KIEV - Opposition lawmakers hurled eggs and smoke bombs inside Ukraine’s parliament Tuesday as the chamber approved an agreement allowing the Russian Navy to extend its stay in a Ukrainian port until 2042.

Thousands of opposition demonstrators rallied outside the parliament building as deputies from newly elected President Viktor Yanukovich’s coalition approved a 25-year extension to the Russian Black Sea Fleet’s base in Crimea.

The chamber of the parliament filled with smoke as smoke bombs were released and Speaker Volodymyr Litvyn took shelter under his umbrella as eggs rained down on him.

Russia’s lower house of parliament also approved the deal to extend the lease on the naval base at Ukraine’s Black Sea port of Sevastopol Tuesday.

Ukrainian nationalists, led by former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko and former President Yushchenko, regard the base as a betrayal of Ukraine’s national interests. They wanted to remove it when the existing lease runs out in 2017.

But parliament ratified the lease extension by 236 votes — 10 more than the minimum required for it to pass.

Yanukovich agreed to the navy base deal with Russian leader Dmitry Medvedev on April 21 in exchange for a 30 percent cut in the price of Russian gas to Ukraine — a boon to Kiev’s struggling economy.

The Russian fleet has been based in Sevastopol since the reign of Catherine the Great in the 18th century. But, under an accord after Ukraine gained independence following the break-up of the Soviet Union, the fleet would have had to leave in 2017.

A blind eye’
Yushchenko, Yanukovich’s pro-Western predecessor who favored Ukrainian membership of NATO, pushed hard when he was in office for the fleet to be withdrawn on time in 2017.

But the newly elected Yanukovich says he wants to significantly improve ties with Ukraine’s former Soviet master. He says the Black Sea fleet in Crimea does not endanger Ukraine’s national interests and enhances European security.

Yanukovich’s opponents say he is acting against the constitution. But the constitution is ambiguous, containing two contradictory articles on the stationing of foreign military bases in the country.

“If society today turns a blind eye to the Kharkiv agreement, it is possible that it will be the biggest loss to our sovereignty and independence,” Yushchenko said at the weekend, referring to the meeting in the city of Kharkiv where Yanukovich and Medvedev agreed the deal.

The Russian fleet in Sevastopol comprises about 16,200 servicemen, a rocket cruiser, a large destroyer and about 40 other vessels including submarines, landing craft, small destroyers and support ships.

To the embarrassment of Yushchenko, the fleet sent warships to support Russian military action against Ukraine’s then-ally, the former Soviet republic of Georgia during Russia’s brief war there in August 2008.

Opponents of the Black Sea deal say that, by hosting the Black Sea fleet, Ukraine could be dragged into future Moscow conflicts with other powers.

Proponents point out that the Crimea was part of Russia until then-Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev gave it to Ukraine in the 1950s. The region retains a strongly Russian-leaning population.

Source (article): MSNBC

Source (picture): MSNBC

On February 11, 1945, a week of intensive bargaining by the leaders of the three major Allied powers ends in Yalta, a Soviet resort town on the Black Sea. It was the second conference of the “Big Three” Allied leaders–U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin–and the war had progressed mightily since their last meeting, which had taken place in Tehran in late 1943.

What was then called the Crimea conference was held at the old summer palace of Czar Nicholas II on the outskirts of Yalta, now a city in the independent Ukraine. With victory over Germany three months away, Churchill and Stalin were more intent on dividing Europe into zones of political influence than in addressing military considerations. Germany would be divided into four zones of occupation administered by the three major powers and France and was to be thoroughly demilitarized and its war criminals brought to trial. The Soviets were to administer those European countries they liberated but promised to hold free elections. The British and Americans would oversee the transition to democracy in countries such as Italy, Austria, and Greece.

Final plans were made for the establishment of the United Nations, and a charter conference was scheduled to begin in San Francisco in April.

A frail President Roosevelt, two months from his death, concentrated his efforts on gaining Soviet support for the U.S. war effort against Japan. The secret U.S. atomic bomb project had not yet tested a weapon, and it was estimated that an amphibious attack against Japan could cost hundreds of thousands of American lives. After being assured of an occupation zone in Korea, and possession of Sakhalin Island and other territories historically disputed between Russia and Japan, Stalin agreed to enter the Pacific War within two to three months of Germany’s surrender.

