Showing posts with label Donetsk. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Donetsk. Show all posts

Monday, July 18, 2022

To honor the memory of all the children killed in Ukraine since 2014, let's do what's necessary to protect them!

To honor the memory of all the children killed in Ukraine since 2014, let's do what's necessary to protect them!

Greg Krasovsky

July 18, 2022

  

July 18th is a memorial day (a day of mourning) for the 2000 children who were killed by Nazi Germany's Air Force during their evacuation from Leningrad in 1941.
 
But let’s not forget the children who died in the Donetsk Coal Basin (Donbass) from 2014 to the present, the vast majority at the hands of the Ukrainian military forces, volunteer territorial battalions, foreign fighters and other paramilitaries.
 
Some of those children were labeled as incidental "collateral damage", killed "accidentally “ or "unintentionally" by Ukrainian armed forces and paramilitaries near legitimate military targets.
 
But many were killed as a result of war crimes and crimes against humanity, often in civilian areas without any legitimate military targets nearby.

Sadly, their deaths barely received any news coverage by Western mass media.

And those responsible for their deaths were never investigated or brought to justice (arrested, prosecuted, incarcerated or executed).

Why? Because they died at the hands of Ukrainian armed forces and paramilitaries during Ukraine's "anti-terrorist operation" against local insurgents, pro-Russian separatists who refused to accept in the Spring of 2014 the new Ukrainian government which was dominated by Ukrainian Nationalists -- a government which was installed, supported and controlled by the United States of America and its NATO allies from 2014 to the present.
 
That's the double standard -- when U.S. allies, proxies and controlled governments commit war crimes and crimes against humanity, these crimes are generally overlooked by Western Mass Media that are owned and controlled by the same transnational financial-industrial groups that control political parties, politicians, governments, militaries and intelligence agencies.

I believe that ALL deaths of children (regardless of their race, ethnicity, religion, citizenship or their parents’ political affiliation),
 
- In Donbass,
- in the rest of Ukraine,
- in Russia,
- and anywhere else in the world,
 
if there is reason to believe that they were caused by war crimes, crimes against humanity and/or human rights violations,
 
1. must receive fair and objective news media coverage;

2. must be thoroughly investigated by competent, experienced, independent and impartial investigators;

3. their perpetrators brought to justice with full cooperation of ALL countries where (a) their crimes took place, (b) they hold citizenship and/or (c) where they reside or hide; and

4. once convicted, the perpetrators must be punished to the fullest extent permitted by law.

More important than seeking justice is our moral obligation and civic duty to ensure take that all sides take proactive measures to protect the lives of children and other adult civilians and to prevent their deaths during law enforcement, counter-terrorism, military operations and war.

a. Organizing and not hindering the evacuation of children from areas of current or potential use of force,

b. Refusing to locate or hide military forces, equipment and munitions near residential buildings, schools, hospitals and other areas where children are present.

c. Refusing to allow civilians and children to be present (often unaware), even temporarily, near actual or potential military targets, especially when these targets are located in residential neighborhoods, transportation or shopping centers.
 
d. Refusing to use children and civilians as de facto human shields by (i) locating or hiding military forces & equipment in populated areas, buildings and structures or (ii) relocating children to areas where military personnel are located under the guise of evacuating them to a safe location.
 
e. Refusing to (i) use medical transportation to transport soldiers & military equipment and (ii) shoot, bomb or target such medical transportation.
 
f. Refusing to shoot, bomb or target structures and areas where children and civilians are known to be present either voluntarily or de facto hostages & human shields.
    
Why? Because all human lives have equal value and because children's lives are the most precious of all.

Do you agree?
 
***
 
The life of a Soviet person
Yandex Zen
July 18, 2022
 


July 18 - the day of memory of more than 2000 Leningrad children

On June 29, 1941, the first wave of evacuation of residents from Leningrad began.

In the railway train moving towards Staraya Russa, by the time of arrival there were already 12 heating cars, in which more than 3 thousand children were traveling, accompanied by teachers and medical staff. workers.

On July 17, the train began on the first track of the Lychkovo station, waiting for replenishment with children from Demyansk.

Large red crosses were depicted on the roofs of the wagons. The next day the new children arrived and were placed in the wagons.

Planes suddenly flew in. None of the children could even think that they were German until the bombs flew.
Despite the fleeing women and many children, the German pilots continued their work.

When the nightmare ended, the locals began to rescue those who survived. All the rest, adults and children, were buried in the village cemetery in a mass grave.

According to rough estimates, in addition to adults, more than 2 thousand Leningrad children lost their lives here.

They tried to take them to a safe place...

Memorial at st. Lychkovo
 
http://translate.google.com/translate?js=n&sl=ru&tl=en&u=https://zen.yandex.ru/media/id/5cc362c4ad71e300b4a8e624/62d559c2996e500f07e59aae

***
 
Siege of Leningrad
 
The siege of Leningrad (Russian: блокада Ленинграда; German: Leningrader Blockade) was a prolonged military blockade undertaken by the Axis powers against the Soviet city of Leningrad (present-day Saint Petersburg) on the Eastern Front of World War II.

Germany's Army Group North advanced from the south, while the German-allied Finnish army invaded from the north and completed the ring around the city.

The siege began on 8 September 1941, when the Wehrmacht severed the last road to the city. Although Soviet forces managed to open a narrow land corridor to the city on 18 January 1943, the Red Army did not lift the siege until 27 January 1944, 872 days after it began.

The blockade became one of the longest and most destructive sieges in history, and it was possibly the costliest siege in history due to the number of casualties which were suffered throughout its duration.

In the 21st century, some historians have classified it as a genocide due to the systematic starvation and intentional destruction of the city's civilian population.[10][11][12][13][14]

Casualties and losses

Soviet civilians: 642,000 during the siege, 400,000 at evacuations[8]
 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Leningrad

***
 


 
Alley of angels
 
Alley of Angels is a memorial complex in Donetsk in memory of the children who died during the war in Donbass.

Located in the city of Donetsk in the park of culture and recreation named after Lenin Komsomol.

It was opened on May 5, 2015 after the installation of a memorial sign, and on June 2, 2017, a monument to the children of Donbass was added to the composition of the alley.

Moved to the Victory Park, the "Palace of Pioneers" of the Kalininsky district, along Shevchenko Boulevard.

http://translate.google.com/translate?js=n&sl=ru&tl=en&u=https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%90%D0%BB%D0%BB%D0%B5%D1%8F_%D0%B0%D0%BD%D0%B3%D0%B5%D0%BB%D0%BE%D0%B2
 
***
 


36 angels: how the Armed Forces of Ukraine killed and maimed Lugansk children.
Nationalists do not spare even the smallest residents of the LNR.


