Ukraine (cont.)

[Ridgerunner]

The current authorities in Kiev are indeed a violent gang, having overthrown the democratically elected ruler of Ukraine, Yanukovych, and now engaged in a violent military action against the civilian populations of South and Eastern Ukraone.

Interesting that international observers and journalists only come under threat, violence or kidnapping when they get to the Russian-controlled parts of Ukraine. The true violent gang is in the Kremlin and their agents are mostly in Eastern Ukraine.

Yanukovych was definitely elected, but mere election does not bestow kingship. A leader is still (and rightly) held responsible for his actions. Yanukovych tried to drag Ukraine into the Russian orbit. People protested. He tried to suppress the protests with violence (as has been demonstrated in this thread many times). His violence only made the protests grow and, instead of moderating his ambition to be a Kremlin satrap, he ran to his master, Putin, just as Benedict Arnold ran to the British after betraying his country.

But at least he’s more honest now. He and his son are overt supporters of Russian conquest of Ukraine.

 

[Ridgerunner]

It’s more a case of her attitude being symbolic of the extreme anti-Russian sentiment of the Euromaidan.

Symbolic only because Putin supporters want it to seem so. But let’s look at it. Ukraine was the victim of Russian genocide, slavery, starvation, exile, beatings and torture for decades. It managed to be free when Russia could no longer afford the rather expensive enterprise of suppressing 40-some million of unwilling subjects.

Now, Russia is seizing parts of Ukraine, exiling Ukrainians and other non-Russians from those areas, seizing their property, and Ukrainians aren’t supposed to be anti-Russian in the face of that? What people in history have NOT resented such things?

There are a lot better symbols of a people wishing to repulse a conquerer than Yulia Tymoshenko. But it must be admitted the KGB colonel in the Kremlin is as perfect a symbol for today’s Russia as one could imagine.

Russia is a police state; a KGB state. It doesn’t even have the Communist Party to moderate its behavior now.

 

[KyivAndrew]

She is not speaking Ukrainian here, is she?
Я думаю, что они они говорят
по-русски. Это кажется российским мне и не украинское. И если лента ложная, почему она приносила извинения за использование сквернословия?

Of course she is not speaking Ukrainian on the tape but Russian. And you spelled “they” in Russian twice in your reply to me. Did you write the reply in Russian yourself or did you use google translate, and copy and paste the Russian in your reply to me?

As I said, the “nuking” Russians part was definitely one part of the taped phone conversation that was doctored. People who have followed Tymoshenko from the beginning would know what she would normally think, and which things are fantastical.

In any event, just as there are different regional accents in English, so there are too in Ukrainian and Russian obviously and there is “surzhyk”. So Tymoshenko, who is from Eastern Ukraine, speaks Ukrainian with a strong Eastern Ukrainian accent, and Russian was her first language (i.e. she pronounces the Ukrainian “enko” as a Russian “enka” for instance, among other things).

And by a similar point, one realizes from the words used by the heavily-armed pro-Russian masked gunmen who have violently stormed police and government buildings throughout the Donbas that some of these “little green men” use words which would only be used in the Russian language by people from Russia per se, and not Ukraine, as in this clip below which, in the words of Ukrainian comedian Michael Shtur, shows how easily these Russians have blended in with the local population:
youtube.com/watch?v=ivO9nSRrfuY

 

[josie_L]

It’s more a case of her attitude being symbolic of the extreme anti-Russian sentiment of the Euromaidan.

So what if they have anti-Russian/Putin sentiments (although I believe it is more the latter than the former), having such sentiments is not some sort of hate crime, i.e., the sentiment derives from a real and tangible suppression from time immemorial by Russia but more recently by Putin and his puppet, Yanukovych!!

p.s. And it’s not extreme, i.e., they just want to be able to determine their own future without the “help” of Russia.

 

[josie_L]

The current authorities in Kiev are indeed a violent gang, having overthrown the democratically elected ruler of Ukraine, Yanukovych, and now engaged in a violent military action against the civilian populations of South and Eastern Ukraone.

Putin secured Crimea for national security reasons without ever using violence against Ukrainian civilians, and the Ukrainians in Crimea, having seen the violent takeover of Kiev by the Maidan, voted to join Russia rather than serve Kiev.

