Ukraine violence escalates

katertaif wrote:Good Afternoon Marky

I don't know about democracy in the Crimea, we could do with a little democracy ourselves. our political masters keep saying this is a democratic country when even a brief glance at the cabinet shows that it is closer to the Russian oligarchy.

Personally I believe that  the situation in the Ukraine is at least partly the fault of EU bungling. In 2008 Europe as a whole with Angela Merkel presiding, opposed The Ukraine from joining NATO. If they were now members of NATO would Putin be even thinking of deploying troops? Then, the same EU offers EU membership, a bit two faced.

Last December several foreign ministers while not actively protesting themselves mixed with Ukrainian demonstrators, giving them hope that if the balloon went up, Europe would support them, a forlorn hope as it turns out. The same with Obama. One of the Ukrainians at the air base the other day shouted that the USA was with them. In spirit perhaps, but not with anything substantial

However this turns out: and we can only hope for the best, Europe and it's leaders including ours have been more than a little two faced, and have wrongly encouraged the Ukrainian people with false hope

a little tongue in cheek to be honest. the semi autonomous crimean parliament votes to align with russia and plans a referendum on the matter and the ukrainian prime minister calls this illegal and quite likely the result of a gun being held to their heads. i don't know if irony is the right word but...

  

You may very well be right Marky, about the gun to the head. It makes little difference though in lessening the tensions in the region. The news tonight was full of more threats of escalating economic sanctions. The same news also pointing out that not only are we very dependent on Russian gas, but Germany's trade is in surplus with Russia as is ours, and we could be hit just as hard.

In addition, Putin does not recognise the interim government, and the Ukrainian PM is saying they will not accept the results of this referendum. (unless it unaccountably went their way of course in which case it would be a great victory for common sense and democracy)

The ethnic Russians in the Crimea, say Kruschev had no right to hand the place to the Crimea, and they want to be Russian again. Neither side seems to be interested in any compromise. I would love to be wrong, but I think the referendum may well trigger a fresh wave of violence which could easily give Putin an excuse, albeit highly spurious to move troops across the border.

It's all very well then for Cameron, Merkel, Hollande, Obama and co to say this would be illegal, apart from the highly doubtful worth of these economic sanctions no one is going to do anything, and Putin well knows it. Obama is already saying that he is looking for Europe to take the lead so he quite obviously is not going to do anything. It's a mess. Unfortunately people have been killed in it, and more may in the coming days.

it's a mess all right and yes, obama want nothing to do with it. as for europe, it's like threatening someone who's holding a gun to your head.

  

Good morning Marky

Short and to the point, well put.

deutschland über alles   

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2576103/SIMON-HEFFER-The-two-faced-Germans-letting-Putin-wreak-havoc.html,

All is well in the world again, (apparently) as Putin puts his aggressive face back in the box and declares the Sochi Winter Paralympics open...
http://abcnews.go.com/Sports/wireStory/putin-declares-sochi-winter-paralympics-open-22820349

And...
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/03/07/obama-biden-stick-to-vacation-schedules-despite-ukraine-crisis/
Both Obama and Biden are off on their holidays..... So everything must be fine and rosey...

Crisis over.

Hi Marky.

The news tonight says that we are preparing to bail out the Ukraine with an absolute absurdly large amount of money. Apart from the question of just how long we can go on bailing out these countries, who let's be honest, only want to join the EU for that very purpose. It seems the Ukraine hasn't been paying it's gas bills and so we have one of two scenarios. They will continue not paying, and the Russkis will eventually turn the taps off, and the balloon will go up. The other possibility being that the money will go straight to Russia to pay for the gas, which makes a mockery of these economic sanctions.

The USA aid turns out to be little more than a myth. £1 billion will go nowhere in terms of Ukraine's needs and is only loan guarantees anyway not actual cash. So much for the vaunted US aid.