The News & AntiWar.com – 2014-03-18 01:30:48
http://www.thenews.com.pk/article-141408-Crimea-declares-independence-from-Ukraine,-applies-to-join-Russia-
Republic of Crimea Appeals UN, World to Recognize It as Independent State
The News
SIMFEROPOL (March 17, 2014) — Crimea’s regional assembly on Monday declared independence from Ukraine and applied to join Russia, saying all Ukrainian state property on the peninsula would be nationalised.
“The republic of Crimea appeals to the United Nations and to all countries of the world to recognise it as an independent state,” read a document approved by the assembly, a day after the peninsula voted overwhelmingly to become part of Russia.
Ukraine: Russia Mediation Proposal ‘Unacceptable’
Jason Ditz / AntiWar.com
(March 17, 2014) — After a solid week of US officials berating them, Russian officials came to the table with Ukraine’s interim government, offering a proposal of “mediation.”
The proposal included calls for dramatic revisions to the Ukrainian constitution, something US officials had also endorsed yesterday. Despite this, Ukrainian officials reacted with outrage, and condemned the proposal as “unacceptable.”
The Russian proposal sought the constitutional revision to grant broad levels of autonomy to individual provinces within the country, and also to cement the nation as permanently neutral militarily.
Ukrainian officials are more interested in railing at the Crimean referendum yesterday, though that seems to be a done deal, with an overwhelming majority backing accession into the Russian Federation and Russia formally recognizing their independence.
Ukraine Announces Full Mobilization, Readying for War
Jason Ditz / AntiWar.com
(March 17, 2014) — While insisting they remain committed to “diplomacy” in their ongoing dispute over possession of the Crimean Republic, Ukraine’s interim government today announced a full military mobilization, preparing for war.
Many in the newly installed Ukraine government see war with Russia as inevitable, and the military is digging defensive trenches along their eastern border with Russia, while officials pledge harsh crackdowns against ethnic Russians in Donetsk, who supported the ousted elected government and have protested the new one.
Interim Defense Minister Ihor Tenyukh insisted that Crimea “will be our territory,” and that the troops still deployed in Crimea will not withdraw. Russian and Ukrainian officials announced a “truce” over those bases until Friday, hoping cooler heads would prevail.
Yet protest leader Vitali “Dr. Ironfist” Klitschko insisted that Friday won’t change anything, and the troops will remain beyond the date to control the bases.
Interim Justice Minister Pavlo Petrenko insisted that between now and Friday the Army needs to be “ready for combat” and that the interim government’s goal is “to restore the military might of Ukraine.”
Despite the bellicose talk, Sen. John Barrasso (R – WY) says interim PM Arseniy Yatsenyuk told him a quite different story of a military where “nothing flies, nothing shoots and nothing works,” and urged major US military aid for his country. Though President Obama has pledged support for Ukraine’s new government regaining control of Ukraine, so far they have stopped short of pledging military backing for a war against Russia.
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