Ukraine (cont.)

[KyrieEleison17]

I guess you never bothered to read the whole article because at the bottom of that page is a listing of parties representing the Ukrainian interim government, i.e., the Svodoba party does not have a majority of the seats …

Try again.

 

[josie_L]

Try again.

Please provide a source of those representing the Ukrainian interim government by party? Thanks.

 

[pepipop]

It’s comes down to the posts, members of either party have been appointed to, in the coup d’etat government.

The Svoboda party’s presence in the ruling coalition—it has four cabinet seats, including defense minister and a deputy prime minister—has fueled accusations by Russia that the new government, backed by Europe and the U.S., includes fascists who pose a threat to ethnic Russians.

online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304756104579449491092134038

The Party of Regions has lost much of its influence amid the ongoing crisis in Ukraine. 72 deputies[121] have left the party and remaining deputies either supported key opposition demands like impeaching Yanukovich, firing Zakharchenko and the General Prosecutor or did not vote.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Party_of_Regions

 

[KyrieEleison17]

Please provide a source of those representing the Ukrainian interim government by party? Thanks.

Your location is given as “Montreal, Quebec”. Unless you are new to our country, you should know that “the government” does not equal “the parliament”. The Parliament is equivalent for Americans to Congress. “The government” is equivalent to “the Administration”. You are arguing as if because, say, the Republicans have a majority in Congress it is therefore impossible that the Democrats should have any executive place, position or power.

America’s chief representative in Ukraine - who botched the job, quite possibly deliberately - is married, for instance, to a notorious neoconservative.

 

[josie_L]

Your location is given as “Montreal, Quebec”. Unless you are new to our country, you should know that “the government” does not equal “the parliament”. The Parliament is equivalent for Americans to Congress. “The government” is equivalent to “the Administration”. You are arguing as if because, say, the Republicans have a majority in Congress it is therefore impossible that the Democrats should have any executive place, position or power.

America’s chief representative in Ukraine - who botched the job, quite possibly deliberately - is married, for instance, to a notorious neoconservative.

Then would you be so kind as to provide a break down of the present deputies (by party) in the parliament of Ukraine (which I have provided in the my link but which you seem to have ignored)? Thanks.

 

[josie_L]

Actually I’m going to post what was stated on Wikipedia, according to the info, as of May 16, the Verkhovna Rada has:

The Party of Regions with 103 seats (the party which Yanukovych once led)

The Fatherland party with 88 seats

The Udar party with 41 seats

The Svodoba party with 35 seats

The Communist party with 33 seats

The Economic Development party with 39 seats

The Sovereign European Ukraine party with 35 seats

The non-affiliated with 73 seats.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verkhovna_Rada

So I’m going to ask why is it that people on these boards keep claiming that the deputies (all 450 of them) that make up parliament, i.e., the current government in Kyiv, are neo-Nazis?

As I stated in an earlier post the seats for the far-right (fascist) party LDPR in Russia is more than 50 of a total of 440.

 

[pepipop]

youtube.com/watch?v=-gICZo6wn-8

It doesn’t look like the Tatars fared too well under Ukrainian rule, taken in 2007.

Putin, stated a few days ago that he will ensure their rights.
*
“Nevertheless, under no circumstances can we allow that Crimean Tatars become a small coin in disputes, especially in inter-state disputes such as the one between Russia and Ukraine,” Putin stressed.

“It is impossible to use the Crimean Tatar factor to defend the interests of other, third, countries,” the president emphasized, saying that would do nothing but harm to Crimean Tatars.
Putin pledged Russia would do everything to make Crimean Tatars feel full-fledged owners of their land.

“This, in fact, concerns representatives of all other ethnic groups residing in Crimea, including ethnic Russians, Ukrainians and other repressed peoples: Greeks, Bulgarians and Germans,” Putin said.

