BS: Ukraine

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: GUEST,Ed T
Date: 06 Mar 14 - 06:58 AM

"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves". - William Pitt, 1783

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 06 Mar 14 - 08:09 AM

Our local paper carriers an article explaining the fate of two Irish people living in Crimea who are separated and, due to the divisions there, are on opposing sides
It is entitled 'The Two Sides to the Crimean Situation', which is misleading - there are numerous sides to the present dispute.
You have the supporters of the overthrown government and of the rebels.
Russia, however heavy-handed it is being, has a large number of Russian people living there.
Should the situation lead to war the United Nations will be put into a situation of having to consider intervention.
Due to the prominent presence of ultra-nationalists, everyone not of Ukrainian (whatever that means) origin is under threat.
The area has an extremely confusing turbulent history; it only became 'The Ukrainian People's Republic' following the Russian Revolution and later, following further hostilities, became the 'Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic' in 1922.   
If nationalism gets any sort of a toe-hold it could lead to a bloodbath comparable with the Serbo-Croat one.
It is totally irresponsible politicking for any country to support one side at this stage,
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 06 Mar 14 - 08:47 AM

Crimean parliament are taking the matter of Crimean independence from the Ukraine to a public referendum on the 16th of this month.
Meanwhile the current unelected government in Kiev declare any such public vote to be 'unconstitutional.'

There has been some fast negotiating going on behind the scenes in Crimea. Either that or the US-backed coup in KIev was predicted and Putin already had his political moves ready to put into play in Crimea when it happened.

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Sandy Mc Lean
Date: 06 Mar 14 - 10:35 PM

Am I only the one cynical enough to wonder why this whole issue waited until the Olympics were history!

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: GUEST,whatever
Date: 06 Mar 14 - 10:52 PM

the Paralympics in Sochi, Russia, March 07- 14
45 Nations.

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: The Sandman
Date: 07 Mar 14 - 03:18 AM

"For its part, the United States has strongly come down on the side of the opposition" oh dear, how many times has the us done that before with unfortunate consequences

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Sawzaw
Date: 07 Mar 14 - 11:34 AM

"Putin is like the bored kid in the back of the classroom slouching in his chair and not paying attention"

"This is my last election. After my election I have more flexibility." Medvedev: "I understand. I will transmit this information to Vladimir"

"I think they sit there across the pond in the U.S., sometimes it seems … like they're in a lab and they're running all sorts of experiments on the rats without understanding consequences of what they're doing, why would they do that? Nobody can explain."

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: GUEST,guest
Date: 07 Mar 14 - 02:55 PM

Putin walks like a gun-slinger,

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 07 Mar 14 - 03:50 PM

The Ukraine say good-bye to Crimea.

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Ed T
Date: 07 Mar 14 - 04:37 PM

While the route is unfortunate, andvtge fall-out long-lasting, there seems to be only one course-separation.cIt is best to have it done, rather than have it linger and fester.

That in itself, is nof the end of the world. In fact, it may allow both segments to focus on finding their future course, without the added turmoil of two Nations (artificially being brought together from outside), within one Nation

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Songwronger
Date: 07 Mar 14 - 09:14 PM

The fascist danger in Ukraine

A politically sinister propaganda offensive is underway in the media to either deny the involvement of fascists in the US-backed coup in Ukraine or present their role as a marginal and insignificant detail.

The New York Times, for example, asserted, "Putin's claim of an immediate threat to Ukrainian Russians is empty," while Britain's Guardian dismissed as a "fancy" claims that events in Crimea were an attempt to "prevent attacks by bands of revolutionary fascists," adding that "the world's media has [not] yet seen or heard from" such forces.

This is an obscene cover-up.

The reality is that, for the first time since 1945, an avowedly anti-Semitic, pro-Nazi party controls key levers of state power in a European capital, courtesy of US and European imperialism. The unelected Ukrainian government, headed by US appointee Arseniy Yatsenyuk, includes no fewer than six ministers from the fascist Svoboda party....

http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2014/03/06/pers-m06.html

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 08 Mar 14 - 08:03 AM

To shout "Foul cwaven" must be in order!!

