The Ukrainian military is continuing to escalate its attacks against the eastern portion of the country, announcing today that it is suspending the ceasefire at the area around the MH17 crash site.
Ukrainian forces had largely ignored the ceasefire at any rate, attacking several cities within the ceasefire zone in recent days. The announcement appears to portend even further escalation of the offensive against breakaway easterners.
The attacks continue to focus on the city of Donetsk, with intense artillery fire hammering a hospital in the city, hitting the pediatric dental wing and killing at least one civilian.
Rebel leader Aleksander Borondai announced he is stepping down as leader of the eastern rebels, becoming a deputy under new leader, Alexander Zakharchenko, a native of Donetsk. Borondai had been under criticism internationally as a “foreign fighter” because he was originally from Moscow, and says he hopes Zakharchenko will reflect the rebellion’s local nature.
Looking at the pic, one can't help but wonder, wouldn't the Dnieper river make an ideal border between Ukraine and Russia?
I agree with you to a certain extent, but the thing is you have ethnic Russian Ukrainians all over the place and conversely you have full fledged Ukies in the East. When you get involved with ethnic stuff it gets rather complicated. This isn't like Danzig in 1939 when 99% of the population was ethnic German. IN the E you are only talking like 60-70% ethnic Russians.
No, it wouldn't. The population east of the river is overwhelmingly Ukrainian and there's no reason why they should be annexed to a foreign country against their will. Czarist colonialism is wholly out of place in 2014!
"… there's no reason why they should be annexed to a foreign country against their will."
Indeed. So why not stop the fighting and hold referendums in each province?
For the same reason the US regime changers (Nuland et al) wouldn't wait a month for the scheduled elections that would have replaced Yanukovic. Because the regime changing Neocons with their "F*ck the EU!" attitude also have a "F*ck everyone!" attitude. The Neocons want to run Ukraine. And they don't want anyone, the Ukrainian people included, butting in. (Well, actually, they want to run the world, but well, you know, one country at a time.)
Fascism do what fascism dose. And I agree with you, that would be the ideal border between Ukraine and Russia.
What ceasefire? Would that be the same style of ceasefire the Israelis announced in Gaza – they must cease fire whilst we continue firing?
Little by little, the rebellion is crumbling. They've admitted to atrocities, they've hindered the investigation of the air crash, they look like they've stepped straight out of a TV documentary on American white supremacist militias, no one now believes that they have the support of anything but a small minority of the population and now, their leader turns out to be a Russian! What credibility have they got left?
Far more credibility than Poroshenko's gang of genocidal maniacs.
It's not a ceasefire, it's a UNSC resolution. Now I expect the United States to condemn the wanton violence from the Kiev putscists and impose sanctions on them.
Kiev is afraid of info.Instead of analysing,debating info on Russian channels they cut the transmissions one after the other "because information terrorism".Every one who does not agree with Kiev is nowadays called russian spy ! All this with full support of USA and EEC.