LoLion on 24/2/2014 at 16:33
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And that'll probably happen at the upcoming elections. I assume it'll be both for Parliament and Presidency, right? What it boils down to is that, after these events, you need a more significant majority to legitimise whatever administration comes next. If you get a 47% to 53%, for example, and those percentages happen to roughly align with the regional split we've been discussing so far, you're back to square one. Either separate, or, most likely rinse and repeat soon enough. Which is a troubling prospect.
Exactly! I find it quite short sighted how people seem to perceive the elections (last I heard both presidential and parliamentary ones were set to be held in May) as some sort of magical solution to everything when in fact it appears that the current crisis further strengthened the division of the country rather than weakened it. In all likelihood the elections will simply give the same close results as always, perhaps even results that the EU wont like at all (kinda like everyone pushed for elections in Gaza and then got mad when Hamas won). Moreover even if the parties that deposed Yanukovich (who btw had an arrest warrant issued on him by the new government) win there is no guarantee that their coalition is going to last long.
Meanwhile the new government also banned use of Russian in communication with the authorities, which will certainly not go down well in the eastern portion of the country.
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I've studied Ethnic Conflict (aka divided communities/reconciliation) so this rings a bell, altho it's been a while since I reviewed my notes. One somewhat successful approach used in similar situations in the past (such as in North Ireland or Bosnia) was a consociational democracy that basically ensures that both sides of a divided nation get equal political power, with rotating presidents for both sides, or even outright dual presidency. Might be the best "solution" given the fairly even and extreme split of the two sides.
Actually the Bosnian solution (federation with extremely weak central government) appears to be pretty (
http://www.transconflict.com/2014/02/failure-bosnia-202/) dysfunctional. There were large (
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/02/07/us-bosnia-unrest-idUSBREA160UU20140207) riots in Bosnia happening pretty much in parallel with the events in Ukraine, but got completely overshadowed. While consociational democracy indeed tends to weaken the potential of ethnic conflict it also tends to generate governmetns that are simply unable to steer the country through problems. And since Ukraine is already on the verge of state bankrupcy they will in all likelihood need strong government rather than a week one.
Moreover if I remember my Political Science classes correctly the consociational democracy depends on the ability of the elites of all concerned groups to find a common ground and cooperate at least on the most basic issues, which is something that so far cant be taken for granted in the case of Ukraine. After all Yanukovich put Tymoschenko in jail when he came to power and the current government is now trying to jail him...
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The riot police are most likely NOT even Ukrainian – they are NOT the local police. No one actually knows where these thugs came from, but they appear to be mercenaries perhaps from Russia. The local police are now starting to side with the people outside of Kiev and realize they are not the thugs involved suppressing the people of Ukraine.
This is a very interesting point though as far as I know there is no evidence that the riot police were actually foreigners. There was a lot of talk that Russian "advisors" were present on the ground, but on the other hand the protestors captured a lot of riot cops in the fighting and it would surely became public knowledge instantly if they for example didn’t speak Ukrainian. Still if this turned out to be true Yanukovic would be in even bigger problems than he already has.
Nicker on 25/2/2014 at 05:35
Viktor Yanukovych is on the run with an arrest warrant over his head. Now Putin is rattling sabers and cranking up the rhetoric to justify armed intervention.
But the oligarchs know that war is only good business when it is somewhere else, preferably another continent. Is there sufficient testosterone the Kremlin to defy the criminal overclass or will cooler heads and deeper pockets prevail? Humanity is so easily enamored with psychopaths in suits and uniforms.
I hope that the people of the Ukraine are able to fight the ogres within and without.
faetal on 25/2/2014 at 13:24
It's not like they have much chance to go to war with countries which aren't nearby. Only the US gets to do that these days - so perhaps they'll take what they can get. War is still a great way to move money about.
Tony_Tarantula on 28/2/2014 at 03:40
Quote Posted by Slasher
I doubt they put those signs up to be patronizing. Some people just miss the obvious from time to time, or all the time. There are dozens of fairly easy and obvious ways to die at the place I work at, but that doesn't mean all the safety signs and protocols we have now were there from the beginning. Someone usually had to get scalded, shocked, burnt, crushed, smashed, deafened, or develop cancer before warning signs went up. "Don't take long strides between one load and the next near buss work" might seem patronizing to some people, but it's really not.
It still highlights a rather remarkable difference in the cultures (and how litigious the different countries are).
