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[Jackpot]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-31020283

A pretty good article on Russia's deception tactics.

 

[Ty4on]

Then Putin recognizes this republics to be independent. War is over. Then final sanctions are thrown by US and EU. Then final contr-sanctions are thrown by RU. That'll be it.

It won't be. They consider all of Donbass to be their territory and control less than half of it.

 

[Veritigo_X]

Senate of LNR has just acknowledge Republic of South Ossetia to be independent. May be Putin decided as well to make LNR and DNR independent like Gergian disputed regions.

My bet is Ukrainian forces will be kick off beyond republic's border before February ends. Then Putin recognizes this republics to be independent. War is over. Then final sanctions are thrown by US and EU. Then final contr-sanctions are thrown by RU. That'll be it.

Funny that Putin can just wave his hand to make the war over just like that.

 

[chadskin]

Bellingcat, known for its investigative report into who shot down MH17, has released a new extensive report that centers around the clashes in Mariupol on May 9, 2014.

On 9 May 2014, the center of the Ukrainian city Mariupol was the site of violent clashes between anti-government activists and the Ukrainian army. More than 200 recordings of the events were uploaded onto YouTube by anonymous protestors, often in an attempt to prove that soldiers used excessive force. In this article, I’ll use these videos to reconstruct the course of events that day. In doing so, I will show why it’s important to scrutinize video content with a critical eye.

Conclusion:

The results of this investigation have shown that on 9 May, Ukrainian forces did not arrive in Mariupol to shoot at police officers and peaceful demonstrators. Instead, they were forced to support Ukrainian forces that were trapped and surrounded by separatist militants inside Mariupol’s police headquarters. The separatist attack was deliberately carried out at the start of the Victory Day march in a successful attempt to cause havoc. At least four men were killed on Kiev’s side, and their local police chief was kidnapped. After Ukrainian forces had withdrawn, most of the city remained in hands of the DPR. Nevertheless, Kiev demonstrated that it wouldn’t give up the city without a fight, and on 13 June, Ukrainian forces successfully recaptured the city.

The foregoing reconstruction of events was produced to counter allegations of Ukrainian forces using excessive force. Not surprisingly, Russia Today referred to the events as a “massacre,” but even mainstream news outlets criticized Ukrainian forces. Shaun Walker, writing in The Guardian, contended that “unarmed civilians were shot at by Ukrainian forces” during their retreat. Anna Neistat of HRW wrote, “My preliminary findings suggest that Ukrainian units might indeed have used excessive force near the drama theater, which resulted in deaths and injuries of some unarmed people.” In Memorial’s final report, the organizers of the anti-terrorist operation were held liable for criminal negligence, as they had failed to arm the soldiers with non-lethal material such as stun grenades and tear gas. They further suggested that the protestors were only armed with Molotov cocktails and stun guns.

The available video evidence shows otherwise: at theatre square soldiers received fire from someone who used a hostile crowd as a human shield. Only afterward did soldiers shoot protestors in the legs. Many of the protestors wrongfully believed that they were under attack by Ukrainian forces, which largely exacerbated the standoffs. At the police headquarters, Ukrainian forces were also attacked by some of the protestors, while simultaneously taking sniper fire. Here too the crowd behaved in an overtly hostile manner, and at least two protestors carried firearms. Though the soldiers did seem inexperienced and unaware that bullets could ricochet, they generally restrained themselves, despite operating under very difficult circumstances.

-> https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-...on-of-clashes-in-mariupol-ukraine-9-may-2014/

 

[Kabouter]

Funny that Putin can just wave his hand to make the war over just like that.

Why couldn't he?

 

[Veritigo_X]

Why couldn't he?

I know he could. It's funny hearing that come from Outcome when his narrative is all about how there isn't any Russian involvement in the conflict.

 

[Resident_UA]

The was a meeting in Kiev for resignation of the Kiev's Mayor, Vitali Klitschko:
Vitali Klitschko himself came to this meeting and said the following:

What he meant nobody knows. He was silent after that phrase. "Forces" may need to be translated as "powers". I'm not sure.

People participated in the meeting were yelling, inter alia, to him the following:

You are a very sad person... Instead of worrying about politics in Russia you are worrying about politics in Ukraine?