Ekaterina Tyunina
May 8, 2022, 00:02

The LPR is almost completely liberated from the nationalists. Soon the long-awaited peace will reign throughout the republic, the destroyed houses will be restored. But the people of Luhansk will never forget about the thousands of fellow countrymen who died at the hands of the soldiers of the Ukrainian army. Among the victims are many children killed and maimed by the nationalists. Izvestia tells the stories of some of them.
 
Shooting at children

During the eight years of the war of Ukraine against the inhabitants of Donbass in the Luhansk People's Republic, 99 minors were injured of varying severity, Yulia Nazarenko, the Commissioner for Children's Rights of the LPR, told Izvestia.

Eight schoolchildren were affected this year alone.

http://translate.google.com/translate?js=n&sl=ru&tl=en&u=https://iz.ru/1326039/ekaterina-tiunina/36-angelov-kak-vsu-ubivali-i-kalechili-luganskikh-detei
 
***

 

The cry of the soul: the stories of the dead children of Donbass
February 25, 2022

Each of us knows what the loss of a loved one is. But God only knows what a mother feels when she loses her own child. Military operations in the Donbass have been going on for eight years. Eight years of bloody slaughter, in which not only soldiers, but also civilians, including small children, died every week. They have been deprived of a future.

But for some reason, they didn’t seem to notice this before, or they tried to close their eyes to the atrocities of the Ukrainian authorities. FAN decided to remind why Russia decided to end the war in Donbass.

    “If the Western media had at least partially shown what has been happening all these eight years - about the alley of angels in the Donbass, about the torn and murdered women and children, all the daily bombings, then the Western community would not have questions “What is happening?” There would be a question: “Why hasn’t Russia done this (we are talking about a special operation. - Note FAN) yet?” It is simply unprofitable for them to show and highlight that their satellites, their sixes in the person of Ukraine and [its president Vladimir] Zelensky are doing such horrors, ”political analyst Ivan Arkatov is convinced.
 
http://translate.google.com/translate?js=n&sl=ru&tl=en&u=https://zen.yandex.ru/media/riafan.ru/krik-dushi-istorii-pogibshih-detei-donbassa-6218d26df8e9ed2952f0fb03
 
***
 
Children of Donbass killed by Ukraine (the most complete list)

yadocent
February 4, 2022, 05:29
 
According to the UN human rights monitoring mission, in Ukraine during the entire period of the conflict from April 14, 2014 to April 30, 2021, 152 children were killed (including 102 boys and 50 girls), another 146 children were injured (of which 120 boys and 26 girls).

http://translate.google.com/translate?js=n&sl=ru&tl=en&u=https://yadocent.livejournal.com/1416159.html

***


 

Angels. Ten horror stories about the dead children of Donbass
 
matveychev_oleg
June 1, 2017, 20:04
 
Today, June 1, on Children's Day, Donetsk residents will take to the memorial rally "Angels" at 21:00. Not to remember. They are never forgotten. We just need to honor their memory. On this day, sky lanterns will be launched for every child who has died. Let him have a new toy there in heaven. Come out and you.

http://translate.google.com/translate?js=n&sl=ru&tl=en&u=https://matveychev-oleg.livejournal.com/5531284.html

***
 

 

Dead children of Donbass

ronin_077
Jun 1 2016, 15:39
 
In November 2014, I found myself at one not very pleasant event. In the Donetsk Church of the Three Hierarchs, which is on Azotny, Nikita Russov, a boy who died the day before during shelling, was buried in a closed coffin. Since then, I have been collecting information about the dead children of Donbass.

Eternal memory to them!

Information on children who died as a result of hostilities on the territory of the Donetsk People's Republic for the period from April 2014 to the present

http://translate.google.com/translate?js=n&sl=ru&tl=en&u=https://ronin-077.livejournal.com/37466.html

***


 

How the children of Donbass were actually killed: Forbidden evidence

Natalya Zalevskaya
04 February 2022 19:00
 
Ukrainian propagandists swung at the sacred: they declared fake photos on the Alley of Angels - a memorial to the dead children of Donbass. It is unbearably scary for the perpetrators of these crimes to wake up from the mythology with which they surrounded themselves with their own hands, talking about Russian aggression. It's scary to open your eyes and see how monstrous the real truth is and who the real culprit is.

A memorial stone in memory of children killed by Ukraine in a Donetsk park is covered with snow. White ice crystals slowly descend on the cold black marble, like heavenly stars sending news from the wonderful land of human souls. Orthodox elders say that there, in this country unknown to most, all those innocently killed in the vile war that brought so much suffering and blood to the Donbass are at peace. Children's blood.
Terrible truth

According to Andrey Pinchuk, one of the leaders of the Union of Donbass Volunteers, the first head of the Ministry of State Security of the DPR, the Ukrainian military shelled the educational institutions of the People's Republics quite deliberately.

    In October 2014, the children went to school later because of the economic blockade... Then the Ukrainian military purposefully fired at the schools. There is a famous monument in Donetsk, when a brother shielded his sister, whom he brought to school, and other children in the doorway. He was hit with shrapnel because he covered them with himself. Such little heroes are direct confirmation that the Armed Forces of Ukraine are murderers and scoundrels,

Pinchuk told Tsargrad.

Many violent deaths of children through the fault of Kyiv occurred in the subsequent years of the Donbass war - 2015 and 2016.

In Donetsk, on the fact of the death of young Donbass residents, a special international commission was created, whose representatives clarified in detail the facts of the death of children, clarified the testimony of witnesses, including the parents of the victims.

According to a representative of the commission from the Ministry of Information of the DPR, the parents of children killed by Ukraine could not always talk about their tragedies on camera. Grief crippled them and robbed them of their strength.

Here are just a few testimonies about the death of the young inhabitants of the region, now forever young and immortal.

http://translate.google.com/translate?js=n&sl=ru&tl=en&u=https://tsargrad.tv/articles/kak-na-samom-dele-ubivali-detej-donbassa-zapreshhjonnye-svidetelstva_489404
 
***

War in Donbas (2014–2022)

The war in Donbas[note 1] was an armed conflict in the Donbas region of Ukraine, part of the broader Russo-Ukrainian War. In March 2014, immediately following the Euromaidan protest movement and subsequent Revolution of Dignity, protests by pro-Russian, anti-government separatist groups arose in the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts of Ukraine, collectively called the Donbas.

These demonstrations began around the same time as Russia's annexation of Crimea, and were part of wider pro-Russian protests across southern and eastern Ukraine.

Declaring the Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics (DPR and LPR, respectively), armed Russian-backed separatist groups seized government buildings throughout the Donbas, leading to armed conflict with Ukrainian government forces.[32]

Casualties
Main article: Casualties of the Russo-Ukrainian War

The number of confirmed fatalities caused by the war was 14,200–14,400 as of the end of December 2021, including non-combat military deaths.

