PowerSwitch

Western governments are jubilant over the fall of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich, a Russian ally. They may be underestimating Vladimir Putin: Russia has the option to hasten Ukraine's slide into chaos and wait until the hapless European Union acquiesces to - if not begs for - Russian intervention.

That leaves the West with a limited number of choices. The first is to do nothing and watch the country spiral into chaos, with Russia as the eventual beneficiary. The second is to dig deep into its pockets and find US$20 billion or more to buy near-term popularity for a pro-Western government - an unlikely outcome. The third, and the most realistic, is to steer Ukraine towards a constitutional referendum including the option of partition.

Attempts to set up a government by the Western-backed Ukrainian opposition forces that seized power in Saturday’s fascist putsch have collapsed amid rising demands for social attacks on the working class from Washington and the European Union (EU), and military tensions with Russia.

EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton left Kiev yesterday after two days of fruitless talks attempting to bring the different opposition parties together in a government. The putsch, cynically hailed by the Western media as a struggle for democracy, is proving to be an operation to forcibly install a filthy dictatorship of imperialist finance capital. Opposition officials estimated this week that Ukraine needs up to $35 billion to refinance its debts. However, the major international banks have effectively cut off credit to Ukraine, charging ruinously high interest rates that it cannot afford. Meanwhile, Russia has withdrawn its offer of $15 billion in aid after the putsch toppled Russian-backed President Viktor Yanukovych.

EU and International Monetary Fund (IMF) officials are demanding austerity measures, such as deep cuts to state subsidies for consumer energy prices, in exchange for a $1or 2 billion payment to stave off immediate bankruptcy. Yanukovych rejected a planned association agreement with the EU entailing such cuts last autumn—the decision which led to the opposition protests against him—fearing that the cuts might lead to social upheavals that would bring down his regime.

Now, the pro-Western opposition, supported by gangs of fascist thugs from the Svoboda party and the neo-Nazi Right Sector group, is trying to push this reactionary, anti-democratic agenda through. Arseniy Yatsenyuk of billionaire oligarch Yulya Tymoshenko’s Fatherland Party, whom Washington has identified as its preferred right-wing figurehead in Ukraine, called on the opposition to join government and do the banks’ bidding despite popular opposition. “This is about political responsibility. You know to be in this government is to commit political suicide, and we need to be very frank and open,” Yatsenyuk told reporters outside Parliament.

biffvernon wrote:Now if only we didn't have nation states and borders....

PS_RalphW wrote:Separatists have taken a government building in the east . Russia says it will defend their right to self determination. Clearly Russia is keen to get the east back.

biffvernon wrote:National borders are often very temporary affairs.

Mean Mr Mustard wrote:

biffvernon wrote:National borders are often very temporary affairs.

Ask any Pole...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Territoria ... _of_Poland