“The fact that the problems have remained unsolved was connected with the economic situation in Ukraine, with Crimea being made technically a budget-receiving region,” Putin said at a meeting with Crimean Tatars on Friday.
“It wasn’t done on purpose or because life was too good but the reason was to support with finance other regions that were in a more difficult situation,” he said.
“We have resources, the government has reserves that surpass all of Crimea’s needs for this year as well as for the forthcoming years,” the president said calling on the participants “to professionally elaborate the program of Crimea’s development.”*

en.itar-tass.com/russia/731905

 

[AnastasiaRomano]

Seventy years after their deportation, Crimean Tatars defy meeting ban to commemorate anniversary

kyivpost.com/content/ukraine/seventy-years-after-their-deportation-crimean-tatars-defy-meeting-ban-to-commemorate-anniversary-348320.html

For the last two decades, the Turkic, Muslim Crimean Tatars have gathered in Simferopol from all over the Crimean peninsula on May 18, for the anniversary of the Soviet deportation of their people from their historical homeland.

2014 is an especially significant year, marking 70 years since this entire nation was rounded up and transported to labour camps in Siberia and central Asia, purportedly for collaborating with the Nazis in World War II. An estimated 46 percent of the population died on the way, or in the first years of exile.

…

The Kremlin-backed Crimean Prime Minister Sergei Aksyonov announced on May 16 a ban on all public meetings in Crimea until June 6, citing troubles and provocations in southeast Ukraine. The ban came just one day after the Mejlis had agreed with authorities that the annual May 18 meeting would go ahead, without political speeches or Ukrainian flags. The next day, riot police began mass training exercises in the center of Simferopol.

But unsanctioned Crimean Tatar anniversary meetings went ahead in towns around the peninsula. The largest was in Akhmechet, a suburb of Simferopol built by returning Crimean Tatars on wasteland in the early 1990s. Thousands carrying the Crimean Tatar flag marched past parked buses full of armed police to reach the Akhmechet mosque. During the meeting, two military helicopters circled overhead, drowning out the speakers. But those there, many of whom had come with small children, said they were not so much afraid as bewildered by the show of force against them.

“Why was our meeting banned? Look, nothing is happening except our grief,” said Asanova. “We held this meeting every year for 23 years in Ukraine and nothing ever happened; no provocations, no clashes, nothing.”

 

[josie_L]

Here’s an article by Forbes:

Inside Putin’s Campaign Of Social Media Trolling And Faked Ukrainian Crimes

Putin’s invisible social-media campaign includes fiction writers posting on fake Facebook (or the Russian version Vkontakte) accounts, pretending to have witnessed some horrendous crime committed by Ukrainian extremists. A second wing handles the shadowy distribution of photo-shopped or staged photos, again featuring Ukrainian atrocities. A third wing spreads rumors to destabilize entire communities and districts. No one really knows from whence the fake photo came or who originated the rumor, but they continue to spread through the targeted population.

I provide examples of each of the three genres of insidious disinformation by Putin’s social media:

First, Radio Free Europe reported in its Odessa Doctor or Random Dentist a fabrication following the tragic fire that claimed almost fifty lives in Odessa. Featured as a Facebook post, this fabrication is supposedly the account of a valiant first-aid physician, Igor Rozovskiy (a Jewish name, by the way), who rushed to the fire to render aid, but extremists denied him entry, beat him, warning that all Jews like him will share the fate of the fire victims. Rozovskiy plaintively ends his account wondering why the world is silent.

Good writing! This is enough to make anyone’s blood boil. How can such barbarism be tolerated? Quite a story, perfect for the Russian narrative of crazed neo-Nazi extremists rampaging through eastern Ukraine in search of innocent victims.

The good doctor’s post served its purpose: The Russian-language Facebook, Vkontakte.ru, gathered more than 5,000 shares one day after it appeared. Rosovskiy’s account was expeditiously translated into English, German, and Bulgarian. Why not believe the story? It seemed to make sense, after all the noise about the Kiev extremists.

