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What is the most powerful flying bug? This poll is closed. |
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15 | 3.71% |
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115 | 28.47% |
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12 | 2.97% |
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67 | 16.58% |
| dragonfly |
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94 | 23.27% |
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14 | 3.47% |
| 🐝 |
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87 | 21.53% |
| Total: | 404 votes | ||
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Bad news for Ukraine - The Romanian Parliament has snubbed Zelensky. https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-fatigue-zelenskiy-snubbed-by-romania-/32634822.html Amid Talk Of Ukraine Fatigue, Zelenskiy Seemingly Snubbed By Romanian Parliament By Andreea Pora Oana Despa Andy Heil October 12, 2023 15:59 GMT For most of the world, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy is the face of Ukrainian resistance to a 19-month-old Russian invasion with no end in sight. As such, he has made the pitch for continued Western resolve and support his top priority everywhere he goes. So, while his launch of a "strategic partnership" alongside Romanian President Klaus Iohannis this week was good news for Kyiv, it might have been overshadowed by what didn't happen in Bucharest. Faced with threats from nationalist, pro-Russian lawmakers of something "bad" happening if they "caught" Zelenskiy in the Romanian Parliament, official plans were abandoned for the Ukrainian head of state to give a speech to lawmakers. Iohannis and other Romanian officials were tight-lipped about the climbdown, except to cite time constraints and a "busy" schedule. At a press conference at the presidential residence, Zelenskiy -- a popular TV comic before becoming a wartime president -- joked diplomatically that while "you understand that I don't have a problem with speeches, in any country…I haven't prepared any speech, with all due respect." "I'm not ready to do it," he said. "But next time, I assure you that I'll come and give a speech, with great pleasure." But the timing was particularly awkward, with fresh talk of Ukraine war fatigue among Western allies fueled by Congressional wavering in the United States and government positions seemingly hardening in Warsaw and Bratislava. Valentin Naumescu, a professor of international relations at Babes-Bolyai University in Cluj and director of the Center for the Study of the European Union's External Relations and Global Order (EUXGLOB Center), said the cancellation represented an "abandonment of the discourse" and was "extremely depressing" for Romania in particular. "It created the impression of a vulnerable and weak country where nationalists, extremists, and pro-Russians impose their agenda," Naumescu said. "We are witnessing an increase in anti-Western [sentiment] that manages to intimidate the leadership at the top of the Romanian state, the fundamental institutions of democracy." Romania shares over 600 kilometers of border with Ukraine, including land and maritime boundaries. Along with a handful of other so-called frontline EU and NATO states, Romania is a key alternate export route for Ukrainian goods otherwise blockaded by Russia's Black Sea naval forces. Romania's grand-coalition government has quietly provided military aid to Ukraine alongside its NATO allies and cautiously echoed the official EU position of strong support for Kyiv, although cracks have occasionally emerged to suggest there is some disagreement behind the scenes in Bucharest. Despite Iohannis's pledge this week of military support for Ukraine "until victory over Russia," the nature of that support will continue to generate political debate. Historian Cosmin Popa told RFE/RL's Romanian Service that the visit itself was "very clear proof…of the acceleration in the warming of relations between Ukraine and Romania" amid widening tensions with regional allies such as Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia. He added, however, that Romanian officials' apparent reluctance to go through with the invite was sure to embolden anti-Ukraine and pro-Russian voices. Popa warned that a cancellation "for political reasons, for bilateral reasons, or for reasons related to the inability of the leaders of Parliament to control any noisy demonstrations in the Parliament shows that…those in charge of Romania are only encouraging a state of unjustified hostility toward Ukraine and [encouraging] Russian propaganda and interests." Many Romanians welcomed Ukrainian war refugees spilling into their country on a mass