Ukraine (cont.)

[pepipop]

I should add that I am not wishing to drag up the very tortuous history of Northern Ireland and British-Irish relations in general. As a Scot with an Irish surname myself (I have a very Irish surname ), its kinda difficult history if you get my drift, for both of us in different ways. I was merely pointing out that technically I’m not sure its a good comparison given that legally speaking Britain wasn’t a foreign country to NI

No, Vouthon, you were quite correct. My response was more in relation to the fact that people may vote freely with armed forces on the ground - even though a large percentage of the NI population did not want them there.

 

[Vouthon]

But that was a religious conflict, riiiight?

The schoolboy error of course My father knew a Catholic unionist from NI and Protestant republicanism was actually important in the early stages of Irish nationalism (ie in the 18th-19th centuries). I mean Wolfe Tone for crying out loud:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theobald_Wolfe_Tone

And the Society of United Irishmen:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Society_of_United_Irishmen

 

[Vouthon]

Yes, for all intent and purposes, it was essentially protestants against catholics. The protestants / unionists wishing to remain in the UK under British rule and the nationalists who wished to have a united Ireland.

Yet as I said above, it wasn’t entirely black and white. In a general sense, you are correct but in terms of the origins of the conflict, Catholic England had originally conquered Catholic Ireland. Pope Adrian, no less sanctioned it. Religion became a tool, a convenient won after the Reformation. The roots of the conflict were ethnic…but I don’t want to go there…a different thread perhaps.

 

[Tenofovir]

Yet as I said above, it wasn’t entirely black and white. In a general sense, you are correct but in terms of the origins of the conflict, Catholic England had originally conquered Catholic Ireland. Pope Adrian, no less sanctioned it. Religion became a tool, a convenient won after the Reformation. The roots of the conflict were ethnic…but I don’t want to go there…a different thread perhaps.

The media however spins it as that. It’s a Catholic vs Protestant thing and these groups of people are dueling it out over the status of The Blessed Virgin and the Pope. Anyway I’m derailing this thread.

 

[josie_L]

That doesn’t prove anything. Maybe the situation has changed. But I’d be insulted if someone so far away said I was simply being manipulated by propaganda when I’ve spent my entire life in a country. It’s not like we could not be manipulated either. Our media is entirely honest. And we really know what people think on the ground. And Putin must be bad.

The way many of these Russian ethnics are waving Russian flags and saying that this was always their dream, I’m simply surprised that they didn’t vote for a pro-Russian party before this, i.e., the current pm (who was “elected” by Russia) had only 4% of the votes in the last election in 2010. It just rather “odd”, coincidental considering all the facts surrounding the situation in Crimea, but if you wish to believe otherwise, then so be it.

It’s a point that foreign soldiers don’t invalidate referendums and elections by their presence. And saying “oh but the British in Iraq were the good guys” is your POV but you’re not the one who’s experiencing the foreign occupation.

So you believe that there is a foreign occupation of Crimea but don’t feel that this invalidates the referendum, even though the very same people who are occupying Crimea, i.e., the Russians, are controlling an area that is voting on whether to join their country??? You think this is perfectly fine??? Moreover, the British and the Americans never intended to hold a referendum that would allow them to annex Iraq or Afghanistan, while still occupying it, so there is false dichotomy which you are creating here???

 

[josie_L]

Yeah but the non-joining Russia option could have allowed for further clarification of the rights of the minorities. More could have followed from that. Then again 58% > 42%. But then protections of minority rights are needed, I agree.

The non-joining Russian option was not clarified because the referendum was rigged, i.e., under the options given Crimea would be like South Ossetia, virtually a vassal state of Russia, and/or part of the Russian federation, i.e., there was no option to REMAIN in the Ukraine as is, that is why the Ukrainians and Tatars opted to boycott the referendum.

P.S. And there will be no protection of minority rights when Catholicism is not even considered a valid/legalized religion in Russia.

 

[Tenofovir]

The way many of these Russian ethnics are waving Russian flags and saying that this was always their dream, I’m simply surprised that they didn’t vote for a pro-Russian party before this, i.e., the current pm (who was “elected” by Russia) had only 4% of the votes in the last election in 2010. It just rather “odd”, coincidental considering all the facts surrounding the situation in Crimea, but if you wish to believe otherwise, then so be it.

Maybe they didn’t feel threatened then?

So you believe that there is a foreign occupation of Crimea but don’t feel that this invalidates the referendum, even though the very same people who are occupying Crimea, i.e., the Russians, are controlling an area that is voting on whether to join their country??? You think this is perfectly fine??? Moreover, the British and the Americans never intended to hold a referendum that would allow them to annex Iraq or Afghanistan, while still occupying it, so there is false dichotomy which you are creating here???

It’s not a false dichotomy. We don’t have to be specific about the outcomes. In the case of the West certain parties and movements were banned and people were intimidated. Just the presence of armed foreigners who shoot at you and send drones bombing your neighbors is enough. At the end of the day, foreigners cannot occupy Iraq or Afghanistan or Crimea or Canada or USA. However that still did not invalidate the way people voted in Afghanistan when it came to the West. In fact the presence of armed soldiers who the natives mostly distrusted was not much of an issue on CNN/BBC. Now suddenly when the Russians are not using drones or locking up people in Abu Gharaib or urinating on dead Muslims it’s the moral violation of the 21st century.

