Ukraine protests: Before and after photos from Kiev's battle zone
abc.net.au
abc.net.au
If this happened in the USA, every single protester (and innocent bystander) would be in jail or dead by now.
I heard they forced the retirement of head of the army who was refusing shooting on their own people and put the head of the navy in charge? Doesn't sound like it is going to end well.
Do you really say that in USA president could beat-out peaceful protest (yes, they started completely peaceful, I was there), and later say "it was done in order to install new-year tree"?
Protesters are beaten and locked up almost immediately, huge "pens" are made to coral them like animals, and recently the new tactic is to make "safe zones" where people are not even allowed near the events anymore.
If there was even a hint of weapons being used, our police are heavily militarized now and would not hesitate to shoot someone even holding a smartphone if they thought they could get away with it. Virtually no police are prosecuted in any given year for shooting unarmed people in the USA, happens every week.
However what you have in the Ukraine is something I am jealous of, people actually care.
Here's a medical worker who had been shot https://twitter.com/HromadskeTV/status/436445556664066048/ph...
Here's a video of sniper shooting at people: https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=570573343039007&set=vb....
http://espreso.tv/new/2014/02/20/poranena_v_shyyu_volonterka... (in Ukrainian)
From yesterday's news:
According to [Ukrainian Security Service head] Yakimenko, “over the last day more than 1,500 firearms and 100,000 rounds of ammunition have come into the hands of criminals.”
...
Meanwhile in Ivano-Frankovsk, rioters have seized 268 pistols, 2 rifles, 3 light machine guns, 92 grenades and 15,000 ammunition rounds, the deputy head of the Security Service, Vladimir Porodko, has said, adding that the police are searching for the stolen arms.
Most of the times I am inclined that snipers are 3rd party working for the benefit of pushing around people/police/media.
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[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1968_Democratic_National_Conven...
Also, no-one is allowed near the conventions anymore. So much for freedom of speech unless you want to protest a poor woman going into a health center for an abortion, then be as close as you want.
Oh here you go:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Republican_National_Conven...
Note the pre-emptive arrests a week before the convention. I think we were criticizing China for that behavior.
Then why did you write this, implying that it's worse in the US:
>If this happened in the USA, every single protester (and innocent bystander) would be in jail or dead by now.
This is exactly the kind of bullshit hyperbole that makes political discussions on sites like this such a waste of time.
Because he knew it would be massively up voted. The maturity level on this site, at least with political stuff, is very low.
In the US if it got to that level, everyone would be in jail or dead.
In the US they would never let it get to that level. Police would not just stand by a peaceful protest without permits. They sure as hell would never let people occupy a government building, even peacefully. They would insert people to make it violent and then start arresting people, at the first sign of weapons, you'd start seeing some massive escalation. If fires were being set on that level the national guard would come in fully armed.
So we are fortunate in that it has not escalated like the Ukraine. But if it did, make no mistake, the US would be giving other countries lessons in brutality.
Our police are completely militarized. They even have tanks now decommissioned from overseas wars. People just do not realize this, or they do not care. But what is really scary is you do not sit on that kind of weapons and not use them, it would be like giving a police officer a taser or gallons of pepper spray and being surprised when they constantly use it.
For every political discussion, there is always a guy who A) drags the US into it, and B) tries to draw the conclusion that the US is actually worse than whatever is being discussed.
Hence the police know they better be even better armed than the civilians and shoot to kill first. This is why we have police officers that kill kids holding phones or game console controllers.
I cannot say the US is worse than elsewhere as is, I am saying it could be worse than elsewhere if the events you see elsewhere happened here. It would be a wasteland. We kind of got a mini-preview of that after New Orleans flooded, there was some seriously criminal police behavior.
They heard the calls to disperse but wanted to finish eating, so they stayed a few minutes extra figuring that they weren't a part of the protests anyway so they'd be fine. A few minutes later they exited the restaurant and got the full treatment: tear-gassed, tackled, handcuffed, and taken to jail. They saw someone who was running away get hit in the head with a tear gas canister.
