Be careful with what you call parroting because the next step is that we start calling each other parrots.
I've read in western media that the participation was undoubtedly big.

But nobody wanted to do secession in Ukraine, Not Kiev and not Donetsk and even less Odessa. They are going there in the rhetorics without really that we can assess how serious they want to go through with it. War yes, but word war. Will it stay like that? Nobody knows, because there is a point where the confrontation escalates to a point that was not the original plan and one sees it when it's too late.

It's first and foremost about the way the eastern Ukrainians make sure the western nationalist do not take it too easy with power and let them become second zone citizens. The trauma of the independence of Baltic states is still alive in Russia, the west don't even see where the problem is. Eastern Ukrainians make sure they stay Ukrainians in their full rights and avoid becoming a Russian minority that they never were. They speak Russian but that doesn't make them Russian. Not that the west would care, but still...

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Es wird nichts ausgelassen, um mich hier herauszuekeln. Ein Lehrbuch. False accusations and attacks continue. There is no stopping righteous people when they are wrong.

"Next time I'll fly on board TU-160." How lovely, Russian style.
How was that movie called....Moscow doesn't believe in tears?
http://www.theguardian.com/world/201...dmitry-rogozin

Some media wrote there were very few polling stations, do the crowds were caused artificially to feed the Russian propaganda. As there were zero independent observers, then the media can either say what they saw or they can suggest conclusions.

About "They don’t want their own citizens getting the idea that they actually have a right to separate from the state that claims to rule them."
In most countries citizens have the right to leave and go somewhere else; they do not have the right to take a piece of the country with them.

Many of those tycoons are simply rich businessmen. To describe them as BANDITS is a generalising exaggeration

Germany tries to save Ukraine-Proper. But Britain and France have simply given up the Ukraine

A) in Switzerland it would NOT be the Federal Army but the Cantonal Police who would take charge
B) BOTH, army-men in Russia, and army-men in the Ukraine, are, exactly in the top echelons, people of the armed forces of the USSR. We have seen it in Hungary in 1956 and in the CSSR in 1968, that the USSR military men shoot first and discuss later

About "nobody wanted to do secession in Ukraine, Not Kiev and not Donetsk and even less Odessa."

But, from today's (Western) newspapers - "The "People's Republic of Donetsk" declared itself an independent country on Monday afternoon, and within two hours of doing so had asked to join Russia. Separatist leader Denis Pushilin told journalists that the self-proclaimed republic would ask Moscow to consider absorbing the region, which borders Russia, into its fold."

What do you think now?

NO, whenever the wordings differed it clearly was a vote about breaking away from the Ukraine. And those in charge in Kiev of course know that they have just lost a slice of the East Ukraine. I am just wondering what slice this is to be exactly

And then let's go into Realpolitik. In the case of Belgium, which may break apart one day or later, neither the Netherlands nor France try to tear away "THEIR" part of Belgium their way

To me it is exactly what I expected. I just do not yet know what the borders of the Russian territories there will be.

AGAIN, what Putin needs is a territorial glacis between Rostov and the Crimea. Just as defined in her time already by Czaress Katharina II

Lots of people on the EF are Brits and Americans and Australians, in short, people with a tradition of maritime and aerial military power. But Putin is from a country (USSR+Russia) basically based in a territorial thinking

Maybe where you come from it is, but not in Europe.
We have abolished death penalty in this side of the world you know.


And especially death penalty in the form of the armed forces shooting civilians for conducting an illegal referendum (I agree that it was illegal but still, if you don't like it just don't recognize it).
Ι mean, when Yanukovych's forces shot the people in Maidan it was not OK but when Yatsenyuk's forces shoot the people in Eastern OK it is OK? Seriously?

Don't forget about the pro-Ukraine people in the Eastern regions who were imprisoned or killed by the pro-Russians there for speaking out against the separatist movement leading up to the "vote".