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Sawzaw
Date: 08 Mar 14 - 03:08 PM

The Poisoning of Ukraine's President

One year later, the exact cause of Viktor Yushchenko's disfigurement is pinpointed

"The dioxin found in Yushchenko's blood—pure 2,3,7,8-TCDD—is "the most potent of all the dioxins," said Daniel Hryhorczuk, professor of environmental and occupational health sciences at the University of Illinois. "I doubt someone could have been sophisticated enough to give a dose in the range where you'd be guaranteed to maim and not kill," added Hryhorczuk, implying that the intent was most likely Yushchenko's death, not disfigurement. Hryhorczuk said the dioxin was probably not a homegrown concoction made in Ukraine, but rather, the work of a foreign laboratory. "To make a compound this pure requires a lot of sophistication."

The early suspect: Russian intelligence. After all, it is no secret that Yushchenko, a pro-Western reformer, was not the Kremlin's preferred candidate in 2004. Moreover, Russia's KGB has a long history of failed assassination attempts of political figures, stretching as far back as the time of Rasputin, Tsarina Alexsandra's mystic who was nearly poisoned in 1916 by pastries laced with cyanide.

During the 69 years of Soviet rule, the KGB took poison assassination plots to a new level of sophistication. In 1957, for instance, a Soviet agent assassinated Ukrainian émigré leader Lev Rebet in Munich using a cyanide gas pistol. In 1978, a Bulgarian agent at a London bus stop used an umbrella loaded with ricin pellets to inject a Soviet defector with poison. But dioxin poisoning is un-chartered territory, even for Russian spooks.

If this poisoning was an attempt on Yushchenko's life, why did the assailant not use a stronger substance like strychnine? After all, dioxin is not commonly used as a tool for assassination and the substance can be detected in the blood for years after initial contact. "

http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/the_poisoning_of_ukraines_president/

Ukraine under Russian Rule

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Sawzaw
Date: 08 Mar 14 - 07:50 PM

Convicted because she made a deal with Vladimir Putin when he stopped gas supplies to Ukraine in the winter of 2009

Why isn't Putin equally guilty?

Yulia Tymoshenko's miraculous release at the weekend was from a seven-year prison sentence imposed for a non-existent crime. The former Ukrainian prime minister had done nothing wrong: the police, prosecutors and jurists who fabricated her offense were subservient to a state that wanted her eliminated. Whether or not Tymoshenko becomes president of her embattled country, Europe needs to find a way to deal with officials who are complicit in human rights abuses.

Tymoshenko was accused of abuse of office, because she made a deal with Vladimir Putin when he stopped gas supplies to Ukraine in the winter of 2009. This threatened a humanitarian disaster unless Ukraine agreed to pay a higher price for Russian gas. Under pressure from the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, and the European commission president, José Manuel Barroso, and with her people dying from hypothermia, Tymoshenko gave in to Putin's demands. Some criticised her for not holding out for longer, and she narrowly lost the presidential election a few months later to Viktor Yanukovych.

Yanukovych appointed his crony Viktor Pshonka as prosecutor general, who set his deputy, Renat Kuzmin, to destroy Tymoshenko. This was easy in a former Soviet state that had embraced democracy but had not reformed the justice system, in which all-powerful prosecutors control the judges. Ukraine has "P-plate judges" provisionally appointed for five years with tenure confirmed only if their decisions have not upset the regime. This system has produced a conviction rate in Ukraine courts of 99.8% – an impossible statistic for any democratic country.

To convict at Tymoshenko's trial, the judge brutally refused her bail and did nothing to discourage televised proclamations of her guilt by Yanukovych and his top prosecutors. But even this judge could not invent evidence – because there was none – that she had acted in the gas deal for personal gain, or with any trace of fraud or dishonesty.

Her actions, taken to avoid a humanitarian disaster, cannot rationally be regarded as a crime. But for making what her enemies called a "bad deal", she was jailed.

This travesty of justice was accompanied by similarly rigged prosecutions of her ministers. The Council of Europe turned a blind eye to the outrages. The European court of human rights upheld Tymoshenko's initial complaints, but its slow processes and indulgence of the Ukraine government's delaying tactics prevented it from giving her any meaningful relief.