Over there the attitude is that you shouldn't need to be warned that it's a bad idea to jump out in front of a train....It's also expected that if your train leaves at a certain time that you will be on the train before then. They aren't very sympathetic to people who get butthurt because the train didn't wait for them(for example).
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Viktor Yanukovych is on the run with an arrest warrant over his head. Now Putin is rattling sabers and cranking up the rhetoric to justify armed intervention.
On a random aside, I was flipping through the radio channels on my home in the vain hopes of finding some good hard rock. I caught a few notes of Savage's show and was highly amused to hear the windbag rambling on about the "thugs" that took over Ukraine and ousted a "Lawfully elected ruler".
He conveniently neglected to mention the documents found that prove the elections were rigged in the president's favor and the foreign mercenaries who were killing protestors.
LoLion on 28/2/2014 at 08:14
Speaking of foreign mercenaries, groups of (
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26379722) unidentified Russian speaking gunmen in military gear took control of several key facilities in Sevastopol and Simferpol, including the Crimean regional parliament and two airports. There is (
http://uk.reuters.com/article/2014/02/28/ukraine-military-airport-at-sevastopol-i-idUKL6N0LX0CG20140228) speculation that they might be Russian special forces, though it is also possible that they are rogue elements of Ukrainian police/military still loyal to Yanukovich.
In any case it seems the things are developing in rather dangerous - if not unexpected - direction indeed. I wonder what is the new government going to do about this, since an armed intervention might easily provide pretext for Russians to move in officially.
Ostriig on 28/2/2014 at 12:02
Some guy pointed out on twitter that the uniforms of the guys who took the airport looked a lot like Russian ones. If I'm allowed a chukle in the midst of all this, though, I did read somewhere the other day that a convoy of unmarked APCs approaching Simferopol was turned away by the Ukrainian police... did they give 'em a ticket, as well?
On a more serious note, I don't see the Ukraine breaking off Moscow's orbit with Crimea in tow. The fleet at Sevastopol, former Russian territory, high presence of Russian population. The regional authorities have already announced a referendum for May 25th.
I think we're expecting a public address from Yanukovici later today. It'll be interesting to see what he has to say, aside from "I am still president" and "hurr durr fascists", of course. While Moscow is protecting him, the Russian press has given him a right thrashing for fleeing Kiev.
demagogue on 2/3/2014 at 00:35
I feel obligated to report when I was talking about typical Russian responses above I was conflating different people together, as well as anonymous comments, and my Russian friend here wasn't the worse & was on the more reasonable end of the spectrum. She just questioned the protestors motives.
And my friend is now passing an online petition to stop a Russian invasion of Ukraine, so in the end even she doesn't want to see Russia going off the deep end. For some reason that put things into some perspective. Even people that don't like the protestors, even Russians, don't want to see Russia intervening in another country because of it and are talking like that would cross a line.
Beleg Cúthalion on 2/3/2014 at 07:32
Quote Posted by Ostriig
I think we're expecting a public address from Yanukovici later today. It'll be interesting to see what he has to say, aside from "I am still president" and "hurr durr fascists", of course.
Little more was reported on the radio here on Friday, only that he won't take part in the elections because he was still president.
LoLion on 2/3/2014 at 07:45
I watched Yanukovich´s press conference on TV (it was broadcasted live here) and he didnt really say anything surprising - "hurr durr fascism, criminals taking over country, I never stole any public funds and I am real president" sums it up nicely. Interestingly it appears that Putin is distancing himself from Yanukovich though since he said he did not meet with Putin since he got into Russia and the whole conference was held in pretty obscure location (even mics did not work most of the time and the journalists had to shout questions instead).
Anyway, it appears that full on invasion is underway now with the pretext of protecting the Russian population of Crimea (even though no attacks on them were reported since the whole revolution started). Ukraine has no defacto control over the peninsula anymore, so the secession would be pretty easy if Russians decide to go for it. And it appears the USA/EU wont to jack about it.
demagogue on 2/3/2014 at 09:40
... Because that argument played so well for Germany in WWII, Russia intervening in Georgia a few years ago, Rwanda intervening in Congo (the deadliest war since WWII), and a few dozen other dodgy examples...
Also can't miss this brilliant move:
> Spends 7 years and $50 billion building good will in the international community to host the Sochi Olympics.
> Pisses it out the window not even a week after it's finished.