scale soon after Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022. The UN refugee agency credited them and their government with "speed and generosity" in their response to the humanitarian crisis. The UNHCR said this month that more than 85,000 Ukrainian refugees are present in Romania and 144,000 have been granted temporary protection, which, under EU regulations, gives them access to housing, health care, and the job market. But swelling populist and right-wing political forces, including some with pro-Moscow views, have consistently attacked Romania's participation in Western sanctions against Russia along with military and other support for Ukraine. George Simion, the leader of the far-right Alliance for the Unification of Romanians, and Diana Sosoaca, a notorious conspiracy theorist in Parliament, leapt on the offensive ahead of this week's visit, Zelenskiy's first to Romania since the Russian invasion began. "Don't dare to put him in the Romanian Parliament," Sosoaca threatened in one social media post. "I'm telling you this much, Mr. Iohannis: If I catch him in Parliament, it will be bad!" When Zelenskiy did visit Parliament on October 10 -- not for a speech but to meet with individual lawmakers -- Sosoaca filmed a video of herself shouting questions to him about ethnic Romanians in Ukraine and posted it on social media, adding that he didn't have the "courage" to respond. She also seized on Zelenskiy's gaffe in a televised interview in which he referred to the "Moldovan language," which is used in the region as a name for the Romanian language, saying it "doesn't exist." Simion mocked the cancellation of the speech to lawmakers, saying that, "with pain in our hearts, we announce that the brave Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy will not come to the Romanian Parliament today." Zelenskiy has addressed five European Parliaments since the war began, in addition to the U.S. and Canadian legislatures, as part of a constant push to encourage ongoing military and other assistance. He spoke to the Romanian Parliament via video link in April 2022. Lawmakers from the far-right, pro-Russian Freedom Party in Austria walked out of Zelenskiy's video address to their parliament in March, complaining it was a violation of the country's constitutionally required "permanent neutrality." Vienna has supported Ukraine diplomatically and with humanitarian assistance but not militarily. Since Russia launched a covert invasion of Crimea in 2014 and supported armed separatists in eastern Ukraine, the international community has imposed an unprecedented range of sanctions on Russia, in addition to providing political and other support for Ukraine's defense. The sanctions were significantly strengthened following Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022. "The Romanian state was put in an embarrassing situation," Cristian Pirvulescu, dean of the political science faculty at the National School of Political Science and Public Administration in Bucharest, told RFE/RL's Romanian Service. The authorities had plenty of warning that pro-Russian lawmakers like Simion and Sosoaca were likely to try to disrupt the event, he said, and could have ensured order. Their inability or unwillingness to do that placed themselves and Zelenskiy in an unpleasant situation and was "a shame." "You can't let a hysteric do things like that," Pirvulescu said.
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Oct 13, 2023 03:52
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gradenko_2000 posted:I promise you this clip is on-topic: lol
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Oct 13, 2023 03:56
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gradenko_2000 posted:I promise you this clip is on-topic: maybe fukuyama was right after all
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Oct 13, 2023 04:38
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Fukuyama was wrong because his thesis says those things would not be happening in 2014. They did, the underlying conflicts in 2014 were not resolved. That's why they and history are still happening.
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Oct 13, 2023 04:40
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Critical support to Diana Sosoaca, the fat middle aged woman who implied she would give Zelensky a hiding.
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Oct 13, 2023 05:09
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Oh, in one of those cliff notes explainers for this unusually pleasant newbie, somebody mentioned Ukraine withdrew from Minsk 2, but I don't remember it and can't find it with a casual search. Could someone provide a source or just a more detailed explanation please?
