This is because the Ukrainian govt is stealing from the Ukrainian people and banks. As long as this happens they will never have economic prosperity. This is why the protests started.
Another point we haven't discssed much in this thread. Ukraine did have nukes at one time. LOTS of them. They agreed to give them up in return for protection. Where is the protection? <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Protest agains <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23Russia&src=hash">#Russia</a> invading <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23Ukraine&src=hash">#Ukraine</a>. London now, in front of the Russian embassy <a href="http://t.co/AVBQjgdaFI">pic.twitter.com/AVBQjgdaFI</a></p>— Oleksandr Pryymak (@opryymak) <a href="https://twitter.com/opryymak/statuses/440134349724590081">March 2, 2014</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
So my original question again, why should the majority ethnic Russians in Crimea have any loyalty toward Ukraine? The government have been incompetent and incredibly corrupt for over 20 years now. The orange revolution didn't fix the incompetence or the corruption, and the 2010 election which was deemed fair by the EU & OSCE after dispatching over 1000 monitors didn't fix anything either.
Wow. You do understand that the orange revolution didn't fix the govt because the govt was run by corrupt Russians, right?
Isn't this because the Russians had their hand in everything politics related in Ukraine? So long as the government was/is pro-Russian, they'll do whatever the Russians tell them to do. Think when all this boils over, Ukraine is going to split in half. Crimea goes to Russia and the rest will join the EU. Wish this was easier said than done but we'll see.
Elections. Russia always organise massive votings, buying votes from people for a few dollers so they have an advantage on that. But I would not talk much about an election. Because more important is situation in Crimea. That all media fail to gasp is that Russia is not worried about Ukraine an EU regarding Crimea occupation. You all forget TURKEY. Stalin after WW2 starved to death a lot tatars and the rest was deported. Crimea for a long time was in Ottoman Empire. After Ukraines independence, they allowed tatars to come back to crimea. Now they are minority but quite significant. Turkey won't let Russia to occupy it. Putin knows it, this is why he keeps telling that the map of Ukraine should not change. His goal is not to took some parts of Ukraine under Russia but to keep Ukraine under his shoulder through its government. And after Maidan he understood that his people won't win another elections. So he had to took drastic measures. PS. don't compare this to Orange revolution. It has some similarities but their extent differs so much.
Putin seems to have gone all-in after the flop. I don't see him folding out now without egg on his face. I think ego will force his hand.
So basically everything that's wrong with Ukraine is Russia's fault. It's Russia fault that Ukraine elected a bunch of corrupt officials in 2 consecutive elections that's deemed fair and honest by thousands of EU monitors.
Of course it ain't Russia's fault. It is Russia's win! It is a day-to-day performed, carefully planned actions through money, propoganda and other methods. And they kept winning. So it's not a fault, it's a win.
http://www.opendemocracy.net/od-russia/sergii-leshchenko/rigging-elections-ukrainian-style And there more from our favorite election monitors. I guess they are "satisfied" in that the voting process was smooth. They say nothing of the election being on the up-and-up. http://www.opendemocracy.net/od-russia/sergii-leshchenko/rigging-elections-ukrainian-style
My apologies then. I've stated it a handful of times at the minimum. So just to clarify, I think you're a hateful bigot with a child-like view of the world. I don't choose to engage in serious discussions with you because I don't think you're particularly capable of seeing complex things. I'm happy to have reasonable discussions with reasonable people who contribute real information - SacTown and I are having a fine discussion and he has valuable knowledge on the subject. But yeah, I have zero interest in a serious discussion with people who show no interest or capability to do so. So if those people try to engage me for some odd reason with childish posts, I do tend to either not bother or simply respond them at their level. I've never pretended otherwise. Why would I apologize for stating the situation? That seems kind of ... odd to expect. As of yet, no one has demonstrated how the guy wasn't democratically elected, wasn't driven out of town, and/or the protests weren't sparked by his decisions regarding EU/Russia. You may not like it stated so simply, but it doesn't make it false.
Once again, you are lying (unless you are counting duplicate accounts of yours). A search comes up with exactly zero posts with that statement before the one where you first made the assertion. If you weren't such a cheapskate, you could have found out yourself. But nice try. No, SacTown is educating you. That is not "a fine discussion". You didn't contribute anything of substance, only your completely ignorant and misguided statement.
Who is going to stop them? They could roll right over the Ukrainian forces and it would take less than a week to control the entire country. Europe is too weak to stop them, China doesn't care, and the US is run by people who are wanting to dismantle the military...
Yes, everything that's wrong with Ukraine is due to Russian corruption so that Russia can continue to control Ukraine. First of all the elections were rigged and votes were bought. 2nd, regardless if the elections were fair once the politicians got into power they were controlled 100% by the Russians. Yanukovich did not have a chance to side with EU, Russia did not let him. The money earned by the people of Ukraine was taken from them and the corrupt politicians used it for themselves, Yanukovich had a golden toilet by the way, did you see that? And the rest of the money and natural resources of the country were funneled to Russia. So you are exactly right when you say that everything that's wrong in Ukraine politically and economically is due to Russia. Spot on my friend.
BBC reporting that warning shots have been fired by the Ukrainians. There's an explosion in Crimea's capital but no one knows much about it.
Sorry got my news mixed up. BBC claims that there were explosions in Simferopol and they don't know who's behind it. CNN claims that warning shots have been fired by the Ukrainians and beliefs of an overnight attack on the Crimean naval base is expected.
Chemical attack in Syria today as well. Weird Weird Weird. I am going to go out on a limb here and say that nothing major happens.