This failure underlines the need for EU member states to adopt a "Magnitsky Law", which names and shames officials– especially judges, prosecutors and police chiefs – who are complicit in abuses. Sergei Magnitsky blew the whistle on state corruption in Russia and was killed in prison: the US, to Putin's fury, last year adopted a law that denied entry and banking services to 16 of his tormentors, including judges who had denied him bail.

London has become a favourite destination of violent and corrupt officials and oligarchs. But when five former secretaries of state for foreign affairs called last year on the minister for Europe, David Lidington, to support a Magnitsky law, his ignorant response was that it was "unlikely to contribute to achieving justice". Tell that to Tymoshenko.

Her vicious prosecutor, Pshonka, was the first to be indicted by Ukraine's parliament on Sunday, followed by the defense minister accused of ordering the shooting of protesters. There will likely be more charges against Yanukovych and his cronies if the opposition triumphs in the May elections. Can they be fairly tried in Ukraine, before their own judicial tools?

The greatest challenge to any new government will be to establish an independent judiciary. It may be better for it to invite European (including Russian) judges to sit on the trials of Yanukovych's corrupt apparatchiks, and to ask the international criminal court to try those accused of ordering the lethal force used against peaceful protesters – a crime against humanity.

Tymoshenko, whatever her faults in failing to capitalize on the Orange revolution, is a remarkable and courageous figure. After 30 months in prison for a crime that was not a crime, her greatest challenge will be to reform the justice system so this cannot happen again – even to those who put her behind bars.

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: bobad
Date: 24 Mar 14 - 09:36 AM

Putin`s Ministry of Truth

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: pdq
Date: 24 Mar 14 - 02:43 PM

In recent years, Ukraine has had the second highest death rate in the World, exceeded only by South Africa.

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Greg F.
Date: 24 Mar 14 - 04:49 PM

Source?

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 24 Mar 14 - 07:11 PM

pdq must be looking at some of songwronger's sources.

Ukraine ranks 14 or 18, depending on whether you use OECD or CIA Factbook. Use google to see list.

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: pdq
Date: 24 Mar 14 - 07:25 PM

Countries with the Highest Death Rates

view as: list / map
▲        Country        deaths per 1,000 population
1.      South Africa 17.36
2.        Ukraine 15.75
3.        Lesotho 15.02
4.        Chad    14.85
5.        Guinea-Bissau 14.77
6.        Central African Republic 14.42
7.        Afghanistan 14.35
8.        Bulgaria 14.31
9.        Somalia 14.22
10.        Russia 13.97

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: GUEST,Troubadour
Date: 24 Mar 14 - 08:14 PM

"All a mess. And a very scary mess. I was watching a TV programme about the Great War, and how a seemingly peripheral terrorist assassination built up over a few weeks into an unstoppable rush into total war. And then turned over to the news..."

I think you are looking at the wrong war.

Think rather of the Sudetenland and its annexation at the point of a gun "to protect German speaking citizens", which escalated into the conquest of Czechoslovakia by the Nazis.

A much closer parallel to Putin's referendum at gunpoint. Who's going to argue with a bunch of masked men with Kalashnikovs?

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Rob Naylor
Date: 24 Mar 14 - 09:02 PM

Ed T: Curious, Rob Naylor, since you seemvto have direct knowledge.

Would you say that Russia is still a communist state? If so, how is it different from the pure communist state it used to be ((if different at all). Do people now have accessto information as other do in tge West. Or, is "the state"still the main infirmation source versus the "free press" (recognizing there are limits to what that constitutes everywhere).

Not been on Mudcat for a while as I was on vacation, climbing in the mountains, then in Moscow. Now I'm back on Sakhalin.

I'm not going to argue about whether the USSR was ever a "pure communist state". It's telling that over the years many people who have enthusiastically supported communism and in turn various communist states, whether run by Mao, Stalin or lesser figures, turn to the "well it was never really a proper communist state anyway" excuse once the failures, atrocities etc come to light.

