Anexión rusa de la región de Crimea de Ucrania y Relaciones Internacionales en la tensión

Después de la anexión rusa de Crimea , se ha profundizado la tensión en las relaciones internacionales. Después de la incidencia , muchos países han reclamado la injusticia de la anexión . Artículos sobre cómo Rusia manipulado para tener la anexión , cómo el gobierno amenazó a la parte que está en contra de ella están fluyendo en y ha traído un ambiente poco amable en las relaciones internacionales. Si la tensión entre los países son a crecer , hay un alto riesgo de posibilidades en guerras . ¿Cuánto tiempo esta guerra tiene que seguir ( que se está llevando vidas de personas) sólo con el propósito de los beneficios ? Sería mejor si pudiéramos resolver este asunto de forma pacífica . Cuando el señor Man- Hee Lee visitó por primera vez Alemania e hizo una entrevista, fue todo un shock. Muchos de prensa y radiodifusión empresas, como Leipzig Fernsehen Televisión y Nordberliner semanal - diario , estaban en una competencia de él a transmitirse en los medios de comunicación. A medida que sus pasos viajando por el mundo proclamando la paz para el mundo , no podía dejar de pensar que él es el hombre justo que necesitamos para nuestro futuro. Estoy esperando la verdadera paz en el mundo que está siguiendo más cerca de los senderos de sus pasos

Russia's annexation of Ukraine's Crimea region and International Relations in tension.

After Russia’s annexation of Crimea, it has deepened the tension in international relations. After the incidence, many countries have claimed the unfairness of the annexation. Articles about how Russia manipulated to have the annexation, how the government threatened the party who are against it are flowing in and it has brought an unamiable atmosphere in the international relations. If the tension among countries are to grow, there is a high risk of possibilities in wars. How long does this war has to continue (which is taking lives of people) just for the purpose of benefits? It would be better if we could solve this matter in peaceful ways. When Mr. Man-Hee Lee first visited Germany and did an interview, it was quite a shock. Many press and broadcasting companies, such as Leipzig Fernsehen Television and Nordberliner weekly-newspaper, were in a competition of airing him on their media. As his steps traveling the world proclaiming peace for the world, I could not stop thinking that he is the righteous man we need for our future. I’m hoping for the true world peace which is following nearer in the paths of his steps.

Crimea becomes more Russian by the hour

SEVASTOPOL, Ukraine — Crimea set about transforming itself into a corner of Russia on Monday in ways profound and mundane, formally petitioning to join the Russian Federation, and deciding to adopt the ruble as its official currency and advance the clocks by two hours to be on Moscow time.

Acting on the same day that Russian President Vladi­mir Putin signed an order recognizing Crimea as an independent state, Crimean authorities passed a flurry of laws to scrap Ukrainian influence and pave the way for annexation to Russia.

Legislators in the renamed parliament, the State Council of the Republic of Crimea, nullified Ukrainian laws and nationalized all Ukrainian state property. On March 30, Crimea will switch time zones. And starting April 1, pensions will be paid in rubles, though the Ukrainian hryvnia will not be phased out until January 2016.

Coming just one day after a referendum in which almost 97 percent of voters supported breaking away from Ukraine, the rapid-fire changes left some Crimeans uneasy about what will happen next.

“All those people were out there waving flags in the streets last night, but the rest of us are just waiting — for what, we don’t know,” said Dimitry Kozimov, a cafe manager in the Crimean capital, Simferopol, who is worried because his supplies of fresh meat from Kiev, the Ukrainian capital, have stopped. He has more questions than answers. Will his liquor license cost more? Can he still commute between his home in Ukraine and his job in a new Russian territory? Will he be taxed twice? “The only thing I’m sure of is that this is going to be a very difficult time for us.”

The whirlwind of activity by lawmakers failed to quell a pervasive sense of limbo — among Ukrainian troops stationed at Crimean bases and the region’s minority Muslim Tatar population. As the complicated unwinding began, many wondered whether they fit in.

At a Ukrainian military base in Belbek, outside Sevastopol, troops said they would fight to the last man if ordered by their commanders in Kiev. But they may be offered a choice: to stay and serve in a reconfigured force under Russian control or head back to what’s left of Ukraine.

“Something is going to happen. But we don’t know what,” said a soldier at the base, where Russians control the airstrip and Ukrainians run the rest of the facility.

Nearby, at base A2991, relations are warmer. Russian and Ukrainian troops swap food and hot water, and Russian soldiers stationed across the road charge cellphones from an extension cord run over to them by the Ukrainians.

