuland alleged that the protesters whom Washington has spent $5 billion cultivating were protesting “peacefully with enormous restraint” against a “brutal government.”

According to RT, which has much more credibility than the US State Department (remember Secretary of State Colin Powell’s address to the UN setting up the US invasion of Iraq with his “evidence” of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, a speech Powell later disavowed as Bush regime disinformation), Ukrainian rioters have seized 1,500 guns, 100,000 rounds of ammunition, 3 machine guns, and grenades from military armories.

The human-rights trained Ukrainian police have permitted the violence to get out of hand. A number of police have been burned by Molotov cocktails. The latest report is that 108 police have been shot. A number are dead and 63 are in critical condition. These casualties are the products of Nuland’s “peacefully protesting protesters acting with enormous restraint.” On February 20, the elected, independent Ukraine government responded to the rioters use of firearms by allowing police to use “firearms in self-defense.”

Perhaps the “Russophobic” western Ukrainians “deserve” the IMF, and perhaps the EU deserves the extreme nationalists who are trying to topple the Ukraine government. Once Ukrainians experience being “looted” by the West, they will be on their knees “begging” Russia to rescue them. The only certain thing is that it is unlikely that the Russian part of Ukraine will remain part of Ukraine.


During the Soviet era, parts of Russia herself, such as the Crimea, were placed into the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, perhaps in order to increase the Russian population in Ukraine. In other words, a large part of today’s Ukraine–eastern and southern provinces–are traditional “Russian territory,” not part of historical Ukraine.

Until Russia granted Ukraine independence in the early 1990s, Ukraine had experienced scant independence since the 14th century and had been a part of Russia for 200 years. The problem with the grant of independence is that much of Ukraine is “not Ukrainian.” “It is Russian.”


As I have reported previously, Russia regards the prospect of Ukraine as a member of the EU with NATO with US bases on Russia’s frontier as a “strategic threat.” It is unlikely that the Russian government and the Russian territories in Ukraine will accept Washington’s plan for Ukraine. Whatever their intention, Secretary of State John Kerry’s provocative statements are raising tensions and fomenting war. The vast bulk of the American and Western populations have no idea of what the real situation is, because all they hear from the “free press” is the neoconservative propaganda line.

Washington’s lies are destroying not only civil liberties at home and countries abroad, but are raising dangerous alarms in Russia about the country’s security. If Washington succeeds in overthrowing the Ukrainian government, the eastern and southern provinces are likely to secede. If secession becomes a civil war instead of a peaceful divorce, Russia would not be able to sit on the sidelines. As the Washington warmongers would be backing western Ukraine, the two nuclear powers would be thrown into military conflict.

“The Ukrainian and Russian governments” allowed this dangerous situation to develop, because they “naively” permitted for many years billions of US dollars to flow into their countries where the money was used to create fifth columns under the guise of educational and human rights organizations, the real purpose of which is “to destabilize” both countries. The consequence of the “trust” Ukrainians and Russians placed in the West is the prospect of civil and wider war.

UPDATE:

Reading the collection of foreign news dispatches provided by Richard Rozoff about the situation in Ukraine reminded me of histories about how the pointless and destructive First World War began. In their blind desire to overthrow the democratically-elected government of Ukraine and impose an EU “puppet” state in its place, the American, British, and French governments are “lying through their teeth” and provoking a situation that is headed toward armed conflict.

Unless the Russian government and people are “willing” to accept Washington’s hegemony over Russia, Russia cannot tolerate the coup that the West is preparing in Ukraine. As it is unlikely that Western forces would be a match for the Russian army in its own backyard, or that self-righteous, hubristic Washington could accept defeat, the conflict toward which the “corrupt” Western governments are driving is likely to turn nuclear.

As worldwide polls consistently show, Washington is regarded as the greatest threat to world peace. As I have often written, Washington is not merely a threat to peace. Washington and its despicable European “puppet” states are a threat to the existence of life on the planet. Essentially, Washington is “insane,” and European “leaders” are paid to provide cover for Washington’s “insanity.”

The world could end before the unpayable Western debts come due.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by member_28173 »

Can we look the situation in Another Angle ?

Why and How the debt got created ?

Step 1 ) Stock Market goes Up Uncharactestically.. UKraine Stock Market went Up by 500% during the revival phase... first Opening up of Ukraine - sometime around 2004-2008 .. Ukraine was the best STOCK Exchange return for 1 year around 500%....

Step 2 ) BOokish way of economics -- Debt/equity should be 1.. If you not taking enough debt then you are missing an opportunity

Step 3 ) Debt taken.. Crisis happens .. Equity falls. Debt remains.....

NOTE : Ukraine was inviting Indian business in that period. It seems Accelor Mittal instead SOLD steel mills in that period. Annoced Layoffs. Yes I found it bit awkward why was he doing that... can we check on this angle...