By this point, the UN confirmed 3,404 civilians had been killed in the conflict. Of the civilian deaths, 312 were foreigners: 298 passengers and crew of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17,[27] 11 Russian journalists,[590] an Italian journalist,[591] one Russian civilian killed in cross-border shelling[592] and a Lithuanian diplomat.[593]

Humanitarian concerns

A report by the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) released on 28 July 2014 said that based on "conservative estimates", at least 1,129 civilians had been killed since mid-April during the fighting, and at least 3,442 had been wounded.[616][617] The report found that at least 750 million US dollars worth of damage has been done to property and infrastructure in Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts.[617] Human Rights Watch said that Ukrainian government forces, pro-government paramilitaries, and the insurgents had used unguided Grad rockets in attacks on civilian areas, stating that "The use of indiscriminate rockets in populated areas violates international humanitarian law, or the laws of war, and may amount to war crimes".[618][619] The New York Times reported that the high rate of civilian deaths had "left the population in eastern Ukraine embittered toward Ukraine's pro-Western government", and that this sentiment helped to "spur recruitment" for the insurgents.[620] By early January 2015, the number of deaths caused by the war had risen to 4,707, despite the signing of the Minsk Protocol in early September 2014.[621]

As consequence of the conflict, large swathes of the Donbas region, on both sides of the "contact line", have become contaminated with landmines and other explosive remnants of war (ERW).[622] According to the UN Humanitarian Coordinator in Ukraine, in 2020 Ukraine was one of the most mine-affected countries in the world, with nearly 1,200 mine/ERW casualties since the beginning of the conflict in 2014.[623] A report by UNICEF released in December 2019 said that 172 children had been injured or killed due to landmines and other explosives, over 750 educational facilities had been damaged or destroyed, and 430,000 children lived with psychological traumas associated with war.[624][625]

Displaced population

By early August 2014, at least 730,000 had fled fighting in the Donbas and left for Russia.[626] This number, much larger than earlier estimates, was given by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). The number of internal refugees rose to 117,000.[626] By the start of September, after a sharp escalation over the course of August, the number of people displaced from Donbas within Ukraine more than doubled to 260,000.[627] The number of temporary asylum seekers and refugee applicants from Ukraine in Russia rose to 121,000.[628] Despite two months of a shaky ceasefire established by the Minsk Protocol, the number of refugees displaced from Donbas in Ukraine escalated sharply to 466,829 in mid November.[629]

By April 2015, the war had caused at least 1.3 million people to become internally displaced within Ukraine.[630] In addition, more than 800,000 Ukrainians had sought asylum, residence permits, or other forms of legal stay in neighbouring countries, with over 659,143 in Russia, 81,100 in Belarus, and thousands more elsewhere.[631][632]

According to another report by the UN OHCHR, over three million people continued to live in the Donbas conflict zone as of March 2016.[30] This was said to include 2.7 million who lived in DPR and LPR-controlled areas, and 200,000 in Ukrainian-controlled areas adjacent to the line of contact. In addition, the Ukrainian government was said to have registered a total of 1.6 million internally displaced people within Ukraine who had fled the conflict. Over one million were reported to have sought asylum elsewhere, with most having gone to Russia.[30] The report also said that people that lived in separatist-controlled areas were experiencing "complete absence of rule of law, reports of arbitrary detention, torture and incommunicado detention, and no access to real redress mechanisms".[30][633]

By November 2017, the UN had identified 1.8 million internally displaced and conflict-affected persons in Ukraine, while another 427,240 who had sought asylum or refugee status in the Russian Federation, plus 11,230 in Italy, 10,495 in Germany, 8,380 in Spain, and 4,595 in Poland.[634]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_in_Donbas_(2014%E2%80%932022)

***

Thursday, February 24, 2022

Modern Ukraine: What's just and democratic - a people's right to self-determination in the face of authoritarian dictates or a post-Soviet state's insistence on immutable territorial integrity?

 

Modern Ukraine: What's just and democratic - a people's right to self-determination in the face of authoritarian dictates or a post-Soviet state's insistence on immutable territorial integrity?

Gregory Krasovsky

February 24, 2022

  

I don't often cite or share articles from CounterPunch (see below), but when I do...it's just food for thought.
 
BTW, the American in me has always favored a people's right to self-determination -- which, IMHO should be applied honestly, fairly, without bias and consistently -- over a country's government-protected right to territorial integrity.
 
So does the Ukrainian in me who spent the first four years of his life living in a coal-mining village near the city of Luhansk in the Donetsk Coal Basin (Donbas) of Eastern Ukraine.
   
But throughout history, Monarchs, Emperors, Kings & Queens, Kaisers, Caesars, Tsars, Sultans, Khans, Pharaohs and many a Supreme Leader or just a local Feudal Lord cringed at the concept of a people's right to self-determination and tried to nip in the bud or chop off that pesky thought whenever it started to rear its democracy-oriented head.

What? You people think that you can just hold a people's referendum and leave my/or country, kingdom, empire, republic, or union?
 
Without my/our permission?

How dare you?

Who gave you the right?
 
What makes you people think that you can make this decision locally without getting the approval of the rest of us (who don't live in your land) and our government/sovereign?
 
How ungrateful can you be for all that I/we have done for you?
 
How can you betray my/our rule and state?
 
Would you leave our state and then plot or ally against us with our enemies?

   
Doesn't this sound like some dialogue right out of the Game of Thrones?
 
Forget about Hollywood!
 
Remember when the African slaves rebelled in Haiti against France back around 1802?

And France instituted a naval blockade of Haiti -- with the support of newly founded democratic U.SA., whose Southern states (full of plantations & African Slaves) got a little worried that the Haitian revolt might become contagious?

And then demanded that the Haitian slaves pay France in reparations the market cost for each slave?

And milked Haiti until the 20th century without any U.S. objections even after slavery ended in the U.S. after the Civil War in 1865?
 
What happened to the Haitian slaves' right to freedom and self-determination?
 
The Vietnamese learned that as well when they had to fight against their French colonial masters after WWII.
 
What about Native/Indigenous Americans ("American Indians")?

Would today's America, after the Civil Rights Movement (50+ years have already passed!), BLM, Critical Race Theory (CRT) and WOKE-ism, ever permit a Native American tribe to exercise their right to self-determination, become truly sovereign from the U.S. and live independently of our country?
 
Remember when during President Obama's term in office (Hilary Clinton was the Secretary of State), a Native American tribe from Upstate New York and Canada wanted to travel to England for the World Lacrosse championship (a Native American game, by the way) with their Native American Passports?
 
And even though the British were willing to let them enter the UK with those passports, the post-9/11/01 U.S. would not provide written guarantees that it would permit these Native Americans to re-enter the U.S. (presumably at JFK airport) with these non-U.S. passports ("What if they're Al Qaeda?") in transit to their reservations (tribal lands)?
 
