Russia Without Bs Jacobin Strikes Out Again
A rally at Kiev's Maidan Nezalezhnosti (Independence Square) before the massacre of almost 50 protesters, February 20, 2014. Photograph by Mykola Vasylechko/Wikimedia Commons.
The Ukraine-Russia disharmonize is at present in its most dangerous phase since it began in 2014 after the Western-backed overthrow of the Ukrainian government. Statements by Russian leaders and the Russian military build-up forth Ukraine's borders propose that the danger of a pregnant escalation in the Donbas is real. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky failed to fulfill his election promise to finish the war and resolve the armed disharmonize in the breakaway eastern region peacefully. Talks between the U.s. and Russia following Russian government demands of written guarantees to stop NATO expansion and, in particular, refuse Ukraine's membership in the alliance (despite its farthermost unlikelihood) are non anticipated to resolve the standoff.
US President Joe Biden, his tiptop officials, Western media, and some military experts cited United states intelligence reports and the Russian armed services build-up nigh Ukraine's borders as evidence of Russian plans to invade Ukraine this winter. Journalists including David Sanger of the New York Times propose the same. However, a full-scale Russian basis invasion and occupation of the entire territory of Ukraine appears to be less likely than a more limited employ of military strength. This could include Russian recognition of independence of the cocky-proclaimed separatist republics in the Donbas (the Donetsk and Luhansk People'south Republics), an open up deployment of Russian troops and advanced weapons in the separatist-controlled region, a seizure of the eastern and southern regions of Ukraine, or missile and air strikes of Ukrainian war machine targets in the Donbas and other territories.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and other Russian leaders have stated that NATO membership of Ukraine or the building of US and NATO military installations along Russia's borders are uncrossable red lines. Such statements imply threats to utilise armed forces force.
One way to solve peacefully the escalating conflicts between Ukraine and Russia, and the civil war in the Donbas, is an international understanding involving Ukraine, Russian federation, the US, and the European Union. Such an understanding could offer Ukraine a path to membership in the EU, provided it fulfills accession criteria—stability of institutions guaranteeing democracy, the rule of law, human rights—in exchange for agreeing not to seek NATO membership and to resolve the conflict in the Donbas based on the Minsk Protocol. Still, such a scenario would be difficult to reach due to the unwillingness to compromise and considering of refusal by the EU to fifty-fifty acknowledge Ukraine as a potential fellow member.
Various hawks care little about the potentially disastrous consequences of an escalation of armed hostilities for Ukraine and ordinary Ukrainians. They regard Ukraine just as a tool for geopolitical goals—in particular, the containment of Russia—and they are willing to sacrifice many lives in order to expand Western influence in the region. Of form, nosotros should not expect any direct military involvement by United states or NATO forces, because such intervention could easily result in a nuclear state of war.
Western and Russian leaders and their media express deeply conflicting views concerning the escalating disharmonize in Ukraine and its origins. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and other officials have repeatedly blasted the Kremlin for instigating the crisis along Ukraine's border in an endeavor to carve out a sphere of influence. They argue that after the pro-Russian government of Viktor Yanukovych was ousted by peaceful protesters in 2014—dozens of whom were massacred by authorities snipers—Russia annexed Crimea and launched a hybrid state of war with Ukraine in the Donbas with the help of Russian proxies. Moreover, Western officials maintain that Ukraine is a sovereign state which has a right to join NATO. In contrast, Russian leaders insist that the Ukrainian authorities was overthrown in a fascist putsch, which led to Crimea voluntary joining Russia and to a civil state of war without Russian armed services involvement in the Donbas. They say that Ukraine has been under de facto NATO rule since 2014 and regard unrecognized separatist republics in the Donbas as independent.
