It strikes me as worrying that, with some kind of conflagration imminent, we have the government we do
Reuters reports:
Russia’s seizure of Crimea is a threat to peace in Europe and the situation must be “de-escalated”, Nato’s secretary-general has said, but during emergency talks in Brussels the alliance failed to agree on any major steps to rein Russia in.
Speaking before chairing a meeting of ambassadors from 28 Nato member states, known as the North Atlantic Council, Anders Fogh Rasmussen warned that Russia’s actions are unacceptable and could destabilise Europe.
“What Russia is doing now in Ukraine violates the principles of the United Nations charter,” Rasmussen told reporters. “It threatens peace and security in Europe. Russia must stop its military activities and its threats.”
After the talks, Nato called on Russia to send troops back to bases and refrain from interference elsewhere in Ukraine.
(…)
The stand-off has created the greatest moment of tension between Russia and the West since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, an even Russian president Vladimir Putin once called the worst geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century.
(…)
The United States has brandished the threat of economic sanctions on Russia, with Secretary of State John Kerry calling Moscow’s moves on Ukraine an “incredible act of aggression”.
As Washington’s already strained relations with Moscow deteriorated further, Kerry was scathing in his condemnation and said the US has “all options on the table” including a military response.
(…) Kerry listed visa bans, asset freezes, trade isolation, and investment changes as possible steps, adding: “American businesses may well want to start thinking twice about whether they want to do business with a country that behaves like this.”
And in The Times (London) today:
John Kerry said that the Kremlin is building a case for military intervention on “a completely trumped up set of pretexts” and warned of diplomatic reprisals. Amid growing tension in the world’s capitals, Mr Kerry said that he had spoken to 10 foreign ministers and “all of them, every single one of them, are prepared to go to the hilt in order to isolate Russia with respect to this invasion.”
(…)
President Obama said: “If Russia wants to be a G8 country, it needs to behave like a G8 country.”
(…)
In a visit to Kiev, Willian Hague, the Foreign Secretary, said that Britain would be helping the new government to track down the hidden accounts of the many billions of dollars that are believed to have been stolen and diverted abroad by the outgoing administration. “The EU must agree urgently an asset-freezing regime to target those suspecting of laundering the proceeds of corruption,” said Mr Hague.
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And with Malta tied up to China, friendly with the deposed leader of Ukraine and his cohorts in Russia, and dependent for a power station on Azerbaijan…
As ciccio has been keen to point out, seems to be a new Axis of Evil forming right there.
Not quite. Azerbaijan’s dictator is supported by the United States. That’s the reason there hasn’t been a revolution there. When protests broke out a while ago, about the same time as Kyrgyzstan, they were quickly put down and no more was said about it.
If there is an Axis of Evil it’s the Axis of Double Standards.
Daphne, I could not agree with you more. When one considers what Russia is doing in the Crimea and the many excruciatingly bad decisions taken by Joseph Muscat, I cannot help worry about what will happen in the coming three or four years. Anything can happen.
It’s very worrying.
Completely blind to the bigger picture, Muscat (read Henley & Partners) probably sees “investment” opportunities in all this, and probably hopes to sell more EU citizenships to Russians.
‘Blind to the bigger picture’ implies ‘stupid’ while ‘in spite of the bigger picture’ implies intentionally self-serving evil. ‘Stupid’ is not clever at getting all his ducks in a row therefore be careful of underestimation. Gullibility is a dangerous thing!
You watch Programma Vremya, you read the Komsomolskaya Pravda, and you want to comment on global affairs as if you have a clue of what’s happening.
Crimea? As if an idiotic primadonna like you can know anything substantial about the Crimean situation.
Watch a little http://rt.com for heaven’s sake. Or, even better, just stick to local political gossip where you definitely excel.
Isa, delete now, and find some silly stooge to gossip about.
Yes, I follow that channel.
They’re hilarious, Brussels obsessed with Russia and doing everything to destabilise Ukraine.
And not a word to the ones killed by Yanukovych. Or the fact he had been in talks with the EU until he was forced to rescind everything, filling every square, ask that Putin be involved and have half the country occupied.
Interesting take on a nation’s sovereignity coming from you,
To think those neo-Nazis would instantly group into the Alliance.You’ll be stating Ukraine’s been forced into the EU next.
Judging by what is discussed on news channels lncluding CNN and what gets posted on blogs from Crimea, the Crimean locals do not consider the increased presence of Russian troops on their soil as a seizure or invasion and they are not too keen on EU membership either.