This is quite the summation you have here, i.e., how were the Ukrainian civilians supposed to fight against Putin and his troops, i.e., were they supposed to go after them with wooden spoons and iron skillets??

Moreover, the violence committed by separatists/Russian operatives is the reason why there is military intervention in Eastern Ukraine in the first place, i.e., these are not innocent protestors we are talking about but terrorists who will kill, torture, and kidnap for Mother Russia:

Seven killed:

May 9 – (Two killed, one wounded) – Two cars with bodies of two adults, a wife and a husband, were found on the outskirts of Luhansk. According to the Luhansk Prosecutor’s Office, they were gunned by Kremlin-backed insurgents because they did not stop their cars on the militant’s request. Killed couple’s 10-year old daughter was found in one of the cars injured and taken to the hospital.

May 8 – (Killed) – The head of Prosvita society branch in Krasny Lyman, Valeriy Salo, was found burnt in his car. Salo was captured on May 7 by the militants of the Donetsk People’s Republic, according to the Luhansk police press service.

May 8 – (One killed) – Pavlo Zhuchenko, a 44-year-old priest of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchy, was shot near a block post near the eastern Ukrainian town Druzhivka, according to the Prosecutor General’s Office press service. Editor-in-chief of the local news website Ostov, Serhiy Harmash, reports that the slain priest lived next to the block post and urged Kyiv’s opponents to surrender arms. The law enforcement authorities have started an investigation of the case.

April 28 – (Dead) – In Sloviansk, the body was found at the same site near the river Torets, where the bodies of Horlivka Town Council deputy Volodymyr Rybak and Kyiv Polytechnic Institute student Yuriy Popravko were found earlier. The body has been identified as Yuriy Diadkovsky, a 25-year-old student from Stryi in Lviv Oblast. Diadkovsky had been an active Euromaidan participant since December 3, 2013. According to the Gazeta.ua website, citing Diadkovsky’s brother Oleh, Yuriy went to Donetsk Oblast on April 16 with his friend in order to see what was going on there. His was kidnapped April 17His body was found 11 days later with the signs of torture.

April 22 – (Two killed) – In Sloviansk, the bodies of two men were found near the river Torets with signs of torture, according to Ukraine’s Interior Ministry. One of them has been identified as Volodymyr Rybak, a Horlivka city councilman believed to have been kidnapped on April 17. He was found with a sandbag tied around his body and a slash across his stomach. He is believed to have drowned in the river while unconscious. According to the ministry’s reports, members of the pro-Russian separatist group who seized the city’s security services building were involved in the alleged torture and murder of the two men. The second men has been identified as a 19-year-old Kyiv Polytechnic Institute student Yuriy Popravko. According to Popravko’s mother, Yaroslava Popravko, cited by Liga.net, on April 16 her son visited his girlfriend in Kharkiv. There was no further contact with him after that.

kyivpost.com/content/ukra…ns-347225.html

 

[josie_L]

Nineteen are still being held

May 9 – (One kidnapped) – Valeriy Andruschuk, head of Mariupol police, was kidnapped by the separatist insurgents the same day as the city police headquarters was stormed and burned down. According to the lawmaker and presidential candidate Oleh Lyashko, Andruschuk was abducted as a retiree tried to take him out of the burning building. The information was confirmed by the Interior Minister Arsen Avakov. A retiree, whose name is unknown, was injured with a knife. Andruschuk’s whereabouts are unknown.

May 8 – (One being held) – Oleh Demko, the representative of presidential candidate and Svoboda Part leader Oleh Tiahnybok in Donetsk region’s Makiyivka, was kidnapped by armed men and taken to the premises of Donetsk regional state administration, according to his party colleague Pavlo Derkachenko. Demko had been receiving threats during a whole week before the abduction.

May 7 – (One kidnapped) – Valeriy Harchuk, member of the local city council in Rubizhne, Luhansk Oblast, was kidnapped by four masked men, according to the Luhansk police press office. His whereabouts are unknown.