It means that perhaps it will be. I think beyond that you'll find there are varying opinions on whether it's a moral imperative to enforce the law all the time, or whether there should be a degree of discretion exercised in doing so.
Laws can be changed, sometimes arbitrarily or to serve corrupt interests. If your morality changes with the laws your politicians impose upon you then you are little more than a serf.
It happens in the US too. An 84 year old nun was just sentenced to 3y in prison yesterday in Tennessee for taking part in a peaceful protect against the US nuclear weapon program. Being put in prison isn't as dramatic as being shot by snipers, but it does represent harm and it does affect public opinion (to what extent, who knows).
Russia is crushing nearby countries. Georgia with South Ossetia in 2008. Moldova with Transnistria in 1992. Chechnya.
Now they are crushing Ukrainian people for not loving their pro-Russian president.
Ukraine is in dire straits, their main import is gas from russia, by way of pipelines, which are then collected and exported- they're basing their whole economy on this and it's failing... very soon there wouldn't even be a country.. so, they went to Europe and asked for aid.. Europe said "If you comply with our sanctions on becoming an EU associate (not member) then we'll give you 1billion euros."
which, on the scale of a country isn't a whole bunch of cash, and adhering to the sanctions would cost more than that in of itself.
Putin said "if you don't join the EU (as an associate, not member) then I'll give you 15 billion euros and 50% off the price of our Russias gas"
to me, that sounds like a better long term solution to get the Ukraine out of this problem, and, it sounded like that to the Ukraine government, so they signed the agreement with Putin, however, everyone has heard about the EU, and they're very hopeful they'd be able to join as a member.
the Ukraine people have this vision of free travel to other countries and it's clouding their judgment a lot.
quite a few things have been signed to admonish the protesters and protect them against legal troubles (at the EU request), but the requirement was that the protests cease.. they took the police aside, and issued a no fire order, but clear the square. They didn't even give the officers guns.
Now, people who seem to be there are causing damage and trouble, I'm not even sure they know why they're fighting now, it's certainly not for freedom or the future of their country (as a member of the EU), lets not forget that Turkey has been an EU Associate for 20 years now and seems no closer to being a member state.
So military intervention is not to be unexpected.
but you're mistaken if you think there is no logic involved in the governments actions.
You say you don't know Ukrainian opposition. They are from West of Ukraine. West of Ukraine is notorious for their hatred of Jews and Russians. Hating Jews is not fashionable these days, but there is an open season on Russians. People from West of Ukraine love killing Russians, they don't miss any opportunity, like conflict in Chechnya, where Ukrainians took an active part fighting alongside with Chechens against Russia. West of Ukraine considers East of Ukraine as (1) cattle, (2) slaves and (3) just like Russians but worse. To no surprise, West of Ukraine didn't hesitate to pick up arms and start shooting. They are very passionate bunch. Just watch what will happen when they win (and they will). Central Ukraine will be a blood bath where people will be shot dead for just speaking Russian.
I'm from Poland. I don't know about the current opposition, I'm aware of Ukrainian nationalists and their history[1]. But for the same reason I also fully sympathize with people who do not want to be in the Russian sphere of influence. It's terrible.
Putin is a thug whose regime murders journalists and sends opposition politicians to gulags. As I said, pretty evil. And not hypothetically, perhaps in the future, once he takes over, but really, here and now[2].
Russian empire has always been like that. Behind. And holding back those who were unfortunate to be nearby, too.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacres_of_Poles_in_Volhynia...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_journalists_killed_in_...
Putin is pretty evil
Because ~65% of Russians voted for Putin, and they did it three times. He is very popular. Not difficult to see why. Since he came to power their GDP per capita (PPP-adjusted) almost doubled, law and order improved, corruption went down. And more Russians are being born than die, so the population decline is reversed.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/markadomanis/2013/02/04/five-myt...