Most of the Yalta accords remained secret until after World War II, and the items that were revealed, such as Allied plans for Germany and the United Nations, were generally applauded. Roosevelt returned to the United States exhausted, and when he went to address the U.S. Congress on Yalta he was no longer strong enough to stand with the support of braces. In that speech, he called the conference “a turning point, I hope, in our history, and therefore in the history of the world.” He would not live long enough, however, to see the iron curtain drop along the lines of division laid out at Yalta. In April, he traveled to his cottage in Warm Springs, Georgia, to rest and on April 12 died of a cerebral hemorrhage.

On July 16, the United States successfully tested an atomic bomb in the New Mexico desert. On August 6, it dropped one of these deadly weapons on Hiroshima, Japan. Two days later, true to its pledge at Yalta, the Soviet Union declared war against Japan. The next day, the United States dropped another atomic bomb on Nagasaki, and the Soviets launched a massive offensive against the Japanese in Manchuria. On August 15, the combination of the U.S. atomic attacks and the Soviet offensive forced a Japanese surrender. At the end of the month, U.S. troops landed in Japan unopposed.

When the full text of the Yalta agreements were released in the years following World War II, many criticized Roosevelt and Churchill for delivering Eastern Europe and North Korea into communist domination by conceding too much to Stalin at Yalta. The Soviets never allowed free elections in postwar Eastern Europe, and communist North Korea was sharply divided from its southern neighbor.

Eastern Europe, liberated and occupied by the Red Army, would have become Soviet satellites regardless of what had happened at Yalta. Because of the atomic bomb, however, Soviet assistance was not needed to defeat the Japanese. Without the Soviet invasion of the Japanese Empire in the last days of World War II, North Korea and various other Japanese-held territories that fell under Soviet control undoubtedly would have come under the sway of the United States. At Yalta, however, Roosevelt had no guarantee that the atomic bomb would work, and so he sought Soviet assistance in what was predicted to be the costly task of subduing Japan. Stalin, more willing than Roosevelt to sacrifice troops in the hope of territorial gains, happily accommodated his American ally, and by the end of the war had considerably increased Soviet influence in East Asia.

HISTORY.COM
Date: 2009-02-11

MOSCOW – Russia cut off all gas supplies to Europe through Ukraine on Wednesday, playing hardball in a weeklong standoff that has left more than a dozen countries struggling to cope with dwindling energy supplies in the depths of winter.

The U.S. put the blame squarely on Russia, accusing Moscow of using its energy resources to threaten its neighbors.

But Prime Minister Vladimir Putin endorsed the move, even as factories shut down in eastern Europe, schools closed and tens of thousands of people scrambled to find other ways of keeping warm.

Insisting that Ukraine was responsible for the crisis, Putin appeared determined to force Kiev to back down and accept increased prices for natural gas. The two sides were to meet Thursday in the first face-to-face talks since negotiations broke down on New Year’s Eve.

The effects of the gas cutoff reverberated across the continent, with Bulgaria, the EU’s poorest member, among the worst hit. Croatia declared a state of emergency and Hungary instituted gas rationing for industries. The situation in Bosnia was so dire that woodcutters revved up their chain saws to cut wood for fireplaces.

“It is a shame that in the last two decades our rulers did not look for alternative sources of energy supplies. It’s again up to Moscow,” retired teacher Anelia Petrova said in Sofia, the Bulgarian capital.

Hundreds stormed shops in Sofia looking for electric heaters. Tsvyatko Peev got the last one in a downtown shop.

“I’m glad I got one, although I fear that the additional electricity costs will ruin the family budget,” Peev said.

In Hungary, voluntary rationing for the country’s largest consumers went into immediate effect.

Japanese carmaker Suzuki closed its plant in the northern city of Esztergom, while a brick factory belonging to Austria’s Wienerberger, the world’s largest brick manufacturer, in the eastern city of Bekescsaba and a tire factory in Racalmas, central Hungary, owned by South Korea’s Hankook also shut down due to gas shortages.

The Hungarian subsidiary of General Electric and famed salami maker Pick were among the companies cutting output.

