See here.

It is believed he was kidnapped, tortured and murdered by Russian thugs because he attempted to join the Ukrainian military.

http://irek-murtazin.livejournal.com/1159741.html

NEW DELHI: With Russia facing sanctions from the US and some other countries after it annexed Crimea from Ukraine, India on Wednesday made it clear that it will not support any “unilateral measures” against Russian government.

“India has never supported unilateral sanctions against any country e.g. Iraq or Iran. Therefore, we will also not support any unilateral measures by a country or a group of countries,” sources in the government said here.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/India-not-to-support-western-sanctions-against-Russia/articleshow/32307749.cms

I’m not sure whether or not this is accurate. Nevertheless:

Western governments may not have to make good on their threat to punish Russia for invading Crimea. Investors are doing it for them.

Moscow’s Micex stock index plunged more than 11 percent today, the first day of trading after President Vladimir Putin got parliamentary approval to send troops into Ukraine. The ruble sank to a record low against the dollar, even after Russia’s central bank unexpectedly hiked its key lending rate from 5.5 percent to 7 percent.

Russia can’t afford to let this go on. Even before the Ukraine crisis, it was hemorrhaging investment capital. Outflows totaled $17 billion in January alone, undermining efforts to jump-start an economy that grew only 1.3 percent last year. The ruble is one of the world’s worst-performing currencies. “If investors begin to boycott Russia, that would be a far more damaging sanction” than any penalties meted out by the U.S. or the European Union, says Chris Weafer of Moscow investment group Macro-Advisory. He predicts that Putin, in an effort to limit economic damage at home, won’t make a grab for other Ukrainian regions after Crimea.

Read the rest here: http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-03-03/forget-sanctions-dot-what-could-really-hurt-putin-is-investor-backlash

http://ukr.lb.ua/news/2014/03/20/260114_ukraina_obvinila_rossiyu.html

This is a politically neutral analysis of why CEO decisions might be more important than political ones.

http://prymovych.wordpress.com/2014/03/19/how-crimean-developements-translate-into-fdi-in-russia/

http://americablog.com/2014/03/american-bars-boycott-russian-vodka-ukraine-crimea.html

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26653295

Okay, so it seems this story is getting more traction than I realized. I was originally pretty dismissive of it.

As I wrote before:

Regarding that story, two possibilities:

1. Svoboda are trying to show how tough they are and regain the standing the lost in these protests. (The protests are largely a ship that sailed without them, and they’ve even embarrassed themselves by getting caught in lies exaggerating their activity: http://romaninukraine.com/wounded-maidan-protesters-vs-svoboda-party/.)

2. These are Russian sponsored provocateurs.

I hadn’t heard of this guy or this incident before until an American colleague asked me about them, so I just checked with a friend (thanks, Andriy!). It seems nobody is giving it much attention b/c the guy was corrupted thief who would have eventually been fired anyway.

I did not know who the guy was. Apparently, he’s been identified as Igor Miroshnichenko, a Svoboda member of the Verkhovna Rada.

So, probably he doesn’t see himself as a provocateur. He’s probably another narcissistic idiot seeing credibility in the political realm by going after an easy and safe target.

Regarding Russian influence however, there have been wide spread rumors in the past that Svoboda was sponsored by either the Kremlin or Party of Regions in order to radicalize the opposition. I do not know if these rumors are true, btw. I only know that they exist.

Ukrainians seem horrified by the incident. When I was in Lviv’s city center, they were playing interviews on the big screen in which people denounced him, saying “Now Putin is going to play this all over Eastern Ukraine and claim that he was right after all about us being bandits.”

Here, someone photoshopped Ihor’s face onto Vadim Titushka, the Eastern-Ukrainian rent-a-thug who beat up a female journalist last year.

Vadim has since sought forgiveness. He was on Maidan chopping firewood for the protesters. I heard he then volunteered for the military. Unfortunately for him, the word “Titushka” has stuck, and is now commonly used to refer to the rent-a-thugs used by Russia and the now-ousted Party of Regions.

Lol! I think this is a new meme. “Zaiavy Pyshy, Suka, Blin!”

Translation: “Write the Statement, bitch, dammit!”

Here’s the American & Russian US diplomats:

very moving

[youtube]Xeqpqnx9lzQ[/youtube]

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/19/us-russia-estonia-idUSBREA2I1J620140319

“Russia signaled concern on Wednesday at Estonia’s treatment of its large ethnic Russian minority, comparing language policy in the Baltic state with what it said was a call in Ukraine to prevent the use of Russian.

Russia has defended its annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea peninsula by arguing it has the right to protect Russian-speakers outside its borders, so the reference to linguistic tensions in another former Soviet republic comes at a highly sensitive moment.”

www.aljazeera.com/indepth/inpictures/2014/03/pictures-ukraine-navy-base-sto-2014319144827331171.html

“Ukraine is drawing up plans to withdraw its soldiers and their families from Crimea, Kiev’s security chief says.

Andriy Parubiy said they wanted to move them “quickly and efficiently” to mainland Ukraine.