May 2 – (One held) – Georgian citizen and pro-Ukrainian activist Basile d’Budik was kidnapped by unknown masked and armed men in the eastern Ukrainian city of Horlivka, according to the member of right-wing Svoboda party Maja Karlash. According to the Council to Georgia Irakli Advadze, d’Budik was reached by phone and denied the fact of kidnapping, while his relatives say they do not know activist’s whereabouts. Karlash confirms d’Budik is being held by pro-Russian militants. The head of the territorial defense battalion “Donbas” Semen Senchenko offered separatists’ leaders to exchange nine detained militants for d’Budik and abducted on the same day Mykola Yakubovych.

May 2 (One held) – Mykola Yakubovysch, a Donetsk activist and one of the leaders of the local pro-Ukrainian self-defense, was kidnapped in the center of the city of Donetsk, according to Novosti Donbassa. He is held hostage by pro-Russian militants.

May 2 (One held) – Ihor Otrya, 18-year old student from Krasnyi Lyman, was kidnapped in Sloviansk on his way home from Kyiv, Gazeta.ua reported. According to Otrya’s parents, their son was detained on suspicion of having connection to nationalist Right Sector organization. He is currently being held by pro-Russian insurgents in the seized SBU building.

April 29 – (Two still held) – Four police officers, including head of the criminal investigation department Vitaliy Benko, Head of the department for combating drug trafficking Oleg Zaitsev, two operational servicemen Andriy Redko and Volodymyr Mischenko, were kidnapped in Kramatorsk by pro-Russian militants after they refused to take separatist’s side, according to the Ukrainian Interior Ministry’s press office. They were transported to the regional SBU headquarters in Sloviansk. On May 2, two of them, Redko and Mischenko, were released.

April 29 – (Two still held) – Two members of district election commissions were kidnapped in the Donetsk region. Yaroslav Malanchuk, a member of a district election commission Krasnoarmiysk from the right-wing Svoboda party, and Artem Popyk, head of the local Svoboda organization, were kidnapped in Kostiantynivka.

April 26 – (Still being held) – A Lviv journalist and freelance correspondent for the local ZiK TV-channel Yuriy Leliavsky was captured by pro-Russian militants in Sloviansk during a shooting, according to program director of Telekritika website Viktor Galkin. Leliavsky was taken to the building of the local city council.

April 26 – (One held) – Serhiy Shapoval, a journalist for the Volyn Post, has being missing since April 26 when he decided to head to Sloviansk from Kharkiv, where he was reporting on the local protests. A communication with him was lost at 3 p.m. April 26 and at 9 p.m. same day telephone connection was lost, according to the Telekritika website. He is held hostage by pro-Russian militants.

April 25 – (Two still held) – Recognized theatre director Pavlo Yurov and art curator Denys Gryschuk were kidnapped in Sloviansk. According to the LB.ua website, citing the friends of the kidnapped men, they were on their way from Donetsk to Kyiv via Sloviansk when they stopped answering phone calls. A self-proclaimed mayor of Sloviansk Viacheslav Ponomaryov later confirmed holding them hostage.

April 23 – (Still being held) – Sloviansk City Council member Vadym Sukhonos was abducted by Kremlin-backed militants, reports TSN television channel, citing local media in the Donetsk Oblast. Sukhonos apparently was kidnapped for ideological reasons. In February, he quit the Party of Regions, the dominant party in eastern Ukraine, and is now a local independent lawmaker.

kyivpost.com/content/ukra…ns-347225.html

 

[josie_L]

April 21 – (Still being held) – Kramatorsk chief of police, Interior Ministry Colonel Vitaliy Kolupai was kidnapped by Kremlin-backed terrorists, the Interior Ministry reported. The masked pro-Russian militants have apparently demanded weapons and arms in exchange for the police colonel’s release. The Interior Ministry accuses Russian military intelligence Colonel Igor Strelkov for commandeering the kidnapping. Ukraine Security Service has identified the Russian colonel as the chief coordinator in the slow-motion Russian invasion of Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts by using a combination of Russian special forces and black operatives, a deeply-rooted network of spies and agent saboteurs who are Russians and Ukrainians, and the cooperation of local elements of law enforcement and government officials.