 

[Tenofovir]

The non-joining Russian option was not clarified because the referendum was rigged, i.e., under the options given Crimea would be like South Ossetia, virtually a vassal state of Russia, and/or part of the Russian federation, i.e., there was no option to REMAIN in the Ukraine as is, that is why the Ukrainians and Tatars opted to boycott the referendum.

P.S. And there will be no protection of minority rights when Catholicism is not even considered a valid/legalized religion in Russia.

You make valid points about Russia. But that still does not invalidate that even if you were 100% right, that Putin would have a precedent because of Kosovo. At least he’s not killing civilians, yet.

Still regarding religious freedom, I don’t hear many complaints from Russian Muslims. Russians must be very tolerant toward them.

 

[Vouthon]

P.S. And there will be no protection of minority rights when Catholicism is not even considered a valid/legalized religion in Russia.

Yes, we are actually seen as an ‘alien sect’ that has no real right to be in Russia. Islam is even recognised as a “traditional” Russian religion (unless you happen to be a Tartar or a Chechen who might break away) but not Catholicism.

ie

Islam is the second most widely professed religion in Russia. Islam is considered as one of Russia’s traditional religions, legally a part of Russian historical heritage.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_in_Russia

But Catholicism:

Due to the long-held views of the Russian Orthodox Church, Catholicism is not recognized by the state as a legitimately Russian religion, and Catholics have often been seen as outsiders, even if they are ethnically Russian. The Soviet Union, which persecuted all religions, also saw Catholicism as a non-Russian allegiance…A** 2004 Ecumenical conference was organized for Russia’s “traditional religions” Orthodox Christianity, Judaism, Islam and Buddhism, and therefore excluded Catholicism**

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_C…cism_in_Russia



Russia therefore doesn’t believe in religious freedom. Religion is subordinated to Russian nationality and heritage. Catholicism has no place in that “heritage”, according to Nationalists, so it is an illegitimate faith.

 

[Vouthon]

Still regarding religious freedom, I don’t hear many complaints from Russian Muslims. Russians must be very tolerant toward them.

It depends on the ethnicity of the Muslim in question. If a Tartar then no, they are not tolerant. In general, Islam is recognised as part of Russia’s heritage and as a validly Russian faith. Catholicism is not.

Few other countries I know of discriminate between religions based upon whether they are viewed as part of the country “heritage” or not.

It is a very strange nationalism.

 

[Tenofovir]

Yes, we are actually seen as an ‘alien sect’ that has no real right to be in Russia. .

But Tartars are mostly Muslim so in this case this would not be a major problem.

 

[Vouthon]

But Tartars are mostly Muslim so in this case this would not be a major problem.

I’ve just explained to you that Tartars, because of their ethnicity and Russian obsessions with their traditional homeland of Crimea which they annexed from the Turks, are the exception to the rule (possibly Chechens as well). Look above and you’ll see me saying this.

Read:

**Part of the appeal of Crimea for Mandelstam and Tsvetaeva was its exotic, Muslim atmosphere. **Mandelstam’s poem Feodosia is an ode to the Tatar town of Kaffa…

Crimea is a site of a different kind of longing for Crimean Tatars, whose entire population was sent into exile by Stalin in 1944. Nearly half the 200,000 Tatars perished during the Surgunluk, or exile, when the Tatars were (wrongly) accused of collaboration with the Nazi occupiers, rounded up and sent to Uzbekistan to live on remote and inhospitable reservations. Since independence, about 100,000 Crimean Tatars have returned, but after a determined effort to erase their presence, there was little left.

More than a hundred Tatar villages were immediately wiped off the map, while almost all Tatar names were changed to Soviet or Russian ones. Ukrainians and Russians lived in Tatar houses. Today Tatars are regaining confidence and a political voice, and researching and preserving their history and culture. The forced exile of the post-war period that continued despite Khrushchev’s apology and retraction of the accusation of collaboration, meant that an idea of Crimean Tatardom was kept alive by exiled Tatars, which might have become diluted had they been able to live together with other communities in Soviet Crimea.

bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-26610276

The “exotic Muslim atmosphere” that once attracted Russians to Crimea is now being destroyed by this Russian takeover, completing Stalin’s ethnocide and deportation against Tartars. Who would ever know now that Crimea used to be Islamic? Most traces have been annihilated.

Tartars in Crimea have had crosses painted on their doors as a sign of intimidation to their Muslim heritage (and incidentally the Islamic heritage of Crimea which is now being thoroughly Russianized).

 

[josie_L]

Maybe they didn’t feel threatened then?

And why were they feeling threatened?? What was the threat??? And who was suggesting that they were being threatened??? You realize you’re running in circles.