For all his populism, Putin's economic policies have been very shrewd - Russia paid out its foreign debt and has currently some of the largest foreign currency reserves, and one of the lowest tax rates in the world.
As to the efforts to present Putin as some evil thug, throwing journalists to gulags etc. - this is just laughable. The best example are Pussy Riot. When the best anti-Putin propaganda can do is to call a punk-group who insults religious minorities a victim of political prosecution... Well, probably, Russians have to conclude that there are no real issues with freedom of speech in their country!
It's perfectly fine not to like Russians improving their life and enjoying a stronger country. But don't blame poor Putin for that. He is simply an elected official, it's just that Russians have been lucky to find a capable one.
And what is much more troubling - almost every country with powerful ruling class is like that. As people say "паны дерутся, а у хлопцев чубы трещат" (=when those in power, the superiors, are in conflict, it is the common people, the subordinates, who suffer). And curse those Ukrainian officials who let it escalate to this.
There are several power centers in Russia and Putin has to tread carefully with them. There are entire blocks of government that are not doing what they are supposed to do, and forcing them directly is not going to work without upsetting their cover up the food chain.
Just like you said, it is the same in every country with powerful ruling class.
Also, please justify Putin's actions. I'd love to hear why he is the good guy in all this.
It's a stalemate. The only way forward for Ukraine is to let Russia have its safety buffer. If they want to join EU, they will have to split.
I think a likely course will be a "least of all evils" scenario. Yanukovych will make concessions to the opposition leaders who will then try to mollify the crowds. The EU treaty will be put back on the table and things will be dragged out for the long haul.
It's easy to see why Ukrainians would want to align with open economies of the west than with Russia.
I know that now the protests are against the anti-protest laws and the beatings, but the EU deal was also a factor, and would probably be a factor again once the protests end.
Then there was a night when protested people got beaten by police, next morning goverment commented that "it was done to be able to install New-Year Tree!". That's when everything really started. It's not about EU now, really.
What is happening actually in Ukraine is what you get when 2 super-powers choose a foreign country as a battlefield. The stakes are high, because who ever controls Ukraine has the biggest say in the Euro-Asia region over the other (Germany vs Russia). Ukraine could play a key-role in a new form of union that Russia wants to create with it's neighbors. If Ukraine joins then, they have the numbers to face on military, political and financial level both the USA and the EU. If not, it's just Russia basically, the others don't add much to the sum.
Ukraine's elites are split, but of course they are not the ones bleeding on the street. They have average Joe's for that. This country became independent in 1991 but never achieve real independence (much as my beloved Greece) from foreign interests and now they are slaughtering everything and everyone.
The liberal west is using Nazi groups (far-right wing skinheads) to physically attack the current establishment. So it's for democratic governments to use Nazis when they see fit. The government responds in a very Russian way and you get chaos.
Mind you, that Yanukovych was at least elected and the people do not trust the opposition's leader either (and how could they?).
None of this is for the good of Ukranian people, this is just foreign super-powers tearing a country apart, for their own sake. Everything else is for mass consumption.
Both sides are equally corrupted. I feel sorry for the Ukrainian population because they are caught up on a spiral from which I don't know how they could get off, without getting hurt.
ps. As for the 19BN deal, what are you proposing exactly? If you have 19 BN for every Ukranian (45M people) out there, I'm sure they will be eager to hear from you.
- this is bullshit, because the driving force of the protests is disgust of the widespread corruption and rotting of the whole system. People are very tired of the general air of the lawless governing. EU does not act at all, as it seems to us, peaceful protesters. Though I agree that Russia can't be aside when a country is getting out of its sphere of influence.
> Ukraine's elites are split, but of course they are not the ones bleeding on the street.
- that is bullshit because protests have begun exactly with the average Joe's anger to Yanukovych decisions. The scale of protests was a great surprise to the opposition. Russians tend to greatly overestimate influence of elites on political process.
