About "The useless EU commission (a political dwarf)..." Europe is Russia's biggest energy customer & takes circa 80% of all exports.
Energy prices are crashing down due to oversupply, Putin's challenge is to retain Russia's market share. Must be time to start being nice to your biggest customer?

p.s. it is 10 minutes before midnight - will the guns stop?

Potemkin mirage is not a paraphrase, it's a pleonasm and a barbarism. Teachers know best.

Now 5 past Midnight? Good news?

He was NOT Russian

Back to the news -- Russian media reports that Poroshenko refuses to ceasefire. Seems like the peace deal is dead?

Sorry, he just gave the order. How long will it hold?

Depends on St. Vlad.

Also in Russian media (Interfax ) "Mr Zakharchenko (rebel leader) said the ceasefire did not apply to the fighting in Debaltseve. The Minsk agreement doesn’t say a word about Debaltseve,” Timed at 15:22

The immunity is promised to the rebels. Netherlands is worried about the investigation and prosecution of the responsible for downing of MH317.

Depends on whether one believes what's written in Pravda...
Debaltseve is still shelled indiscriminately, both military and civilians are entrapped there.

With respect to the victims and their families, MH317 will never go to trial. It will be filed under "Collateral Damage" with many similar stories. After all, it was flying in a conflict zone.

War is hell.

A) with respect to the victims and their families, the case ought to be brought to Trial


B) Collateral Damage is a disrespectful and insulting Expression


C) Civil aircraft on scheduled flight regularily overfly conflict zones

A) Of course it should be. The reality is, there is a 99% chance it won't. Just like Crimea should be handed back to the Ukraine. Do you see that happening?

B) It is. But the perpertrators will never consider it as anything else.

C) Yes they do, and MH317 demostrates the risk involved in doing so. 36'000ft doesn't grant immunity.

Hmm, that rather reminds me of "justifications" for the war against Iraq...with the mess we see today as the result.
Better not?

A) The CRIMEA will stay with Russia
B) The MH317 matter is hopeless due to lack of proof
C) Thousands of scheduled civil airplanes overfly conflict zones daily. usually in close conjunction with the ATC offices of the wider area

About " The MH317 matter is hopeless due to lack of proof" Actually there is plenty of proof but for some unknown reason the countries who have the proof do not want to publicise what they have

Well, if the US had proof that the Russians shut it down, their interest would be to make it known asap, not hiding it. If someone manages to build a coherent argument free of the usual fallacies, I call the Nobel committee for nominees myself on the spot. I said free of fallacies, that's the hard part.

For the record: I genuinely don't know and don't have an opinion about this, I just find the think experiment interesting. To me, both sides are perfectly capable of shutting a plane and blaming it on the other side - equally able.

__________________
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.

For some unknown reason the US have avoided directly confronting Putin on all aspects of the Ukraine affair.
From the MH317 tragedy to the detailed satellite pictures of Russian hardware and military pouring into Ukraine the US do not publish anything, maybe they think Putin will really go nuclear or maybe the richest man in the world is promising them all good pensions or who knows....

No dear, a country that wants to avoid confrontation does not announce lethal weapon delivery.

Now the answer to my own question: A rumor is far more efficient than evidence when you want to accuse somebody. That's PR course material for beginners, chapter 1.

German media were reporting that BND (Germany's Federal Intelligence Service) attributed guilt to the rebels using a captured Ukrainian Bug system. This is the least probable agency that would leak false accusations.

Rumor and no evidence. Exactly my point. They might be right or wrong, I don't know, but they don't prove anything, they just make announcements in the media. Nothing more. Thanks for confirming it. We agree, bring the Champagne