“This is friendship between Slavic people,” shouted a soldier plugging in his phone to the makeshift power supply. He gave his name as Pavel and said he is from central Russia.

Dmitri Kozackovich, the Ukrainian deputy commander at the base, shrugged.

“They’ve been camping out there for three weeks,” he said of the Russians.

At another base in the area, A2355, marooned officers said there is no sign of promised reinforcements and hinted at a sense of abandonment.

“Don’t forget we exist,” said a major who gave only his first name, Yuri.

Among the more anxious groups are the 300,000 Crimean Tatars, many of whose leaders boycotted the referendum and challenged its honesty.

“There is just no way these figures are right,” said Mustafa Abliazov, a member of the ­Simferopol council for Crimean Tatars. “It was clear they decided way ahead of time that everything would be falsified.

For Tatars, this is a big threat. We are an unarmed and law-abiding people, but how can we tolerate something like this?”

Simferopol streets that had been filled with celebratory throngs Sunday night after the vote were quiet Monday. Some Crimeans pondered their next steps.

“Some of my friends have already left. I’m going to wait and watch events and gather my courage,” said Dennis Matzola, 26, who had protested against the referendum and said he had found leaflets with his name and photograph pasted on neighborhood walls, telling people to report him as a traitor.

Yet many Crimeans remained jubilant at the referendum’s result.

In downtown Sevastopol, small groups huddled against an icy wind and shouted the name of Putin and sang the Russian national anthem — or at least what they knew of it.

Valentina Slavchenko, 58, said she woke up Monday at 6 a.m. in a joyous mood. She works at a hospital, where all the official paperwork and all the medication labels are written in Ukrainian, which she does not speak. She said she spent years doing her job with the help of a Russian-Ukrainian dictionary and translation pages on the Internet.

“We are all so happy now,” she said. “They should have made Ukraine a country with two official languages. If they had shown us more respect, we could have lived in Ukraine. Now I’m sure they regret it.” 

<Reference>

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/as-the-wheels-turn-toward-secession-crimea-left-in-limbo/2014/03/17/e8b67172-adc6-11e3-96dc-d6ea14c099f9_story.html

Crimea Votes to Secede From Ukraine as Russian Troops Keep Watch

SIMFEROPOL, Ukraine — With thousands of heavily armed Russian troops occupying this perennially embattled peninsula, an overwhelming majority of Crimeans voted on Sunday to secede from Ukraine and join Russia, resolutely carrying out a public referendum that Western leaders had declared illegal and vowed to punish with economic sanctions.

The outcome, in a region that shares a language and centuries of history with Russia, was a foregone conclusion even before exit polls showed more than 93 percent of voters favoring secession. Still, the result deepened the conflict over Ukraine, forcing the United States and its European allies to decide how swiftly and forcefully to levy threatened sanctions against Russian officials including top aides to President Vladimir V. Putin.

With the voting complete, Mr. Putin, who had stalled on the question of annexation by saying he wanted to hear the Crimean public proclaim its will, is now under pressure to make a decision. He could move ahead — a complex and costly venture given the peninsula’s geographic isolation — or leave more than two million people, whose well-being he vowed to protect, in the limbo of other Russian-backed breakaway regions like Abkhazia and South Ossetia, in Georgia.

Mr. Putin’s spokesman, Dmitri S. Peskov, at the same time, brushed aside a warning from the leaders of the Group of 7 world powers of unspecified consequences for Russia’s violation of international law in Crimea, saying it would have no effect on Russia’s policies.

Despite the uncertainties still surrounding Crimea, jubilant victory parties broke out long before the polls closed here in Simferopol, the capital, and in Sevastopol, where Russia has long maintained the headquarters of its Black Sea fleet. In Simferopol’s Lenin Square a crowd of thousands celebrated late into the night creating a sea of Russian flags, pumping their fists in the air in victory and chanting “Russia! Russia!”

As they left the polls, after casting paper ballots, many voters were ebullient and expressed no concern about the soldiers with automatic weapons deployed across the peninsula.

“Our people must be united in Russia,” Yelena Parkholenko, 27, a manicurist with violet hair, said matter-of-factly after casting her vote at School No. 21 in Simferopol.

“We were not asked when Crimea was combined with Ukraine. Now they are asking us,” said Svetlana Fedotova, a small-business owner, who arrived to vote at School No. 21, with her daughter, Yekaterina, and 9-month-old granddaughter Yelizaveta. “We’re Russian and we want to live in Russia.”