However, having spent a considerable time in Poland in the 1970s when it was still in the Warsaw Pact, less but significant time in East Germany around the same time, and then a fair bit of time in the USSR (specifically Estonian SSR) in the early 80s, there's just no comparison.

In Estonia in the early 80s our rooms were definitely bugged. As independent visitors (ie not travelling as part of a controlled group) we were followed, not always very discreetly, everywhere we went and locals, both ethnic Russians and Estonians, were quite wary of speaking to us, and certainly wouldn't discuss political issues or even think of commenting negatively on their governments or leaders. Estonians could get (and understand) Finnish TV but it was often jammed.

As a foreign student in Torun, Poland, in 1974, I could access the "Foreign Club" which had English papers...but ONLY the "Morning Star" and "Socialist Worker"! (essentially organs of the Communist Party of GB and Socialist Worker's Party at the time).

Now, there's just no comparison. There's free access to the internet here (Russia, where I am now) and foreign papers and magazines freely available everywhere. Whilst most of the press is controlled to a greater or lesser extent, there ARE non-government-controlled publications, though their staff do sometimes suffer levels of intimidation...indeed, some have died in mysterious circumstances.

You can argue that the place is essentially run by gangsters....but then it was to as the USSR, too!....Putin and many of his cronies came up through the old USSR system, KGB etc. From what I hear, conditions in jails etc, while still appalling by European standards, are nowhere near as bad as they were under the USSR.

I can now have political discussions with my local friends and acquaintances, and these seem to be very free, with people criticising their government frequently. Local friends here are appalled at some of Putin's rhetoric on Ukraine, and are happy to say so. Discussions can get quite heated when pro and anti people get together!

Not sure how much it was reported in the foreign press (it was reported in the state media here as a small demo of a couple of thousand people!), but there was a huge peace demo in Moscow last week....at least 50,000 people, carrying alternating Ukrainian and Russian flags, with signs saying that Russia should leave Ukraine alone and one that I have a photograph of saying (in Russian): "Putin: he stole Russia and now he wants to steal Ukraine too".

I went for a walk round Victory Park in Moscow on Saturday and the statue representing the Ukrainian soldier was covered in red roses.

Either of those things would have been totally inconceiveable under the USSR.

One thing that is slow to change though is people being unwilling to take responsibility or to "go outside the box" to get things done. Everything has to be done strictly by the rulebook here, no matter how inconvenient it makes things. For example, one project I'm working on now is completely stalled waiting for visa applications to be allowed. It's going to have a knock-on effect onto a whole gas project (which is Russia's main source of foreign income) which will be held up for weeks or months and will cost the Russian economy hundreds of millions of dollars. But the local Visa Dept isn't accepting work visa applications because the forms have been changed and they don't have a supply of the new forms yet. No-one there is in the least interested in getting forms couriered here from Moscow, or sending images for local printing or whatever....they'll "come when they come" and until then the project's stalled as we can't get the required engineers in. No-one gives a damn...very similar to USSR days when "the government pretends to pay us so we pretend to work".

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Mar 14 - 09:47 PM

Excellent chronicles and pov's here.

But on the bright side, Russia is willing to let Ukraine keep Chernobyl.

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Rob Naylor
Date: 25 Mar 14 - 01:10 AM

Just got out of a meeting with a fairly high-powered General Director of a local company we work with. Talking generally over a coffee after we'd finished business talk I asked him how the sanctions were biting. He gave a great guffaw and said: "the only thing the top people are worried about is why they AREN'T on the list!" It's a status symbol andif you're not on the list it means you're not "elite" enough!

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Greg F.
Date: 25 Mar 14 - 11:20 AM

From: pdq - PM
Date: 24 Mar 14 - 07:25 PM
Countries with the Highest Death Rates

Still no source given, PeeDee- unless the source is your own imagination?

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: GUEST,Stringsinger
Date: 25 Mar 14 - 12:03 PM

The US has nothing useful to say about Ukraine or Crimea. Many of the Svoboda Party in the Ukraine have actual Nazi ties. They are reactionary radicals, very much like the US House of Representatives, supported by the likes of McCain and Lindsey Graham.

Putin might be a little dictator but the US, by building up it's missile base in NATO has put him on the defensive so is a co-contributor to his authoritarianism. The cold war has been re-ignited by the radical reactionaries in America.

