Fragile Empire: How Russia Fell In and Out of Love with Vladimir Putin
Putin calls the Ukrainians his friends and are on Christian name terms - this is what he does to them
Путин называет украинцев своих друзей и на христианских условиях имени - это то, что он делает для них
VoiceOfDonetsk.
Ukraine / Голос Донецке. Россияне вы одобряете террористической Игорь
Всеволодович Гиркин боевых действий в Донбасс Украины?
Wikipedia
The
War in Donbass (also known as the
War in Ukraine or
War in Eastern Ukraine) is an ongoing armed conflict in the
Donbass region of Ukraine. From the beginning of March 2014, demonstrations by pro-Russian and anti-government groups took place in the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts of Ukraine, together commonly called the "Donbass", in the aftermath of the 2014 Ukrainian revolution and the Euromaidan movement. These demonstrations, part of a wider group of concurrent pro-Russian protests across southern and eastern Ukraine, escalated into an armed conflict between the separatist forces of the self-declared Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics, and the Ukrainian government Prior to a change of the top leadership in August, the separatists were largely led by
Russian citizens.
Russian paramilitaries are reported to make up from 15% to 80% of the combatants.
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Igor Vsevolodovich Girkin (Russian:
Игорь Всеволодович Гиркин, Ukrainian:
Ігор Всеволодович Гіркін Ihor Vsevolodovich Hirkin), also known as
Igor Ivanovich Strelkov (Russian:
Игорь Иванович Стрелков), born on 17 December 1970,
is a Russian citizen from
Moscow who is a key figure behind the War in Donbass as the military commander of the Donetsk People's Republic rebellion.
Strelkov, a Russian nationalist and veteran of several other conflicts, was charged by Ukraine authorities with terrorism
and is currently sanctioned by the European Union for his leading role in the insurgency in eastern Ukraine. By his admission, he served in the Russian
FSB until March 2013, and according to Ukrainian and EU authorities, he is a retired Russian military intelligence GRU colonel who has previously participated in the 2014 Crimea crisis................Ukrainian authorities alleged Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoygu
has coordinated all of Girkin's actions, supplying him and "other
terrorist leaders" with "the most destructive weapons" since May and
instructing him directly, with Russian President Vladimir Putin's approval.
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12/09/2014
.
Igor Bezler (Russian:
Игорь Николаевич Безлер; born 1965, Simferopol,
Crimean Oblast, Ukrainian SSR) is one of the pro-Russian leaders whose group is controlling the local police department in Horlivka. He thus participates in the 2014 pro-Russian conflict in Ukraine and is said to have also participated in the 2014 Crimean crisis.....On April 14, 2014, a YouTube video showed a man claiming to be a
lieutenant colonel of the Russian army addressing police officers at the pro-Russian-held Horlivka police station and naming a new police chief. The man was subsequently identified as Bezler. Ukraine accused him and Igor Strelkov of orchestrating the
killing of Horlivka deputy Volodomir Rybak. Bezler denies his involvement. ..........Ukrainian officials have alleged that on July 17, 2014, a phone call was
made at 4:40 p.m. Kyiv time, 20 minutes after the crash of
Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777-200 MH17,
by Bezler who reports to a person identified by Ukraine’s SBU as
Vasili Geranin, a colonel in the main intelligence department of the general
headquarters of the armed forces of the Russian Federation, regarding
the shooting down of a plane that fell beyond a city of Yenakievo
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.
Alexander Yurevich Borodai (Russian:
Александр Юрьевич Бородай, Ukrainian:
Олександр Юрійович Бородай Olexander Yuriovich Borodai; born in Moscow, 1972)
is a former Prime Minister of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic that declared its independence from Ukraine on 12 May 2014.He was appointed to the post by the republic's self-proclaimed Supreme Council on May 16, 2014.
Borodai, a Russian citizen, had earlier worked as a political adviser to Sergey Aksyonov, the prime minister of the republic of Crimea. On 7 August 2014 Borodai announced his resignation.
He was succeeded by Aleksandr Zakharchenko of which he became self-appointed Deputy Prime Minister
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.
Konstantin V. Malofeev is founder of the international investment fund Marshall Capital Partners,member of the board of trustees of the non-profit partnership "Safe Internet League" and Chairman of the St Basil the Great Charitable Foundation...............In July 2014 Ukraine opened a criminal case against Malofeev; he was accused of financing “illegal military groups” in Eastern Ukraine who at the time fought against the Ukrainian army. For this he was also placed on the European Union list of individuals sanctioned during the 2014 pro-Russian unrest in Ukraine
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July 10th post 2014
Former Putin adviser Andrey Illarionov,
senior fellow at the Cato Institute in Washington, DC, estimates that
at least 2,000 Russian intelligence officials are operating in eastern
Ukraine
The self-proclaimed state's activities are headed by the
Donetsk Republic
organization, a group which has been banned in Ukraine since 2007, and
on 16 May 2014, the Republic as a whole was classified as a terrorist
organization by the state..........According to Ukrainian authorities the seizure of RSA's are part of "a
script which has been written in the Russian Federation" to destabilize
Ukraine and bring in Russian troops executed by "about 1,500 radicals in
each region who spoke with clear Russian accents".............According to a poll conducted by the Institute of Social Research and
Policy Analysis, 66% of Donetsk residents view their future in a united
Ukraine, 4.7% support separatism, while 18.2% support joining Russia,
while 31.6% wanted a united Ukraine with expansion of autonomy for
Donetsk region, with only 18.6% in support of current status
.
A second poll conducted 26–29 March showed that 77% of residents
condemned the takeover of administrative buildings, while 16% support
such actions. Furthermore, 40.8% of Donetsk citizens support rallies for
Ukraine's unity, while 26.5% support rallies which are pro-Russia.
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.
Yesterday, however, according to a
major Ukrainian news site, TSN.ua, the
website of
the President of Russia’s Council on Civil Society and Human Rights
(shortened to President’s Human Rights Council) posted a report that was
quickly taken down as if it were toxic radioactive waste. According to
this purported report about the March referendum to annex Crimea, the
turnout of Crimean voters was only 30 percent. And of these, only half
voted for the referendum–meaning only 15 percent of Crimean citizens
voted for annexation.
The TSN report does not link to a copy of the cited report. However,
there is a report of the Human Rights Council, entitled “Problems of
Crimean Residents,” still up on the
president-sovet.ru website,
which discusses the Council’s estimates of the results of the March 16
referendum. Quoting from that report: “In Crimea, according to various
indicators, 50-60% voted for unification with Russia with a voter
turnout (
yavka) of 30-50%.” This leads to a range of between 15
percent (50% x 30%) and 30 percent (60% x 50%) voting for annexation.
The turnout in the Crimean district of Sevastopol, according to the
Council, was higher: 50-80%.
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.
Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin (Russian: Влади́мир Влади́мирович Пу́тин) President in the 2012 presidential election, an announcement which led to large-scale protests in many Russian cities..... Many of Putin's actions are regarded by the domestic opposition and foreign observers as undemocratic.............Putin has cultivated a strongman image and is a pop cultural icon in Russia with many commercial products named after him.
- 
UN News