April 20 – (Still being held) – Irma Krat, 29, the editor-in-chief of Hidden Truth TV and the leader of an all-female self-defense unit during the EuroMaidan Revolution that ousted the former government and President Viktor Yanukovych, was captured around 8 p.m. on Easter Sunday, Krat’s lawyer, Oleg Veremiyenko, told the Kyiv Post. Krat was “taken hostage,” Veremiyenko said, on suspicion of torturing and killing a Berkut riot police officer. She is reportedly being held in the Ukrainian State Security Service building in Sloviansk. The day after her capture, the pro-Russian separatist group holding her paraded her to meet the press, during which time she confirmed she was being held but said that she had not been harmed.

April 19 – (Whereabouts unknown) – Local media has reported that Kremlin-backed separatists kidnapped the chief of police in Sloviansk, Lieutenant-Colonel Oleg Prokhorov, but officials are yet to officially confirm the abduction. Prokhorov’s whereabouts are unknown.

Released hostages:

May 9 – (Seven released) – Kremlin-backed militants stormed into the Red Cross office in Donetsk and captured seven people, including one citizen of France and six Ukrainians from Kyiv and Donetsk. All of them were freed after several hours of detention, as was confirmed by the local Red Cross official. According to the spokesman of the separatist “Donetsk People’s Republic”, Red Cross volunteers were detained on suspicion of espionage. Iryna Tsariuk from the Ukrainian Red Cross said one of the released hostages has been severely beaten. It is also reported that insurgents seized medicine, which was delivered to Donetsk Red Cross office for distribution in the region.

May 7 – (One released) – Armed militants kidnapped a man, who took part into the motor rally for the united Ukraine, according to journalist Ekaterina Sergatskova. The abduction took place in Stahaniv, Luhansk Oblast. He was kept in the seized SBU building, tortured and interrogated, and released May 8.

May 4 – (Released) – Pro-Russian militants broke into the house of the member of Novogorodenka (Donetsk Oblast) city council and kidnapped him and five men visiting him, according to the SBU press office. Three of them, a coal miner Oleksandr Vovk, a member of the local city council from the Communist party of Ukraine Oleg Bubich and a member of the local city council from the Party of Regions Valeriy Pavlyk , were released on May 5. Each of them has the signs of torture, according to the press service of the Confederation of Free Trade Unions of Ukraine. Three other, including a coal miner Oleksandr Gurov, a member of the local city council from the Defenders of the Motherland Party Kostyantyn Musiyenko and an unknown man, were released on May 6. While being detained coal miners were constantly beaten and tortured. For instance, militants tried to cut of the words “Glory to Ukraine”, which were tattooed on Gurov’s arm. Gurov claims he was abducted for his strong pro-Ukrainian position.

May 3 – (Released) – Five servicemen of the Armed Forced of Ukraine were kidnapped by masked pro-Russian militants in Melekino village, Donetsk Oblast. They had being detained at the seized Mariupol city council building for several hours and released May 4 at 1 a.m., says SBU press office’s statement.

May 3 – (Released) – Armed men in camouflage kidnapped two persons,Oleksiy Bida and Anna Mokrousova, in Luhansk, kept them in seized regional SBU headquarters for several hours and released afterwards, according to the activists of community Euromaidan SOS.

May 2 (Released) – Three groups of Western journalists from a number of news outlets were briefly detained by pro-Russian militants in eastern Ukraine, according to Novosti Donbassa. Mike Giglio from American BuzzFeed and his translator Olena Glazunova were taken from a checkpoint en route to Sloviansk by pro-Russian militants, blindfolded, held at seized police building for three hours and released, says Mike Giglio’s on his Twitter. Americans reporters for CBS Clarissa Ward, Erin Lyall, Andy Srevenson, Geoff Mabberley and a team with Britain’s SkyNews Stuart Ramsay, Barnaby Green and their translators Oleg Malko and Oleksandr Pustovit were detained at rebel-held check-points and released after couple hours.