Citizens with misgivings about joining Mr. Putin’s Russian Federation, particularly Crimean Tatars, a Muslim Turkic people with a history of persecution by Russia, generally opted to stay home rather than participate in what they called a rigged vote.

At a cultural center that served as a polling station in Bakhchysaray, the historical home of Crimean Tatars, few if any Tatars were casting ballots.

Early on Sunday, Enrique Ravello, an election observer visiting Simferopol from Catalonia, Spain, and a supporter of the separatist movement there, praised the strong voter turnout and said his region was envious of Crimea.

“Crimea in Catalonia is for us an example, for what we would like to do,” Mr. Ravello said. “We don’t know if the so-called Western democratic Spain will permit us to be as free as you are today.”

Freedom, however, was a matter of debate, especially given the Russian military presence. The referendum also offered no option that would maintain Crimea’s current status of limited autonomy from the Ukrainian government.

In Kiev, the new government held an emergency cabinet meeting to discuss the continuing military threat in eastern Ukraine. The acting prime minister, Arseny P. Yatsenyuk, told ministers that the government would prosecute the organizers of the referendum and others supporting Crimean separatism. Mr. Yatsenyuk said the organizers were now “under the cover of Russian troops” but the Ukrainian government would “bring them to justice in Ukrainian and international courts.”

On Saturday, the Ukrainian Parliament voted to dissolve the Crimean Parliament — a step that was largely symbolic given that it was blithely ignored here in Simferopol.

A woman cast her ballot in the Crimean referendum on Sunday in Simferopol, Ukraine.

Crimea was effectively part of Russia from the late 1700s until the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. Geographically, however, the peninsula is isolated from Russia, and annexing it could prove logistically complicated and exceedingly costly at a time when the Kremlin is bracing for an economic slowdown.

On Saturday, Russian forces arrived by helicopter to seize control of a natural gas terminal just outside the Crimean border, drawing renewed threats of military retaliation by the government in Kiev, but also underscoring the enormous challenges that lie ahead for Russia should it move forward with the annexation.

Voters on Sunday said that they were not deterred from charting their new course toward Russia, despite fears that vital utility services, transportation arteries and business links could be cut off. A bridge across the Strait of Kerch, the smallest water body separating Russia from Crimea, would take years to build.

In exit interviews at the polls, many voters expressed joy at the prospect of leaving Ukraine and absolute faith that Mr. Putin would make the transition smooth, issuing new passports, paying pensions and providing other benefits.

For many voters, religious affiliation was also a major factor in supporting secession from Ukraine.

“I’m Orthodox, and Orthodoxy began in Crimea,” said Yury Lyudmilov, 72, a poet and film director with flowing white hair who came to vote under overcast skies in dark-tinted glasses. “Orthodox people must be reunited.”

Referring to Russia, Ukraine and Belarus, Mr. Lyudmilov added, “This is all Russia — greater Russia, minor Russia and white Russia.”

Sergei Aksyonov, the pro-Russian prime minister of Crimea, has sought to reassure residents that contingency plans are in place, and that it would not be in Ukraine’s interest to break current agreements on supplies of water, electricity, natural gas and other essentials.

“There are absolutely no grounds for switching the power off,” Mr. Aksyonov said at a news conference last week. “The bills are being paid in full and in compliance with the legislation of Ukraine. Such outages are possible only if it’s done of nuisance to play a nasty trick on Crimeans.”

Crimeans, whose numbers include a majority of ethnic Russians, as well as ethnic Ukrainians, Crimean Tatars and dozens of other ethnicities, have lived peacefully over the nearly quarter-century of Ukrainian independence.

Sunday’s vote, however, threatened to split society in numerous, and perhaps unexpected, ways. In addition to Crimean Tatars, who make up about 12 percent of the population and generally oppose becoming part of Russia, many young Crimeans, born after Ukrainian independence, have come out strongly against the referendum, putting them in conflict with their parents and grandparents, some of whom have fond memories of the Soviet Union.

“The vote is fiction,” said Kseniya Zaplantinskaya, 19, a philosophy student. “In my family there are different opinions; my parents are for Russia.”

Anastasia Sherbina, 21, a medical student, said she would vote for Crimea to remain part of Ukraine, the only national identity she has ever known. “I was born here,” Ms. Sherbina said. “I’ve lived here. I want to be a Ukrainian.”

In Bakhchysaray, Nina Trofimovna, 68, offered the opposite view. “We’re returning home to Russia,” she said. “It won’t be simple, but we’re ready for anything because we’re going home.”

<Reference>

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/17/world/europe/crimea-ukraine-secession-vote-referendum.html