> The liberal west is using Nazi groups (far-right wing skinheads)
- this is bullshit, because Ukrainian nationalists are not Nazis and are not skinheads (who are widespread in Russia), Ukrainian nationalism is not based on ethnicity, it's based on idea of sovereign Ukrainian State living in peace with anyone who is not a threat to its existence and well-being. Yes, there are minor groups of real far right forces like S14, they are used heavily by Russian media to demonize Ukrainian nationalists, but they don't have any real influence.
> Yanukovych was at least elected - Hitler also had been democratically elected, this does not justify any of his ensuing deeds.
> the people do not trust the opposition's leader - it's true, we don't follow them blindly, they depend on Maidan much more than Maidan depends on them. We trust them as far as they express our will.
> None of this is for the good of Ukranian people - me, as a Ukrainian, disagrees with you.
> Both sides are equally corrupted. - this is a popular propaganda cliche to make people passive and to kill their will to change a corrupt leader. It is hard to imagine a person who can do more harm to Ukraine than Yanukovych did.
I live in Kiev and I am also very tired of explaining why these premises based on Russian propaganda, are not correct. Come to Maidan (it's easy if you live in Russia), see with your own eyes, then think again of all that bullshit.
Russian medias are biased (as West medias are), but I don't see how it related to post above.
No. They are completely wrong or a complete fantasy. From things that are fantasy like "this is not good for ukrainians", or conspiracy-like talks about "big games by giants" bla-bla, to being wrong in facts like "west is using Nazis". Complete bullshit. It's not Nazis there, it's normal people from both, East and West.
p.s.: Russian medias are not biased, they are writing complete shit, from obviously underestimating number of protestors, to saying bullshit like "Ukrainian people protest against laws that forbid Nacism and Fashism". How biased you need to be to say bullshit like this?
- "It's not Nazis there" - it again easily verifiable that there are Nazis (just first West media from google [1]), you are trying to ignore the obvious here
- "Russian medias are not biased, they are writing complete shit" - I'm not familiar with all russian medias, only with some online news, and for them I can clearly state that they are writing not more shit that popular West media
1. http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jan/22/ukraine...
How do you call Pravij Sektor then? UNA-UNSO? White Hammer?
I never stated that all the people involved are Nazis. No the presence of the Nazis is not irrelevant at all, it's the exactly the opposite: It's very relevant because it says a lot about the real goal of the opposition: Come to power no matter what.
I know that Arseniy Yatsenyuk is backed by USA interests and Vitali Klitschko by EU (German) interests. So it's a sort of a triangle, but these two for the time being are against the Russian backed current PM Yanukovych.
As for the "Liberal West". Theoretically the west (EU, UK & USA) are promoters of democracy, civil rights and so on. Both Klitschko and Yatsenyuk were in Berlin 24 hours before the massacre. So when Nazis with guns were attacking government buildings the two opposition leaders were embracing the move with specific remarks from "Square of Freedom". So there is clearly a link between the legal opposition and the extremist far-right (Nazi + other kind of) opposition. Of course, we don't know if in Berlin any decisions were taken, but then again you have to be a little bit naive to believe in this sort of coincidence.
In this and many others cases, the goals do NOT justify the means, because if the opposition uses (directly or indirectly) the Nazis today, no one says that they are not going to use them again tomorrow against their next enemy. It's simple as that.
The EU's stance is very descriptive: The first day they condemn the episodes (by the Nazi opposition), the next day announces sanctions against the current government!!! It's embarrassing: The EU wants the Ukranian government to stand down because they don't like it.
I'm not saying Putin is any better, but I expect the EU to be a lot better than Putin, China or Iran by supporting democratic values, not back-channeling and fueling war.
this fight has been going for several hundred years, since before times when one out of these 2 super-powers came to existence.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mD6UkzJs9h0&feature=player_de...
>None of this is for the good of Ukranian people, this is just foreign super-powers tearing a country apart, for their own sake.
learn the history and real situation in Ukraine today.