April 29 – (Released) – Five activists were briefly detained by separatists after a pro-Ukrainian rally in Donetsk, reports Novosti Donbassa website citing the organizer of the rally Diana Berg. They were freed later that day, which was confirmed by the local militia’s press office.

kyivpost.com/content/ukra…ns-347225.html

 

[josie_L]

April 26 – (Released) – Major Serhiy Potiomsky, Captain Eugeniy Verinsky, Lieutenant Colonel Rostyslav Kyjashko from SBU’s high-ranking Alpha Group were kidnapped in Kramatorsk, while they were on their way to Horlivka. Kremlin-backed militants took hostages to Sloviansk, where they were interviewed by Russian journalists. On the video, immediately published on the Internet, SBU officers were answering questions while seating with their pants off, hands tied, blindfolded and showing signs of having been beaten. According to the SBU’s statement, the group was kidnapped while performing a task to arrest a Russian citizen suspected of killing Horlivka city council member Volodymyr Rybak. Rybak was kidnapped on April 17, five days later his body was found near the river Torets in Sloviansk with signs of torture. All three were released on May 7. According to representatives of the “Donetsk People’s Republic” they were exchanged for the Donetsk region’s “people’s governor” Pavlo Gubarev. SBU press service says it would not be correctly to say that an act exchange had occurred although confirms that all three servicemen were freed.

April 25 – (Released) – Eight members of a military monitoring mission were abducted on April 25 and held hostage in Sloviansk by pro-Russian separatist forces. The group of OSCE monitors, including four Germans, a Swede, a Pole, a Dane, and a Czech, were traveling by bus from Kramatorsk to Sloviansk in Donetsk Oblast and were accompanied by five Ukrainian soldiers, includingIhor Turansky, Oleksandr Matvijenko, Valeriy Udod, Oleksij Pluschev andAndriy Kolodka. Pro-Russian militants showed the documents of some of them, including John Christensen (Denmark), Krzysztof Kobelski (Poland), Axel Schneider (Germany). On April 27 a Swede OSCE officer, major Thomas Johannson, who suffers from diabetes, was freed. On May 3 all the other members of the mission and Ukrainians, who were accompanying them, were freed.

April 25 – (Released) – Yevhen Hapych, a journalist from the Ivano Frankivsk Oblast town of Kolomyia in western Ukraine, who on April 22 was kidnapped with his brother Hennadiy in Donetsk Oblast, were released and made it home on April 25. Hapych had received a travel grant from Telekritika, a Kyiv-based media watchdog organization, to report in Kharkiv, Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts. His work was to be published in various media.

April 22 – (Released) – Vyacheslav Ponomaryov, the self-proclaimed mayor of Sloviansk in northern Donetsk Oblast confirmed that unidentified people in uniform had captured Vice News journalist Simon Ostrovsky, an American, who was last seen early morning on April 22. Ostrovsky was released three days later.

April 22 – (Released) – Yuriy Zahrebelny, prosecutor of Sloviansk, was reportedly kidnapped in his office at about 5:50 p.m. by a group of three armed and masked men, Ukraine’s Interior Ministry said on April 23. They brought him by car in an unknown direction and released in some 40 minutes later. Zahrebelny refused to disclose the details of his interrogation, the police said.

April 22 – (Released) – At about 11 a.m. several people in masks came into the office of Sloviansk medical forensics service and captured its head, Mr. Yakymov, Ukraine’s Interior Ministry reported. The ministry did not disclose his first name. Yakymov was taken to the local SBU headquarters now occupied by pro-Russian separatists. At about 2 p.m.Yakymov was released and refused to comment on the details of his captivity. “He is very scared after that,” Stanislav Rechynsky, an Interior Ministry adviser said during a news briefing on April 23. “Apparently it was related to (Volodymyr) Rybak’s murder.

April 21 – (Released) – Italian journalists Paul Gogo and Kossimo Attanasio, and Belarusian journalist Dmitry Galko were kidnapped by separatists in Sloviansk while filming events in the city. Later the journalists were released, but their reporting equipment, money and personal documents were confiscated.

kyivpost.com/content/ukra…ns-347225.html

 

[josie_L]

April 18 – (Released) – Sloviansk Mayor Nelya Shtepa disappeared after she attempted to meet with separatist leader Vyacheslav Ponomarev. Initially, Shtepa appeared to support separatists before changing course and confirming her support for authorities in Kyiv. On April 22, she appeared on pro-Kremlin TV Life News saying that she is thankful to Russian President Vladimir Putin. She is believed to be held inside one of the buildings occupied by the separatists in Sloviansk. They have said that she is fine and being fed well. On April 30, Shtepa resigned.

