By Vestnik Kavkaza
Kiev believes that developments in the Southeast of Ukraine were initiated by Moscow. The official website of the SCU has published materials which say that in Ukrainian regions “wide-scale military aggression of Russia” is taking place, “it is provided by intelligence sabotage groups of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the General Headquarters of Russian Military Forces.” There is a supposedly a record of talks between employees of the GRU, discussing the results of a special operation near Slavyansk.
Disputing the information, the Defense Ministry of Russia stated: “I would like to wish the authors of the record and their supervisors to learn the subject better, as the slang spoken on the record matches children who play hide-and-seek, rather than officers.”
Bogdan Bespalko, the deputy director of the Center of Ukrainianology and Belarusiology of the Moscow State University, thinks that “the scenario of forcible takeover and actions against activists who declared Lugansk, Kharkov, and other people’s republics is quite possible. Logics of behavior of the self-declared authorities in Kiev confirms that forcible measures are their only option against either their supporters in face of Sashka Bily (Alexander Muzychko) and people from the Right Sector or people who try to protect independence of their regions. There are victims, blood ran in Kharkov, Donetsk, Odessa. In fact at the moment the Rubicon is crossed. Now we are speaking about mass forcible suppression.”
According to Bespalko, the situation develops rapidly: “Nobody could imagine several months ago that Crimea would merge into Russia; that groups of activists would declare the Donetsk and Kharkov People’s Republics. However, if we consider the nationalist discourse provided by people who captured power in Kiev due to military overthrow, they cannot accept federalization, independency of regions within the unitary Ukrainian state. So, agreements on federalization or compromise with people who represent the South east are impossible. If they take place, they will have a tactical character.”
Yesterday, the topic was discussed by Vladimir Putin and Barack Obama over the phone. The USA President expressed his concern “about Russian interference in the Southeast of Ukraine,” while Russian President stated that protests in Donetsk, Lugansk, Kharkov, Slavyansk, and other towns of the Ukrainian Southeast are a result of the fact that the leadership in Kiev doesn’t want and isn’t able to consider the interests of the Russian and the Russian-speaking population. He urged Obama to use the capacities of the American side to prevent bloodshed. The leaders of Russia and the USA came to an agreement that they should continue searching for ways of diplomatic cooperation on the Ukrainian crisis ahead of the four-party talks (the EU, Russia, the USA, and Ukraine) in Geneva on April 17th.