Various evidence presented in studies I have authored, which has been echoed by many other Western scholars who research these issues, show that both of these narratives are inaccurate. Indeed, the question of which side carried out the "snipers' massacre" is central to understanding one of the "bloodiest and virtually controversial hours of European conflict since the end of the Cold War," and the main tipping bespeak in the escalating conflict betwixt the West and Russia over Ukraine. According to testimonies by over 100 wounded protesters, several dozen prosecution witnesses, and forensic ballistic and medical examinations past government experts, the massacre of the absolute majority of protesters and constabulary at the Maidan (fundamental square) in Kyiv on Feb 20, 2014 was perpetrated principally by members of the Maidan opposition, specifically its far-right elements. This outcome precipitated the tearing removal of the corrupt and oligarchic but democratically elected regime in Ukraine, touching off a disharmonize which has since killed more than than 13,000 people. Western governments were at least aware of, or de facto backed, the overthrow.
Protesters at Kiev's Independence Square, December 2013. Photograph past Sasha Maksymenko/Wikimedia Commons.
The hidden origin of the disharmonize
The origin of the Ukraine-Russia conflict, which goes back to the violent overthrow of the pro-Russian Yanukovych government in 2014, is ofttimes misrepresented, omitted or even covered-up by Western governments and, with some notable exceptions, the mainstream media.
Studies I have authored, analyzing the Maidan massacre trials (ongoing since their start in 2015) and investigations in Ukraine, reveal overwhelming prove that the Maidan protesters were massacred past snipers positioned inside Maidan-controlled buildings and non by regime snipers or Berkut (riot) policemen, who have been accused of picking off dozens of demonstrators. Such studies include a peer-reviewed article, a volume chapter, and papers and video appendices presented at major academic conferences, including at the contempo virtual World Congress of the International Council for Central and Eastward European Studies in Montréal. With some notable exceptions, such evidence was not reported by the Western media, which from the commencement blamed authorities snipers and the Berkut police for the massacre of the Maidan protesters on the orders of so President Yanukovych.
Such evidence includes videos, testimonies by more than 100 wounded protesters and several hundred other witnesses, including several dozen prosecution and defence witnesses at the Maidan massacre trial and investigation, and forensic ballistic and medical examinations by government experts.
Synchronized videos show that specific times and directions of shooting of the absolute majority of the protesters did not coincide with the specific times and the approximate directions of live ammunition fire past the special Berkut police unit. Three protesters were killed and x wounded even before this unit appeared in the Maidan. Synchronized video footage besides show that the killings of the protesters practically stopped later the regime sniper units were deployed to the regime-controlled areas near the epicentre of the protest. The videos alone testify beyond any doubt that Berkut and regime snipers did not massacre the Maidan protesters.
Dozens of members and commanders of government sniper units testified as prosecution witnesses at the Maidan massacre trial that they were ordered to locate and neutralize snipers who killed and wounded the Berkut policemen. They also testified that they came under burn down by snipers from Maidan-controlled buildings and areas. Even the official investigation determined that Yanukovych government snipers did not massacre the Maidan protesters. It recently charged an Omega special forces unit sniper with killing one protester. But videos, photos and forensic examinations by government experts, and trial testimonies of two protesters (both of whom were adjacent to him) revealed that he was shot in the back from a steep direction past a corroded bullet from a Maidan-controlled building when he faced the government positions.
Videos released by the BBC, Ukraine'south ICTV, and various other footage, including unbroadcasted segments of the most famous video of the Maidan massacre by Belgium's public-service broadcaster VRT, showed snipers in the Maidan-controlled buildings shooting the protesters and the police and dozens of the protesters and journalists pointing out snipers there. The government investigation revealed that a sniper, who was filmed shooting at the BBC crew, and at protesters in the BBC and ICTV videos, did this from a Hotel Ukraina room in which one of the leaders of far-right Svoboda party then lived.
The accented majority of wounded Maidan protesters testified at the Maidan massacre trial and investigation that they were shot by snipers from Maidan-controlled buildings or witnessed such snipers there. Even the official investigation determined, based on their testimonies and investigative experiments, that well-nigh one-half of the wounded protesters were shot from sectors other than regime positions and did not accuse anyone with their shooting.
A wounded Maidan protester testifies at the Maidan massacre trial virtually snipers in the Maidan-controlled Hotel Ukraina. From the written report "The Maidan Massacre in Ukraine: Revelations from Trials and Investigation," by Ivan Katchanovski. Presented at the tenth Globe Congress of the International Council for Central and East European Studies, August 3-8, 2021.