My belief is Ukrainian Steel Mills are GOOD enough... built for mordernisation. excellant workforce ... good demand potential.Made me wonder why Mittal sold.
Politics and Economics.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by member_28173 »

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kryvorizhstal Why is WIKI Pedia talk all different from I read long back.... :( Mordernization fight etc.... Has my memory gone weak

What I am saying is How-Economy-was-Screwed 101. We should look from this angle.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by member_28173 »

http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/i ... 184406.ece

ukraine had 30% of Soviet defence industry
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by svinayak »

chanakyaa wrote: You will be surprised how many in their 50s through 70s think we should forget Birteesh atrocities and move on. There is no shortage of losers. But I digress ....
They dont even see the Pakistan atrocities and many unaware of Pak receiving billions in arms to attack India.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by svinayak »

ShankarCag wrote: Just recently we have eased visa norms and are providing visa on entry to citizens of 140 countries !!!
India is not ready for this
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by Singha »

Putsch is over. Yanukovitch has fled to kharkov and even his house is unguarded.

long live the revolution.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by Vikas »

^ Was it a real revolution or made to order 'enemy' action ?
Now I wonder if other famous revolutions like Brit , Romanian, Russian and French were not sponsored by vested interests.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by TSJones »

anti-democratic forces are many and Putin is their leader. This revolution won't last because Putin in all liklihood will crush it.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by member_28352 »

^^^Amen to that thought.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by UlanBatori »

Hungary, 1950s. Czechoslovakia, 1970s. Chechnya 1990s. Armenia, 2000s. Georgia 2010?

I don't think Russia is going to sit idly by and watch Ukraine getting taken over by the Germans and NATO.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by Singha »

Partion into west and east Ukraine is likely.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by Austin »

No there wont be any partition as such , Just that Ukraine will be in turmoil.

The real challenge will come when IMF conditions loans have asked for reforming the [national currency] Hrivna rates to make them more flexible, as well as about cutting subsidies, revitalizing the budget and changing domestic [gas] tariffs.

When they implement these IMF reforms that would squeeze the remaining gas out of the nearly bankrupt economy then people will feel the real pinch and the revolution will go out of their head and real day to day problem begins biting them.

Ukraine was already a basket case no matter who comes to power they will have to face the wrath of the people.

Even Russian stopped the promised $15 billion bailout mid way waiting for new political authority , Ukraines will be forced to bite the IMF bullet till then wait and watch.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by vic »

Let Ukraine suffer IMF, it will become a docile dog in a few years. Russia should retaliate by fomenting trouble in Sunni land of Saudi Arabia through Iraq, Iran and Yemen.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by chanakyaa »

The timing of all this fascinating. While Russia and others were busy collecting medals, the drama in Ukraine wrapped just before Winter Olympics were over. President has been kicked out and previously jailed fancy hair premier has been released..
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by Singha »

Russia cannot let Ukraine go any more than usa can lose control over Mexico.
else it will be a tsp type cats paw right next to core heartland of European Russia and Belarus.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by habal »

It's just a weak comeback for Syria debacle.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by Austin »

Singha wrote:Russia cannot let Ukraine go any more than usa can lose control over Mexico.
else it will be a tsp type cats paw right next to core heartland of European Russia and Belarus.
Ukraine is not joining NATO , so the threat is not really militarily .

The issue is Ukraine wanting to join Europe Association Agreement (EAA) or Join the Customer Union led by Russia.

The Reality for Ukraine is its trading with Russia is slightly more than it does with EU ... so its more beneficial for them to be in EU and CU both .... but EU insist it can one of the both.

If Ukraine join EAA then it is benefitial for the Young Population of Ukraine who can go to Europe for better jobs more wages etc but it would be disastrous for their industry as they will be flooded by Cheap EU goods ......Russia for the fear that these cheap goods will enter CU will add tarriff barrier that will signiifcantly impact Ukraine industry and its export to CU will take hit.

Ukraine local industry for all practical purpose will cease to exisit as they cant compete with EU .....that will create another set of problem and another source of revolution.

For Ukraine its a choice in short term as choice between devil and deep sea .....it will have to take a hit either ways.

Not to mention IMF condition for loans are itself very hard hitting for Ukranian economy and its people.

In the real world when all the revolution comes to end and the real economy starts hitting.

For the good of Ukranian People they should get benefit both from EU Association Agreement and Russian Customer Union but that does not look real for now atleast not in this condition and I doubt Europe will agree though Russia is fine with that.
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by Austin »

chanakyaa wrote:The timing of all this fascinating. While Russia and others were busy collecting medals, the drama in Ukraine wrapped just before Winter Olympics were over. President has been kicked out and previously jailed fancy hair premier has been released..
Hahah yes even the Georgia attacking the Russian Peace keeper was also timed during Olympics and the subsequent Georgian war
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Re: Eastern Europe/Ukraine

Post by Austin »

Seems like Russian Troops in Ukraine is something top of US NSA mind :lol:

Bringing of Russian troops to Ukraine would be "grave mistake" - US national security adviser

US President Barack Obama's national security adviser, Susan Rice, said on Sunday it would be a "grave mistake" for Russia to send military forces into Ukraine and that it is not in the interest of Russia, Europe or the United States to see Ukraine split apart.

Speaking on the NBC program "Meet the Press," Rice was asked about a possible scenario in which Russia would send forces into Ukraine to restore a government more friendly to Moscow.

"That would be a grave mistake. It's not in the interests of Ukraine or of Russia or of Europe or the United States to see a country split.

She also said it was in no one's interest to see crisis-hit Ukraine break apart and called for calm.

"It's not in the interests of Ukraine or of Russia or of Europe or of the United States to see the country split," Rice told NBC's "Meet the Press" program. "It's in nobody's interest to see violence return and the situation escalate."
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