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 25 Mar 14 - 01:09 PM

I quoted figures from the OECD and the CIA Factbook.
pdq gave figures but no documentation.
Lesotho
Afghanistan
Swaziland
DR Congo
Guinea-Bissau

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Mar 14 - 01:22 PM

http://www.mapsofworld.com/world-top-ten/countries-by-highest-death-rate.html

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 25 Mar 14 - 01:25 PM

Oops! cut off. Ukraine is 14, Russia is 23, USA is 104 and Canada is 130.
Wikipedia; List of sovereign states and dependent territories by mortality rate.

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Greg F.
Date: 25 Mar 14 - 02:15 PM

Mitt Romney's apparently got a new gig as a
Stand-Up Comic

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: pdq
Date: 25 Mar 14 - 02:18 PM

OK, here is my source...

http://www.aneki.com/death.html

The CIA has politicised their numbers on many subjects for a long time, and the other sources cited probably use CIA data anyway.

Now can we discuss why Russia's Bread Basket is now near the worst place in the World as far as death rates go? Its farm land is legendary and its produce hase fed other parts of Europe for a very long time. What happened?

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Greg F.
Date: 25 Mar 14 - 06:05 PM

So tell me, PeeDee- where did this aneki outfit I've never heard of get THEIR numbers since they don't tell us what their "numerous sources" are?

Sounds kinda like Tailgunner Joe documentation to me.?

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Rob Naylor
Date: 25 Mar 14 - 07:07 PM

Actually, Ukraine does have a high mortality rate. Very similar to that of Russia, possibly even slightly higher. I wouldn't trust pdq's source for its exact position in a "mortality league table" but it IS much higher than western Europe and similar to nearby areas of Russia and Belarus. Source for this is:

Ukraine: The Social Sectors during Transition
A World Bank Country Study, 2010


There seem to be various reasons:

- a high incidence of smoking/ smoking-related diseases
- a high incidence of high blood pressure
- a very skewed demographic due to wars, famines and Soviet-era purges
- poor pollution controls in the industrialised east of the country
- low birthrate

Since the end of the soviet era there has been a gradual improvement, but the older generations were born and brought up under those conditions and what we are seeing now as those generations die off early is the consequences of the pollution, deprivation etc they lived their earlier decades under. Mortality rates dropped significantly between 1980 and 2010.

This has been compounded since independence by the aspirations of a large proportion of Ukrainians to adopt a western lifestyle (ie fast-food diet, less physical exercise) but without improving very much on the existing healthcare infrastructure.

Yulia Tymoshenko's government started a programme to improve health care in 2009 but this was largely emasculated when Viktor Yanukovych's government came into power in 2010.

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 25 Mar 14 - 07:54 PM

aneki gives no documentation. reliability?

The Wikipedia entry also gives the CIA Factbook rankings; doesn't agree with aniki either.

Rates for eastern Europe are high in general, but a number of African countries are worse.

Others- Belgium, 60; UK, 82; Germany, 45; Latvia surprisingly high at 18.
(OECD listing)

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Rob Naylor
Date: 28 Mar 14 - 08:12 PM

Just looking at the locals where I am now (Sakhalin) it's fairly obvious that a high percentage of the middle-aged men have some pretty severe alcohol problems. Almost everyone smokes.

I imagine it's similar in Ukraine.

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: bobad
Date: 30 Mar 14 - 11:09 AM

I would encourage those who are still buying into Russian propaganda re the uprising and slaughter of protesters in the Maidan, to read this article:

Photographs Expose Russian-Trained Killers in Kiev

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Greg F.
Date: 30 Mar 14 - 11:21 AM

Baghdad, Boo-Bad

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: GUEST,Ukie
Date: 25 Jul 14 - 08:18 PM

Well I read through this entire thread and I must tell you that Jim Carroll is right. My grandparents came from Halcyon a (Galicia) and to say that my grandfather hated Russians would be an understatement- with an extreme passion! My grandmother was much more tolerant. She explained that east and west Ukraine were different. West hates Russia and is closer to Polish and east were pretty much Russian. But she also taught me that we are descended from the same people, the Rus, and would have remained one people had it not been for the Mongol Invasion. One people, much more alike than different in a myriad of ways, and different from the West, ruled by the heart.