After all, America
 

- supported Taiwan in its independence & refusal to rejoin communist China,
 
- encouraged & facilitated the break-up of the Soviet Union,

- Supported the Tibetan people's struggle for independence from Communist China,
 
- encouraged the break-up of former communist/socialist Serbian-ruled Yugoslavia (into Croatia, Slovenia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Montenegro, Serbia and [North] Macedonia) and then helped Kosovo separate from Serbia (Pro-Russian) with a massive bombing campaign & war that killed thousands of civilians,
 
- Encouraged the Chechen war for the Republic of Ichkeria's independence against Russia (even though it was funded and partially fought by Islamists, Wahhabis, and some of those who survived went on later to join Al Qaeda and ISIS)

- Eventually supported East Timur's independence from Indonesia,
 
- helped South Sudan (with oil deposits) separate from the North.

 
But then again, America did NOT help and opposed (either actively or tacitly/surreptitiously)
 

- Southern Nigeria (with recently discovered oil deposits) gain its independence from the predominantly Muslim Northern Nigeria and supported the federal Nigerian government in the brutal Biafran War (over 1 million civilians killed in the South) only 7 years after Nigeria won its independence from the U.K.    
 
- The Palestinians establish their own state next door to Israel,
 
- Abkhazians (Pro-Russian Muslim folks) and Southern Ossetians (Pro-Russian with most of their ethnos living in Russian Ossetia next door) gain their autonomy and independence from Post-Soviet Georgia in the early 1990s.

   
Forget about America, just look at all the recent conflicts about a people's right to self-determination and their own country (or desire to join another country), such as

  • Northern Ireland,
  • Scottish referendum to leave the U.K.,
  • Catalonia in Spain, 
  • Basque country in Spain,
  • The French Canadian's struggle for autonomy in Quebec, 
  • Zapatista movement in Chiapas, Mexico, 
  • The Kurds' struggle for statehood/autonomy in Turkey, Syria and Iraq 
  • Western Sahara struggle for independence from Morocco,  
  • East Timur's recently won independence from Indonesia, 
  • The Shiite Houthi struggle for power and autonomy in Yemen against the Saudi Arabia backed  
  • The Muslim Rohingya people's struggle for equal rights in Burma/Myanmar, 
  • The Sikh people’s desire to create an independent state from India in Punjab called Khalistan, 
  • The Tamil Tigers' struggle to create an independent state, Eelam, in Sri Lanka,   

and etc.    

By now, you probably get the picture.

The U.S. and its allies, including many European countries, who publicly profess to be the staunchest defenders of freedom, human rights & democracy world-wide, end up being very selective -- depending on geopolitics and money from natural resources -- when it comes to supporting a people's right to self-determination of statehood.
 
Western Democracies will support independence movements world-wide only when it fits their geopolitical objectives and/or profitable.

Otherwise, Western Democracies, like most other states, will support territorial integrity (i.e. government/state power over people).  
 
Just imagine Texans voting to leave the U.S.!

Even if the residents of Texas voted 99% to leave the Union, you'd see the full power of the U.S. military remind them how the Confederate States were brought back during the American Civil War in 1861-1865, even though modern Texas doesn't have slaves but just more conservative Republicans than most "Northern" States!
 
The recent situations in East and Central Europe since 1991 are not different, including Ukraine since 2014.

As an example of double-standards, I'd bet my bottom dollar that America and its NATO/EU allies would have supported a pro-Western Anti-Russian L’viv or Carpathian People's Republic if in 2014 "Pro-Russian" Ukrainian President Yanukovich managed to hold on to power and Western Ukraine tried to declare "governmental sovereignty" (i.e. autonomy) against the Ukrainian government.

Which is what the Pro-Russian Luhansk & Donetsk People's Republics did in 2014 (citing the illegal overthrow of lawfully & democratically elected President Yanukovich).

So did the Pro-Russian population of Crimea, who wasn't happy with being transferred to Ukraine by Soviet leader Khrushchev in 1954 and did not want to stay in post-Yanukovich Ukraine governed by Pro-American and Anti-Russian Ukrainian Nationalists.

They exercised the people's right to self-determination.  

Should the people of regions that were un-democratically and forcefully incorporated into modern Ukraine by totalitarian Soviet communist / Bolshevik regimes & leaders (like Lenin, Stalin and Khrushchev) be allowed to hold referendums on what country they want their regions to re-join (if not create their own mini-state), like Poland (1939), Slovakia (1945), Hungary (1945), Romania (1945) and/or Russia (1922 and 1954)?
      
So in light of all that, what's the solution?
 
For Ukraine and for any other independence/autonomy/self-governance movement mentioned above?
    
Just as important, how should the United States, its people and allies consistently treat the people's right to self-determination, both at home and abroad, with respect to democratic principles and inalienable human rights?

What do you think?
 
As always, please don't forget to comment and share for thought & discussion!
 
***
 
The Territorial Integrity of States vs. the Self-Determination of Peoples.
by John Whitbeck
CounterPunch
February 24, 2022
 
Two often-cited principles, each with established roots in international law, are frequently in conflict — the territorial integrity of states and the self-determination of peoples.
 
https://www.counterpunch.org/2022/02/24/the-territorial-integrity-of-states-vs-the-self-determination-of-peoples/
 
*** 




Tuesday, October 27, 2015

Minsk Deal? Never Heard of That! Ukrainian Forces Shelling Donetsk Airport

Minsk Deal? Never Heard of That! Ukrainian Forces Shelling Donetsk Airport

So what is there to gain from shelling the already destroyed Donetsk International Airport?

Unless you want to justify military expenditures, militarization of society and deflect attention from other serious economic problems.

War mongering always brings misery, death and destruction.

Please read the Sputnik article at:

http://sputniknews.com/europe/20151027/1029156346/Ukrainian-Forces-Shelling-Donetsk-Airport.html

Sunday, October 11, 2015

Ukraine to begin long-delayed mass polio vaccination program.

Ukraine to begin long-delayed mass polio vaccination program.
  
Comments by Greg Krasovsky:

The Poroshenko-Yatsenyuk government in Kyiv had a choice in 2014 and 2015 - negotiate a political settlement with the Donetsk & Lugansk Pro-Autonomy/Federalization/Decentralization movements and spend borrowed money on healthcare, education, pensions and other vital government programs.

Instead, they chose to spend government funds on the civil war in an attempt to crush the Donetsk & Lugansk autonomy movements by military force.

The result? War crimes and crimes against humanity, loss of countless innocent civilian lives, destroyed industry and infrastructure and no money for basic services, like Polio vaccinations for Ukrainian children. 

This is what happens when war-mongering politicians have free reign and foreign political, economic and military support.
  
How many more Ukrainian children will have to die from disease, war and malnutrition before the people of Ukraine stop supporting politicians that would sacrifice the lives and well-being of ordinary Ukrainians for the politicians' financial interests, political power and the agenda of their foreign sponsors?
  
Is this what Ukrainian children deserve? 

Protection from polio thanks to a batch of vaccines donated by Canada but possible spoiled due to improper storage? 

Would you want to take the chance and vaccinate your child from such a batch?