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Oct 13, 2023 05:17
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Weka posted:Oh, in one of those cliff notes explainers for this unusually pleasant newbie, somebody mentioned Ukraine withdrew from Minsk 2, but I don't remember it and can't find it with a casual search. Could someone provide a source or just a more detailed explanation please? I don't think Ukraine ever formally withdrew from Minsk 2. They signed the ceasefire and then as time went on they ceased ceasing fire. Ukraine spent eight years ignoring the Minsk accords and shelling the separatists in Donbas. In 2022 when Russia had lined up all its troops on the border, Ukraine decided that instead of attempting diplomacy they would massively escalate the bombardment of the Donbas Republics. Russia responded by recognizing the Donbas Republics, Ukraine responded with even more artillery attacks, Russia responded with the invasion of Ukraine. Here's a graph of ceasefire violations, 2020 was the trilateral peace conference which was a real bit of hope that Ukraine might decide to stop killing it's own countrymen. 
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Oct 13, 2023 06:41
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yeah I don't think they "officially" withdrew from Minsk, they just never bothered to implement any of its provisions and then after the war started it came out that they were just stalling for time and never really intended to honor the agreement
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Oct 13, 2023 06:55
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BearsBearsBears posted:I don't think Ukraine ever formally withdrew from Minsk 2. They signed the ceasefire and then as time went on they ceased ceasing fire. Ukraine spent eight years ignoring the Minsk accords and shelling the separatists in Donbas. In 2022 when Russia had lined up all its troops on the border, Ukraine decided that instead of attempting diplomacy they would massively escalate the bombardment of the Donbas Republics. Russia responded by recognizing the Donbas Republics, Ukraine responded with even more artillery attacks, Russia responded with the invasion of Ukraine. Here's a graph of ceasefire violations, 2020 was the trilateral peace conference which was a real bit of hope that Ukraine might decide to stop killing it's own countrymen. Though in all fairness that's ceasefire violations on both sides. The separatists might also have gotten quite a few shots in with a large part of the Russian army lined up on the border.
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Oct 13, 2023 07:03
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Yeah they never officially withdrew but did begin fresh shelling at the height of tensions (early hours of the Friday morning which spurred the recognition of the Donbass republics on the following Monday) which bloated rat Boris Johnson claimed to be false flags. This came a few days after Zelensky made some speech threatening to break the Budapest Memorandum and nuke up. So basically over the course of a week, The Ukraine rapidly accelerated tensions out of nowhere as Russia, France, Germany and The Ukraine were all in talks to compromise up to that point.
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Oct 13, 2023 08:03
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Frosted Flake posted:Erm. Who’s going to tell him? Unless you got the brainworms. China pretty good at keeping the brain worms out so far.
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Oct 13, 2023 08:03
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Zoeb posted:No. I am sorry. I simply do not agree with that position. The Russian invasion was a war crime and countries should not be invading or conquering each other anymore. It was wrong when the US invaded Iraq and Afghanistan and it wrong for Russia to invade Ukraine. It must be nice to simply not agree with a position. Shame about all the people getting killed as a result. Oh well. Orange Devil has issued a correction as of 08:14 on Oct 13, 2023 |
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Oct 13, 2023 08:09
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genericnick posted:Though in all fairness that's ceasefire violations on both sides. The separatists might also have gotten quite a few shots in with a large part of the Russian army lined up on the border. It is combined ceasefire violations from both sides. It's impossible to know who shot first, since we would have to define "first" first, and the Donbas republics certainly have the right to defend themselves. The OSCE maps for the last few days show most of the artillery falling on Ukrainian separatist territory and most of the civilian casualties overall were on the Donbas side as well. BearsBearsBears has issued a correction as of 08:52 on Oct 13, 2023 |
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Oct 13, 2023 08:38
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dk2m posted:I think you're right to question all these things, and you're fine to feel conflicted. After all, there's been breathless words and media coverage over the last 1.5 years on a situation that, on first glance, seems fairly cut and dry - a country is invaded by its neighbor, who is now trying to annex its land. It's fair to ask, how could anyone find an issue with this? I appreciate your long response to me. And that you don't just dismiss me as a liberal or whatever. I will think on what you have said.