The Ukie Nazis are a blight on our people. There is no excuse for the western media's blackout on this except that they have a nefarious agenda where our people are concerned and have given these haters a prominent place in the so-called revolution and current regime.

What the Ukie Nazis believe I am intimately familiar with and it smacks of the same sort of revisionist history/mythology that the Germans Nazis once espoused. First off, there must be an all purpose scapegoat. We all know who that is. Ukie Nazis don't hate all Jews, just "Postal Jews." For example, they don't hate benefactor Jewish oligarch Kolmoisky, recently appointed as governor of Dnipetrovsk, notorious for his mafias type business practices.

The Ukie Nazis cry crocodile tears over the Holodomor. The Holodomor never touched their regions. The Holodomor occurred primarily in the east, in the regions that were part of Russia until Lenin gifted them to Ukraine in the 1920's much as Kruschev gifted Crimea in 1954.Stalin, a Georgian, starved those regions for a few different reasons. 1.) Agricultural prowess that could produce exports that could finance his plans for industrialization (to compete with the west who I might had imposed similar hardships on their own "subjects" (Let's not forget the Irish famine). 2.) These were the regions inhabited by the people (many of them Cossacks) who fought against the Bolshevik Revolution. History is rife with examples of retaliation against lovers in a conflict. 3.) They were FARMERS. Land was very important to them. They were ideologically opposed to sharing in the sense that socialism espoused. They were branded "kulaks", counter - revolutionaries who should be forced into collectives or face genocide. I'm not altogether sure that Max or Lenin held farmers to the same standards as factory owners but that neither here nor there. Stalin was a monster. Not even Russian. In any case, none of this transpired in west Ukraine, land of Svoboda. You wouldn't know that to hear them rant about it.

Ukie Nazis are not descendants of Zaphorizian Cossacks in any sense although they have coopted the legacy of these great warriors much as Hitler would have done.

Open for discussion. ..

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: GUEST,Ukie
Date: 25 Jul 14 - 08:34 PM

Many errors due to autocorrect on Korean phone. Halychyna not "Halcyon" lol. Not "Postal Jews" but rather "Moskal Jews" lolol. Not "lovers" but losers in a conflict. Damn Korean phone. You must teach it! Marx = Max etc.

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Feb 15 - 07:36 AM

Last week, President Petro Poroshenko said Ukrainian security services had discovered that Russia directly orchestrated the killing of anti-government protesters in central Kyiv last February.
Petro Poroshenko, Ukrainian President: "The General Prosecutor's Office and Ukraine's Security Services have found a direct link to Russia's part in the shooting of Maidan protesters. Now investigators have access to the records of phone conversations between former President Yanukovych and Russia's Federal Security Service. Together they planned the shootings."
In response, Vladimir Putin said the claims that Russia was involved in the Maidan massacre were baseless.

20 Russian FSB agents suspected of Euromaidan Revolution crimes identified

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: GUEST
Date: 26 Feb 15 - 07:50 PM

The Donetsk terrorist gangs are using artillery to execute Russian mercenaries who are owed back pay for several months of "service," reports Liga.net, citing the Russian TV journalist Timur Olevsky.

Terrorists at the so-called "Donetsk People's Republic" (DNR) are executing Russian mercenaries to avoid paying them back wages, the well-know Russian journalist Timur Olevsky, a correspondent for the independent Dozhd TV channel, reported on his Facebook page, February 26.

"In Pisky I saw a strange scene. For four hours the DNR artillery pounded a building near the airport where another DNR unit was located. I even did a news report on it. I could not understand what was happening. And the Ukrainian officers could not understand it. They only said that it happened quite often. First they fired on their own and then they opened fire on them," Olevsky wrote.

Olevsky said the explanation was provided by a journalist who lives in Novosibirsk and who managed to return alive from the Donbas after several months fighting on the side of the DNR terrorists. "He said that this is the way they kill the mercenaries from Russia to avoid paying them the promised wages. They may owe them three months back pay, and before their return they shoot them down with artillery fire if they have managed to survive some useless battle. The Donetsk airport was one of those places. "Written off," Olevsky concluded.