1. If this happened in Russia half of people protesting would be arrested.
2. What does this have to do with anything? Klitschko is an idiot. What does it have to do with Russia?
3. Please leave Ukraine alone. Go find another country to hate. I was trying to understand Russians who support Putin, but I think I'm going to give up now. The fact that 80% of Russians support him only proves that there's nothing in common between Russians and Ukrainians. You want to be a huge empire? Go ahead, but please leave us alone.

 

[Yamauchi]

Frederic Mousseau, policy director at the respected Oakland Institute, has written an article in the Asia Times outlining the foreign takeover of Ukraine's agriculture industry in conjunction with the ouster of Yanukovych.

It's quite an interesting read: http://atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/CEN-02-280115.html -- West's agri-giants snap up Ukraine

---

Edit: The full reports are available here: http://www.oaklandinstitute.org/land-deals-ukraine

Both reports detail that the EU's $17 billion bailout plan which was rejected by Yanukovych and led to his overthrow stipulated opening up Ukraine's agriculture industry to multi-national agriculture conglomerates.

 

[Resident_UA]

Frederic Mousseau, policy director at the respected Oakland Institute, has written an article in the Asia Times outlining the foreign takeover of Ukraine's agriculture industry in conjunction with the ouster of Yanukovych.

It's quite an interesting read: http://atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/CEN-02-280115.html -- West's agri-giants snap up Ukraine

---

Edit: The full reports are available here: http://www.oaklandinstitute.org/land-deals-ukraine

Both reports detail that the EU's $17 billion bailout plan which was rejected by Yanukovych and led to his overthrow stipulated opening up Ukraine's agriculture industry to multi-national agriculture conglomerates.

You are not getting any closer to the truth. What's sad is that Outcome seems to know about Ukraine more than you do. And he doesn't know much. Where are you from?

All you had to do is go to Wikipedia again. Even if this opinion article was true, agriculture is relative small % of already small Ukrainian economy. To say the least this article exaggerates the importance of the sector. Also is it supposed to be bad that huge corporations are investing in Ukraine? Sure they are corrupt, but not as corrupt as Ukrainian government.

Also, what a pleasant surprise, the report is available in Russian language. What are the chances?!!

 

[Nivash]

You are not getting any closer to the truth. What's sad is that Outcome seems to know about Ukraine more than you do. And he doesn't know much. Where are you from?

All you had to do is go to Wikipedia again. Even if this opinion article was true, agriculture is relative small % of already small Ukrainian economy. To say the least this article exaggerates the importance of the sector. Also is it supposed to be bad that huge corporations are investing in Ukraine? Sure they are corrupt, but not as corrupt as Ukrainian government.

Also, what a pleasant surprise, the report is available in Russian language. What are the chances?!!

I didn't think the Oakland Institute raised any red flags at first. Then I did a simple search on their site for "Russia" and hoo boy. There're a lot of blog posts about Ukraine over there. One referred to the revolution as a "military coup" and another to the current government as "illegal oligarchs". That's way too much bias in word choice alone.

I agree with you that I don't see the harm in outside corporations staking a claim either.
After all, agriculture in Ukraine shouldn't be such a small part of the economy considering just how fertile the country is, that it's so poorly developed mainly reflects the Soviet mismanagement and later the government mismanagement. It would probably have been even better if the development was done by Ukrainian corporations rather than multinational ones, but any investment is a good thing. The taxes and the farmers will still be Ukrainian and contribute to the national economy.

 

[Resident_UA]

I didn't think the Oakland Institute raised any red flags at first. Then I did a simple search on their site for "Russia" and hoo boy. There're a lot of blog posts about Ukraine over there. One referred to the revolution as a "military coup" and another to the current government as "illegal oligarchs". That's way too much bias in word choice alone.

I agree with you that I don't see the harm in outside corporations staking a claim either.
After all, agriculture in Ukraine shouldn't be such a small part of the economy considering just how fertile the country is, that it's so poorly developed mainly reflects the Soviet mismanagement and later the government mismanagement. It would probably have been even better if the development was done by Ukrainian corporations rather than multinational ones, but any investment is a good thing. The taxes and the farmers will still be Ukrainian and contribute to the national economy.

