jimnyc
02-26-2014, 10:58 AM
I wonder if Russia will get involved? I'm no expert on Russia/Ukraine relations/history, but a friend of mine tells me that there will be much, much worse fighting if Russia tries to intervene.
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday ordered a test of combat readiness for troops stationed in a region that touches Ukraine’s northern border as tensions continued to escalate in the strife-torn Eastern European country.
The Wall Street Journal reported early Wednesday that the move comes as the situation deteriorates between Russia and Ukraine, whose pro-Russian president, Viktor Yanukovych, was ousted by European-leaning protesters at the weekend following violence in which more than 80 people were killed.
A warrant for the ousted president's arrest was issued this week but he remains at large and is believed to be hiding in Crimea, a pro-Russian region on the Black Sea.
“In accordance with the decree of the president, today at 1400 [1000 GMT] troops were put on alert in the Western Military District as well as units stationed with the 2nd Army Central Military District Command involved in aerospace defense, airborne troops and long-range military transport aircraft,” Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said, according to the Journal.
The Western District is based in St. Petersburg and stretches from Russia’s western arctic to its border with Ukraine and Belarus. The central district is based in Yekaterinburg and stretches from Siberia to just west of the Ural Mountains.
Meanwhile, thousands of pro-Russia separatists and supporters of Ukraine's new leaders confronted each other on Wednesday outside Crimea's regional parliament before a debate on the political upheaval that swept away Yanukovich.
About 2,000 people, many of them ethnic Tatars who are the indigenous group on the Black Sea peninsula, converged on the parliament building to support the 'Euro-Maidan' movement which overturned Yanukovich in Kiev after three months of protests.
They were met by a similar number of pro-Russia demonstrators who bellowed loyalty to Moscow and denounced the "bandits" who had seized power in the Ukrainian capital.
The two sides, who were held apart by police lines, rallied in a noisy cacophony outside the parliament which, under pressure from pro-Russia forces, had called an emergency session for later on Wednesday to discuss the crisis.
Crimea was transferred from Russia to Ukraine in 1954 in the Soviet-era by then Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev. With a part of Russia's Black Sea fleet based in the port of Sevastopol, it is the only region of Ukraine where ethnic Russians dominate in numbers, although many ethnic Ukrainians in other eastern areas speak Russian as their first language.
http://www.newsmax.com/Headline/putin-high-alert-ukraine/2014/02/26/id/554824
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday ordered a test of combat readiness for troops stationed in a region that touches Ukraine’s northern border as tensions continued to escalate in the strife-torn Eastern European country.
The Wall Street Journal reported early Wednesday that the move comes as the situation deteriorates between Russia and Ukraine, whose pro-Russian president, Viktor Yanukovych, was ousted by European-leaning protesters at the weekend following violence in which more than 80 people were killed.
A warrant for the ousted president's arrest was issued this week but he remains at large and is believed to be hiding in Crimea, a pro-Russian region on the Black Sea.
“In accordance with the decree of the president, today at 1400 [1000 GMT] troops were put on alert in the Western Military District as well as units stationed with the 2nd Army Central Military District Command involved in aerospace defense, airborne troops and long-range military transport aircraft,” Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said, according to the Journal.
The Western District is based in St. Petersburg and stretches from Russia’s western arctic to its border with Ukraine and Belarus. The central district is based in Yekaterinburg and stretches from Siberia to just west of the Ural Mountains.
Meanwhile, thousands of pro-Russia separatists and supporters of Ukraine's new leaders confronted each other on Wednesday outside Crimea's regional parliament before a debate on the political upheaval that swept away Yanukovich.
About 2,000 people, many of them ethnic Tatars who are the indigenous group on the Black Sea peninsula, converged on the parliament building to support the 'Euro-Maidan' movement which overturned Yanukovich in Kiev after three months of protests.
They were met by a similar number of pro-Russia demonstrators who bellowed loyalty to Moscow and denounced the "bandits" who had seized power in the Ukrainian capital.
The two sides, who were held apart by police lines, rallied in a noisy cacophony outside the parliament which, under pressure from pro-Russia forces, had called an emergency session for later on Wednesday to discuss the crisis.
Crimea was transferred from Russia to Ukraine in 1954 in the Soviet-era by then Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev. With a part of Russia's Black Sea fleet based in the port of Sevastopol, it is the only region of Ukraine where ethnic Russians dominate in numbers, although many ethnic Ukrainians in other eastern areas speak Russian as their first language.
http://www.newsmax.com/Headline/putin-high-alert-ukraine/2014/02/26/id/554824