Comments by "R Johansen" (@rjohansen9486) on "'Sympathy for Russia...': Barack Obama's Big Admission on Crimea amid Ukraine War | Watch" video.
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The Revolution of Dignity, also known as the Maidan Revolution took place in Ukraine in February 2014 at the end of the Euromaidan protests, when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in the capital Kyiv culminated in the ousting of Kreml puppet President Yanukovych and a return to the 2004 Constitution.
In November 2013, a wave of large-scale protests (known as Euromaidan) began in response to President Yanukovych's sudden decision not to sign an already negotieted political association and free trade agreement with EU, instead choosing closer ties to Russia. Earlier that year, the Ukrainian parliament had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement with the EU. Russia had put much pressure on Ukraine to reject it, but they declined. The scope of the protests widened, with calls for the resignation of Yanukovych and the Azarov government. Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of oligarchs, police brutality, and human rights violations. Ressive anti-protest laws fuelled further anger.
In January and February 2014 further protests resulted in the Azarov government resignation. On 21 February, Yanukovych and the parliamentary opposition signed an agreement to bring about an interim unity government, constitutional reforms and early elections. Yanukovych fled the city the same day. The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0.
Parliament restored the 2004 amendments to the Ukrainian constitution. An interim government, led by Arseniy Yatsenyuk, signed the EU association agreement and disbanded the Berkut. Petro Poroshenko became president after winning the 2014 presidential elections.
Russia then occupied and then annexed Crimea, with “little green men” (Russian masked soldiers). More “little green men” together with Russian armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war.
The Russian Federation initially denied that these were Russian military forces, but on 17 April 2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin finally confirmed the presence of the Russian military. Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, stated that 50,000 Russian citizens fought in the Donbas up to August 2015.
These soldiers are the ones that the Ukraninan government fought against, NOT “shelling of innocents in Donbass”, which Russian trolls will tell you.
Then in 2022 they invaded with much larger forces (even if they said it was just a drill. The Ukrainians, UN and other nations tried with diplomacy, but Putin DENIED. He wanted his imperialistic war, no matter what)
Since then they have plundered and raped their way through the Southeastern Ukraine. Shelled civilian houses and infrastructure. Trucks after trucks loaded with stolen goods (washing machines, toilets??, computers) has been sent home to Russia.
International Criminal Court investigation in Ukraine: Since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the Russian military and authorities have committed multiple war crimes in the form of deliberate attacks against civilian targets, massacres of civilians, torture and rape of women and children, torture and mutilitation of Ukrainian prisoners of war, and indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas.
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The history of the Crimean Peninsula, historically known as Tauris begins around the 5th century BCE when several Greek colonies were established along its coast. The culture remained Greek for almost two thousand years.
In the medieval period, it was partially conquered by Kievan Rus. Thereafter a period to the Mongols, who later lost to the Ottoman Empire.
In 1774, the Ottoman Empire was defeated by Catherine the Great. From 1853 to 1856, the strategic position of the peninsula in controlling the Black Sea meant that it was the site of the principal engagements of the Crimean War, where Russia lost to a French-led alliance.
By the late 19th century, Crimean Tatars continued to form a slight plurality of Crimea's still largely rural population and were the predominant portion of the population in the mountainous area and about half of the steppe population. There were large numbers of Russians concentrated in the Feodosiya district and Ukrainians as well as smaller numbers of Jews, Belarussians, Turks, Armenians, and Greeks and Roma. Germans and Bulgarians settled in the Crimea at the beginning of the 19th century.
During the ensuing Russian Civil War, Crimea changed hands numerous times and was for a time a stronghold of the anti-Bolshevik White Army. It was in Crimea that the White Russians made their last stand against the Red Army in 1920.
Approximately 50,000 White prisoners of war and civilians were summarily executed by shooting or hanging after the defeat at the end of 1920. This is considered one of the largest massacres in the Civil War. BETWEEN 56,000 AND 150,000 OF THE CIVILIAN POPULATION WERE THEN MURDERED as part of the Red Terror, organized by Béla Kun.
In 1921, the Crimean ASSR was created as an autonomous republic of the Russian SFSR.
However, this did not protect the Crimean Tatars, who constituted about 25% of the Crimean population, from Joseph Stalin's repressions of the 1930s. The Greeks were another cultural group that suffered. Their lands were lost during the process of collectivisation, in which farmers were not compensated with wages. Schools which taught Greek were closed and GREEK LITERATURE WAS DESTROYED, because the Soviets considered the Greeks as "counter-revolutionary" with their links to capitalist state Greece, and their independent culture.
Crimea experienced two severe famines in the 20th century, the Famine of 1921–1922 and the Holodomor of 1932–1933.[40] A large Slavic population (mainly Russians and Ukrainians) influx occurred in the 1930s as a result of the Soviet policy of regional development. (THE INHABITANTS WERE LITERALLY EXCHANGED WITH SLAVIC PEOPLE). These demographic changes permanently altered the ethnic balance in the region
On 18 May 1944, the entire population of the Crimean Tatars were forcibly deported in the "Sürgün" (Crimean Tatar for exile) to Central Asia by Stalin. The ASSR was downgraded to an oblast within the Russian SFSR in 1945 following the ETHNIC CLEANSING OF THE CRIMEAN TATARS and in 1954, Crimea was transferred to the Ukrainian SSR as part of celebrations of the 300th anniversary of the Treaty of Pereyaslav.
Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the Republic of Crimea was formed in 1992, although the republic was abolished in 1995, with the Autonomous Republic of Crimea established firmly under Ukrainian authority and Sevastopol being administered as a city with special status.
In 2014, Crimea saw intense demonstrations against the removal of the Ukrainian president Yanukovych culminating in pro-Russian forces occupying strategic points in Crimea and the Republic of Crimea declared independence from Ukraine following a disputed referendum supporting reunification. Russia then formally annexed Crimea, although most countries recognise Crimea as part of Ukraine.
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Here's what Obama REALLY said:
Former President Obama defended his response to Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014 on Thursday, saying that circumstances were different then compared to Russia’s military invasion of Ukraine last year.
“Ukraine of that time was not the Ukraine that we’re talking about today,” Obama said in an interview with CNN on Thursday “There’s a reason there was not an armed invasion of Crimea, because Crimea was full of a lot of Russian speakers and there was some sympathy to the views that Russia was representing.”
Russia ILLEGALLY HELD AN ELECTION and annexed the Crimean peninsula of Ukraine in 2014. In response, the U.S. and European allies led a sanctions campaign which fell far short of its goals in weakening Russia and preventing further action in Ukraine.
WESTERN ALLIES DID NOT PROVIDE UKRAINE WITH ANY MATERIAL SUPPORT to fight Russia, or object to the annexation beyond economic or diplomatic means, the former president argued.
Instead, Russia claimed Crimea as a rightful part of the country given that a majority of the population in the region was ethnically Russian and spoke Russian, a view that had some understanding in Europe, Obama said.
“Part of what happened was, both myself and also [German Chancellor Angela] Merkel, who I give enormous credit for, had to pull in a lot of other Europeans kicking and screaming to impose the sanctions that we did and TO PREVENT PUTIN FROM CONTINUING THROUGH THE DONBASS AND THROUGH THE REST OF UKRAINE,” he added.
Obama said that the sense of identity and ability to push back against Russia developed in Ukraine after the 2014 annexation, and that identity and ability is what led to the fierce resistance now.
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@chlim6826 CEPA: Russia’s Lie Machine Fans Flames of Odessa ‘Massacre’
Most of the propaganda themes used by Russia to try to justify its invasion of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine dated back at least as far as the 2004 “Orange Revolution.” They took on a whole new dimension following the Euromaidan revolution of 2013-14, reaching a level so extraordinary that the head of one state TV channel reportedly said that they made Cold War disinformation look like “child’s play”.
Portrayals of the new government in Kyiv as a “fascist junta”, supported by anti-Semitic hordes and waging genocide against Russian-speakers did however hit major obstacles. Prominent Ukrainian Jewish figures took out full-page adverts in several international newspapers to debunk such claims and condemn Russian aggression. On several occasions, Jewish or other ethnic minorities issued public statements dissociating themselves from fake ethnic groups claiming persecution.
There was further incontrovertible evidence that the rampant fascism narrative was nonsense. In May 2014, the two Ukrainian far-Right presidential candidates together received a mere 2% of the popular vote. While there are certainly far-Right groups in Ukraine, and the authorities often fail to respond adequately to racist or homophobic attacks, the scale of the problem remains small. Despite this, any report about the far-Right or anti-Semitism in Ukraine is far more likely to hit the headlines than stories about similar trends in Russia, or about Russia’s extensive links with far-Right groups in European countries.
The problem is, however, that most people have no idea that they are being deceived and would simply not think to verify the information they receive if they watch Russia’s state-funded RT (formerly Russia Today), assuming this to be a Russian version of the BBC or Deutsche Welle.
It is seven years since 48 people died during disturbances and a terrible fire in Odessa. The flames were still smoldering when Russia first began presenting the conflagration as a massacre by Ukrainian nationalists. This has continued regardless of several investigations, by the bipartisan 2 May Group; the Council of Europe’s International Advisory Panel and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Each has found that the earlier disturbances began when a large group of pro-Russian activists attacked a peaceful march in support of Ukrainian unity. From then on, weapons were used by both sides and six people were killed. Toward evening, pro-Ukrainian activists headed towards Kulikove Pole Square intending to destroy a tent camp set up by pro-Russian activists. The latter responded with gunfire and Molotov cocktails from the roof and windows of the Trade Union building. All independent reports agree that with Molotov cocktails being thrown both at and from the building, it is impossible to determine the source of the fire which caused the death of 42 pro-Russian activists.
Selective coverage was evident from the outset. All Russian video footage treated Ukrainian “radicals” as the perpetrators of the earlier riots. No mention was made of the shooting and Molotov cocktails from inside the building, nor of the pro-Ukrainian activists who risked their safety to rescue people from the building. Russian footage instead showed a pro-Ukrainian activist firing a pistol at the building, failing to note that the man was returning fire coming from the building’s windows and that his pistol contained blanks.
Two years after the Council of Europe’s report, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that, “Ukrainian nationalists drove defenseless people into the Trade Union building and burned them alive”. This knowingly false story has now been peddled around the world, with generously financed exhibitions and carefully selected “witnesses” taken on tours of European countries.
It is a story that is known to have cost even more lives, with many of the young men who volunteered to fight for the Kremlin-backed insurgents in eastern Ukraine citing the alleged “Odessa massacre” as a catalyst.
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