**Not so fast. Bloggers, who investigated the good doctor’s Facebook story, discovered something odd. Dr. Rozovskiy’s smiling face turns out to be that–the same face, the same room, windows and background–of a North Caucasus dentist — in the advertising brochure of the Ust Dzhegmiska Dental Clinic. The dental clinic identifies the man on Igor Rosovskiy’s Facebook page as Ruslan Semenov, graduate of Stavropol Medical College, 1997 graduate, 17 years of experience, phone 7-19-68. I decided not to call Semenov in Ust Dzhegmiska. He has probably been bothered enough.

Shortly after Radio Free Europe’s discovery, Rozovskiy’s Facebook account suddenly carried the announcement that “this content is no longer available.”**

Notably, Putin’s invisible disinformation campaign is a carbon copy of the one Stalin used during the Great Terror (1937-1938) and World War II. During this period, the typewriter was one of the scarcest commodities and fiction writers were in high demand. Imaginative writers used the typewriters to paint lurid descriptions of enemies, conspiracies, and spies, written as confessions handed to the “enemies of the people” to sign. Similarly, the systematic spreading of rumors was part of the Stalinist tool kit. In fact, the stories have not changed over 80 years–the enemy is still poisoning the water, lurking in the woods, and planning atrocities with enemy agents.

It should be noted that Mr. Putin, as a young KGB officer in Berlin, was not an intelligence agent but a disinformation specialist who ran informant networks. He is just putting what he learned in his younger days to use, only now as the head of a nation.

forbes.com/sites/paulroderickgregory/2014/05/11/inside-putins-campaign-of-social-media-trolling-and-faked-ukrainian-crimes/

 

[josie_L]

Your location is given as “Montreal, Quebec”. Unless you are new to our country, you should know that “the government” does not equal “the parliament”. The Parliament is equivalent for Americans to Congress. “The government” is equivalent to “the Administration”. You are arguing as if because, say, the Republicans have a majority in Congress it is therefore impossible that the Democrats should have any executive place, position or power.

America’s chief representative in Ukraine - who botched the job, quite possibly deliberately - is married, for instance, to a notorious neoconservative.

When one says that the government in Kyiv is fascist or a neo-Nazi entity (which has been repeated many times over on this thread) than that would include parliament because parliament is part of the government, i.e., they are not mutually exclusive.

 

[asnate]

Comparing Vladimir Putin and Russia to Hitler and Nazi Germany - as has been done on this thread - is uncharitable and will not be tolerated. It’s the kind of tactic I would expect from the State Department, not a Catholic Forum.

And pulling the old ad Hitlerum fallacy is always a sure sign of a losing argument.

Russian fascism:
youtube.com/watch?v=wgLNakOzlCk

 

[HansTrappist]

Russian fascism:
youtube.com/watch?v=wgLNakOzlCk

There are fascists in many countries.

The difference is that in Ukraine they now control the Government and Military.

In Russia, they are not in control.

Putin is a White Russian, in the best traditions of Orthodox Russia.

The West’s attempts to demonize him have no basis in fact.

The West is responsible for the situation in Ukraine, not Putin.

 

[pepipop]

Here’s an article by Forbes:

Hahahahaha…the media are scraping the barrel now. Journalism at its best.

 

[HansTrappist]

Hahahahaha…the media are scraping the barrel now. Journalism at its best.

Yeah, Forbes has hit a new low with that innuendo.

 

[asnate]

There are fascists in many countries.

The difference is that in Ukraine they now control the Government and Military.

In Russia, they are not in control.

Putin is a White Russian, in the best traditions of Orthodox Russia.

The West’s attempts to demonize him have no basis in fact.

The West is responsible for the situation in Ukraine, not Putin.

Fortunately, people of Donbas do not think like you, please listen to GRU professional pleading people to join separatists:
youtube.com/watch?v=80YfSwCHQhk
Very few people want to join separatists, except, of course, criminals who are just eager to get access to weapons.