The EU accused both Russia and Ukraine of using consumers as pawns in their dispute.

“It is unacceptable that the EU gas supply security is taken hostage to negotiations between Russia and Ukraine,” EU spokeswoman Pia Ahrenkilde Hansen said.

In Washington, U.S. officials criticized Russia for the energy crisis.

“Cutting off these supplies during winter to a vulnerable population is just something that is unacceptable to us,” State Department spokesman Robert Wood said.

U.S. national security adviser Stephen Hadley warned Moscow if it continues to threaten its neighbors and manipulate their access to energy it will “compromise any aspirations for greater global influence.”

Russia supplies one-quarter of Europe’s natural gas, and about 80 percent of that is shipped through pipelines crossing Ukraine. Other smaller pipelines run through Belarus and Turkey.

Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Greece, Italy, Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia and Turkey all reported a halt in Russian gas shipments by Wednesday. Others — including Austria, France, Germany, Hungary and Poland — reported substantial drops in supplies.

Russia’s gas monopoly Gazprom stopped all gas shipments to Ukraine on Jan. 1 after the two countries failed to agree on prices and transit fees for 2009, but kept supplies flowing to Europe over Ukraine’s pipelines.

Russia reduced supplies Tuesday, accusing Ukraine of siphoning off gas meant for Europe. But Putin ordered Gazprom to stop all shipments Wednesday.

“This should be done publicly and in the presence of international observers,” he told Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller.

EU Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso pressed Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart Yulia Tymoshenko for a quick resolution to the standoff.

“If this matter is not solved, it will raise very serious doubts about the reliability of Russia as a supplier of gas to Europe and Ukraine as a transit country,” Barroso said.

He said both countries agreed Wednesday to accept international monitors that could verify the flow of gas once it resumes.

Andrew Neff, an energy analyst with Global Insight, said Gazprom’s cutoff aimed to pressure Ukraine to settle quickly.

“While the Russian gas giant risks further sullying its already-poor reputation in Europe with its tactics, Gazprom is effectively seeking to force this dispute to an end sooner rather than later,” he wrote in an analysis.

Talks had been expected Thursday in Moscow, but Ukraine said it was sending its delegation instead to Brussels, where Gazprom’s Miller is to speak before the European Parliament.

In 2008, Russia charged Ukraine about half what it charged its European customers for gas — a Soviet-era practice it has long sought to change. Ukraine, however, says if it pays more for natural gas, Russia should pay more for shipping that gas across Ukraine.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev told Ukraine’s President Viktor Yushchenko on Wednesday that Moscow would insist that Kiev pay European prices “without discount.” Medvedev also demanded full payment of Ukraine’s $600 million debt to Gazprom, which Ukraine has said it will not pay until the issue is settled in arbitration courts.

Ukraine, which has a vast underground storage system full of natural gas, says it can weather the dispute until early April.

Gazprom, however, is losing substantial income during a peak season for gas consumption. It also will soon see an excess of gas in its system, which will create a costly storage problem.

SOURCE: YAHOO!NEWS

In post-revolutionary Russia, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) is established, comprising a confederation of Russia, Belorussia, Ukraine, and the Transcaucasian Federation (divided in 1936 into the Georgian, Azerbaijan, and Armenian republics). Also known as the Soviet Union, the new communist state was the successor to the Russian Empire and the first country in the world to be based on Marxist socialism.

During the Russian Revolution of 1917 and subsequent three-year Russian Civil War, the Bolshevik Party under Vladimir Lenin dominated the soviet forces, a coalition of workers’ and soldiers’ committees that called for the establishment of a socialist state in the former Russian Empire. In the USSR, all levels of government were controlled by the Communist Party, and the party’s politburo, with its increasingly powerful general secretary, effectively ruled the country. Soviet industry was owned and managed by the state, and agricultural land was divided into state-run collective farms.

In the decades after it was established, the Russian-dominated Soviet Union grew into one of the world’s most powerful and influential states and eventually encompassed 15 republics–Russia, Ukraine, Georgia, Belorussia, Uzbekistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia. In 1991, the Soviet Union was dissolved following the collapse of its communist government.

HISTORY.COM
Date: 2008-12-30