Putin Tells Obama Russia Will Act In Case of Ukraine Violence
Source: RIA Novosti
MOSCOW, March 2 (RIA Novosti) Russian leader Vladimir Putin told US President Barack Obama in a telephone conversation Sunday that Moscow reserved the right to protect its own interests and those of Russian speakers in the event of violence breaking out in eastern Ukraine and Crimea.
The Kremlin press service said Putin responded to Obamas expression of concern over possible Russian plans to deploy troops in Ukraine by drawing attention to the provocative, criminal acts of ultranationalist elements being effectively encouraged by authorities in Kiev.
Putin said that there was a real threat to the life of many Russians on Ukraines territory, the press service said.
--clip
People are afraid for the fate of those close to them and are asking not just for protection, but also to help them receive fast-tracked Russian citizenship, Kazakova said. A large number of applications are from members of Ukrainian law enforcement bodies and government officials fearing reprisals from radically disposed groups.
Read more: http://en.ria.ru/world/20140302/188009718/Putin-Te
TwilightGardener
(46,416 posts)right? That's what Russia would REALLY do if it were honest, instead of invading Ukraine.
newthinking
(3,982 posts)is to have them all leave Ukraine?
TwilightGardener
(46,416 posts)Wouldn't it be cheaper and easier to let them into Russia? I'll bet Ukraine would allow it if the invasion stopped. They'd be RUSSIA's mouths to feed. Am I right? Problem SOLVED!
newthinking
(3,982 posts)if they are under threat, as the "solution".
Do you even realize what you are saying?
in Response to:
"Wouldn't it be cheaper and easier to let them into Russia? I'll bet Ukraine would allow it if the invasion stopped. They'd be RUSSIA's mouths to feed. Am I right? Problem SOLVED!"
TwilightGardener
(46,416 posts)Has anything happened other than an official-language law? If they're more loyal to Russia than to Ukraine, shouldn't they leave lest they stay as traitors?
riderinthestorm
(23,272 posts)Its like the Middle East where tribal Bedouins were often grouped into countries with both Shia and Sunni Muslims to disastrous consequences (Iraq). Or Native Americans whose tribal areas span the Dakotas and Canada. Or the Maya who are all throughout Central America and Mexico and who identify more as Maya and less so Guatemalan.
They ARE home. Moving them away from where they are and "to" Russia is a bizarre notion from their perspective. They live there, they have always lived there. Its our international arbitrariness that assigned some of them to Russia and some of them to Ukraine.
TwilightGardener
(46,416 posts)that they either need refugee status or an invasion to protect them?
riderinthestorm
(23,272 posts)Presumably that element in Crimea - approximately 60% - would self-identify as Russian Crimeans, and then there's the Crimean Tartars which are a substantial minority in Crimea (if I can recall its about 12% of the population) who certainly don't see themselves as Ukrainian and actually align more with Turkey.
Regardless.
None of those groups needed protection because the region was loosely and fairly peacefully held together as "Ukraine", including the Crimea, until the protests (and Yanukovich's overreaction) threw the place into chaos. So Putin is moving in to seize control of the Crimea, which identifies primarily as Russian.
And which holds the real prize - Russia's only warm water port Sevastopol.
Russia may be saying its about preserving the Russian element in Crimea but its really all about maintaining control of the port.
It doesn't help much that the government that's taken over in Yanukovich's place is similarly awful.
Really awful. So maybe the Crimean population DOES need saving. Its too early to say. Whatever, Putin isn't waiting.
TwilightGardener
(46,416 posts)have to pack up and leave if they don't like being Russian. I have read that they would want to belong to Ukraine, though. I have no doubt Putin is only looking at land and assets and bases, and I don't really think he gives a shit about ANYONE in Ukraine except as they serve his purposes. That's why I have to laugh at the assertions that he was invading to protect Russians--they are placeholders for territory, and more valuable to him in Ukraine than in Russia.