I dug a bit more. On the Facebook page of Oakland Institute the's this link:
Charges to be Dismissed Against Officer Who Killed 7-Year-Old During Raid

You would think it has nothing to do with their Oakland Institute "mission," but Sputnik is not just any random website. It's the new project brought you by Dmitry Kiselyov (known for his famous statements about "burring the hearts of gay men" and "Russia nuking US"). A face of Russian propaganda! Source

It's funny how small the world is. Yamauchi you are being played by Russia. It's fine to dislike big corporations and American expansionism. Under normal circumstances I would agree with you. But you conspiracy theories about Ukraine are very poorly informed. And even if they were true that still would not change the fact that Ukraine and Russia are different countries and Ukraine is allowed to make its own mistakes...

 

[CHEEZMO™]

Damned United Fruit at it again *shakes withered delirious tankie fist and goes back to browsing ZeroHedge and shilling for a war of territorial expansion and subjugation*

 

[Engell]

Yanukovych and led to his overthrow stipulated opening up Ukraine's agriculture industry to multi-national agriculture conglomerates.

So greedy EU and Americans actually paying their way into Ukraine... stupid people should have used the Russian way and just grapped it.

 

[Outcome]

Chief of the General Staff of Ukraine, General Victor Mudjenko, reported the following on the Ukrainian site www.5.ua:

Currently we have got only facts of certain Russian military service men and Russian citizens participating in combat actions within illegal armed groups. We are not engaged in combats with Russian regular army so far.

Whereas the President Poroshenko just said on the Davos Forum that more than 9,000 Russian soldiers and several hundred tanks are now on active duty in Ukraine.

These guys are clearly outta sync.

 

[Veritigo_X]

Chief of the General Staff of Ukraine, General Victor Mudjenko, reported the following on the Ukrainian site www.5.ua:


Whereas the President Poroshenko just said on the Davos Forum that more than 9,000 Russian soldiers and several hundred tanks are now on active duty in Ukraine.

These guys are clearly outta sync.

What exactly is out of sync here? They are both saying that Russian soldiers and military hardware are being used in Ukraine.

 

[chadskin]

EU wins Greek backing to extend Russia sanctions, delays decision on new steps

The run-up to the Brussels talks was dominated by Greece, whose new prime minister, Alexis Tsipras, took power on Monday and complained that his government had not been consulted before tighter sanctions were threatened.

But at the meeting, colleagues said new foreign minister Nikos Kotzias had swiftly dispelled suggestions that Greece would automatically torpedo any sanctions effort.

According to Italy's foreign minister, Kotzias announced to the meeting: "I am not a Russian puppet."

He signed up to a sharply worded statement that declared Moscow responsible for the violence in eastern Ukraine and demanded it halt its backing for the separatists.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/01/29/us-ukraine-crisis-idUSKBN0L22B720150129

 

[m3r4]

That surely was one hell of a meltdown from Philipps... Entertaining, but sad.

@EliotHiggins Not only are you totally immoral Eliot,you also seem unable to raise your level of discourse above bad words and cheap cracks.

I don't... what?

Since I am pretty sure all parties in most conflicts are doing some fucked up shit, I try not to sway in one direction too much, but after having watched some of the videos Phantast2k posted, I am... pretty disgusted. Do similar videos exist of the Ukranian army? Are they only good at hiding it? Otherwise I have no idea how people can even THINK about supporting the separatists' course of action. Maybe I'm just too limited in scope...

 

[EricTheCleric]

Senate of LNR has just acknowledge Republic of South Ossetia to be independent. May be Putin decided as well to make LNR and DNR independent like Gergian disputed regions.

My bet is Ukrainian forces will be kick off beyond republic's border before February ends. Then Putin recognizes this republics to be independent. War is over. Then final sanctions are thrown by US and EU. Then final contr-sanctions are thrown by RU. That'll be it.

Putin and his fascist friends wont be satisfied with that. They want more, and thus more of your Russian comrades will be sent into a war to kill and be killed for Russian nationalism and the dream of the rebirth of imperial Russia. Does that make you consciously proud of your country or are you just naive and ignorant under the influence of Russias propaganda?

Frederic Mousseau, policy director at the respected Oakland Institute, has written an article in the Asia Times outlining the foreign takeover of Ukraine's agriculture industry in conjunction with the ouster of Yanukovych.