 

[HansTrappist]

Fortunately, people of Donbas do not think like you, please listen to GRU professional pleading people to join separatists:
youtube.com/watch?v=80YfSwCHQhk
Very few people want to join separatists, except, of course, criminals who are just eager to get access to weapons.

You have to get the timeline straight:

1. Putin offers Ukraine Russian Gas at a bargain price compared to the heavily inflated, usurious EU price.
2. Victoria Nuland, John McCain, Catherine Ashton and other Western leaders refuse to accept the Russian Gas deal and so pay a visit to Kiev.

Describing the deal with the Devil that was made in Kiev, Max Blumenthal writes:

One of the “Big Three” political parties behind the protests is the ultra-nationalist Svoboda, whose leader, Oleh Tyahnybok, has called for the liberation of his country from the “Muscovite-Jewish mafia.” After the 2010 conviction of the Nazi death camp guard John Demjanjuk for his supporting role in the death of nearly 30,000 people at the Sobibor camp, Tyahnybok rushed to Germany to declare him a hero who was “fighting for truth.” In the Ukrainian parliament, where Svoboda holds an unprecedented 37 seats, Tyahnybok’s deputy Yuriy Mykhalchyshyn is fond of quoting Joseph Goebbels – he has even founded a think tank originally called “the Joseph Goebbels Political Research Center.” According to Per Anders Rudling, a leading academic expert on European neo-fascism, the self-described “socialist nationalist” Mykhalchyshyn is the main link between Svoboda’s official wing and neo-Nazi militias like Right Sector.

Right Sector is a shadowy syndicate of self-described “autonomous nationalists” identified by their skinhead style of dress, ascetic lifestyle, and fascination with street violence. Armed with riot shields and clubs, the group’s cadres have manned the front lines of the Euromaidan battles this month, filling the air with their signature chant: “Ukraine above all!” In a recent Right Sector propaganda video [embedded at the bottom of this article], the group promised to fight “against degeneration and totalitarian liberalism, for traditional national morality and family values.” With Svoboda linked to a constellation of international neo-fascist parties through the Alliance of European National Movements, Right Sector is promising to lead its army of aimless, disillusioned young men on “a great European Reconquest.”

Svoboda’s openly pro-Nazi politics have not deterred Senator John McCain from addressing a EuroMaidan rally alongside Tyahnybok, nor did it prevent Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland from enjoying a friendly meeting with the Svoboda leader this February. Eager to fend off accusations of anti-Semitism, the Svoboda leader recently hosted the Israeli Ambassador to Ukraine. “I would like to ask Israelis to also respect our patriotic feelings,” Tyahnybok has remarked. “Probably each party in the [Israeli] Knesset is nationalist. With God’s help, let it be this way for us too.”

In a leaked phone conversation with Geoffrey Pyatt, the US ambassador to Ukraine, Nuland revealed her wish for Tyahnybok to remain “on the outside,” but to consult with the US’s replacement for Yanukovich, Arseniy Yatsenyuk, “four times a week.” At a December 5, 2013 US-Ukraine Foundation Conference, Nuland boasted that the US had invested $5 billion to “build democratic skills and institutions” in Ukraine, though she did not offer any details.

“The Euro-Maidan movement has come to embody the principles and values that are the cornerstones for all free democracies,” Nuland proclaimed.

Two weeks later, 15,000 Svoboda members held a torchlight ceremony in the city of Lviv in honor of Stepan Bandera, a World War II-era Nazi collaborator who led the pro-fascist Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN-B). Lviv has become the epicenter of neo-fascist activity in Ukraine, with elected Svoboda officials waging a campaign to rename its airport after Bandera and successfully changing the name of Peace Street to the name of the Nachtigall Battalion, an OUN-B wing that participated directly in the Holocaust. “’Peace’ is a holdover from Soviet stereotypes,” a Svoboda deputy explained. salon.com/2014/02/25/is_the_us_backing_neo_nazis_in_ukraine_partner/