I think the new government should be allowed to fully form and hold elections in the very near future, and determine for themselves what sort of Ukraine they want (the EU/financial assistance should help guide them) and I think the eastern/pro-Russia areas should be allowed to say if they want to separate or be annexed by Russia. If there are ultra nut extremists in government, hopefully their influence can be lessened by terms and conditions of aid. Russia is trying to grab as much as it can as fast as it can until then.
riderinthestorm
(23,272 posts)Ukrainians who are going to get stuck in Crimea as Russia steamrollers in. And ethnic Russians who are going to be caught on the "wrong" side of the border when hostilities really get firing (if it comes to that and this doesn't get resolved diplomatically).
But overall I agree with you. Putin is just using this as an excuse to move in and seize control. The folks in Crimea that are ethnically Russian were most likely not in any jeopardy from the government in Kiev etc etc etc
TwilightGardener
(46,416 posts)hopefully there are enough eyes on the situation that it's minimized.
2banon
(7,321 posts)Response to TwilightGardener (Reply #7)
newthinking This message was self-deleted by its author.
Igel
(35,293 posts)And Berkutovtsy on the other. The Berkutovtsy number about 4000 and all the heavy lifting on the Maidan and other places were done by them. They're not military. They're not police. They're almost all Russian speakers and were loyal to Yanukovich.
The snipers, those who abducted and tortured Maidanovtsy, they were Berkut. They were disbanded.
They have already been fast-tracked for Russian passports. And rumors are that many fled to Russia and welcomed as Russians. Those who didn't were allegedly called to the Crimea and are suspected to be many of the unidentifiably uniformed quasi-insurgents.
That's loyalty. And while the Russian speakers are demanding that their views be taken into account, that was really the call from the Maidan for a few months when only Russian views were judged to have any real importance. They were willing to rule the roost unimpeded; but when not in charge, they demand an equal voice. Or they'll pick up their ball and join their fellow countrymen, apparently.
And it's the ethnic Ukrainians who are the ultranationalists?
TwilightGardener
(46,416 posts)Demeter
(85,373 posts)Consider the Trail of Tears in the USA....it's the model for such a suggestion.
Or the Israeli plan do dispossess all the Palestinians...
Or Hitler's campaign for "Lebensraum".
Or ethnic cleansing of any kind.
TwilightGardener
(46,416 posts)"cleansed"? Or is this simply the bullshit excuse Russia uses to make a land grab? If anyone's going to be "cleansed" or persecuted, it's going to be loyal Ukrainians who don't want to live under Putin's rules in whatever territory he seizes. The Crimean governor already ordered anyone in the police or security forces out who wouldn't follow his command.
Demeter
(85,373 posts)I'm not going to mince words with you. You are disrupting this thread and destroying the English language. Never mind what you do to factual information.
TwilightGardener
(46,416 posts)okaawhatever
(9,461 posts)control. Speaking of invasions.......
Scootaloo
(25,699 posts)The article covered protests in Paris that ended up with a bunch of hooligan assholes shouting, "Jews out of France!"
The comments below the article? A bunch of people expressing outrage at the sentiment... and advocating that Jews leave France
okaawhatever
(9,461 posts)ethnic Russians but it's okay to tell the ethnic Ukrainians and Crimean Tatars that they now live in a different country? Don't you find it interesting that until now even ethnic Russians didn't want to be annexed to Russia?
But hey, let's tell the Crimean Tatars who were forcibly removed by Stalin and only allowed to return after 1991 that...sorry, the Russians are going to screw you again you now live in Russia. At least there won't be as many to disappoint since most of them died of starvation during exile. Putin is Stalin lite, don't kid yourself.
Purveyor
(29,876 posts)Kiev and were threatening to move on the east.
I don't blame Russia one iota for the actions it is taking. So far not a lot of blood has been spilled. Should Russia sit back and wait for the nazi goons from the West to act, that wouldn't be the case.
TwilightGardener
(46,416 posts)has formed, why don't we let Ukraine sort out Ukraine's government and plan elections instead of disrupting them with a military invasion? Then we'll see if they actually DO turn out to be neo-Nazis or whatever, and do something eeeevil. BTW, why didn't Russia sign the peace deal that would have left Yanukovich in power?
newthinking
(3,982 posts)Explain to me how exactly there will be any chance that they will have proper representation in the May vote without a tremendous disadvantage?
There is not enough time to organize, set a platform, get the word out, etc.
The May election deadline after sacking and eliminating two opposition parties makes it a SHAM.