See http://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/as-it-happens-friday-edition-1.3264765/ukraine-to-begin-long-delayed-mass-polio-vaccination-program-1.3264771

"Ukraine's Health Minister signed a decree today kick-starting a mass polio vaccination program in the country after two cases of the paralyzing disease were discovered in the country last month.

Ukraine currently has 3.7 million doses of the polio vaccine, which were paid for by the Canadian government. But Kyiv has been dragging its feet for weeks on starting a mass vaccination after concerns were raised about the safety of the vaccines.
...
All-Ukrainian Council on Patients' Rights and Safety is concerned that "the vaccines, which have been in storage in Ukraine since being shipped from France in May, are nearing their six-month expiration. They are supposed to be kept frozen, but Kvartiuk says the safety council believes the vaccines were thawed during transport and storage.""
      
"Two children aged 10-months and four-years-old were paralyzed last month after contracting the debilitating disease in the first polio cases in Europe since 2010. Hundreds more are believed to be carrying the virus.

Ukraine was previously declared polio-free, but vaccination levels have dropped to less than 50 per cent of children and 14 per cent of infants in the country. More than three million children are believed to be at risk."

Tuesday, September 29, 2015

The harrowing truth of the 'forgotten' children caught in Putin's war with Ukraine?

The harrowing truth of the 'forgotten' children caught in Putin's war with Ukraine?
  
You can read and trust the Daily Mail, or you can learn and accept the truth.

So you want to know the truth? Can you handle it?
  
Here's an inconvenient truth from a Ukrainian-Russian-American lawyer and former police officer who spent May and June of 2014 in Lugansk, East Ukraine with his family:

1. The vast majority of he people of East Ukraine's Donetsk Coal Basin (Donbass), have a strong ethnic, linguistic and religious connection with Russia. 

Donbass became a part of Ukraine in 1922 only because Lenin and his Bolsheviks needed additional regions in Ukraine in ordere to have enough votes for Ukraine to "voluntarily" join the Soviet Union. 
    
The people of Donbass  have never supported radical West Ukrainian nationalists, such as the Svoboda party, who despise Russians and who consider Ukrainian Nazi war criminals and collaborators, like Stepan Bandera, Ukrainian heroes and patriots.

Donbass' residents have been told by their grandparents of the atrocities committed by radical Ukrainian nationalist Nazi collaborators during WW II not just in Western and Central Ukraine, but also in Eastern Ukraine where Ukrainian Nazi collaborators where brought in by the Nazis as local police ("polizei" in German) to maintain order and help neutralize anti-Nazi insurgents.
  
The Donbass region has very strong economic connections with Russia, including a substantial share of industrial goods being exported to Russia.

2. The people of Donbass were appalled by the violence unleashed by Ukrainian radicals during the Euromaidan protests at mostly unarmed Ukrainian police who were simply defending government buildings.

If these US-supported violent Ukrainian nationalist radicals were not afraid to attack Ukrainian police officers with chains, metal spikes, Molotov Cocktails, bleach, acid, pistols and rifles, then what would these people do to ordinary pro-Russian Donbass residents when they came to power?

The answer came soon enough: 

Around February 22, 2014 the time that Ukrainian President Yanukovich, a resident and supporter of Donbass, was being illegally ousted from office,  busloads of Yanukovich supporters (Anti-EuroMaydan activists) returning to Crimea were stopped and ambushed by Ukrainian nationalists. many passengers were beaten, tortured and killed while local police stood by, watched and even participated.

When Crimeans held their referendum in March of 2014 (under the protection of Russian troops) and overwhelmingly voted to return to Russia (Crimea was "administratively transferred" from Russia to Ukraine in 1954 by Soviet Union's leader Nikita Khruschyev), many residents of Donbass preferred to be in Putin's Russia that in Ukraine ruled by pro-US/NATO Ukrainian Nationalists.
   
In the beginning of April 2014, Anti-EuroMaydan and pro-Russian supporters seized government buildings and authority in Donetsk and Lugansk regions. 
  
In April of 2014 government authority was seized in Slavyansk, a 100K+ city in Donetsk region, by pro-Russian activists with the military support of Russian "volunteers" including former Russian FSB officer Igor Girkin (Strelkov). 

Instead of negotiating, the new interim Yatsenyuk-Turchinov Ukrainian government sent in the Ukrainian Army, newly created National Guard and volunteer battalions staffed with Ukrainian Nationalists, who began a scorched earth siege of the city with disregard for civilian casualties.  
  
The residents of Donbass watched in horror and began to create armed self-defense units.

On May 2, 2014 dozens of Anti-EuroMaydan activists were burned alive, beaten, choked and shot to death in Odessa's House of Unions by radical Ukrainian Nationalists -- while the local police stood by and did nothing.

With all this mind, on May 11, 2014 the residents of Donetsk and Lugansk voted overwhelmingly for "governmental autonomy" from the new Yatsenyuk-Turchinov government in Kyiv, a government that the residents of Donbass considered illegitimate and dominated by Ukrainian nationalists who, if necessary, would turn any town that refused to recognize their authority, into a Slavyansk or Odessa.

Unlike what we read in Western government and Corporate Establishment Media, the referendum was democratic, had a > 80% voter turn out and those who voted against governmental autonomy (no more than 10% of voters) did so openly and without fear of retribution. These are my honest personal observations.

Many residents of Donbass mistakenly thought that Russian would offer them voluntary annexation like Crimea or would bring in Russian peace-keeping troops to protect them like the Trans-Dniester Region of Moldavia. When neither of these things happened, the local population in Donbass became afraid of what would come next.

When President Poroshenko was voted into office on May 25, 2014, instead of trying to negotiate a peaceful political settlement, he escalated the anti-autonomy/federalist/separatist military operation (the so-called "Anti-Terrorist Operation", a/k/a "ATO").

On May 26, 2014 the Donetsk International Airport was heavily damaged by Ukrainian Air Force strikes.  
  
After President Poroshenko's inauguration, many leading political, cultural, public and business leaders of Donbass asked him to hold negotiations withe the political leaders of the Donestk and Lugansk autonomy/federalism movements, but instead he labeled them separatist terrorists and escalated the ATO.

Villages, towns and cities of Lugansk and Donetsk regions were indiscriminately shelled and bombed by the Ukranian Armed Forces (UAF). 

War crimes and crimes against humanity were committed by the UAF when civilian areas were shelled and bombed (even those residential areas where there were no insurgents) without prior warning and without any organized evacuation of local residents.

The ATO used infamous anti-insurgency tactics against the local population -- tactics espoused and perfected not only by dictators and authoritarian regimes throughout the 20th century but also by the U.S. military and intelligence communities -- meant to shell, bomb, starve and scare the local population into submission and abandonment of the insurgents. 
  
The Ukrainian government did not care apparently that the local population included the innocent and vulnerable segments, such as the elderly, women and children.