It's quite an interesting read: http://atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/CEN-02-280115.html -- West's agri-giants snap up Ukraine

---

Edit: The full reports are available here: http://www.oaklandinstitute.org/land-deals-ukraine

Both reports detail that the EU's $17 billion bailout plan which was rejected by Yanukovych and led to his overthrow stipulated opening up Ukraine's agriculture industry to multi-national agriculture conglomerates.

will you ever bring anything other than straight Russian propaganda or hidden propaganda from people and organisations that are part of Russias active measures program?

 

[Outcome]

What exactly is out of sync here? They are both saying that Russian soldiers and military hardware are being used in Ukraine.

In my opinion, facts of certain Russian military service men and Russian citizens (in other words, mere mercenaries) DOES NOT EQUAL more than 9,000 Russian soldiers and several hundred tanks.

And the word "certain" it is a translation of russian/ukrainian "отдельных", which also can be translated as "separate" or "individual", but cannot be translated as "in an amount of more that 9000".

So, Parashenko was horseshitting in Davos, making up numbers out of blue to make a false impression that they are waging war with a fucking russian army, whereas they are actually aware of only some individual russians participating in the illegal armed groups (see the quote of the Ukrainian General a few posts above) which Ukrainian army cannot defeat.

 

[Simplet]

In my opinion, facts of certain Russian military service men and Russian citizens (in other words, mere mercenaries) DOES NOT EQUAL more than 9,000 Russian soldiers and several hundred tanks.

And the word "certain" it is a translation of russian/ukrainian "отдельных", which also can be translated as "separate" or "individual", but cannot be translated as "in an amount of more that 9000".

So, Parashenko was horseshitting in Davos, making up numbers out of blue to make a false impression that they are waging war with a fucking russian army, whereas they are actually aware of only some individual russians participating in the illegal armed groups (see the quote of the Ukrainian General a few posts above) which Ukrainian army cannot defeat.

They seemed to be able to defeat them fine last summer...

What is the point of this straw-grasping anyway? You (pretend to?) believe that ukrainian officials are a bunch of lying fascists and suddenly the word of the general staff of the ukrainian army is gospel, because he used the word "отдельных" instead of "некоторых" or something, and that means that the entire Ukraine dreamt up the russian involvment? Not to mention Nato and every state leader in the west?

And why do you even care? Whether they are Russians, Ukrainians, Tchechens or martian mercenaries you'll cheer them on anyway.

 

[chadskin]

Kazakhstan will reportedly change its alphabet from the cyrillic script to latin letters this year. Sounds like the first step to another "de-Russification" like in Belarus.

edit: there was a typo in the original tweet: the change is scheduled to be completed until 2025, not 2015.

 

[EricTheCleric]

Is there some kind of mental disease that spreads among Russians on twitter?

https://t.co/zzgnHo873k

 

[chadskin]

Shells hit a cultural center and a trolleybus in the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk on Friday, killing at least six people, journalists in the city said.

http://www.themoscowtimes.com/article/515170.html

There are reports that up to 17 people may have been killed in the two shellings, though they've not been confirmed yet. But certainly, the blame game will start anew ...

 

[Outcome]

In the meantime, today in Minsk a new gathering of UA, RU and officially terrorists organization DNR and LNR representatives is being held. I wonder what made UA negotiate with terrorists organizations.

 

[Maledict]

Just because you label someone a terrorist doesn't mean you don't negotiate with them.

See Northern Ireland for an example.

 

[Chumly]

In my opinion, facts of certain Russian military service men and Russian citizens (in other words, mere mercenaries) DOES NOT EQUAL more than 9,000 Russian soldiers and several hundred tanks.

And the word "certain" it is a translation of russian/ukrainian "отдельных", which also can be translated as "separate" or "individual", but cannot be translated as "in an amount of more that 9000".

So, Parashenko was horseshitting in Davos, making up numbers out of blue to make a false impression that they are waging war with a fucking russian army, whereas they are actually aware of only some individual russians participating in the illegal armed groups (see the quote of the Ukrainian General a few posts above) which Ukrainian army cannot defeat.

So how the hell are all of Russians tanks, weapons and supplies getting to these "rogue" Russian army people. Is Russian so fucking incompetent that they are just losing all of that? You think that they are just dropping tanks off at the border to these "rogue" Russians? Seriously?

 

[Outcome]

Just because you label someone a terrorist doesn't mean you don't negotiate with them.

