Retweeted bruce springnote (@BSpringnote):
Former Head of Naftogaz Bakulin arrested for organized crime causing at least $4 bn in theft & damages to Ukraine. Need to arrest Boyko too
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According to a friend of mine who owns a truck business, in the East vehicles with Ukrainian plates are being harassed (stopped, questioned, inspected, detained) by Pro-Russian militia members.
I think this is enabled because in the east, the police were all closely tied to the now-deposed Party of Regions. They are demoralized and in disarray.
The power vacuum gives more free reign to Russian militias consisting of Russians rent-a-thugs as well as locals. There has been speculation in the mainstream media that Russian Special Forces are encouraging these militias. I think that’s likely.
http://www.cerkva.info/en/news/patriarch/4574-patr-zvernennia-anshlius-krym.html
. . . . On March 18, 2014 Russia’s leaders publicly committed three violations of the commandments of God: Do not kill; Do not Tell false witness against your neighbor; Do not wish your neighbor’s house … (and) anything that is thy neighbor (Exodus 20:15-17). The consequence of armed aggression of Russian government against Ukraine has become bloodshed – the murder of the Ukrainian activist by the separatists in Donetsk, killing of the Crimean Tatar and of the Ukrainian serviceman in the Crimea.
Provocateurs, instigated and supported from Russia, sow the confusion and call for separatism, incite civil conflict in the eastern and southern regions of Ukraine. In the Crimea, Ukrainian troops loyal to the oath, and their families are subjected to continuous pressure, are intimidated, including using weapons.
In the occupatied Crimea community activists disappear without a trace. Those who were occupants’ hostages and were released, witness about the cruel, inhuman treatment, constant humiliation, death threats, simulation of execution. The Russian leadership is personally responsible for all this. . . .
Good!
Lithuania banned broadcasts of a Russian TV channel for three months on Friday for showing a film that authorities said lied about events in 1991, when the Soviet army tried unsuccessfully to remove its pro-independence government.
Tensions between the Baltic states, including Lithuania, and Russia have risen since the Ukraine crisis. The former Soviet republics fear Moscow is trying to destabilize their region, which like Crimea also has large Russia-speaking minorities.
A Lithuanian court upheld a move by a media watchdog to suspend the Gazprom-owned NTV Mir after it broadcast the movie this month, on the eve of the 24th anniversary of Lithuania’s declaration of independence from Soviet Union.
“The movie intentionally spread lies about events in Lithuania on January 13, 1991 … mocking the Lithuanian people and scorning the memory of the fighters for Lithuanian freedom,” Lithuania’s broadcast watchdog, which asked for the ban, said in a statement.
In January 1991, 13 civilians were killed in Vilnius as the Soviet army stormed a TV tower and the headquarters of the TV station.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/21/us-ukraine-crisis-lithuania-idUSBREA2K1HP20140321
http://oleg-leusenko.livejournal.com/1010183.html
If Putin really wanted to fight fascists, he’d start in Moscow.
This is a post-Cold War agreement between the Russian Federation, the US, the UK, and Ukraine, in regards to nuclear non-proliferation, and to respect Ukrainian sovereignty. It is not a mutual defense agreement. It is not titled, as some have claimed, a Memorandum for Security Assistance. It is three governments, the US, the UK, and the Russian Federation, agreeing, individually, to abide by the six points listed above. There is no obligation to defense.
Gun. Ownership.
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This story first appeared on social media with little details:
https://www.facebook.com/yampolska.eva/posts/1416678358587090
Ukrainian forces (who are more likely Crimea locals) refused to surrender their base, but capitulated after the Russians threatened an adjacent school.
Very sensational, obvious. But it seems to have been confirmed, at least by Lyudmila Denisova – secretary (minister) of social policy ministry in Kyiv. She worked for a long time in Crimea.
Story here:
The story is low on details, but the rumor is that it went something like this: After Ukrainians refused to surrender, Russian forces surrounded a school and wouldn’t let anyone leave. Family members of the school children panicked. Some of them were relatives of the Ukrainian soldiers who decided to lay down their weapons and surrender the base. Soldiers were threatened and sent home.
In Kyiv, Anguish And Uncertainty Over Maidan’s Missing
Faina Taran believes she glimpsed her son Ivan for the last time on TV.
Like much of Ukraine, Faina, 66, was glued to rolling news reports on February 20 during bloody clashes in Kyiv. By chance, the camera settled on her son Ivan, 39, an activist on the front lines.
Two of his comrades had been shot and Ivan, wounded, threw himself at Berkut police officers. He disappeared in a melee of shields, batons, and padding.
Had Faina’s eyes deceived her? The next day she got a call from Ivan’s friend. “Your son is missing. The Berkut got him,” she recalls being told, her voice wavering and eyes welling up. No one has seen him since.
http://www.rferl.org/content/ukraine-uncertainty-maidan-missing/25302407.html
(She’s reaching toward a Bulava, a Ukrainian symbol of leadership.)
For the most part, it seems the preponderance of the Jewish community has switched sides. They no longer support the Soviet Union or its modern incarnation. Nevertheless:
MIGHT Russia’s occupation of the Crimea have won Israel a reprieve from American pressure to end its own occupation of Palestine? Set against the unfolding Ukrainian crisis, the shuttle diplomacy between Israeli and Palestinian negotiators that has entangled John Kerry, America’s secretary of state, for nine months seems suddenly almost irrelevant. After meeting Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority, in Washington on March 17th, Barack Obama seemed distracted. These days he needs to be embroiled in the Middle East peace process like a loch in kop, Yiddish for “hole in the head”, wrote Chemi Shalev, Washington correspondent of Haaretz, Israel’s main liberal newspaper.
America’s inability to prevent Russia’s occupation of the Crimea may give succour to Israelis keen to hold on to the West Bank, the chunk of a would-be Palestinian state with about the same population as Crimea’s.
More: http://www.economist.com/blogs/pomegranate/2014/03/israel-and-russia
[youtube]AOjw_hR00oI[/youtube]
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Russian Propaganda in Georgia 2007-2008:
Ukraine 2004, during the Orange Revolution:
