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wantkitteh writes:
"The BBC is reporting that Russia has given Ukrainian military forces in Crimea a deadline of 3AM Tuesday morning to surrender or face assault. Moscow claims the position is to protect Russian civilians in Crimea following what it describes as the illegal coup in the past weeks. The Ukrainian Prime Minister has denounced Russia's actions as totally illegal and has called on it's allies to put pressure on Moscow. Russian military readiness in the area is very high with a blockade in place at Ukraine's naval headquarters and pre-positioned air and ground forces already in central locations around Crimea. Ukrainian forces are outnumbered and unprepared to face the threat. Demonstrations in the largely Russian-speaking area have supported Moscow's position while outside the area civilians are scared of what the future holds."
Russia's military has given Ukrainian forces in Crimea until dawn on Tuesday to surrender or face an assault, Ukrainian defence sources have said. The head of Russia's Black Sea Fleet Aleksander Vitko set the deadline and also threatened two warships, Ukrainian officials said. However, Interfax news agency later quoted a fleet spokesman who denied that any ultimatum had been issued. Moscow has said its troops are needed in Crimea to protect civilians. The Kremlin says people in Crimea have come under threat from "ultra-nationalists" since pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych was ousted last month. Russia is now said to be in de facto control of the Crimea region.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 03 2014, @10:02PM
Wether Janukovytj was democratically elected is highly questionable and one of the reasons for the demonstrations took place in the first place was that the people felt that election results were being tampered with and that he would simply remain in power no matter how people voted.
Also worth noting is that he seems to be little more then a crimelord lining his own pockets with money that isn't his.
His enforcers the ("police") Berkut was pretty much running around doing whatever they pleased, the latest example of their antics would be shooting demonstrators. They have been disbanded by the new government. Interestingly Berkut officers have since been promised russian citizenship by Putin who also seems to distribute passports to people in crimea supposedly to be able to claim that he is protecting his own citizens.
Also the russian motorcycle gang Night Wolves have gathered together a bunch of people and headed to crimea. The leader of this gang is a personal friend of Putin.
All in all it sounds more like a script for a crappy action movie then reality, but sadly it isn't.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 04 2014, @10:05AM
Yanukovych was in fact democratically elected and in a familiar, American way:
http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/robert-schlesi nger/2014/02/21/ukraines-long-history-with-us-poli tical-consultants-and-lobbyists [usnews.com]7 48703630404575053082580601328 [wsj.com]
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_J._Manafort [wikipedia.org]
http://www.dmlmessage.com/about/team/tad-devine/ [dmlmessage.com]