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Oct 13, 2023 08:40
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Ytlaya posted:A big problem is that people who just had "broadly good intentions" (but without any real knowledge) are easily manipulated by propaganda. Show them a picture of like 50 people protesting + interview a few English-speaking expats, and you can convince them to support overthrowing a foreign government. If you disagree, you're denying their voices/lived experiences/whatever. I have noticed that with Venezuela. It would appear to be wealthier and more well-off Venezuelans who have better access to the media because of their English speaking ability and presence in the United States. I don't think any G-Men needed to come to some media office and start making demands about what they publish, I expect that's because they never need to.
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Oct 13, 2023 08:45
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Zoeb posted:I appreciate your long response to me. And that you don't just dismiss me as a liberal or whatever. I will think on what you have said. We were all liberal centrists once! I used to: "both sides" and "this time is different!" with the best of them!
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Oct 13, 2023 09:12
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yeah, you might get some jokes at your expense from a few, but most are fairly willing to engage if the questions and objections are in good faith.
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Oct 13, 2023 09:19
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Pistol_Pete posted:We were all liberal centrists once! I used to: "both sides" and "this time is different!" with the best of them! Speak for yourself.
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Oct 13, 2023 09:30
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BearsBearsBears posted:I don't think Ukraine ever formally withdrew from Minsk 2. They signed the ceasefire and then as time went on they ceased ceasing fire. Ukraine spent eight years ignoring the Minsk accords and shelling the separatists in Donbas. In 2022 when Russia had lined up all its troops on the border, Ukraine decided that instead of attempting diplomacy they would massively escalate the bombardment of the Donbas Republics. Russia responded by recognizing the Donbas Republics, Ukraine responded with even more artillery attacks, Russia responded with the invasion of Ukraine. Here's a graph of ceasefire violations, 2020 was the trilateral peace conference which was a real bit of hope that Ukraine might decide to stop killing it's own countrymen. there was never any good faith
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Oct 13, 2023 09:35
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The dnd threads retort is "Russian soldiers were still in the DPR so minsk was always null and void" I dont think anyone has asked what would happen if Russia pulled out of DPR before the provisions were implemented
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Oct 13, 2023 09:37
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this is the barest minimum of decency we just chucked into the peace agreement guys. just dont implement nazi anti-russian culture laws where your country's largest minority is russians. welp
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Oct 13, 2023 09:39
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gradenko_2000 posted:I promise you this clip is on-topic: omg that last five seconds
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Oct 13, 2023 09:46
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this is also a war of choice for Ukraine a very stupid choice at that
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Oct 13, 2023 09:51
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Growing tanker fleet, cheaper freight challenge Russian oil price cap Important article about the economic war. The tanker fleet that is carrying Russian petroleum outside the reach of Western sanctions or through shell games to avoid them has grown large enough that the shipping rates being charged are decreasing. Russian companies selling barrels of oil from the Urals are making an extra $7 per barrel due to the savings. An example the article gives is a 100,000 tonne tanker sailing from Russia's Baltic ports to India used to have a freight rate of $15 million earlier in the year. Now it's about $5 million. Another example is from the Black Sea to India. Which was $5 million and is now $4.1 million-4.2 million.
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Oct 13, 2023 10:51
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Neurolimal posted:The dnd threads retort is "Russian soldiers were still in the DPR so minsk was always null and void" Yeah, somehow Minsk 2 was entered under duress due to Russian force of arms, so is invalid, but also had Russia agree that they'd remove all their forces without any preconditions? The liberal brain is very powerful.
