21 Ways Life in Crimea has Changed Since the Russian Anschluss

by Paul Goble

Paul Goble is a longtime specialist on ethnic and religious questions in Eurasia. He has served as director of research and publications at the Azerbaijan Diplomatic Academy, vice dean for the social sciences and humanities at Audentes University in Tallinn, and a senior research associate at the EuroCollege of the University of Tartu in Estonia.

The Russian occupation of Crimea has affected residents of the Ukrainian peninsula in large ways and small. Now, Novy Region-2 has published a list of 21 ways in which life has changed for all the residents of that region, establishing a useful checklist for all concerned (nr2.com.ua/hots/Okkupacija_Kryma/Krym-do-okkupacii-i-posle-81493.html).

There are other, more high-profile changes that affect the Crimean Tatars, for example, but here is a list of changes that the site suggests are affecting everyone in Russian-occupied Crimea


Vodka costs more and isn’t sold after 10:00 pm.

Residents can no longer take part in spontaneous political meetings, “even if they want to thank the authorities and Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin personally.”

Crimeans can no longer rent out rooms to visitors.

Crimeans are to be drafted into the Russian army and serve not in Yalta but in Chechnay, Daghestan, the Far North and the Far East.

Pregnant women can’t “hope for direct compensation for the birth” of children. Any money the state does give them will only be for their children and well into the future at that.

Those with Russian passports and Crimean residence permits can’t travel abroad for vacations: they are expected to stay in Crime “or go to Sochi and become patriots.”

Crimean residents can no longer make money by serving as informal taxi drivers: there simply aren’t enough visitors to allow them to operate.

Because Moscow doesn’t allow elections for mayors any more, Crimeans are not subjected to a constant barrage of campaign literature and promises.

Those who served in the Ukrainian army may get a chance to serve again – in the Russian one.
Participating in demonstrations no longer brings in money from the authorities; it can lead to “up to 15 years in prison.”

“Seven parties of Russian nationalists will monitor suspicious ‘Russians and Crimean Tatars’ who have been subject for 23 years to the influence of ‘Banderite propaganda’ in Ukraine.”

Crimeans who have received Russian passports are learning about an important aspect of Russian geography: the location of prison camps in various parts of the Russian Federation.

Crimeans won’t get paid for taking part in May Day or City Day holiday marches. They also won’t be allowed “to carry their own signs or shout their own slogans when they pass the tribune.”

Crimeans long accustomed to cursing their own presidents on social networks are having to learn that now they must never do that. Instead, they must praise whatever the Russian rpesident does.

Crimean school children are having to forget much that they had been taught by “’falsifiers from Ukraine’” about such subjects as the Mongol yoke and the terror famine. “How could Russians survive hundreds of years under the Tatar yoke?”

Crimean residents are now having to learn not to be proud of themselves and their families but of the Russian state.

Crimeans also now have to remember that “there is no sex in Russia just as there was none in the Soviet Union.” They can no longer be tolerant of gays or lesbians, and they have to remember that they must “love a young woman just as they do the Motherland, the army, the president, and the Fatherland.”

They have to adapt to Russian dietary traditions including some that are very confusing involving Russians who like Ukrainian dishes but may not call them that.

“Young people of Crimea must become accustomed … to ‘a second national-regional language’ if not for [themselves], then for [their] children in schools.” And they must speak it better than Ukrainian because they may be sent anywhere in Russia in the future.

Crimeans can “curse other nationalities (for example, Ukrainians and their culture) in blogs and social networks only if they are in Ukraine. In the Russian Federation,” on the other hand, that can lead to jail. But the list of approved and disapproved peoples keeps changing “after each ‘reset’ in ties between the Russian Federation and the United States.” It is thus best to avoid “the nationality question altogether.”

And Crimeans must now always carry their passports because they may be asked for them by officials, something that wasn’t true six months ago.

copyright and source:
http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.it/2014/10/window-on-eurasia-21-ways-life-in.html

The sanctions work. Head of the Russian Sberbank rebels against Putin

by Andrey Kolesnikov

At the Russia Calling Forum, the head of Sberbank violated the strange etiquette pertaining to the current (Russian) elite, which is liquidating the consciences of Putin’s economic policy, but shies away from speaking about the reasons for such policies.

The chairman of VTB Andrey Kostin looked like a bronze monument to himself and methodically played with his pen, Central Bank chairman Elvira Nabiullina smiled shyly, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov turned to stone. The soundtrack to this scene at the forum with the ironic name Russia Calling was provided by Sberbank chairman German Gref, who spoke the truth from the Crowne Plaza booth. For ten entire minutes.

He essentially said everything the esteemed leaders in economics knew without him, but were afraid of saying out loud. In some sense he violated the certain strange etiquette for the current elite, which is fighting with all its might to liquidate the consequences of the economic policies on part of the Russian President and his state-capital inner circle, but does not have the confidence to speak about the reasons for such policies, their contents, nor their consequences.

Gref unveiled the root problem of the regime: money. Money at all costs. To the extent of introducing new taxes on small businesses, which, as the former Minister for Economic Development noted, is near death.