See Northern Ireland for an example.

I didn't know that. I thought nobody negotiate with Al-Qaeda- and ISIL-like organization. E.g. Japan does not negotiate with ISIL to get their citizens back alive, neither has US and UK done recently for their citizens captured by ISIL.

 

[MysticX]

In the meantime, today in Minsk a new gathering of UA, RU and officially terrorists organization DNR and LNR representatives is being held. I wonder what made UA negotiate with terrorists organizations.

I thought the "terrorists" said they won´t be negotiating?

 

[Dilly]

I didn't know that. I thought nobody negotiate with Al-Qaeda- and ISIL-like organization. E.g. Japan does not negotiate with ISIL to get their citizens back alive, neither has US and UK done recently for their citizens captured by ISIL.

Irrelevant and not at all compareable to the current situation, but creative try.

 

[Outcome]

So how the hell are all of Russians tanks, weapons and supplies getting to these "rogue" Russian army people. Is Russian so fucking incompetent that they are just losing all of that? You think that they are just dropping tanks off at the border to these "rogue" Russians? Seriously?

This was my version, postcount=3380 in this thread, I'll quote:

1) russian forces write off equipment as broken or aged to utilization, then at nights when cloudy weather they are sending it to rebels;
2) rebels take away equipment from Ukraine army;
3) rebels buy equipment from Ukraine army.

I thought the "terrorists" said they won´t be negotiating?

OSCE invited terrorists personally, terrorists could not resist.

 

[ClosingADoor]

I didn't know that. I thought nobody negotiate with Al-Qaeda- and ISIL-like organization. E.g. Japan does not negotiate with ISIL to get their citizens back alive, neither has US and UK done recently for their citizens captured by ISIL.

Some countries have those policies (the US being the most known for it). But that does not mean talks are never held. Sometimes through back doors, through other countries, etc.

You can still label a group to be terrorists and still want to settle the dispute by diplomatic means.

You're really reaching here and you know it very well.

This was my version, postcount=3380 in this thread, I'll quote

And how is that not clearly the Russian military supporting these guys? What is your argument here even.

Even if there are no Russian soldiers in Ukraine (yeah, sure...) the equipment ending up there is already shady and support enough from Russia. Sorry dude, but believing anything else by this point is just delusional.

 

[Outcome]

And how is that not clearly the Russian military supporting these guys? What is your argument here even.

Even if there are no Russian soldiers in Ukraine (yeah, sure...) the equipment ending up there is already shady and support enough from Russia. Sorry dude, but believing anything else by this point is just delusional.

Russia may support seps directly just like US supported seps in Syria to fight against Asad. But Ukraine were claiming that they were fighting against russian regular army counted by thousands solders and hundreds tanks. That's a little bit different things.

 

[ClosingADoor]

Russia may support seps directly just like US supported seps in Syria to fight against Asad. But Ukraine were claiming that they were fighting against russian regular army counted by thousands solders and hundreds tanks. That's a little bit different things.

Except it has been proven there are Russian soldiers on the ground there and body bags coming back to Russia. The numbers don't matter. It could be a 100, could be 1000 or 10.000. If Russia is sending them, they are invading a country.

You can't tell me those guys are there during their holidays and just happen to have brought their equipment along. If you are really pushing that narrative, you really are buying into all the Russian propaganda and can't see clearly anymore what is going on.

 

[glaurung]

Removed.

 

[Outcome]

Don't bother communicating with Outcome. He has proven time and again that he is an indoctrinated instrument of Putin propaganda.

He's been on my ignore list for a while now.

Stop making these silly references to Putin, Russian TV, propaganda, me getting paid by Putin to push propaganda on NeoGAF, these all are just silly.

I just quoted two claims by Ukraine President and by Ukraine General, and gave my opinion that they do not correspond. That's it. You think otherwise. Ok. You've got your point, I've got mine.

 

[chadskin]

AFP: #BREAKING Ukraine peace talks in Minsk cancelled: rebel spokesman

So much for that.

 

[Kabouter]

Don't bother communicating with Outcome. He has proven time and again that he is an indoctrinated instrument of Putin propaganda.

He's been on my ignore list for a while now.

I've stopped actively moderating this thread after MH17 happened, but even so, please don't do this.

 

[glaurung]

I've stopped actively moderating this thread after MH17 happened, but even so, please don't do this.