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Oct 13, 2023 11:41
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samogonka posted:this is also a war of choice for Ukraine Also in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the entire western apparatus is in support of the weaker country
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Oct 13, 2023 11:41
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samogonka posted:this is also a war of choice for Ukraine There's another thing that's important to remember. Zelensky ran as a peace candidate and was elected as such. Ukrainians wanted the Donbas conflict to end. I think in the beginning that Zelensky wanted that too. He visited Azov at the front and told them to back off and gave his "I'm not some loser" speech to them. You have to watch the video, he grabbed his camera crew from his TV show and the multi-camera effects combined with the slick editing make the video a really impressive production. Of course, the far-right paramilitaries like Azov aren't fully beholden to the elected government in Kyiv. Here's part of the video with english subtitles, there are longer versions but without english subtitles: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_kRCYyxcDng Of course, the Kyiv government is still responsible for their far-right paramilitary forces, If Kyiv had stopped supplying them and reigned them in, using the real army if necessary, then I would be fully supporting the Kyiv government. Instead Zelensky or whoever is actually in charge of Ukraine decided to back them to the hilt, deciding that total war against Russia was preferable implementing Minsk 2. EDIT: Earlier I mentioned that the majority of civilian casualties in the Donbas war were on the side of the separatists. I found a citation, 80% of the civilian casualties were on the Donbas side of the war. This is only from 2018-2021 though, before Ukraine ramped the war up. Here's the document straight from the UN. https://ukraine.un.org/sites/defaul...corr%20EN_0.pdf BearsBearsBears has issued a correction as of 12:47 on Oct 13, 2023 |
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Oct 13, 2023 12:39
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Dokapon Findom posted:Also in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the entire western apparatus is in support of the weaker country Are you sure about that? US Secretary of State Blinken said Russia claimed it had the 2nd-best military in the world, but now 'many see Russia's military as the 2nd-strongest in Ukraine'
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Oct 13, 2023 12:40
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gradenko_2000 posted:I promise you this clip is on-topic: lol
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Oct 13, 2023 12:47
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BearsBearsBears posted:Of course, the far-right paramilitaries like Azov aren't fully beholden to the elected government in Kyiv. this, by the way, is one of the most important things to remember when liberals try to claim that the nazis are actually an insignificant minority in ukrainian politics; if a nazi paramilitary group can tell the elected president to gently caress off (and threaten his life on camera with impunity) when he asks them to stop attacking donbas with zero consequence, that means they're in control of the government
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Oct 13, 2023 13:59
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gradenko_2000 posted:I promise you this clip is on-topic: I was reluctant to watch all the way through but I'm glad I did
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Oct 13, 2023 14:02
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3 posted:this, by the way, is one of the most important things to remember when liberals try to claim that the nazis are actually an insignificant minority in ukrainian politics; if a nazi paramilitary group can tell the elected president to gently caress off (and threaten his life on camera with impunity) when he asks them to stop attacking donbas with zero consequence, that means they're in control of the government They also got him to stop wearing a suit and start buying clothes from them instead, which is underrated.
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Oct 13, 2023 14:05
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Oct 13, 2023 14:26
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gradenko_2000 posted:yeah I don't think they "officially" withdrew from Minsk, they just never bothered to implement any of its provisions and then after the war started it came out that they were just stalling for time and never really intended to honor the agreement Same kind of action as the grain deal. Sign it and never do your own part.
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Oct 13, 2023 15:05
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Rules based world for thee but not for me.
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Oct 13, 2023 15:10
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BearsBearsBears posted:Are you sure about that? blinken might legit be the stupidest secretary of state we’ve ever had
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Oct 13, 2023 15:21
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https://twitter.com/IhateTrenches/status/1712764030249513333 Not surprised at all, this has always been Russia's tactics. It's also why the Soviet Union's casualties in WW2 were so extremely high. The only somewhat surprising thing about it is that in the day and age of easily accessible information the general Russian population is fine with it, although even that shouldn't be that surprising anymore after 20 months of war.
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Oct 13, 2023 15:23
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oh right forgot your gimmick for a moment dear Mr president, cspam has too many gimmick posters nowadays. please eliminate three, I am not a crackpot
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Oct 13, 2023 15:28
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Raskolnikov38 posted:blinken might legit be the stupidest secretary of state we’ve ever had 
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Oct 13, 2023 15:31
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Why is there a Twitter account called ihatetrenches?
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