And as soon as business started lifting up its head, they decided to take from it.

Just to buy security and mass loyalty for themselves, the government: to give money to the man with the gun and the ‘swamp.’ Not the one protesting in squares but the one that works on inertia, if it does at all, which the government does not allow to fall below the poverty line with their payments – otherwise the government will lose the skeleton of its electorate: the almost declassified individual which some researchers humorously call ‘the below the middle class.’ And also to give money to those who suffered from the sanctions and can only get surplus revenues instead of hyper-surplus revenues as usual from their position within the court. Like Alkhen, they have their own ‘orphans,’ the citizens of the Crimean peninsula. The rest of the Russian population are also ‘orphans,’ but second-rate ones, compared to the Crimeans. It looks like the Chinese should care for those living in Siberia and in the Far East.

Speaking of which, Gref also made an example of the Chinese. He praised their inclination towards innovation, their market openness. In this sense, our government thinks in vain that the dividing line lies between China and Russia on one side and the U.S. on the other. In the economic sense everything is totally different: China and the U.S. on one side and Russia on the other.

When criticizing Russia’s isolation, especially in regard to import and loans, the head of the bank which had been subject to sanctions, did not tear into the West, which void its bank of capital, but his government. Thus noting that source of all evil without naming it directly.

And said heartily: “You can’t violate the laws. The laws of economics.”

In this light Gref mentioned Yegor Gaydar and his work The Death of an Empire, a detailed analysis of how the Soviet Union degraded and died economically. And, essentially, directly compared the current situation with the one in the late Soviet era… Kostin still played with his pen nervously, Nabilullina smiled, Siluaniov didn’t…

Speaking of which, Gaydar also wrote about laws of economics. In another work, which is very educational, Economic and Hierarchical Structures. It was written when the discussion of the design of reform slowly transformed into the search for the methods to execute life-support measures: in 1987-1989. The following words addressed to the government can be found within: “While it was impossible to put an end to economic autarchy immediately for objective reasons…, it is necessary to act in accordance with the laws of the market and not in spite of them.”

“I don’t want to stand in line at the old Soviet Sberbank,” said Gref. A figure of speech. Another smile is allowed. But it is also the conclusion that the current economic policy is turned to face the past instead of the future.

The person whose name is used for the unexecuted ambitious plan for second-wave reform, Gref’s program of 2000, also mentioned another thing: the fact that the system of government had reached the limit of its efficiency. There is no result whatever they do. The problems cannot be solved even if they are flooded with money. However, what is being solved are private issues of redistribution coalitions that are sucking from the state currents.

Gref’s words were permeated by tiredness and resentment.

He did not directly say the King was naked. But he hinted at this circumstance.

The rest pretended it was a comedic performance, not a satirical one, with borderline jokes about Vasiliy Illych. And Vladimir Putin spoke after Gref, for whom the same governmental suicidal logic once more became grounds for optimism, to ‘concentrate resources.’ The resources that don’t exist. And mobilization searches for which lead directly to the very same line to the Soviet Sberbank.

It is good to mention a quote from the Death of the Empire Gref noted. The book ends with the following words: “Russia has a market economy, which is incomparably more flexible than the socialist one. It is able to easier adapt to the changes in the global economic conjuncture. Its logic does assume that all the responsibility for changes in economic life lies on the existing government. But this does not mean that the risks tied to the loss of the ability to adapt, the growth of the country’s dependence on the parameters which are not under government control, have disappeared. This is the situation in which caution, a sober attitude towards the threats the country may face is an integral part of responsible policies.”

And Gref? What about Gref? He was too emotional. His nerves gave out – his business is subject to sanctions.

He made a funny speech. It’s okay. The audience laughed… It looks like there will be no conclusions.

copyright and source:
Forbes Ukraine
translation by EuromaidanPress - Mariya Shcherbinina

http://www.forbes.ru/mneniya-column/vertikal/269755-bunt-grefa-nemnogo-smysla-v-kholodnoi-voine

Separatists using Russian T-72s supplied by Moscow via rail in the battle for Donetsk airport Ukraine H2200

lol, Pyrrhic victory

Although the pro-Russian Harmony Centre came in first in the elections, its performance cannot be called victory,
It won the largest number of votes, as compared with others, but it definitely did not win. As compared with the elections a few years ago, the Harmony Centre, which mainly represents the Russian-speaking community and claims to be a social democratic and centre-left force, it rallied 5 percent less support this time.

http://en.delfi.lt/nordic-baltic/elections-will-not-bring-changes-to-latvian-politics-lithuanian-observer-says.d?id=66041524#ixzz3FPAwG28F

Things are developing exactly as expected in the Ukrainian "East": the terrorists of the LNR are fighting with the Russian army units that came with "brotherly help". Now they will start fighting each other, and Russian soldiers stuck inside this hellhole will wonder why the heel they were ever sent there to defends this bunch of crooks and idiots

http://censor.net.ua/news/305643/na_luganschine_sostoyalsya_boyi_mejdu_boevikami_lnr_i_voorujennymi_silami_rf_moskal