April 16 – (Released) – Ukrainian journalist Serhiy Lefter was kidnapped while reporting on events in Sloviansk. He had being held in the basement of the Ukrainian State Security Service building in Sloviansk until May 2, when he was released together with another hostage, Sloviansk resident Artem Deynega. Deynega was abducted by pro-Russian insurgents on April 13 after he was observed filming from the balcony of his family’s apartement. The apartment is across the street from the Ukrainian Security Service building in Sloviansk. Lefter was working with the non-governmental organization Open Dialog Foundation when he was captured. Despite been freed on late night May 2 Lefter arrived in Kyiv only five days later as they were hiding in SLoviansk fearing pursuit. During press-conference on May 8 Lefter said that he was treated not that bad during detention and was occasionally questioned, whether he had any connections to nationalist Right Sector organization.

kyivpost.com/content/ukra…ns-347225.html

 

[latin_rite]

This, from another thread, is interesting. Said by the Catholic primate of Ukraine:

“Of course, from the great exultation of seeing off an unworthy president who fled the country at a time of crisis, leaving the Ukrainian Parliament to pick up the pieces and institute an interim executive, and a sense of triumph, we quickly were confronted with the reality of Russian aggression in Crimea, and the comfortable West’s inability to respond to this most dangerous development since World War II.
Then the events in Eastern regions of Ukraine began, fomented again by special operatives from Russia, the “political tourists” in neat uniform, but without any identifying insignia, whom the people have christened “little green men”. And all this time some 40 thousand Russian troops at the border of Ukraine, to further cloud the minds and hearts of those people who had not yet been set free by the “revolution of human dignity.” And the propaganda war unleashed by Russia is the most twisted informational assault since Goebbels pontificated that if you brashly lie long enough, loudly enough some will inevitably believe you.”

catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=21356&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+CatholicWorldNewsFeatureStories+%28Catholic+World+News+%28on+CatholicCulture.org%29%29

Don’t tell me there are officials within the Catholic Church ready to jump into bed with the nazis again?

 

[josie_L]

Thought this article would come in handy, so here it is:

Even Russian human rights body finds Crimean referendum falsified

05.05.14 | Halya Coynash

Vladimir Putin’s own Council on the Development of Civil Society and Human Rights has confirmed that the turnout for the so-called “referendum” on the Crimea’s status was much lower than reported, and the results also far less overwhelmingly in favour of joining Russia. The same results have been reported from other sources, however this report can hardly be dismissed as seditious US propaganda. The confirmation that Russia used falsified figures to justify the annexation comes on the eve of supposed “referendums” planned for two east Ukrainian oblasts.

The similarities between the armed men who seized government buildings in Crimea (top) and in Slovyansk (bottom) and other east Ukrainian cities have been widely noted.

The report finds that while the overwhelming majority of residents of Sevastopol voted for joining Russian (turnout of 50-80%), the turnout for all of Crimea was from 30-50% and only 50-60% of those voted for joining Russia.

The authors also noted that Crimean residents voted less for joining Russia, than for what they called an end to corrupt lawlessness and thieving rule of people brought in from Donetsk (where Viktor Yanukovych and most of his people were from). It was only in Sevastopol, they say, that people genuinely voted for joining Russia. They add that the fear of “illegal armed formations” was higher in Sevastopol than in other regions of Crimea.

The comment is of interest given that the so-called referendum was held with the Crimea swarming with Russian soldiers in uniform without insignia and so-called “Crimean self-defence” vigilantes. Presumably what was referred to were the armed formations which Russian television channels claim have been let loose by EuroMaidan and the new authorities in Kyiv. It is perhaps significant that the turnout was not higher given that the puppet government installed at gunpoint on Feb 27 made a point of closing Ukrainian media and installing precisely those channels which relentlessly push the idea that Kyiv is “fascist” and a threat to all Russian-speakers and ethnic Russians.

