Staunton, February 13 – In what Vladimir Putin may see as an additional benefit and others as collateral damage, the Minsk accords have deepened splits within the European Union, with European Parliament Vice President Ryszard Czarnecki saying that the German and French leaders “sacrificed” Ukraine at Munich for the economic interests of their own countries. […]
Staunton, February 14 – Despite his success in intimidating some European governments into inaction or even willingness to come to terms with the results of his aggression, Vladimir Putin in fact is having to cope with an ever-shrinking Russia world as his insistence on Minsk as a venue for talks about Ukraine shows. Indeed, had […]
Staunton, February 14 — Concerned that regional TV channels in Russia might broadcast something at variance to Moscow ones, especially in the run-up to the 2016 presidential elections, Vladimir Putin is moving quietly but quickly to take total control of those channels based outside of Moscow and in some cases still relatively independent of it. […]
Staunton, February 13 – Many including the author of these lines have compared what happened in Minsk this week with what happened in Munich in 1938, but Vytautas Landsbergis, the man who played the key role in recovering the independence of Lithuania, argues that the Minsk meeting was “much worse than Munich.” One reason for […]
Staunton, February 12 In the 1930s, Hitler pursued a simple policy: he simply said one thing and did another. Putin has innovated: he not only lies but uses forces to do his bidding for which no one holds him responsible and thus has the chance to be accepted by some in the West as a […]
Staunton, February 6 — Over the last two year period for which statistics are available, only 37 ethnic Russians moved from Estonia to the Russian Federation despite Moscow’s program for resettling what it calls “compatriots” and the regular complaints of Russian officials that Estonia is oppressing its ethnic Russian minority. In February 6 issue of […]
Staunton, February 6 – Like many countries, the Russian Federation suffers from many regional and ethnic tensions, any one of which could become a Donbas if an outside power provided it with assistance, a reality that both Moscow and many in the West appear to have forgotten, according to Ukrainian commentator Pavel Kazarin. In a […]
Staunton, February 8 – Many people around the world are not only horrified by the Russian invasion of Ukraine but surprised that such a thing could be happening now. But they shouldn’t be, Igor Eidman says, because the invasion is the “absolutely logical” outcome of the “deferred demand” for Russian fascism of a century ago […]
Staunton, February 6 – In their rush to end the fighting in southeastern Ukraine, Western governments are in danger of creating a far larger and long-lasting problem for the region and themselves in the future, according to Bacho Korchilava, because if the West legitimates a role for Russia in the Donbas, Moscow will be able […]
Staunton, February 6 – Russians have always been inclined to and fearful of religious sectarians seeing them as a threat to their faith and their country, but seldom have they faced one with a more bizarre name than one committed to driving out both Orthodox Christians and Jews from the territory of Eurasia. Called “USSR” […]