Why? Because Ukrainian President Poroshenko and his government received approval from their foreign supporters & allies (U.S. first and foremost) for the ATO and assurances that the US/EU political establishment would turn a blind eye on the collateral damage (i.e. war crimes against civilians and crime against humanity) necessary to contain and/or defeat the pro-Russian federalist/autonomy menace that would threaten the new pro-US/EU/NATO Ukrainian government.

The Ukrainian and Western government and corporate media supporting US/EU/NATO policies and objectives in Ukraine also turned a blind eye on the UAF atrocities and engaged in blatant propaganda designed to falsely show the world that instead of the Ukrainian Army fighting local insurgents (who constitute at least 90% of the insurgent forces in Donetsk and Lugansk) and killing local civilians in the process, the Ukrainian people are battling a Russian invasion of East Ukraine.

This Daily Mail article on the consequences of war for East Ukraine's children has the same propaganda spin. 

Instead of putting blame for war crimes and crimes against humanity on the Ukrainian government and armed forces -- the side that, thanks to superior government firepower, undeniably has committed the vast majority of such crimes against the local population -- the Daily Mail, attempts to place blame for such crimes against children on Russia and its President Putin. 

How? For supporting and providing assistance to the DNR/LNR self-proclaimed republics and their populations after they were literally left to fend for themselves by the Ukrainian government without food, water, electricity, natural gas, heat, sewage, medical care, education, transportation, other vital government services and jobs.

If you think that I'm making up the ruthless & criminal approach of the Ukrainian government and President Poroshenko, then take a look at President Poroshenko's own words below .

So who's to blame for the death and suffering of Donbass' children, Daily Mail?  

How about the hundreds of thousands of children of Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria?  

Russia and Putin?

I don't think so.

Gregory Krasovsky
   
******************************

"Poroshenko: "Their children will hole up in the basements - this is how we win the war!" 
Published on Nov 14, 2014

Petro Poroshenko announced another cynical approach of the Ukrainian government to the recalcitrant residents of Donbass during his speech in Odessa.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHWHqj8g7Bk

Ukraine’s Tragicomedy
Made in the USA
by Justin Raimondo, June 05, 2015 

http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2015/06/04/ukraines-tragicomedy/

"Unlike tranquil Crimea, east Ukraine is in blood-stained turmoil, with the inhabitants refusing to buckle under to rule from Kiev. 

This may have something to do with the merciless pounding they have taken from the Ukrainian military, which has murdered thousands of civilians in aerial bombardments of cities and towns. Kiev’s attitude toward its citizens in the eastern part of the country was succinctly summed up by Poroshenko, who famously declared:

“Our children will go to school, to kindergarten, while theirs’ will hole up in basements. This is how we will win this war!”

His statement has got to be the first time in recorded history that a government leader has boasted about targeting children in wartime."

Wednesday, September 16, 2015

Can the West afford to ignore Russia's offer to resolve the current Ukrainian conflict through the Minsk-2 Agreements?

"West 'ignored Russian offer in 2012 to have Syria's Assad step aside'."

Why?

Because the goal of the U.S. and its allies was regime change -- getting rid of Bashar al-Assad, who was considered an ally of Iran, another U.S. target for regime change in the Middle East.

The U.S. and its allies did not want to risk a negotiated political settlement that could have resulted in a new Syrian government with supporters of Assad or Iran at the helm -- so the U.S. & Co. funded, trained and equipped Syrian opposition rebels with the expectation that they would topple Assad's government -- Syria's lawful government -- fairly quickly.

What do we have now in 2015? 

A country devastated by war, over 200 thousand killed and ten million plus Syrians abroad seeking refuge in other countries.

Plus we have ISIS and other Islamic fundamentalist (extremist) rebels whose international ranks (now trained, experienced and full of blood-lust) constitute a clear and present danger -- including from terrorism -- worldwide and especially to their countries of origin and previous residence.
  
Was it moral, just or legal for the U.S. to try to oust Syria's president Assad? Had Syria declared war on the United States? 

Had Syria been proven guilty in terrorist attacks on Americans?

Could  the fact that Syria's president opposed U.S. foreign policy and refused to obey Washington's orders ever justify military, political and economic interference in another country's internal affairs?

Can it be argued that America's regime change project in Ukraine, which includes

- U.S. support (political, financial and military) of extreme right nationalist Ukrainian political movements (Svoboda party, UNA-UNSO, Right Sector and etc.),

- the Euromaydan protests, including aggravated assault and murder of Ukrainian police officers lawfully assigned to protect government buildings and officials,

- the unlawful ouster of President Yanukovich in February of 2014,  

- the approval and support (political, financial and military) of the so called "Ant-Terrorist Operation" (ATO) in East Ukraine against political movements and civilian populations who refused to recognize the legitimacy of the new pro-American government and voted for governmental autonomy from it in local referendums in May of 2014, a military and police operation that has devastated East Ukraine and includes the commission of numerous and grievous war crimes and crimes against humanity,
  
could produce the same results in Ukraine, the geographic center of Europe, as in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and/or Syria? 

After all, the Poroshenko-Yatsenyuk government does not seem to be interested in resolving this civil conflict (war) through a political compromise by holding direct negotiations with the political leadership of the Donetsk and Lugansk Self-Proclaimed Republics (DNR/LNR).

Instead, the U.S. backed Poroshenko-Yatsenyuk government continues to believe that that DNR/LNR can be subdued eventually with an economic blockade and military action (as long as Russia does not provided direct military assistance to them!).
   
Let's think about it. If Russia is willing to provide direct military assistance to its ally, the Syrian government at a distance of 1200+ KM from Russia's borders (just like the U.S. has provided assistance to its allies across the globe, including Vietnam and etc.), does anyone really think that Russia won't provide direct military assistance to local rebels in DNR/LNR who are fighting a U.S. backed government in Kyiv that presents a clear and present danger (political, economic and military) to Putin's Russia?
  
So can the Ukrainian people and Europeans afford to have the same scenario unfold in East Ukraine and beyond as in the Middle East? After all, Europe is lucky that over a million of Ukrainian refugees have chosen to flee to Russia unlike their middle-eastern counterparts who are now storming European shores and borders while they seek refuge from the flames of war that the U.S. and its European allies have ignited and fed in Syria?
   
Sadly, the Poroshenko-Yastenyuk regime in Ukraine and its supporters in Washington understand that if DNR/LNR are reintegrated into Ukraine with political & economic autonomy and protection from political prosecution, then these regions with a population of over 7 million are likely to topple their governments in the next elections.

Why? Because the resident of DNR/LNR haven't forgotten how the Ukrainian government forces tried to bomb their cities, villages, industry and infrastructure into the stone age and how the Poroshenko-Yastenyuk  government tried to starve them into submission with a complete blockade blockade on the delivery of foodstuffs, medicine, goods, pensions and anything else of material value into their rebellious regions.
  