The official figures claim that the turnout for the Crimea was 83.1% with 96.77% in favour of the Crimea becoming a part of Russia.

This discrepancy mars still further the already questionable reputation of those members of far-right and neo-Stalinist parties whom Russia invited to “observe” the event. None found anything untoward about the running of the vote or the alleged result.

Since the report highlights some serious rights violations, including to the Crimea’s indigenous Crimean Tatar population, it makes the failure of the EU and USA to adopt any serious sanctions against Russia particularly disturbing.

Crimean residents were not given adequate information about the consequences of refusing to accept Russian citizenship. A lot of public sector workers were threatened with dismissal if they did not become Russian nationals.

Many Crimean Tatars were also left with no choice but to accept Russian citizenship since they have land plots on agricultural land which according to Russian legislation can only be owned by Russian nationals.

Of the people the authors of the report spoke with, virtually none of those wishing to retain Ukrainian citizenship had received any information from the Russian Migration Service about their legal position as “foreign nationals”, including the need to leave after 90 days; permission to be in the country for only 90 days out of each 180, etc.

Given Moscow’s constant propaganda regarding “protection” of the rights of linguistic minorities, it is of significance that the one Ukrainian-language lyceum in Simferopol is being made Russian-speaking, while the only Ukrainian-Tatar language and literature studies university faculty is closing…

The Orthodox Church of the Kyiv Patriarchate is effectively also being dissolved with land lease for places of worship now not being renewed.

The authors write that “the authorities of the Crimea are turning Islam from a religion into a protest ideology”. While the movement Hizb-ut-Takhrir has been called an extremist organization and banned in Russia, it has never been banned in Ukraine, and its literature was freely distributed in mosques. The religious community “Davet” even won a court case in Ukraine with the court agreeing that its activities did not incite inter-faith enmity. Under Russian occupation the community is now coming under serious pressure from the law enforcement bodies.

The report was prepared by Council member Yevgeny Bobrov; together with prominent human rights defender Svetlana Gannushkina and lawyer Olga Tsetlina, following a visit to Simferopol and Sevastopol from April 15-18.

The recommendations are all to the Russian authorities on eliminating this or that problem, with no suggestion that the annexation itself is inadmissible. Since the rights of the Crimean Tatars, Ukrainian speakers and a large number of believers are already now seriously infringed, that omission is regrettable.

khpg.org/index.php?id=1399238176

 

[latin_rite]

Thought this article would come in handy, so here it is:

Even Russian human rights body finds Crimean referendum falsified

05.05.14 | Halya Coynash

khpg.org/index.php?id=1399238176

Still a bigger margin than what Obama won by.

 

[latin_rite]

Remeber when governments would try and hide things like this? This administration don’t even try and cover it up one bit. It’s just like. “Yeah i did it. So what? You’re not going to do anything about it.”

liveleak.com/view?i=537_1400048390

Hunter Biden, the youngest son of Vice President Joe Biden, has been appointed to the board of directors of Ukraine’s largest private-gas producer.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Still a bigger margin than what Obama won by.

A falsified “bigger margin” is still false.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Remeber when governments would try and hide things like this? This administration don’t even try and cover it up one bit. It’s just like. “Yeah i did it. So what? You’re not going to do anything about it.”

liveleak.com/view?i=537_1400048390

Biden’s son being on the board of a gas company seeking to develop gas resources in Ukraine really ought to be a political embarrassment, and I agree this administration is shameless in many ways.

But the other side of the coin is that Ukraine is certainly going to need any gas resources it can develop, because Russia will continue to use gas as a weapon against Ukraine and others, assuming Russia does not seize all of Ukraine. My guess is that Biden’s kid’s company is not going to be the only developer, either.

 

[josie_L]

Still a bigger margin than what Obama won by.

Hmm, I don’t think you quite understood the ramifications of this article, i.e., the powers that be, i.e., the puppet government in Crimea at the time of the referendum and the Russian forces supporting them via Putin’s directives, LIED.

 

[pepipop]

Biden’s son being on the board of a gas company seeking to develop gas resources in Ukraine really ought to be a political embarrassment, and I agree this administration is shameless in many ways.