1. The February 21st Agreement is signed calling for new Presidential elections among other things, but is never implemented as Yanukovych is forced to flee Ukraine after his life and the life of his family are threatened.
2. Once Russia realizes that the February 21st Agreement - which was signed in the presence of the representatives of France, Poland, Germany and Russia - is being ignored and that Yanukovych was violently and unconstitutionally deposed, all bets are off and Russia moves to secure her preexisting national security interests in Crimea.
3. Crimeans, realizing that there is not a peaceful and law-abiding Government in Kiev, vote overwhelmingly to join Russia.
4. Ethnic Russian Ukrainians in the South and East of Ukraine decide to follow in the steps of Crimea.
5. The illegitimate Government in Kiev decides to launch a military assault against the ethnic Russian civilian populations of East and South Ukraine.

To be continued…

 

[Ridgerunner]

You have to get the timeline straight:

1. Putin offers Ukraine Russian Gas at a bargain price compared to the heavily inflated, usurious EU price.
2. Victoria Nuland, John McCain, Catherine Ashton and other Western leaders refuse to accept the Russian Gas deal and so pay a visit to Kiev.

Describing the deal with the Devil that was made in Kiev, Max Blumenthal writes:

One of the “Big Three” political parties behind the protests is the ultra-nationalist Svoboda, whose leader, Oleh Tyahnybok, has called for the liberation of his country from the “Muscovite-Jewish mafia.” After the 2010 conviction of the Nazi death camp guard John Demjanjuk for his supporting role in the death of nearly 30,000 people at the Sobibor camp, Tyahnybok rushed to Germany to declare him a hero who was “fighting for truth.” In the Ukrainian parliament, where Svoboda holds an unprecedented 37 seats, Tyahnybok’s deputy Yuriy Mykhalchyshyn is fond of quoting Joseph Goebbels – he has even founded a think tank originally called “the Joseph Goebbels Political Research Center.” According to Per Anders Rudling, a leading academic expert on European neo-fascism, the self-described “socialist nationalist” Mykhalchyshyn is the main link between Svoboda’s official wing and neo-Nazi militias like Right Sector.

Right Sector is a shadowy syndicate of self-described “autonomous nationalists” identified by their skinhead style of dress, ascetic lifestyle, and fascination with street violence. Armed with riot shields and clubs, the group’s cadres have manned the front lines of the Euromaidan battles this month, filling the air with their signature chant: “Ukraine above all!” In a recent Right Sector propaganda video [embedded at the bottom of this article], the group promised to fight “against degeneration and totalitarian liberalism, for traditional national morality and family values.” With Svoboda linked to a constellation of international neo-fascist parties through the Alliance of European National Movements, Right Sector is promising to lead its army of aimless, disillusioned young men on “a great European Reconquest.”

Svoboda’s openly pro-Nazi politics have not deterred Senator John McCain from addressing a EuroMaidan rally alongside Tyahnybok, nor did it prevent Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland from enjoying a friendly meeting with the Svoboda leader this February. Eager to fend off accusations of anti-Semitism, the Svoboda leader recently hosted the Israeli Ambassador to Ukraine. “I would like to ask Israelis to also respect our patriotic feelings,” Tyahnybok has remarked. “Probably each party in the [Israeli] Knesset is nationalist. With God’s help, let it be this way for us too.”

In a leaked phone conversation with Geoffrey Pyatt, the US ambassador to Ukraine, Nuland revealed her wish for Tyahnybok to remain “on the outside,” but to consult with the US’s replacement for Yanukovich, Arseniy Yatsenyuk, “four times a week.” At a December 5, 2013 US-Ukraine Foundation Conference, Nuland boasted that the US had invested $5 billion to “build democratic skills and institutions” in Ukraine, though she did not offer any details.

“The Euro-Maidan movement has come to embody the principles and values that are the cornerstones for all free democracies,” Nuland proclaimed.