Oh well.

 

[params7]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-31020283

A pretty good article on Russia's deception tactics.

Excellent read this. Expect the unexpected with Russia.

 

[Outcome]

So much for that.

There seem to be the following situation: Kiev demanded leaders of the DNR and LNR to be participating in the meeting, while DNR and LNR sent their representatives, but not leaders. DNR and LNR explained it that Poroshenko did not assign any official representative of Ukraine (Kutchma, former president, is kinda volunteer or something, but not an official person assign by the President of Ukraine, according to seps) for this meeting, not saying that he come to the meeting himself. Eventually, Kiev dropped it, coz no leader of DNR and LNR showed up (according to the seps).

 

[Engell]

Looks like the ruble vs the dollar is at its lowest point ever (in recent history at least)

29 Jan 2015 12:40 UTC - 30 Jan 2015 12:42 UTC
USD/RUB close:70.43046 low:68.50010 high:71.29567

http://www.xe.com/currencycharts/?from=USD&to=RUB&view=1M

 

[Outcome]

Looks like the ruble vs the dollar is at its lowest point ever (in recent history at least)

29 Jan 2015 12:40 UTC - 30 Jan 2015 12:42 UTC
USD/RUB close:70.43046 low:68.50010 high:71.29567

No, it was more that 80 at the Moscow stock exchange in December. You can see it here: http://moex.com/en/issue/USD000UTSTOM/CETS Today ruble dropped because Russian bank lowered the bank rate from 17 to 15%.

 

[chadskin]

re: Syriza:

A CRIMEAN FAIRY TALE: THE BEST MAN

I wrote about the strange disappearance in late 2014 of the future Minister of Defense of Greece. On October 25th, 2014, Syriza’s functionary Dimitris Konstantinopolous wrote that:

Panos [Kammenos] appeared from somewhere a month ago full of “excitement“, asking for tactical collaboration [with Syriza]. Then he went to Moscow for private reasons, as told us (a friend’s wedding) and then disappeared off the face of the Earth with a pretty impressive way. I’m very curious if you ever go to see what explanation they give for the disappearance.

After Panos returned from the wedding, as we now know, he was eager to form a coalition government with Syriza, despite this being a party of opposing ideology.

Well, now we know where he went to a wedding. Along with 89 other Greeks.

On October 3rd 2014, an email was sent from one member of the close circle of Konstantin Malofeev to another. The email was sent from the account of Maxim Kryuchkov. Kryuchkov is Malofeev’s assistant and travelled with him and Igor Girkin to Ukraine to take “presents from the Russian Orthodox Church to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church”. Their travels took them to the Crimea, where in Girkin’s own admissions, during the trip they set up the organization for the future secession from Ukraine. For more on that, you might want to read my trilogy “The Orthodox Crusaders”.).

The email contained an attachment called “The Greeks”. The pdf file, which I attach below, has a list of 90 Greek names, and the planned lodging arrangements for all of them in a luxurious Crimean resort.

Near the top of the list of 90 Greeks is a certain Mr. Panagiotis Kammenos, together with his family. They were put up in the luxury villa “Fairy Tale”, right on the Black Sea beach.

In short, the new Minister of Defense of a NATO/EU country was lavishly entertained by a war criminal.


UPDATE: I have just found out that the reason for this unusual congregation of Greek guests to Russia-annexed Crimea was …a wedding…You may remember that Malofeev was put on the EU travel blacklist after the second round of names were added to the sanction list. This prevented Malofeev from travelling to Greece to a wedding ‘of a dear friend”, in his own words. What does a Russian oligarch on the EU blacklist for funding international terrorism do when they can’t travel to the wedding? He brings the wedding to him. Here is Malofeev himself:

Sanctions are a very stupid instrument, and only Obama and his administration can believe in the power of their effect. They did nothing to my business. What they did, though, was prevent me from travelling. I cant go to vacation in the Alps. This past weekend, a Greek friend asked me to be a Best Man at his wedding. So I was forced to bring him along with 90 Greeks to me, and organize his wedding here, as I couldn’t go to him. These are the effects of sanctions for me…”

The full list of wedding guests who stayed in Crimea, apparently at the expense of Konstantin Malofeev, is here. СПИСОК_ПОСЛЕДНИЙ_НОВЫЙ.