But the other side of the coin is that Ukraine is certainly going to need any gas resources it can develop, because Russia will continue to use gas as a weapon against Ukraine and others, assuming Russia does not seize all of Ukraine. My guess is that Biden’s kid’s company is not going to be the only developer, either.

How long would any of the rest of us be allowed to remain in our ‘homes’ with even a few thousand of a gas bill, or more likely be jailed - let alone a $3.5 billion gas bill! Russia, surely has been using their gas resources as a ‘weapon’ against Ukraine - and all at discounted prices too!

Oh well, at least now we know why Biden Snr was handing out cookies and getting numerous photo shoots with the non-elected coup d’etat government.

Jobs for the boys - and timed a few weeks before the ‘democratically elected’ Ukraine government gets into power.

 

[Ridgerunner]

How long would any of the rest of us be allowed to remain in our ‘homes’ with even a few thousand of a gas bill, or more likely be jailed - let alone a $3.5 billion gas bill! Russia, surely has been using their gas resources as a ‘weapon’ against Ukraine - and all at discounted prices too!

Oh well, at least now we know why Biden Snr was handing out cookies and getting numerous photo shoots with the non-elected coup d’etat government.

Jobs for the boys - and timed a few weeks before the ‘democratically elected’ Ukraine government gets into power.

I see you have, like Putin, decided already that whoever is elected on May 25 will be regarded by you and Putin as “illegitimate”. In short, there’s nothing Ukrainians can do to be anything but “the enemy”. One thought as much. But that has been Putin’s way in this whole thing; give the victim no way out.

Yanukovych was not “the government” of Ukraine. He was the chief executive. He was not the parliament, which is still there. When Yanukovych ran to Russia, the parliament elected a temporary replacement for Yanukovych. On May 25, the Ukrainian voters will select a more permanent one. But Putin won’t accept the legitimacy of anything the Ukrainian voters do. After all, he considers them rightfullly to be Russian subjects anyway, whether they like it or not.

To complete your analogy, one would have to add that, since the Sevastopol naval lease and the resources in Crimea, Donets and Luhansk were a significant source of revenue for Ukraine, it would be like the gas company stealing your wallet, costing you your job, increasing your other costs of living, and looting your bank account, then blaming you for not paying your gas bill.

That’s one argument in support of the likelihood of Putin seizing even more of Ukraine. The frackable gas deposits are not only in central Ukraine, but some of the better ones are in the northeast part of the country. To truly have an energy stranglehold on Ukraine forever, he will need to seize more of Ukraine than he has already.

 

[pepipop]

I see you have, like Putin, decided already that whoever is elected on May 25 will be regarded by you and Putin as “illegitimate”. In short, there’s nothing Ukrainians can do to be anything but “the enemy”. One thought as much. But that has been Putin’s way in this whole thing; give the victim no way out.

I don’t know what you mean. I said the ‘boys got their jobs’ prior to the democratically elected government being in place, i.e. to be elected on 25/2/14. It was all set up whilst the US/EU supported ‘coup d’etat government’ was in place.*

 

[Ridgerunner]

Ridgerunner;11999437:

I see you have, like Putin, decided already that whoever is elected on May 25 will be regarded by you and Putin as “illegitimate”. In short, there’s nothing Ukrainians can do to be anything but “the enemy”. One thought as much. But that has been Putin’s way in this whole thing; give the victim no way out.

I don’t know what you mean. I said the ‘boys got their jobs’ prior to the democratically elected government being in place, i.e. to be elected on 25/2/14. It was all set up whilst the US/EU supported ‘coup d’etat government’ was in place.

I don’t doubt for a minute that the US and EU expressed support for the protesters. They should have, and not only the protesters against Russian tyranny, but also those who protested the tyranny of the Mullahs in Iran. But the latter, of course, is another story.

But, as the whole world knows, it’s not a “coup d’etat” when a corrupt executive runs away and the legitimately elected parliament is still in place and continues to govern. The president is not the whole government. He’s one man, and only conditionally authorized to run his branch of government. Yanukovych ran away to a foreign, hostile power and aided it in attacking his own country. That’s not a coup d’etat, that’s a traitor forfeiting any right to his office.