Two weeks later, 15,000 Svoboda members held a torchlight ceremony in the city of Lviv in honor of Stepan Bandera, a World War II-era Nazi collaborator who led the pro-fascist Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN-B). Lviv has become the epicenter of neo-fascist activity in Ukraine, with elected Svoboda officials waging a campaign to rename its airport after Bandera and successfully changing the name of Peace Street to the name of the Nachtigall Battalion, an OUN-B wing that participated directly in the Holocaust. “’Peace’ is a holdover from Soviet stereotypes,” a Svoboda deputy explained. salon.com/2014/02/25/is_the_us_backing_neo_nazis_in_ukraine_partner/

1. The February 21st Agreement is signed calling for new Presidential elections among other things, but is never implemented as Yanukovych is forced to flee Ukraine after his life and the life of his family are threatened.
2. Once Russia realizes that the February 21st Agreement - which was signed in the presence of the representatives of France, Poland, Germany and Russia - is being ignored and that Yanukovych was violently and unconstitutionally deposed, all bets are off and Russia moves to secure her preexisting national security interests in Crimea.
3. Crimeans, realizing that there is not a peaceful and law-abiding Government in Kiev, vote overwhelmingly to join Russia.
4. Ethnic Russian Ukrainians in the South and East of Ukraine decide to follow in the steps of Crimea.
5. The illegitimate Government in Kiev decides to launch a military assault against the ethnic Russian civilian populations of East and South Ukraine.

To be continued…

No really good reason to continue, since we have all seen this Russian argument dozens of times.

But one salient fact stands out, no matter how anybody sugar coats it. Russia has seized portions of three countries so far, made them part of Russia, and appears poised to seize more.

Conquest is conquest is conquest, whether one had fifth column agents in the conquered areas or not.

 

[josie_L]

Hahahahaha…the media are scraping the barrel now. Journalism at its best.

At least, Forbes is not considered an unreliable news source by CAF. And the content in the Forbes article can be found/verified elsewhere.

 

[josie_L]

Fortunately, people of Donbas do not think like you, please listen to GRU professional pleading people to join separatists:
youtube.com/watch?v=80YfSwCHQhk
Very few people want to join separatists, except, of course, criminals who are just eager to get access to weapons.

That person in the video Igor Strelok is really Igor Girkin, he is a Russian citizen working with the separatists.

Last Monday, one of the separatists’ leaders, a Russian citizen and intelligence officer, Igor Girkin – nicknamed Strelok – proclaimed himself the commander-in-chief of the so-called Donetsk People’s Republic and turned to Russia for immediate military aid. He also called for law-enforcers in the Donetsk region to swear an oath of loyalty to this newly emerged state. And he intends to prosecute members of Ukrainian government, among others.

If Strelok is the negotiating party Russia wants to see at Ukraine’s round table, we presume that he is not welcome – by Ukraine, nor by OSCE co-facilitators. Why should a Russian special operative who had previously terrorised civilians in eastern Ukraine be the voice of the people? Rather, he is welcome at Ukraine’s criminal courts.

theguardian.com/commentis…sian-gun-putin

 

[HansTrappist]

No really good reason to continue, since we have all seen this Russian argument dozens of times.

But one salient fact stands out, no matter how anybody sugar coats it. Russia has seized portions of three countries so far, made them part of Russia, and appears poised to seize more.

Conquest is conquest is conquest, whether one had fifth column agents in the conquered areas or not.

Which three countries did Russia “conquer?”

Certainly not Crimea, which voted to join Russia AFTER the Western-backed coup against the democratically-elected President of Ukraine forced Russia to secure her national security interests there.

Perhaps you refer to the 2008 war with Georgia. Anyone who impartially studied that conflict would know that Georgia fired the first shots. That was a mistake and Russia quickly ended the conflict. If Russia had been interested in “conquest” as you continually assert on this thread, then why did Russia not take all of Georgia?

And I am still waiting for you to answer a simple question, Ridgerunner: Do you support the current authorities in Kiev?