Once, again, we have a choice in America and Ukraine. We can step on the same rake twice -- by trying to resolve the East Ukrainian conflict with military means and the facing the same consequences as in Syria -- or we can try to resolve it with a negotiated political settlement.

But we must be ready to accept the strong possibility that  such a political settlement includes the risk of having a U.S. supported regime eventually be replaced by an independent Ukrainian government that's likely to select a non-aligned course to maintain the peace and productive economic relations both with the U.S., the EU and Russia.

So what's it gonna be? Another Syria, but in the center of Europe, or a political settlement like in Northern Ireland?
  
*****************

West 'ignored Russian offer in 2012 to have Syria's Assad step aside'.


"Exclusive: Senior negotiator describes rejection of alleged proposal – since which time tens of thousands have been killed and millions displaced.
...
Russia proposed more than three years ago that Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, could step down as part of a peace deal, according to a senior negotiator involved in back-channel discussions at the time.
...
Former Finnish president and Nobel peace prize laureate Martti Ahtisaari said western powers failed to seize on the proposal. Since it was made, in 2012, tens of thousands of people have been killed and millions uprooted, causing the world’s gravest refugee crisis since the second world war.
...  
Ahtisaari won the Nobel prize in 2008 “for his efforts on several continents and over more than three decades, to resolve international conflicts”, including in Namibia, Aceh in Indonesia, Kosovo and Iraq. 
... 
Ahtisaari held talks with envoys from the five permanent members of the UN security council in February 2012. He said that during those discussions, the Russian ambassador, Vitaly Churkin, laid out a three-point plan, which included a proposal for Assad to cede power at some point after peace talks had started between the regime and the opposition. 
... 
On 22 February 2012 he was sent to meet the missions of the permanent five nations (the US, Russia, UK, France and China) at UN headquarters in New York by The Elders, a group of former world leaders advocating peace and human rights that has included Nelson Mandela, Jimmy Carter, and former UN secretary general Kofi Annan.
...
But he said that the US, Britain and France were so convinced that the Syrian dictator was about to fall, they ignored the proposal.
... 
“It was an opportunity lost in 2012,” Ahtisaari said in an interview. 
...
“Nothing happened because I think all these, and many others, were convinced that Assad would be thrown out of office in a few weeks so there was no need to do anything.”
...
At the time of Ahtisaari’s visit to New York, the death toll from the Syrian conflict was estimated to be about 7,500. The UN believes that toll passed 220,000 at the beginning of this year, and continues to climb. The chaos has led to the rise of Islamic State. Over 11 million Syrians have been forced out of their homes.
...
“We should have prevented this from happening because this is a self-made disaster, this flow of refugees to our countries in Europe,” Ahtisaari said. “I don’t see any other option but to take good care of these poor people … We are paying the bills we have caused ourselves.”"

Read the rest at http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/15/west-ignored-russian-offer-in-2012-to-have-syrias-assad-step-aside

Friday, August 7, 2015

Listing of URA Observer's Prior Posts on Facebook.

For those of you who may not follow or have missed this blog's prior posts on Facebook, here's a list:
  
The Ukrainian-Russian-American Observer

https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer


Report: Global War On Terror Has Killed Over 4 Million Muslims.
August 5, 2015

     https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1165102920170512

You can lose your U.S. passport without a court order or a contested court proceeding if you're suspected of helping terrorists or not paying your taxes!
August 5, 2015

     https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1165029146844556

Dumping Debt and Seizing Assets - Ukrainian Countermeasures for Russian Aggression?
July 30, 2015

     https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1161466413867496

Ukraine agribusiness firms in 'quiet land grab' with development finance.
July 30, 2015 

     https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1161461493867988

What is happening to civilians trapped in eastern Ukraine’s war zone?
July 30, 2015

     https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1161458573868280
  
When Ukraine is no longer Ukraine.
July 30, 2015 
  
     https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1161390380541766

Ukraine faces mass starvation and the exodus of millions, says bishop
July 30, 2015

     https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1161388253875312

Pentagon Plans More Support for Ukraine as Buffer Zone Mooted
July 30, 2015
  
     https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1161384840542320
  
Special Report: Ukraine struggles to control maverick battalions
July 30, 2015 

     https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1160846030596201

Ukraine: World’s unseen refugee crisis
July 28, 2015 

      https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1160339223980215

OSCE Delegation Confirms That It Came Under Fire in Donbass
July 28, 2015 

      https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1160332987314172

The White House Should Resist Calls to Arm Ukraine
July 28, 2015

       https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1160329397314531

Ukrainian Jew who transported 137 faceless corpses starts over in Israel
July 28, 2015 

       https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1160323293981808

In America, mass incarceration has caused more crime than it’s prevented
July 25, 2015 

       https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1158445637502907
  
New Sandy Bland Dash Cam Footage Released - The Young Turks
July 25, 2015 

       https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1158416917505779
  
IMF Violates IMF Rules, to Continue Ukraine Bailouts
July 13, 2015 

      https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1150285758318895 

The IMF Has Made €2.5 Billion Profit Out of Greece Loans
July 6, 2015 

      https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1146490755365062

Churches introduce FACIAL RECOGNITION to keep track of members' attendance
July 2, 2015

      https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1143869662293838
  
XKEYSCORE: NSA's Google for the World's Private Communications
July 2, 2015

    https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1143842275629910

What Borders Mean to Europe
The Muslim refugee crisis, Greece's economic quagmire and the situation in Ukraine all stem from Europe's understanding of borders.
July 2, 2015

     https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1143739658973505
   
Operation Barbarossa
June 23, 2015
  
      https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1138237539523717

Thursday, July 2, 2015

What borders mean for democracy, Europe, Russia, Ukraine and the United States.

What borders mean for democracy, Europe, Russia, Ukraine and the United States, 

a commentary on

What Borders Mean to Europe
By George Friedman, founder of Stratfor
Geopolitical Weekly
June 23, 2015
 
https://www.stratfor.com/weekly/what-borders-mean-europe
 
********
   
When it comes to the age-old argument of a state (a country's) right to territorial integrity vs. a local people's right to self-determination, I've always been a supporter of genuine democracy, that is a local population's inalienable right to determine -- through a local democratic election or referendum -- what state (country) they want to join, stay in or leave.

So if the local people of Scotland or Northern Ireland hold a referendum and decide to leave the UK, then we should respect their right and the rest of the UK's population should be able to prevent them from leaving, even on the typical grounds of territorial integrity and national security.

The same democratic standard should be applicable to

- Quebec in Canada,
- Basque country in Spain,
- Kurdistan in Turkey, Iraq & Iran,
- Palestinians in the West Bank, Gaza, Jordan, Lebanon & Egypt, 
- Tyroleans in Italy,
- Darfur in Sudan,
- Igboland in Nigeria,

and countless other populations world-wide who'd like their own state (country) or genuine autonomy based on ethnicity, race, religion, language or other local cultural traits.

