Ukraine
The US and Russia traded sanctions on Thursday and the EU is mulling additional sanctions against Russia. The new sanctions have been prompted by the Crimean vote to leave Ukraine and Russia's subsequent annexation of it. Le Monde Diplomatique gives some background on the protests that led to the ouster of the Moscow-leaning President Viktor Yanukovych and discusses the aftermath. "Who were the protesters and what were their goals?...The protest movement emerged in November last year, after Yanukovych suspended negotiations on a free trade agreement with the European Union." The pro-Western protesters were soon joined by "several nationalist groups... and... ultra-radical, non-democratic movements without European sympathies...Dormant during the Soviet era, the nationalist movement reappeared after independence in 1991, when the Social-National Party of Ukraine (SNPU) was formed. Until the early 2000s, the SNPU was a marginal, xenophobic and ultra-nationalist organization." Then the SNPU changed significantly. "It shed its fascist trappings ...in 2004, renaming itself Svoboda (freedom) and abandoning its neo-Nazi badge, the Wolfsangel (wolf hook), in favour of a more neutral symbol." Svoboda's nationalist and anti-system stance won it 10% of the vote in 2012. Svoboda wants to end Russian influence in the Ukraine. Its strong nationalist stance translates into a foreign policy that wishes "to see Ukraine join NATO, rearm with nuclear weapons and leave all post-Soviet cooperative organisations." Another opposition group gaining in popularity after the street clashes is Pravy Sektor, which supports "none of the opposition parties, especially not Svoboda, disappointed by its 'appeals for calm and negotiation with the authorities.' ... Svoboda’s success over the past few years and the presence of neo-fascist groups such as Pravy Sektor in Independence Square are signs of a crisis in Ukrainian society...Though Independence Square will go down in history as an extraordinary example of collective and popular action, the political outcome is as yet unclear. Ukraine is in need of a new force that truly serves the people and transcends its many social and political divides."
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| Map of Ukraine with Crimean Peninsula highlighted (adapted from ESL-in-Canada's website) |
Crimea
Crimea has a Russian-ethnic population and they voted overwhelmingly to join Russia in a referendum last Sunday. Western nations have declared the referendum and annexation illegal. Juan Cole at Informed Comment agrees but notes that "Crimea had been Russian territory since the late 18th century and was only attached to Ukraine by Khrushchev in the 1950s, at a time when Russia and Ukraine were part of the same country. Whatever the status of Sunday’s referendum, it seems likely that if Crimeans could vote fairly and freely, a majority would probably accede to Russia." Cole notes that "Russia’s annexation of Crimea is among the few significant territorial acquisitions since the end of World War II by one country from another, more or less by force. The only clear parallel... is the Israeli annexation of the Palestinian territories in 1967." Cole concludes that Israel's steps in occupying the Palestinian territories "are more egregious than Russia’s incorporation of Crimea. No local populations in any of those areas would vote to accede to Israel....Unlike with Mr. Putin, the US has not imposed sanctions on Israel for its territorial aggrandizement, and instead has de facto supported it."
Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey
If you enjoy good science, you need to watch the new Cosmos series on Fox and National Geographic TV. Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey is an updated re-imagining of Carl Sagan's 1980 series, Cosmos: A Personal Voyage. Hard to believe that the original Cosmos aired more than 30 years ago. Neil deGrasse Tyson hosts the new series, which began Sunday, March 9. "According to National Geographic, it was the largest global rollout of a TV series ever, appearing on 220 channels in 181 countries and 45 languages." Mother Jones discusses Tyson's Inquiring Minds podcast and notes the contrast between him and Carl Sagan in debating the anti-science (or bad science) forces. "Carl Sagan himself often took strong stands on science-based political issues of the day. He clashed with the Reagan administration over arms control and the 'Star Wars' program, and the debate over his ideas about 'nuclear winter' served as a kind of preview of the current battle over global warming. 'Carl Sagan would debate people on all manner of issues,' said Tyson.'And I don't have the time or the energy or the interest in doing so. As an educator, I'd rather just get people thinking straight in the first place, so I don't have to then debate them later on.'...In other words, Tyson's view appears to be that in an age rife with science denial, Cosmos rises above that fray by instilling in us wonder about the nature of the cosmos and our quest to understand it. And given the breathtaking quality and stunningly wide distribution of the show, there's much to say for that approach. "
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| Image is from NatGeoTV.com |
"Right wing Israeli officials ....expressed rage [last weekend] at US Secretary of State John Kerry for saying that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu should “drop” his demand that the Palestinians recognize Israel as a Jewish state." Both the Arab League and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas have "rejected Netanyahu’s diction. It is a red line for them. Insisting on it will mean no agreement." To agree to Netanyahu's statement would jeopardize the Palestinian right of return. In a March 12 speech, Abbas explained that "his commitment to the negotiations was time-bound, for a nine-month period, while Kerry tried to hammer out an agreement, especially on security and borders." Abbas laid out the Palestinian position in the negotiations - East Jerusalem as the capital of Palestine, complete Israeli withdrawal from "the West Bank or from territories equivalent to the extent of the West Bank as it existed in 1967", and compensation and a right of return for Palestinians displaced in 1948 and 1967. "This speech may help explain why President Obama told PM Netanyahu that the US can’t protect Israel if there is no agreement. Mahmoud Abbas has not put going to the International Criminal Court off the agenda, he just postponed it for nine months. The nine months is expiring. If the Kerry negotiations crash and burn, pressure will build on Abbas and other Palestine officials to go to the ICC." [Informed Comment, March 16]
Industrial Civilization's Collapse?
The Guardian's Earth Insight blog on March 14 had this ominous lead: "A new study sponsored by Nasa's Goddard Space Flight Center has highlighted the prospect that global industrial civilisation could collapse in coming decades due to unsustainable resource exploitation and increasingly unequal wealth distribution." Examining the collapse of civilizations through history, the project identified "the most salient interrelated factors which explain civilisational decline, and which may help determine the risk of collapse today: namely, Population, Climate, Water, Agriculture, and Energy." These factors can result in civilizational collapse when they result in the aforementioned resource exploitation and wealth maldistribution. "Modelling a range of different scenarios, [lead researcher Safa] Motesharri and his colleagues conclude that under conditions 'closely reflecting the reality of the world today... we find that collapse is difficult to avoid.'... However, the scientists point out that the worst-case scenarios are by no means inevitable, and suggest that appropriate policy and structural changes could avoid collapse, if not pave the way toward a more stable civilisation." They write: "Collapse can be avoided and population can reach equilibrium if the per capita rate of depletion of nature is reduced to a sustainable level, and if resources are distributed in a reasonably equitable fashion."
Links
You can watch full episodes of Cosmos here.
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