But of course when you shoot someone in broad daylight with the camera rolling it's more obvious than when people are quietly abducted in the night and never seen again....




http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/...K_2907537b.jpg

If the people holding the "referendum" were armed men in baclava's who have kidnapped/killed those who oppose them and beat-up/threaten international journalists,monitors, etc.....then yes, I think the Swiss Army (or any country's army) would have the right to go in and restore order.

The protest there was primarily peaceful at the start, ie: no armed people in baclavas. When things started getting out of hand towards the end, then yes, I think the police should have cracked down with appropriate force, altho using snipers to randomly shoot people is not appropriate in my view

Self-determination isn't exactly an unprecedented concept in recent history, and seems very likely to be making a comeback. Whether oligarchs have a legitimate 'right' to suppress or stop it remains very much to be seen.

I am very much for people being able to protest to make their views heard. However what happened in East Ukraine was not a "popular" uprising. The population there is/was split, they had protests for and against. What happened was not some peaceful protestors making their view known to promote dialog or political change, it was armed groups of men in baclavas seizing government buildings in a coordinated movement. That's not "self-determination" in my view, it's more like terrorism/hijacking.

The violent overthrow of a democratically elected government in Kiev was hardly a "popular" uprising either — and in fact is exactly what the East Ukrainians have been responding to. One would have to invoke a pretty blatant double standard to pretend that what happened in Kiev was legitimate while condemning what has taken place in East Ukraine as a direct result.

Ehm, here it's me thinking that this unprecedented understanding for the Russian actions is just another way of keeping the poor chaps (Ukrainians) out.

The sitting President was selling the country down the river while sitting on golden toilets. Even the people in the East were disgusted with Yanukovich after seeing how blatantly he robbed the country. He is/was finished politically.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...ne-to-see.html

What happened in Kiev was to force an early election. Let every party put forward their best candidate, hold a legal and valid vote, and let the people decide, East and West. The current government is an interim one, until a new one is elected next week. I have a hard time comparing that to whats happening in the East with armed gangs storming buildings and claiming to be the permanent new leaders based on illegitimate "referendums".

You can bad-mouth Yanukovich and sugar-coat the coup all you want, but it won't change the fact that a democratically elected administration was displaced by violence with right-wing extremists. So Yanukovich was "finished politically" — so let the political process displace him peacefully. There are other ways of changing government besides violent overthrow by extremists.

No matter how unhappy East Ukraine may have been with Yanukovich, they're obviously even less happy with the violent right-wing takeover.

If you have a hard time comparing a violent right-wing coup with the reaction it caused, maybe it's because you swallow the western (read: US) media version of the situation without question. The referenda are mainly labelled "illegitimate" by oligarchs whose monopoly of power would be threatened by the spread of self-determination. (Otherwise, what fair-minded person would object to a group of people taking a vote on their own political future?)

And nobody in the East is "claiming to be the permanent new leaders" any more or less than anybody in Kiev.

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"Live every day as if it were going to be your last; for one day you're sure to be right." — Harry Morant

No, I speak to my family in Southern Ukraine daily and get updates from them. They are ethnic Russians and voted for Yanukovich in the last election, BTW. They didn't support the "Maiden" protests, but weren't too concerned by them either. They watch Russian TV and were shocked when the propaganda machine suddenly came into action (they now stopped watching Russian TV). Even more shocked when Russia took Crimea. People in their town are actually more nervous about armed pro-Russian gangs. They want to handle things "normally" with elections, not people with guns suddenly showing up and claiming authority over them.

Actually, what they told me yesterday, is that local pro-Russians and pro-Unity groups are working together and patrolling the streets on the look out for any "outside extremists" who come there looking to cause trouble. To see both sides working together to keep the peace is probably the best glimmer of hope and sense I have heard so far in this mess.

PS- In Kiev, the protests were basically the few streets around the Maiden, the rest of the city/country functioned normally (well, as "normally" as Ukraine functions . In East Ukraine, lawlessness and chaos is taking place in the power vacuum. It's a much more dangerous situation. Hard to compare it to Kiev, so I don't.

This is really sad... I hope your family will be safe.

What is the name of this town?