It’s not a false dichotomy. We don’t have to be specific about the outcomes. In the case of the West certain parties and movements were banned and people were intimidated. Just the presence of armed foreigners who shoot at you and send drones bombing your neighbors is enough. At the end of the day, foreigners cannot occupy Iraq or Afghanistan or Crimea or Canada or USA. However that still did not invalidate the way people voted in Afghanistan when it came to the West. In fact the presence of armed soldiers who the natives mostly distrusted was not much of an issue on CNN/BBC. Now suddenly when the Russians are not using drones or locking up people in Abu Gharaib or urinating on dead Muslims it’s the moral violation of the 21st century.

It is a false dichotomy and I’ve already explained why. You do not occupy a nation on false pretexts, barricade Ukrainian military bases, take over it’s institution, put in place a pro-Russian government, create a referendum that will favour your country either way it goes, while all the while occupying said region that you plan to “annex” but under the guise of a referendum. It’s not that hard to understand, really.

P.S. And I was never for the occupation of Iraq which so many of you are fond of bringing up. I’m simply ambivalent about equating Iraqi occupation by American soldiers with what is happening in Crimea. End of story.

 

[Vouthon]

P.S. And I was never for the occupation of Iraq which so many of you are fond of bringing up. I’m simply ambivalent about equating Iraqi occupation by American soldiers with what is happening in Crimea. End of story.

I have said innumerable times on this forum that I consider the Iraq War to have been wrongful but that it is not in any way the same as the Ukranian crisis. Iraq was fought on a shady pretext (invisible weapons of mass destruction) but not to annex the territory and make it part of the US or Britain. It is totally different from Ukraine.

 

[pepipop]

It wouldn’t surprise me in the least if this wasn’t all a big business scheme because as I already mentioned (although I unintentionally misstated his announcement) Putin announced he would take Crimea back in 2008 if the Ukraine joined Nato (i.e. not if they tried as I stated previously);

However anyway, the western powers could have planned to rekindle the cold war for business purposes if Putin kept his promise
And sure enough Joe Biden was in Poland trying to reassure them and trying to sell them on nuclear energy, shale oil and gas and promising natural gas from the USA:

The big problem is that although big business will prosper, it will take too long to keep front line countries dependent on Russian gas from suffering.

This was interesting at least to me also:

There was attempted sabotage in laying the pipes in the first place, so since they’re already laid and operating - now go to plan C. There’ll be more to all of this than meets the eye, which Putin will be aware of, whether it be for military or financial reasons.

In the early 1980s there were American efforts, led by the Reagan administration, to convince European countries through which a proposed Soviet gas pipeline was to be built to deny firms responsible for construction the ability to purchase supplies and parts for the pipeline and associated facilities. The pipeline was built despite these protests and the rise of large Russian gas firms such as Gazprom as well as increased Russian fossil fuel production has facilitated a large expansion in the quantity of gas supplied to the European market since the 1990s.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russia_in_the_European_energy_sector*

 

[Aramis]

Am I really reading this…

The RF Parliament gave him blanket permission to protect ethnic Russians throughout the whole of the Ukraine.

His rhetoric is following the exact same pattern (from the other side of the border) as was used by Adolph Hitler in 1937-38

 

[josie_L]

You make valid points about Russia. But that still does not invalidate that even if you were 100% right, that Putin would have a precedent because of Kosovo. At least he’s not killing civilians, yet.

Still regarding religious freedom, I don’t hear many complaints from Russian Muslims. Russians must be very tolerant toward them.

Because Islam is a recognized religion in Russia, but Catholicism is not, so my point still stands. Please do attempt to read up on the way Catholics are treated in Russia.

P.S. And this is not a thread about Russia vs. the West, i.e., I have never claimed that the West is innocent, but I’m getting tired of having to make excuses for Russia because of mistakes that the West has made. The cold hard facts of this case are that Russia is to blame for what is happening in Crimea, no one else.

 

[Aramis]

The president was deposed. Was he not?

By a valid quorum of the parliament.

 

[Vouthon]

Because Islam is a recognized religion in Russia, but Catholicism is not, so my point still stands. Please do attempt to read up on the way Catholics are treated in Russia.

P.S. And this is not a thread about Russia vs. the West, i.e., I have never claimed that the West is innocent, but I’m getting tired of having to make excuses for Russia because of mistakes that the West has made. The cold hard facts of this case are that Russia is to blame for what is happening in Crimea, no one else.

Excellent post.

 

[josie_L]

Yes, we are actually seen as an ‘alien sect’ that has no real right to be in Russia. Islam is even recognised as a “traditional” Russian religion (unless you happen to be a Tartar or a Chechen who might break away) but not Catholicism.

ie

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_in_Russia

But Catholicism:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_C…cism_in_Russia



Russia therefore doesn’t believe in religious freedom. Religion is subordinated to Russian nationality and heritage. Catholicism has no place in that “heritage”, according to Nationalists, so it is an illegitimate faith.

I feel like crying Vouthon, I really do, I don’t even know how this is all going to be resolved. I feel helpless. I’m really worried about their plight, and what this means for the rest of the Ukraine and other regions in Eastern Europe. It’s not good.