A huge chunk of the eastern part of Ukraine is of the same opinion. There is no legal government running the place at present, so I cannot understand which legal government in Ukraine the Maltese government is currently supporting or with whom Kerry is signing deals re future aid to Ukraine.
Judging by what was said on CNN, SKY and other credible news channels, the largest, most influential, richest and most powerful EU country, Germany, has no intention of censuring Putin too strongly because of the huge economic interests both countries have in common.
But they do have a legal government. The new PM is Victoria Nuland’s favourite, ‘Yats’, as she calls him, the former IMF-appointed central banker. We know he’s her choice through a phone leak, you see – it even hit the mainstream media.
Ms Nuland is the US Assistant Secretary of State for Europe and Eurasia, so she knows what’s best for the people of Ukraine, who evidently don’t, having four years ago elected a corrupt president.
The post-coup, US-EU-IMF appointed government has now placed their best oligarch friends to top democratic posts to rule over the eastern dissenting Russians and Russian-speakers who are saying ‘No’ to the EUSSR.
Crimea, that Russian gem which served as Krushchev’s gift to the people of Ukraine in 1954, is nearly entirely populated by Russians. Everything in Ukraine is in Russian, just less in the western part of the country.
So Ukraine, the cradle of ancient Rus, the survivor of Soros’ Orange Revolution, is finally going into EU-IMF serfdom – wholly, if they can manage to drag the eastern and southern flanks with them. No amount of lies and disinformation will make that an easy feat, however.
And remember, ‘u-kraij-ina’ is a Russian derivative for ‘borderland’. By the time the IMF finishes it off with a multi-billion-euro debt-aid programme, an indebted Ukraine will be ready to become an EU borderland and continue paying perpetual tributes to our Overlords in compound interest.
Welcome to the Eurozone Federation, missna nghidulhom. Minn issa!
There were also reports that neo-Nazis from all over Europe are descending on Kiev to join the mobs that have been patrolling the city with bats and want the Jews and visible minorities out of the Ukraine. It’s not law, it’s not order, it’s a lawless vigilante justice coup and it should be scary to anyone who wants peace and order and just rule of law.
Many Russians live in Ukraine, especially in Crimea , plus the Crimea was handed to the Ukraine in 1954 when it was part of the USSR.
Under the 1994 agreement, under any sense of moral duty, any sense of national pride or simply as a matter of being the power in the region that Russia has power to prevent chaos.
There is no question that Russia is within her right to protect these people in this way. The only people who can shriek about the international law ironically are the people who have been violating it without cease for at least the last 15 years flagrantly and on view for all the world to view and that is these Ukrainian neo-Nazis.
Russia will come out of this better than they went in. Crimea is basically is a de-facto secession already. The Western Ukraine is a mess. They are going to scream and rebel when austerity via EU membership comes in and ruins their lives much more than Yanukovich ever could have. And when the EU starts to place 3rd world refugees there, these neo- Nazis will go wild with rage and hate.
It is an absolute disaster for the West, a security disaster for Russia, and there is no way for it to end well except for the eventual peaceful partition of the country.
A comment that I heard on TV from a person (whose name I did not manage to get) with insight on Russian affairs, rather struck me. He said that Putin has come to realise that “banks are stronger than tanks”, and he (Putin) believes that the financial interests in Europe and the USA, especially London, will work against any strong actions with financial implications against oligarch Russians.
A document from the British foreign ministry to the Cabinet’s office, carelessly handled across the street and photographed by the press, seems to support this assessment.
Military action is out of the question.
Only the moral authority of an overwhelming genuine stand against Putin’s retrograde KGB policies, within and outside Russia, and sustained economic pressure that hurts Russia, and collaterally other countries, will restrain Putin.
As for Malta, let carnival reign.
The so-called ‘neo-Nazis’ (most call themselves ‘national socialists’) – aided and abetted by the West, as it were – are themselves a divided lot. Many are aware that the European Union is a modern-day version of the Soviet Union and that their new country will be milked by the IMF-ECB cabal.
Meanwhile, many of the EU-flag waving protestors who took to the streets the moment the trade talks fell apart are not Europhile enough to want to see their country thorn apart and wrecked by a proxy war.
This is yet another Western mess, right on the heels of the Syria debacle, when they were caught spreading lies and arming non-Syrian Islamic extremists while staged events where being unearthed, first by the alternative media, then by the mainstream media, finding it hard to spin the evidence around.