Holding a local population hostage in a country where they perceive discrimination, persecution or any other form of second-class citizen status is not democratic, but a vestige of past imperial and colonialist traditions.

When politicians and/or people from other parts of a country in question believe that they're entitled to dictate to a local population where it belongs, that's a perversion, if not an outright denial, of true democracy. 
 
Such a litmus test can have scary repercussions.

What if Alaskans decided in a genuine democratic people's referendum that the government in Washington didn't represent their interests and they wanted to leave the Union?

What if a majority of Texans, residents of an independent republic (country) before it joined the U.S.A. decided to leave the U.S., should the residents of California, Vermont or Florida have the right to prevent them from leaving?

What if residents of a conservative state like Utah, decide that they don't want to accept gay marriage and leave the Union?

Sound familiar? It should, because I bet that any state which tries to leave the U.S. will find out (even at the receiving end of a gun barrel) what territorial integrity means and how even the self-proclaimed cradle of democracy just pays lip service to a people's right to self-determination.

Movements for governmental self-determination through  autonomy or the creation of a separate independent state usually encounter resistance through the following:

 
1. Constitutional requirements or other state laws that prohibit any challenges to the country's territorial integrity by

- outlawing separatism or any individual or organized efforts that challenge the current governmental or constitutional regime through demands for autonomy or independence.
- demanding that any autonomy or independence be decided not just by the local population (true democracy) but by the majority of an entire country's electorate and parliament.  
 
2. Prohibitions against local referendums on autonomy or independence.

- these can be constitutional or based on other laws. Regardless, even if the local population, through local political parties or acts of local (municipal) legislatures, decides overwhelmingly to hold a referendum, it will be prohibited by law.
 
As a result, the only alternative is to hold an unofficial people's referendum with all ensuing consequences -- legal invalidity, criminal prosecution of organizers & participants and, if necessary, military (national guard) intervention to prevent or stop the vote.

- some past movements for autonomy or independence, when confronted with a prohibition against a referendum and the bigger country's ability to enforce it, elected to first secure their local territory's borders with insurgents and then hold a referendum to affirm the local population's democratic choice for autonomy.

While this practical approach ensured the holding of a referendum unfettered, it also provided the bigger country's government and its allies with justification to fight the local separatist movement since the local separatists first staged an armed revolt, any subsequent local referendum should be considered null and void.
 
3. Refusal to recognize and deal with the results of a local referendum.

 
- if the referendum takes place anyway (even a verifiable democratic people's referendum with more than sufficient voter turnout), the the country's government, media and its foreign allies will refuse to recognize it, not only from a formal legal perspective, but also as a valid democratic expression of a people's will. 

4. Police, military and economic crackdown on separatists

If, based on the results of a local referendum, the local population decides to declare autonomy or independence and refuse to accept the bigger country's government authority in the local -- now autonomous or independent -- territory, then the state will enforce its territorial integrity through the use of police and military power, no matter how brutal its application or consequences for the local civilian population.

Police and military measures are supplanted by an economic blockade of the insurgent territory, even it results in civilian deaths from starvation, disease, loss of shelter and utilities.

The above measures are always justified by a country's sovereign (almost holy) right to territorial integrity and self-defense on national security grounds, true or not, as the separatists could collude with the bigger country's enemies.
Now add economics into the mix. As they say, always follow the money trail, since money don't lie. What if the region that wants autonomy is wealthier than the rest of the country due to industry or valuable natural resources?

What are the chances that the bigger country would allow its population to have genuine economic & political autonomy or independence and take away the contributions to the country's economy -- often so substantial or irreplaceable that their loss could cripple the bigger country's economy or result in default before its foreign creditors?
 
So what does this all mean in the 21st century for countries (not just in Europe), their borders and a people's right to democratic self determination?

If you're a people living in a small and poor region without any strategic value (political, economic, military or cultural), then you may have a chance at securing greater autonomy or outright independence from your country, since it's probably tired of supporting your population without any clear returns in the present or future.

If you're a people living in a strategically  important or wealthy region and you insist on autonomy or independence, then get ready to learn the true value of democracy in a brutal civil war -- a war that you're likely to lose militarily without substantial foreign military, economic and political assistance.

And that type of assistance, given its political and economic costs for the sponsor country, will only come from  your former country's competitors (enemies) and/or countries where the local population will support you (and, if necessary, fight for you) as one of their own on ethnic, religious and/or political ideological grounds.  

Now take the the above premises and apply them to any current civil conflict and movement for greater autonomy or independence.

So what do you think the future holds for those movements?

Do you think

- Iraq will just give up oil-rich Kurdistan in the name of democracy and historical justice for the Kurds?
- Nigeria will give up oil-rich Igboland?
- Ukraine will give up industrial & coal-rich Donestk Coal basin?
- The United States will ever give up Alaska or Texas if the residents of those states chose to leave?

Now, if you're a true supported of democracy and, consequently, a people's right to political and governmental self-determination, what do you think is the right thing to do, regardless of the economic consequences for you or the bigger country in question?

Will you act and vote with or democratic hearts & souls for self-determination or with our wallets and/or pride (committed to ethnic, religious or cultural allegiances) for territorial integrity?
 
Actually, many ordinary folks, especially those who know the horrors of war, will support the status quo and forfeit democracy just to avoid the prospect of bloodshed in a civil war. 

Regardless of your position, the Strafor article is food for thought, including its discussion of Ukraine.


Contributor: Greg Krasovsky
 
See The Ukrainian-Russian-American Observer's Facebook page at
https://www.facebook.com/URA.Observer/posts/1143739658973505

******

Selected quotes from "What Borders Mean to Europe"
    "The right of national self-determination has created many distinct nations in Europe. And, as nations do, they sometimes distrust and fear one other, which occasionally leads to wars. They also have memories of betrayals and victimizations that stretch back for centuries before the nations became states. Some viewed the borders as unjust, because they placed their compatriots under foreign rule, or as insufficient to national need. The right of self-determination led inevitably to borders, and the question of borders inevitably led to disputes among states.
...
Since the end of the Cold War, the principle of the inviolability of borders has been violated repeatedly — through the creation of new borders, through the creation of newly freed nation-states, through peaceful divisions and through violent war. The principle of stable borders held for the most part until 1991 before undergoing a series of radical shifts that sometimes settled the issue and sometimes left it unresolved. The Europeans welcomed most of these border adjustments, and in one case — Kosovo — Europeans themselves engineered the change.

It is in this context that the Ukrainian war must be considered.
...
The idea of borders being archaic is meaningful only if the nation-state is archaic. There is no evidence that this is true in Europe. On the contrary, all of the pressures we see culturally and economically point to not only the persistence of the idea of nationality, but also to its dramatic increase in Europe. At the same time, there is no evidence that the challenge to borders is abating. In fact, during the past quarter of a century, the number of shifts and changes, freely or under pressure, has only increased. And each challenge of a national border, such as the one occurring in Ukraine, is a challenge to a nation's reality and sense of self."