Earlier, pro-Russian forces seized two naval bases – including Ukraine navy’s HQ – in Crimea. Kiev says its navy chief has been detained.”

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26656617

http://buchanan.org/blog/putin-irrational-one-6292

Curt Doolittle’s response: I think you understand the Putin strategy, although you do not seem to have added the obvious problem that Russia has enormous borders and a thin population – which has historically been accosted from all sides. Their only defense is a strong offense.

Second, if Putin is in fact, an ethno-nationalist, (I agree that he is) then he should just say so. Because a lot of the west would support him in that position for, as you mentioned, the same reasons we support the jews. Conservative support would be overwhelming.

Third, but the problem he has in convincingly making that argument, is that his government is profoundly corrupt, extractive and predatory on its own people. By contrast, it’s very obvious that membership in the EU is life-alteringly superior for eastern Europe – at high cost to western europeans.

Fourth, Russia has nothing to offer the world or its orbit other than oil and gas. Russian occupation is a net negative for any economy that it influences. (See the Economists’ report.)

Fifth, all he had to do was offer all Russian-Crimeans dual citizenship, and then ask for a referendum – one which everyone would support. It was completely unnecessary to use military occupation with a foregone conclusion.

Russia must reform it’s systemic and pervasive corruption. It is too heavy a burden on the people for the people to compete on the world market. Without reforming corruption, Russia is just a rogue and predatory militaristic state with nothing to offer the world.

An ethno-nationalist Russia that suppresses corruption offers something wonderful to the world.

12% Listed Relations with Russia as one of the top THREE issues.

http://freebeacon.com/the-ron-paul-institute-for-putins-priorities/

Also, Irena Schneider:

“Ron Paul and his minions are doing an enormous disservice to human liberty. This is absolutely disgusting. Just a couple of years ago Russian libertarians looked up to Paul. It is no surprise or secret that Paul’s think tank is connected to the Kremlin and supports brutal dictators who will take a gun against their own people without hesitation not only in Russia, but in Ukraine, Belarus, Libya, Iran and Syria. These Paul people have absolutely zero understanding of the principles and institutions of liberal government and their crude arguments should be resisted at every possible moment. I hope one day they try living in one of these countries and see how they like it.”

Just like in WWII, Russians used propaganda and even staged atrocities to get the Ukrainian and Polish partisans to fight one another. Sadly, they succeeded.

This discussion of present-day agitation is in Ukrainian:

http://www.radiosvoboda.ua/audio/audio/1093424.html

(thanks, Walt!)

In 2013, 40% of Crimeans admitted to never using internet, down from 57% in 2009. Aside from the fact that they are decades behind in technology, this speaks volumes about the kind of information they consume.

Putin to the rescue!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Russian1346.gif

“While the people of Simferopol celebrated Russia’s annexation of Crimea, 10 minutes’ drive from the city centre on Balaklava Street another Russian invasion was under way – this time of a private business.

A group of heavily-armed suspected Russian soldiers in ski masks on Tuesday stormed the Bogdan Avto-Salon, a Hyundai and Subaru dealership in a quiet suburb of the city, taking control of its offices and salesrooms. The men, who later stood guard along the salon’s perimeter fence, refused to identify themselves to reporters and waved them away with guns.

. . . .

the dealership targeted in Tuesday’s raid was owned by a partner of Petro Poroshenko, the Ukrainian oligarch, who backs the new government in Kiev.

Whatever ends up happening to the Bogdan Avto-Salon, one thing is clear: Crimea’s choicest state assets have already been taken over by pro-Russian forces in the peninsula, and will ultimately be controlled by Moscow.

These include Chornomornaftogaz, which pumps oil and gas from the Black Sea, and the Feodosia Oil Products Supply Co, which is one of Ukraine’s main transshipment facilities, capable of transferring crude oil and products from ocean-going tankers on to freight trains.

Other assets now up for grabs are Artek, a legendary Soviet-era children’s summer camp, and the many sanatoria and hotels on Crimea’s sunny coast, which are owned by Ukrainian ministries and trade unions.

. . . .

Older people said they hoped joining Russia would bring a better standard of living. “My pension is just 1,100 hrivnias a month (about $116), and half of it goes on utility bills,” said Galya Zhukovskaya, who is from Bakhchisaray. “Putin keeps raising pensions for Russians.”

But among Crimea’s 350,000 ethnic Ukrainians, many of whom did not vote for union with Russia, the mood was different. Yulia Yavorskaya recently drove her 13-year-old son hundreds of miles to Kiev, where he is now living with family friends, because she feared armed clashes might break out in Crimea. She thinks her whole family may now have to pack up and leave the peninsula altogether.

. . . .

Miroslava Zakladnaya, a 67-year-old pensioner who is originally from Lviv in western Ukraine, says she witnessed a row in a Simferopol bus last week when a man started speaking Ukrainian on his mobile phone and was loudly told by fellow passengers to switch to Russian.”

Read the whole article here: http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/66a08912-aeba-11e3-a088-00144feab7de.html