(A Russian here. Personally don't like "zapadencev", yet respect for brave fighting for their vision of their country even in the face of sharp shooters who were pretty active today shooting protesters down on Maidan like practice targets. As Litovians/Latvians/Estonians were saying 25+ years ago fighting similar fight - "For our and yours freedom")
It is not Litovnians etc who were saying that, but Russians who were dumb enough to support their fight for independence just to be locked up in ghetto after that.
For somebody who also lives in a country that is heavily influenced by Russia, it is clear that this is actually a peoples protest.
Put in simple words: There is no way for anybody to do any business with somebody outside Russia's circle. There is no way for anybody outside Russia's circle to tap into any of these countries. There isn't any visible progress and there aren't any kind of investments coming in.
I suspect some people got mad.
And Ukraine is not a battlefield created by super-powers. Super powers only aligned with the sides after it erupted. And people don't give a shit about them anyway. It's the same argument as blaming Ukrainian opposition - protesters don't give a shit about opposition, opposition only uses protests to sneak their way into power.
People are just fed with corruption and criminals in power, all the political fighting is secondary here, despite Russian propaganda efforts to paint it otherwise.
"...despite Russian propaganda efforts to paint it otherwise."
You seem to know a lot about geopolitics, strategy, and psychological warfare! Why would a player limit itself to only align with someone after the eruption of a given conflict? Why would it refrain from causing an opportunistic conflict in the first place? And why a superpower for that mater when the requirements for this kind of dirty games are (usually) low?
That's like releasing a lion to eat your house neighbor because you had a quarrel. It's really THAT stupid. These are Nazis, they are not people with whom you can reason. Not to mention the message you are sending to others: I wanna come to power no matter what, I'll do whatever it takes (rape, kill, steal, etc) to stay there. So you're no better than the current ones, you might even be worse.
> And Ukraine is not a battlefield created by super-powers. Super powers only aligned with the sides after it erupted. And people don't give a shit about them anyway.
Do you know what are you even talking about? You think Klitschko and Yatsenyuk being in Berlin 24 hours before the mess, is just a coincidence. It might be, but I can't believe it. I'll go with the conspiracy that they got full support from Germany and USA and they decided that it was time to use guns. The fact that other forces, which are not controlled by the opposition weighted in, is irrelevant. I mean, THEY are the irrelevant part, not the other way around.
> People are just fed with corruption and criminals in power, all the political fighting is secondary here, despite Russian propaganda efforts to paint it otherwise.
And what exactly to propose for people to do: Overthrown the government not by elections but by force? This gave (actually already did happen) the excuse to USA, EU and Russia to weight in. We might even see an armed conflict there, as we saw in Syria.
The thing is that you can't fight fire with fire, because you'll get burned. Of course the largest part of the population - no in Ukraine, everywhere - can not see the big picture until it's too late. History repeats itself.
I feel for the people, I agree that both sides are equally corrupted but I don't think violence is the answer. It will only make things worst.
This is people willing to die not be part of Russia and not to live in a kleptocracy. This is blood being spilled for freedom. It is terrible, but necessary if you do not want to live under the rulership of the most brutal.
Sniper tactics is completely different from shooting non-priority targets, it's usually enemy leaders, machinegunners, other snipers and so on. Medics are civilians and only provocators would choose them as targets.
According to your comment I guess you would like them to be ashamed that they were forced to defend and retreat instead of fighting back?
In 1 years time it will turn out that everything you have been told was a lie. Just like in the last 5-6 wars.
Stop drinking the Kool-Aid.
http://imbo01.vg.no/users/bildespesial/images/47512aad574685...
http://i.imgur.com/ZeDmQqc.jpg?1
http://totallycoolpix.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/20140219_k...
Story about opposition taking hostage dozens of police is all over the news (Russian news at least, I am not sure if it is reaching the English-speaking media yet).
Also, notice the gun used? It is not exactly police issue.
> Glory to Ukraine! Men and women, sorry not with you, not in Kiev! We hope that you find an opportunity to help!
I'm ukrainian, so I may have messed up english grammar.