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Mar 15 - 08:19 AM

This is an English-language translation of an op-ed by the slain Russian opposition leader, Boris Nemtsov, that the Kyiv Post published on Sept. 1, 2014. It is worth reading and re-reading to understand why Vladimir Putin decided to wage war against Ukraine.

One excerpt: "Ukraine became an example of an anti-criminal revolution, which overthrew a thieving president. 'Oh so you dared to get out onto the street and throw off a president?' Ukraine needs to be punished for it to make sure that no Russian would gets these thoughts. Moreover, Ukraine chose the European way, which implies the rule of law, democracy and change of power. Ukraine's success on this way is a direct threat to Putin's power because he chose the opposite course – a lifetime in power, filled with arbitrariness and corruption."


Boris Nemtsov: 'This is Vladimir Putin's war'

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Mar 15 - 09:55 AM

Andrea Chalupa: "Putin always feared, ever since the Orange Revolution, that his pesky neighbor Ukraine would export revolution to Russia. That's why he killed Boris Nemtsov who was devoted to Ukraine and about to release damning evidence of Russia's invasion. Today at the Moscow protest, as thousands marched, a member of Ukraine's parliament was singled out and arrested. The Kremlin repeatedly ignores calls from the International community to free Ukrainian pilot Nadiya Savchenko, a POW on an 80+ day hunger strike who has become a symbol of resistance. In short, Putin fears Ukraine. He has the second most powerful military in the world, but he's worried about a country with a depleted military; that's the power of being on the right side of history. There's no greater might than the longing for freedom."

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 02 Mar 15 - 04:36 AM

At least dissidents got a show trial in Stalin's time.
Now they are just gunned down in the street.

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 02 Mar 15 - 11:41 AM

"Now they are just gunned down in the street."
That's capitalism for you (not that Stalin was a communist by policy)
Interesting to examine Nemstsov's agenda - if Yeltsin hadn't got him, The CIA would've
Jim Carroll

NEMTSOV WAS A CAMPAIGNER AGAINST BANDIT CAPITALISM
CONOR O'CLERY

Neither his looks, his charm nor his integrity could save the 'golden boy' of Russian democracy
In the summer of 1994 Boris Nemtsov was a frequent telephone caller to our house in Washington DC as his 10-year-old daughter Zhanna was staying with us on her way to and from summer camp in Virginia,
A few years before, when I was Moscow correspondent of the Irish Times, Boris Nemtsov had emerged as one of the pere¬stroika generation of reform¬ers.
He began his political activ¬ism in 1988 in a successful campaign to prevent a nuclear power station being built in Gorky, since renamed Nizhny Novgorod.
Aged just 32, he was elected to the Russian Supreme Soviet in 1990 in the dying days of the Soviet Union. After the collapse of communism, President Boris Yeltsin appointed him first governor of Nizhny Novgorod.
He was tall, charming and good-looking, with an integrity and an exuberance for change that made him known as the "golden boy" of the fledging Russian democracy.
Yeltsin put him in charge of the first attempt at dismantling the communist system of state ownership in an orderly fashion. It was a pilot programme involving the privatisation of six state-owned farms in the Nizh¬ny-Novgorod region.
The model for this was constructed by the International Finance Corporation, in Washing¬ton, an off-shoot of the World Bank.
As a consultant on a team under Anthony Doran, manager of IFC's Russia division, which conceived and executed the project, my wife (also called Zhanna) came in contact with Nemtsov (hence his daughter staying with us).
Farm employees
The dining table in our house in the Washington suburb of Bethesda in those days was often strewn with documents translated into Russian on how to create entitlement certificates to give farm employees the purchasing power to buy land and property.
It was a complicated process based on fairness. Land entitlement certificates had to be equal in value but property certificates were calculated according to seniority, and pensioners and service providers had to be accommodated.
Much of the work involved legal terminology and components, and the production of Russian-language manuals.
Russian prime minister Victor Chernomyrdin endorsed the pilot programme and it became the template for privatising business, industry and property throughout Russia.
Nemtsov's achievements as a reformer were recognised by Yeltsin who appointed him a deputy prime minister in 1997. Nemtsov began a campaign against what he called "bandit capitalism". He insisted on top bureaucrats disclosing their incomes and using Russian-made cars.
However the idealistic Nemtsov was unable to prevent the rapid development of a culture of quick profits, corruption and oligarch capitalism.
The voucher system worked out at the IFC was overwhelmed with corrupt auctions. Loans for shares gave for¬mer party officials and bureau¬crats the means to grab enormous parcels of property.
Before stepping down in 1999, Yeltsin spoke of Nemtsov as his successor but in the end nominated former KGB official Vladimir Putin, who could be trusted not to pursue corruption charges against Yeltsin's family circle.
Neither wanted a reformer
Before stepping down in 1999, Yeltsin spoke of Nemtsov as his successor but in the end nominated former KGB official Vladimir Putin, who could be trusted not to pursue corruption charges against Yeltsin's family circle
in the Kremlin who would pursue a vision of a transparent, free and competitive society based on the rule of law. That this happened is Russia's tragedy.
We got Zhanna Nemtsova safely back on the plane to Russia after her stay in the US. Today she is a journalist working in Moscow for RBC-TV.
Conor O'Clery is a former Moscow and Washington correspondent of the Irish Times