TwilightGardener
(46,416 posts)Loyal-Canadian Party? Let's not bullshit each other, the "ethnic Russian protection" reason for invasion is, well, bullshit. And the entire world knows that. However, Russia will try to present "evidence" that Russians are being persecuted, I have no doubt. Everybody knows what's coming.
Response to TwilightGardener (Reply #11)
newthinking This message was self-deleted by its author.
okaawhatever
(9,461 posts)propagandists who have popped up on this site.
another_liberal
(8,821 posts)It might never have happened as far as some people are concerned, or maybe they think it's the proper way to go about conducting a democratic election.
We and the EU have taken over Ukraine for now, but only because our bankers, stock brokers and "venture capitalists" think they see an opportunity to loot and steal. It looks more and more like we will soon have to abandon the place and leave it in ruins.
Scootaloo
(25,699 posts)I've been ambivalent, mostly because I'm aware of all the misinformation coming from both sides.
But an abolishment of rival parties... that sends a fucking clear message as to what's going on.
another_liberal
(8,821 posts)In their first day after seizing power, last Saturday, the so-called "Transitional Government" in Kiev passed resolutions outlawing two of the major parties which made up Yanukovich's majority coalition in the Rada Parliament. Yes they did.
Igel
(35,293 posts)Yesterday (Friday, February 28) Vladimir Rybak became the new acting head of the Party of Regions. Azarov resigned on Friday.
http://www.unian.ua/politics/891350-ribak-stav-vo-golovi-partiji-regioniv.html
That's days after it was supposedly banned. And just a couple of days after it moved into the opposition in the VR.
People here heard that a bill was offered in the VR to ban the PR and Communist Party.
They assumed that to propose a bill is to pass a bill. Obviously they think that Ukrainians are completely different from Americans or British, in whose legislatures bills are often proposed that sit there, untouched, unloved, and unpassed.
Or perhaps they're unaware of this little habit of legislatures--to allow all kinds of things to be proposed without permission from the Top Dog, even if they're never voted on. Ukraine, the US, Britain, they're just not as well run as Russia, I guess, where the legislature does its job, passing what the Top Dog wants and otherwise waits for orders. Now *that's* a democracy?
The other possible source of the muddle-headed thinking are news reports about the Party's being banned (with the Communist Party) in some strongly pro-Ukrainian jurisdictions. The area around Lviv, for instance, and some other areas in the center and West. Why, one such area banned the two parties on Wednesday or Thursday (again--if the party was outlawed nationally, why ban it locally?). Of course, a national-level judge already said that such banning has dubious legal footings and Constitutional merit.
The thing is, if self-professed znatoki, experts, are wrong on such an obvious point of fact, one that is easily verified and utterly debunked, one has to wonder what more subtle points they may have overlooked, and even--in a small fit of ill-will--wonder if perhaps they've crossed from mere confirmation bias into open disinformation.
The Party is under investigation for violating Ukrainian law. It's a witch hunt, sadly.
okaawhatever
(9,461 posts)newthinking
(3,982 posts)But come on, their offices have been burned down, they have been intimidated out of some regions, they have had their lives threatened.
Ya right, you are going to get a successful vote in that circumstance.
Purveyor
(29,876 posts)I've been following this for weeks and said weeks ago this wouldn't have been allowed to happen to this extent if it had been for the Olympics.
Russia would have acted much sooner than this.
The timing of this uprising to coincide with the Olympics is telling indeed.
Still waiting to fully discover the western 'people behind the curtain' that have/are orchestrating this debacle (for them I might add).
TwilightGardener
(46,416 posts)okaawhatever
(9,461 posts)who set the time table. Had he signed the agreement like they had been working on for years, the one supported by the majority of the country, the protest wouldn't have taken place. It's the criminal President and your bff Putin who created the time table.
joshcryer
(62,269 posts)Until then it was a bunch of no nothing right wingers being a nuisance. No injuries or anything.
