UPDATE 3-Separatists seize control of TV HQ in east Ukraine city

[dipsydoodle]

Last edited Sun Apr 27, 2014, 02:38 PM - Edit history (1)

Source: Reuters

DONETSK, Ukraine, April 27 (Reuters) - Pro-Russian separatists on Sunday seized control of the offices of regional state television in the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk and said they would take it off air and broadcast a Kremlin-backed Russian channel instead.

A Reuters reporter said four separatists in masks, with truncheons and shields, were standing at the entrance to the building controlling access, while more separatists in camouflage fatigues could be seen inside.

About 15 police officers were standing a short distance away but were not trying to resist the separatists.

It was the first time the station had been seized by the separatists, though previously a transmission tower in the Donetsk region had briefly been seized and technicians forced to broadcast Russian stations' output.

Read more: http://uk.reuters.com/article/2014/04/27/ukraine-crisis-donetsk-tv-idUKL6N0NJ0P020140427

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edit : Reuters changed their link

[Duckhunter935]

1. yeh that childrens programming

is scary. Nothing like replacing that with a propaganda channel that never lies. I am actually surprised this did not happen before and I am sure Russian special forces had absolutely nothing to do with the planning or takeover of this station. More will be attacked this is how they work.

[muriel_volestrangler]

2. Some of the European stuff ...

I've since concluded it was part of some horrible East German physiological warfare test, where before sending their troops west they'd reprogram all the children with their mind warping 'entertainment'. Like the Ipcress File brainwashing for British youngsters.
...
The Prince starts out charming enough and then turns into a bear, and a nasty bear at that. The Princess is spoilt and cruel, and gets turned into something hideous. These are the nearest to a 'good' people you get, everyone else seems to be either mad, ugly or an evil dwarf. The giant fish that totally terrified me is actually 'friendly', I'm told, but I hated the way it looked and moved. It was otherworldly, and I didn't want it anywhere near me.

To enhance the disturbing characters the entire thing had been shot in vivid Technicolor and then been processed into black and white for transmission, giving it the enhanced contrast of film noire. When you were six it was like your own private nightmare, in three 25 minute episodes. If they'd showed it in one piece, I don't think I'd have watched TV again until I was in my 20s, or maybe ever.

I'm sure some of you are thinking I've either made this up, or it wasn't remotely as bad as I thought. In my defence Paul Whitehouse once said, "The Singing Ringing Tree used to make me pee my pants when I was a kid". Paul knows my pain.

http://www.denofgeek.com/tv/19267/the-singing-ringing-tree-scariest-kids-tv-show-ever

A Radio Times readers' poll in 2004 voted this programme the 20th spookiest TV show ever.

How a 1960s BBC TV series, bought from East Germany and complete with a Communist princess and the world's weirdest fish, ended up terrifying and obsessing a generation of British children

In hushed conversations around Britain, devotees of the Singing Ringing Tree, now perhaps in their late thirties or early forties, try to come to terms with one of the great traumas of postwar childhood. This programme reveals why it was that the BBC saw fit to import a terrifying Communist fairy tale, and why the East Germans themselves struggled to work out how a superbly arrogant princess and lots of strange magical animals could promote world revolution.

In locations ranging from film studios in East Berlin to a bizarre back garden on Teesside, the full extent of Singing Ringing Tree mania is laid bare. Former BBC bosses, fanatical former children, the princess herself and a six foot three inch wannabe wicked dwarf add their richly varied perspectives. And from the film itself come scenes of appalling rudeness, touching redemption and chilling laughter.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/arts/singing_ringing_tree.shtml

[ballyhoo]

3. I can't make your link work. Here's one from yahoo news....

http://news.yahoo.com/separatists-seize-control-tv-hq-east-ukraine-city-140235399.html

[dipsydoodle]

5. Thanks - Reuters had changed their link when they updated.

I've changed mine now.

[ballyhoo]

6. Roger that. Circle of the Sun? Research that

one a little.

[ballyhoo]

7. Independent from everyone? If

that is what you mean, fine. But it has to be everyone: The West. The East. The greedy mercenaries who don't care who they work for.

[The Magistrate]

8. And Just Who Are Those 'Greedy Mercenaries', Sir....

Such an odd usage, given the link here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1014787623#post7

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1014787623#post10

About what one would expect from the folks at 'wide awake gentile' if they were trying to be on good behavior....

[JackRiddler]

9. It's the thugs on both sides.

Same logic that let the worst come to the fore and herd all the reasonable people into the various paramilitaries fighting in Yugoslavia. Imagine all the young Yugoslavians who didn't even think of themselves as ethnic this or that until suddenly the ethnic madness reasserted itself.

The logic that comes to the fore whenever enough people allow a bunch of long-dead ethnic resentments and mythologies to be more important than their present-day interests.

A year ago, they were all citizens of the Ukraine. Then the Ukrainian nationalists and the neoliberals had their U.S.-backed coup and scapegoated the Russians as if these were foreigners instead of citizens of the same nation. And so the hardliners on that side come to the fore. Even as the cold-warriors internationally are excited at the revival. Everyone wins, except the reasonable and those who are just too damn lazy to want to "serve" on behalf of one of these idiotic sides - they will be the ones herded and railroaded, however.

[The Magistrate]

10. Did You Check The Site Linked to, Sir, In The Hidden Post?

[JackRiddler]

11. I don't see a Hidden Post, sir?

From someone I'm ignoring?

(Practically the only ignores I have on DU were about a dozen incredibly ignorant people whose idea of defending Obama was to attack Harry Belafonte with names like "scum".)

[The Magistrate]

12. The First Link I Posted, Sir, Is To The Hide

The second to jury results from my alert on it.

The hidden post contains a link to a very virulent Jew-hate site called 'wide awake gentile', cited as a source for the member's charges of Ms. Nuland's principal agency, and much else. He maintained he had no idea what the site was, though no one I have run the name by without further comment thought it anything but a hate site, and he also claimed he just came across it once, though it hardly comes up early in a search for Victoria Nuland Ukraine. You may recall I was a mod here for a long time, and I just do not buy the 'innocent' act....

[ballyhoo]

14. Excellent post, JackRidler. Once outside interest feel their

interest is greater than the citizens of whatever country, there is always a team of hired guns that can go in and destabilize so suddenly the real owners of the country looked conflicted by their natural pause. That's what we have here with the Kiev Tire Burners (KTB). It is the lazy that really concern me. Another country I know well let the lazy turn it into a Fascist Paradise.

[Igel]

13. They were obviously broadcasting lies.

Which is to say, truths that the Russians didn't like.

Also needed in principal to tell people "the truth" and feed their confirmation bias about unknown assailants, massive hordes of fascist zombie trident-wielding Ukrainians out to rape their children. And how wonderful it will be in the Trade Union with their all-father Putin.

Perhaps they can outdo what they did last time. Last time they kept 40% or more of the electorate home in the interest of free and impartial elections. Sort of some progressive's goals for the West.

[davidpdx]

16. That's why they detained (read kidnapped) Simon

They wanted to keep him from posting stories on the internet on what was going on in Ukraine. Then they outright lied and said he was not detained and he was being given an exclusive. My guess is they wanted to give him an exclusive beating.

[blackspade]

15. Not separatists....

Criminals.