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Greg F.
Date: 02 Mar 15 - 12:14 PM

Now they are just gunned down in the street.

Kinda like the Black Panthers were.

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 02 Mar 15 - 12:43 PM

"Kinda like the Black Panthers were"
Don't forget George Jackson (and a bit further afield Archbishop Romero), or Patice Lumumba.
All states and institutions have ways of removing yjjeir 'little problems'

Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: akenaton
Date: 02 Mar 15 - 01:16 PM

I fail to see what the possible benefit to Mr Putin would be in ordering the murder of a dissident with little public support, right outside his front door.   I just doesn't make sense.

Mr Putin is at the moment, one of the most popular presidents ever in Russia.....he regularly polls over 60% in popularity, why on earth would he involve himself in this?

If Nemtsov had really been a danger to Putin...and most observers say that he was a decade out of date, with no power base, surely he could have been bought off or eliminated without it being done on widescreen TV?

The most likely scenario is that one of his business deals went wrong, simply a gangland hit....another possibility is anti Putin elements setting it up.

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: GUEST
Date: 02 Mar 15 - 01:36 PM

"The most likely scenario is that one of his business deals went wrong, simply a gangland hit....another possibility is anti Putin elements setting it up"

Ha, ha, ha.........if you believe that maybe you would be interested in a bridge I have for sale.

Here's another good one from the party line: Moscow police; "Rain washed away all usable traces of the Nemtsov murder"

Photo of murder site

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: GUEST
Date: 02 Mar 15 - 07:14 PM

"A stunning interview published today by Novaya Gazeta (one of very few independent media outlets remaining in totalitarian Russia), showcases the warped mentality of Putin's soldiers in Ukraine. Dorzhi Batomunkuev is a Russian soldier, who participated in a tank battle near Debaltseve. He detailed the process of deployment of Russian troops to Ukraine and outlined his own participation. While the information he revealed is quite staggering, Batomunkuev's self-described mindset is equally as revealing. Although the troops were initially told they are going to participate in military exercises, all soldiers knew where they were going. "Even if we do military exercises first, we'll be sent to bomb khokhols [derogatory slur used by Russians to describe Ukrainians]."

Batomunkuev describes the process of "maskirovka" (military deception) that commenced in Russia: painting over the license plates, disguising tanks, removing military patches and epaulets, leaving passports and military ID's with their military divisions. "We all knew where we were going. I was fully adjusted, mentally and physically, to the fact that we would have to go to Ukraine."

Russian soldier fighting in Ukraine is proud of Putin for deceiving the world

Subject: RE: BS: Ukraine
From: akenaton
Date: 03 Mar 15 - 05:06 AM

Interesting CNN report on Nemtsov's position in Russian politics

"A spent "liberal" force?"