Thanks to the immediate reaction from the Twitter community, we were able to identify some additional names from the “Fairy-tale list”:

• Theodoros_Rousopoulos – a Greek media owner/journalist, former State Secretary and spokesman, and a close confidant of former PM Kostas Karamanlis. Resigned after a property scandal involving real-estate transactions between the state and the Athos monastery.
• Manolis Sfakianakis -is the current Director of the Cyber Crime Center of the Greek police. Cooperates with Interpol and Europol. Writes books on cyber-security. TRAINED and trusted by the FBI. (Apparently couldn’t help his host from having their mailbox hacked.)

https://cgrozev.wordpress.com/2015/01/30/a-crimean-fairy-tale/

 

[Mighty Chin]

What's the IMF's position in all of this?

 

[Nivash]

re: Syriza:

A CRIMEAN FAIRY TALE: THE BEST MAN

https://cgrozev.wordpress.com/2015/01/30/a-crimean-fairy-tale/

Jesus, this is worse than I thought. I don't have time right now to examine the source's credibility but I hope it's not true. The Minister of Defense himself? And not just connections to Russia but to the separatists themselves? This is highly disturbing. If NATO thinks that there's even a remote chance that it's true they have to take some kind of action. That's a fifth column waiting to happen right there.

 

[kess]

Jesus, this is worse than I thought. I don't have time right now to examine the source's credibility but I hope it's not true. The Minister of Defense himself? And not just connections to Russia but to the separatists themselves? This is highly disturbing. If NATO thinks that there's even a remote chance that it's true they have to take some kind of action. That's a fifth column waiting to happen right there.

I'm pretty sure the powers that be knew about this, and it's probably going to be used as leverage (by both sides). Those names have been in Greek politics for a long time.

 

[ICKE]

Moved this response from the Greek elections thread.

see, that's exactly the problem, You think this is about human rights and morals. It's not. This is about spheres of influence, it's about resources and about markets. It's not about the people living there. .

There is absolutely no financial reason to support Ukraine at the moment as all European countries are losing money, because of this crisis. Ukraine is not a developed country that plays an important role other than serving as a tool for some Russian geopolitical aspirations. The cynical thing would have been to let Ukraine fall and become another failed puppet state but western countries understand that Putin's little regime is walking a dark path. Not only are they labeling human rights organizations as foreign agents and constantly increasing civilian suppression, but they are trying to export their broken ideas to old satellite states.

People who play this "It is not incorrect to say that fascists have taken power in Ukraine, both sides are ignoring facts" - card have been drinking too much anti-establishment kool-aid. We can talk about restoring normal relations when :

-Russia stops supporting separatist forces and withdraws its equipment/troops from Ukraine
-Peace and order is restored to cities like Mariupol.

Then we can negotiate how we should proceed as we would still have these issues on the table:

-The illegal annexation of Crimea
-Reparations to families of the 298 deceased passengers (MH17)
-Reparations to citizens of Ukraine and rebuilding the destroyed infrastructure.

Before that happens, Putin and his friends can fuck off.

 

[Tacitus_]

Jesus, this is worse than I thought. I don't have time right now to examine the source's credibility but I hope it's not true. The Minister of Defense himself? And not just connections to Russia but to the separatists themselves? This is highly disturbing. If NATO thinks that there's even a remote chance that it's true they have to take some kind of action. That's a fifth column waiting to happen right there.

Well, the Greeks didn't oppose continuing the sanctions and an official even claimed that "we're not Russian puppets"... so far so good.

 

[Nivash]

Well, the Greeks didn't oppose continuing the sanctions and an official even claimed that "we're not Russian puppets"... so far so good.

The government as a whole probably isn't compromised, it's just that the Minister of Defense has access to a lot of classified NATO intel simply because Greece is a NATO country. That's extremely concerning if he has a habit of buddying up with Russian ultranationalists.

 

[chadskin]

Then we can negotiate how we should proceed as we would still have these issues on the table:

-The illegal annexation of Crimea
-Reparations to families of the 298 deceased passengers (MH17)
-Reparations to citizens of Ukraine and rebuilding the destroyed infrastructure.

Before that happens, Putin and his friends can fuck off.

Also, let's not forget Russia's occupation of Georgia territory in 2008, namely South Ossetia and Transnistria.