SolutionisSolidarity
(606 posts)The days of of rationally marginalizing the role they played in the protest movement are done. They wouldn't be given the military and police forces unless they earned them. Ethnic Russians should be scared right now, as should Jews, LGBT, and those on the Left. All Russia has to do is wait for an excuse, and with Svoboda in charge they won't have to wait long.
http://peoplesworld.org/ukrainian-ultra-rightists-given-major-cabinet-posts-in-government/
TwilightGardener
(46,416 posts)pre-emptively invade America under the guise of "protecting" those of Mexican descent? Pre-emptive invasions are wrong, no matter who does them (including the US).
SolutionisSolidarity
(606 posts)The Far Right appears to be well in control now. I mean actual, self identifying fascists.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26394980
840high
(17,196 posts)my opinion.
JVS
(61,935 posts)jsr
(7,712 posts)Demeter
(85,373 posts)until the statute of limitations has passed and most of the war criminals are dead...
frwrfpos
(517 posts)I hope Putin deals with these fascists and anti semites hard and quickly. The Ukrainian government has been literally taken over by the violent fascists and I hope they are taken care like the terrorists that they are.
Deep North
(26 posts)...does NASHI pay these days?
jwirr
(39,215 posts)country that is on their border. It is an action that was part of the cold war era as well.
pampango
(24,692 posts)of the UN's Responsibility to Protect. The UN standard, though, requires proof that genocide or mass atrocities are already occurring. It is not preventative in nature. And it requires the consent of the Security Council.
Putin's interpretation of R2P will open the door to its early and more frequent use to prevent atrocities from ever happening. I had no idea that Putin was such a proponent of the use of foreign militaries to protect citizens from their own governments.
The three pillars of the responsibility to protect, as stipulated in the Outcome Document of the 2005 United Nations World Summit (A/RES/60/1, para. 138-140) and formulated in the Secretary-General's 2009 Report (A/63/677) on Implementing the Responsibility to Protect are:
1. The State carries the primary responsibility for protecting populations from genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing, and their incitement;
2. The international community has a responsibility to encourage and assist States in fulfilling this responsibility;
3. The international community has a responsibility to use appropriate diplomatic, humanitarian and other means to protect populations from these crimes. If a State is manifestly failing to protect its populations, the international community must be prepared to take collective action to protect populations, in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations.
http://www.un.org/en/preventgenocide/adviser/responsibility.shtml
Benton D Struckcheon
(2,347 posts)Putin and his "United Russia" party are easily as fascistic as anything the Ukraine has put up, and by the looks of it the Ukrainian side hasn't exactly distinguished itself.
In here, we have folks beating each other up over which of these scum to support. Oh lord.
Simple fact of the matter is you have a bunch of backwater rubes fighting each other in much the same manner as the Hatfields and the McCoys. The only thing that makes it significant to outsiders is that one of the sides involved has, as a matter of historical fact which no longer has any relevance to the actual power structure of the actual world of the 21st century, veto power at the UN. It's more a testament to the fossilized structure of that body than it is to any reality anyone else lives in.
If Putin wins, whatever that means, he gets to reconstruct the old USSR with Russia and the Ukraine in it, but without the Baltics or Kazakhstan or Azerbaijan.
Oh my. What a prize.
2banon
(7,321 posts)what is your thinking as to the significance (if any) certain "pro-democracy" forces from the U.S. might have had in stirring shit up there?
okaawhatever
(9,461 posts)to Russia. Not only that, there is very much an issue with world energy. Putin wants to control the pipelines in Ukraine so he can cut off gas to Europe when he feels threatened. It will also keep competition from moving in. If he can keep the prices of gas elevated it will affect the world market.
All that being said, Putin doesn't want Ukraine because he doesn't want the debt and the cost of improving their infrastructure. He just wants to control it and add it to his trade bloc to give the Customs Union more economic clout. He'll annex it when it's closer to time for him to be invaded.
JVS
(61,935 posts)He already can. The pipeline can always be shut off by Russia. The only thing he needs Ukraine's cooperation for is to keep it flowing.
DallasNE
(7,402 posts)And give him an excuse to invade. Beware of ethnic Russians taking advantage of this situation.
okaawhatever
(9,461 posts)false flag scenarios as a pretense for a military crackdown. I think they tried, Yanukovych had a "band of government funded thugs who were hired to intimidate anti-government protesters and promote fear and discord"
http://forward.com/articles/193488/ukraines-unfinished-revolution-sparks-hope-for-jew/?p=3