The so-called 'peace plan' put forward by the newly elected president of Ukraine doesn't seem to be working. Why? Could it be that Mr. Poroshenko has no control over the Ukrainian army? Or – is the peace strategy something that does not go together with the US plans in Ukraine? The Voice of Russia is discussing these issues with Christoph R. Horstel, government consultant and publicist, based in Germany.
On June, 20 Ukraine’s recently elected president, Petro Poroshenko, ordered a unilateral ceasefire between government-backed forces and independence supporters in the east until June, 27 to defuse the crisis in the country, promising amnesty for all independence defense forces not involved in grave crimes and willing to lay down their arms.
Russia supported it as an effort toward a peaceful settlement. At the same time Russian President Vladimir Putin has stressed that the intentions voiced by Poroshenko must be backed by a real ceasefire. According to Alexei Pushkov, the head of the foreign affairs committee on the Russian State Duma, after the President’s order Ukrainian forces have been engaged in more military action.
Pro-independence forces in the South East said they do not believe in the goodwill of the Kiev authorities, and that Poroshenko is not in control.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has pointed out that Poroshenko’s peace plan bears no mention to a nationwide dialogue.
Says Christoph R. Horstel, government Consultant and publicist, Germany:
“In fact, if you offer a peace plan, that plan should address the problems which have lead into a violation of peace. But the Poroshenko’s plan has never addressed anything, except for one point – complete obedience, subordination of all the Ukrainian people under the rule in Kiev, which is the result of the coup d'état – the second in ten years – a strange kind of election where a majority was no longer necessary, and meanwhile we had rumors that there were frauds all over the place with the presidential election and the government is still in the interim regime.
So, in this situation, what you do as a freshly elected president (if we don’t put into question this election and this person), you try to address the real woes and the real troubles in the country, you try to be the president of all the Ukrainians. And Mr. Poroshenko has never tried. I think he is a deeply criminal person and that is a big trouble for Ukraine. And what is more, I mean, you can even be a criminal person and you can be just a president of part of the people, but what you should do – you should try to keep the national interests of your country in mind. And he is not doing that either. He is just walking after Washington and that’s a very bad story now.
What now? What could be the implications for Poroshenko?
Now the situation is very complicated for Poroshenko. And he has gone very straight into it. That means, he has threatened with the military steps, he has never, even for one hour, fulfilled his own words – the brake of using the firearms has never been accomplished in eastern Ukraine. And what is more, the self-declared people’s republics and the people’s defense forces have from the start said – we don’t believe in it, we have heard this in the past, for several times already, we don’t believe the word “end” – and what is more – we will not give in, our peace starts when the troops move away.
These troops fighting in the east of the country are very special troops, we must remember. Part of them is Nazi killers, another part is consultants from the US and maybe the CIA. So, this is all in one group coming towards that area. And if I were a citizen of that area, I would never drop my arms, of course, because that is the only chance I have, maybe, that I myself and my family, if we are to die decently, it is while defending ourselves. Otherwise these people would be just an easy prey for whoever comes and tries to destroy homes or take away the men, and what else has happened in the past – all these kinds of atrocities.
So, this is the bad situation of the people there and the whole Poroshenko’s peace plan, in fact, puts the nation into jeopardy and is bad for his own fate as a politician, let alone the fate of the people in eastern Ukraine, who are suffering from these kinds of atrocities and oppression.
Could it be that the Western media eventually stops to overlook how things really are in Ukraine?
What we have is a general line. The general line is not friendly with Russia. The general line is not accepting the Crimean vote. The general line is that Russia has to be pushed to do this or that, which would then, according to the Western media, be right. So, this is the general situation.
But what we also have is so much information on the Internet about things contradicting the Washington policies and so much unhappiness among the European politicians with the same Washington policies, that in fact the media are now in a very awkward point. If they continue publishing the official stuff coming from Washington via the Western capitals to the big media, then they will lose the credibility with the population to such an extent, that their economic survival would be endangered even more than now.
You know, we have a reduced circulation number of major papers. The interest in the Internet versions of these papers is so weak, in fact, that they cannot sell their content. This is another problem of this big media. And that is what would aggravate very quickly, if they continue lying in the same fashion and strength that they had in the past.
You’re also saying that politicians are getting increasingly unhappy with the current situation?
Yes, a huge scandal has broken open in Poland. [The scandal erupted last weekend, when a Polish news outlet Wprost released a transcript of an excerpt from secretly recorded conversations involving Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski who was describing his country’s security relationship with the United States as “worth nothing.” - EK]
And that is in fact shaking Europe, because Poland was always considered to be the mainstay of the American interests, especially towards and against Russia. And now the Foreign Minister, being married to an American national, he himself spoke out in such a brutal blunt way, that everybody is in fact shocked. And that makes waves in Facebook and all the alternative media in the Internet. People are crying “hoo” and “wow” and think that is very interesting, and they are very happy, and they are rejoicing it and things like that. So, in fact, they treat him as a hero. He is a hero, Mr. Sikorski.