Forensic medical examinations past government experts tasked with investigating the Maidan massacre determined that the absolute majority of the protesters were shot from the side and back and superlative to bottom directions when they faced the Berkut constabulary on the ground. This is consistent with their shooting from Maidan-controlled buildings. The entry and exit wound locations of three of the killed Maidan protesters, mapped using a 3D model which was produced by a New York architecture company for the Maidan victims' lawyers and was heralded by the New York Times, practice not match the wound locations in the forensic medical examinations past government experts. Consequently, they could not have been shot from the government-held positions. Further wound and bullet pigsty locations in shields and helmets betoken to shooting from the Maidan-controlled buildings.
Forensic examinations past government ballistic experts determined in about a dozen cases that the protesters were shot from the Maidan-controlled structures, including the Hotel Ukraina. It is revealing that the prosecution failed for almost viii years later on the massacre to utilize ballistic experts to determine the locations of the shooters in the accented majority of cases even later on the Maidan massacre trial ordered this to be completed. A forensic ballistic test conducted by authorities experts using an automated calculator organisation establish that bullets from killed protesters did not lucifer bullet samples from the police database of Berkut Kalashnikov assault rifles.
No evidence of whatever guild by Yanukovych or his ministers and commanders to fire upon the Maidan protesters has been revealed by the investigation or the media. Not a single fellow member of his government, police or security forces, admitted interest in the massacre or revealed any bear witness that the protesters were shot past the government forces or, specifically, on a government gild.
In contrast, in that location is evidence of the involvement of Maidan leaders, the far-right, and foreign snipers in the massacre of the police and the protesters. Several Maidan leaders and activists provided testimonies, while 14 cocky-admitted members of the Maidan sniper units admitted in media interviews and to the Maidan massacre trial that they themselves or other Maidan snipers shot at the law and protesters.
Several erstwhile members of the Georgian military testified that they and other groups of Maidan snipers in the Hotel Ukraina and the Music Conservatory were ordered by specific Maidan leaders and ex-Georgian leaders to fire on police and protesters and that they witnessed the massacre. What'south more, a retired Georgian officeholder besides claimed that Georgian snipers linked to Mikheil Saakashvili, ex-president of Georgia, and senior members of his political party and the government were involved in the Maidan massacre. The prosecution and the Maidan victims' lawyers claimed that these Georgians were "actors" even though their identities are confirmed by various prove, such as documents by the Ukrainian, Armenian, Belarusian, and Georgian authorities (a video testimony of one of them was recently admitted equally evidence and shown at the Maidan massacre trial).
Two leaders of the far-correct Svoboda party also stated in split up interviews that a Western government representative told them and other Maidan leaders a few weeks before the massacre that Western governments would stop recognizing Yanukovych later on casualties amidst protesters reached 100. Such specific conditionality created incentives to "cede" protesters and attribute their killing to government forces. The slain protesters were called the "heavenly hundred" fifty-fifty subsequently the official investigation confirmed that 49 protesters died on that twenty-four hours. Immediately after the massacre, Western governments blamed the Yanukovych government and his forces for the mass killing and recognized the new Maidan regime.
The investigation by the Ukrainian government denies that there were whatsoever snipers in Maidan-controlled buildings despite overwhelming prove that they perpetrated a mass killing of protesters and police on February twenty, 2014. It is striking that nearly eight years after the massacre, which was verified past videos, testimonies, witnesses, and forensic ballistic and medical examinations by government experts, nobody has been arrested or convicted. Without agreement the Maidan massacre and bringing to justice its perpetrators, information technology is impossible to empathize and resolve peacefully the internal and international conflicts involving Ukraine and the dangerously escalating state of war in the Donbas.
Ivan Katchanovski teaches at the School of Political Studies at the University of Ottawa. He is the author of Cleft Countries: Regional Political Divisions and Cultures in Mail-Soviet Ukraine and Moldova and co-author of Historical Dictionary of Ukraine (2d Edition) and The Paradox of American Unionism: Why Americans Similar Unions More Canadians Practise, Just Join Much Less.
Source: https://canadiandimension.com/articles/view/the-hidden-origin-of-the-escalating-ukraine-russia-conflict
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