The ruSSian army in Ukraine have no qualms about using a school for cover in military ops against Ukraine's army

@myshownow  "It's clear there is no stopping China & Russia in creating the new world's financial system"

I strongly support this new system and hope that finally ruSSians will be a small minority in Chinese country

«Нафтогаз» и Statoil договорились о поставках газа
Подробнее на эти темы поговорим с автором статьи о «Силе Сибири», партнёром консалтинговой компании RusEnergy Михаилом Крутихиным. Он у нас в гостях.

http://rbctv.rbc.ru/archive/main_news/562949992536841.shtml

Intercept Reveals How Separatist Leader Plans with Moscow Reporter to Spin the Story of ICRC Worker's Death:

http://www.interpretermag.com/ukraine-liveblog-day-228-the-battle-for-donetsk-airport-continues/#4515

Made-up love story and forged passport used to back Lavrov's allegations against Lithuania


After Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov made allegations that Polish and Lithuanian mercenaries were fighting in Ukraine, the Russian media took upon itself to find proof for the minister's claims.

Rubaltic.ru has unearthed a story from one month ago about Yakaterina Semyonova from Kharkiv, Ukraine, who was allegedly looking for her missing lover, Lithuanian captain Remigijus Šinkūnas. It was reported that Šinkūnas had come to Ukraine to teach in a Kharkiv military school; he allegedly met Yakaterina there but, twelve days later, told her he was being sent off to Dnipropetrovsk and had not been heard from since.

According to the story, officers of the Kharkiv police came to Yakaterina and showed her Šimkūnas' passport: it was allegedly found at a military rocket launch site, proving the Lithuanian was involved with the Ukrainian military.

However, the photo in the passport that was claimed to belong to Šimkūnas later revealed the document was forged. A passport with that number belongs to another Lithuanian citizen.

"This is just one more information attack against Lithuania. The passport is forged, a document with that number has been issued to a different person. What we see is a propaganda and misinformation campaign conducted with the help of made-up stories and forged documents," says Rasa Jakilaitienė, spokeswoman to the Lithuanian minister of foreign affairs.

On Monday, Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov told Bloomberg that Lithuanian and Polish nationals were fighting in Ukraine, in "battalions formed and funded by oligarchs".

The interview, which was posted on the website of the Russian Foreign Ministry, was not the first time that Poland and Lithuania had been accused of sending troops to Ukraine. In his notorious speech in Crimea, Russian President Vladimir Putin made similar claims right after Russia annexed the peninsula.

According to political observers, Russian leaders are thus trying to back their more abstract claims that Western countries are interfering into what they say is Ukraine's domestic conflict. Moreover, Moscow keeps denying its own involvement in the crisis, even though NATO has reported about the presence of Russian regular troops on the Ukrainian soil.

http://en.delfi.lt/central-eastern-europe/made-up-love-story-and-forged-passport-used-to-back-lavrovs-allegations-against-lithuania.d?id=66023300#ixzz3F7hdxwmg

Classics. Alexander Negrebetsky, elected by the people of a Russian city Zlatoust (in the Ural region) to serve as a member of their City Council, was arrested for drunk driving and assaulting a police officer. So, what is he doing now? He is fighting against the Ukrainian army in Eastern Ukraine. When asked, why he, a high-rank administrator, 37 y.o., a father of two, went abroad to fight, Negrebetsky said, "I am a patriot of Russia! Here, in Ukraine, people are Russian, they are as Russian as I am! I came here to protect them from Fascists." "And how many other citizens of the Russian Federation are in your unit?" "Well, only 10% of them are locals, 90% are Russian citizens, about one half from the Ukrals and the other half from Perm." "Why so few locals?" "I don't know! It astonishes me. They do not want to defend their motherland! We come here to fight for them, and they are fleeing to Russia! Yesterday, I talked with one old man from the locals. He is a decorated veteran, he fought Fascists in 1941-45. He told me, 'you know, I don't care who is governing us, you guys, or the Ukrainians; I just want my retirement money to be paid on time.' How can it be? He does not care, WHO pays him this money - we, or the Fascists?"



http://avmalgin.livejournal.com/4937460.html

If the separatists in the east of Ukraine gain control over Donetsk airport, combat over which has been going on for days, or the city of Mariupol in order to create a corridor to Crimea, the EU may impose additional sanctions on Russia, reported Bloomberg agency today, citing a source close to German foreign policy. Meanwhile European and U.S. sanctions which had been imposed earlier and are already in effect, are leaving a mark on the state of the Russian economy. This topic was one of the main ones at the Russian Calling! investment forum in Moscow.

http://euromaidanpress.com/2014/10/02/economic-crisis-in-russia-as-a-result-of-aggression-against-ukraine/

How russians falsifies the reports of "genocide" and "ethnic cleansing"

Mysterious expert - In the OSCE do not know, "human rights activist" Ejnar Graudins, who declared about the atrocities of the Ukrainian military in the Donetsk region

http://www.svoboda.org/content/article/26615443.html