Yet, the NY Times commented this morning that the Sikorski’s tape was recorded before the reunification of Crimea with Russia and that there was some kind of Polish frustration with the foreign policy before that point. And through the reunification of Crimea with Russia this frustration was allegedly gone, because then the Polish people could see the aggression and the aggressiveness of the foreign policy of Russia.
That is a very interesting explanation. I don’t believe a word of it. I think, quite clearly, that the world has seen how unaggressive Russia had acted in Crimea, that few bullets were fired, very few people came to be injured, or killed; that in fact, this was a school example of the unified will of the people of Crimea to reunify with homeland Russia, that this was something very broad-based and expressing the wishes of the overall people of Crimea.
So, that is something which shows, in fact, the real mind of the people. And then, look at Germany. We have major people, like the ancient member of the Foreign Committee of the German Bundestag, Mr. Gauweiler, who is an important person in the Conservative Party in southern Germany, saying that this is all going wrong regarding Russia and Ukraine and he is opposed to it. We have the former politicians speaking out in large numbers. And we know that the whole German Government is very uneasy. The economic circles are up in arms in an unprecedented way since the WW II. So, if that is not enough, I don’t know what is.
But does that imply that perhaps we are going to see a change of heart and a change of course in the West?
I think something is still missing. And I'm wondering myself what that could be. Could that be the 28th of June, when Poroshenko is unleashing the promised massacre in eastern Ukraine on the insubordinate people and the people’s defense forces, and things like that; so that we have so terrible pictures from there that there is a change of mind, that you cannot in this 21st century oppress people like we have see in the Middle Ages, that this is crazy.
In fact, if we look at the details, we see that the real terror operation is the operation by Kiev. We have heard that the professional killers trained by the CIA in Poland are used in Ukraine to kill their own people, their own brothers and sisters, so to say, in such a fashion. This is something terrible. The European people may be corrupt, there may be bad governments, but they are not stupid. And they have open eyes, they see these realities themselves, even if they push their media to publish otherwise. That is the situation. It is a complete hypocrisy phenomena we have there in politics today.
But, at the same time, if Russia actively intervenes, Russia would be there to blame.
Of course! And I'm quite sure, if that happens, if Russia takes out a big stick, that is something Washington is hoping for all the time. This is why they are going so hardcore and push Ukraine to execute these wishes. They hope that Russia would be unwise and come in with big troops, and take up the battle. And I don’t think Russia will do that, there are other ways of answering slowly and little step by little step. And I think Russia is doing it quite well right now.
If they continue this way, it is bad for the local population, it will bring the Russian Government under pressure at home, that is correct. But, at the same time, it drives the Western politicians nuts. They get crazy over the fact that Russia is patient, very constructive, all the time talking to everybody explaining exactly what they are doing and the Western side is looking like a warmonger all the time. That cannot continue that way for a long time in the West.
And there is another aspect to that, as far as I understand, shares of leading Western companies are going down. And that is a brilliant chance for the Chinese.
Yes, this is any way a brilliant chance for the Chinese. They have already concluded a wonderful gas deal with Russia. It slightly reduced the price because of the crisis. And thank God that this contract is signed now, because the situation is aggravating and if that deal were to be concluded in one or two months, nobody knows where the price would have gone by then, because the pressure on Russia might become higher and the shares of the Western countries, and the whole luck in all kinds of economic affairs of the Western countries is not in a very good shape.
Germany, yes, is doing quite well, but all the other countries in Europe are further and further down the road. And that is also something that cannot continue this way. Europe is simply breaking apart.
Remember the $28 billion contracts signed by the Chinese Prime Minister in the UK. And more contracts with Greece…
From Greece, from Germany… we have so many interesting involvements of the Chinese recently. These are huge inroads also on the technological advantage of the Western countries, which is diminishing day by day, because they have to simply sell their nuggets to the Chinese in such a bad situation. So, in fact, one of the big winners keeping out of most of the trouble is China right now.
What we have is that all of these countries – Russia and China, and others – investing a lot of money into armament, and this comes only because of these Washington hegemonic terror policies.
Which means that Washington’s policy is reinforcing China, which Washington sees as its biggest adversary. Where is the logic?
Yes, the logic is a very shortsighted, day to day logic of politicians’ survival. There is no strategy anymore. There is no plan reaching beyond a few months. That is very bad. We have all kinds of plans, of course, of interference and scenarios by the military, and these things. But what we do not have is a real policy – policy planning, policy strategy to go ahead constructively. What Washington is doing, is isolating itself as if it was its own arch enemy.
It is clear that Europe faces a fading away solidarity with Washington to such an extent, that you need an explosion which was meant to be confidential and couldn’t keep its confidentiality, like with Mr. Sikorski in Poland, to make everybody aware that, yes, we are on a very-very bad road”.
Credit to The Voice of Russia
No comments:
Post a Comment