Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko has threatened to dissolve parliament and call elections after the collapse of the country's ruling coalition.
Mr Yushchenko's supporters walked out in protest following new laws trimming the president's powers.
The laws were introduced by the pro-Russian opposition and backed by Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko's party.
Former allies, the prime minister and president are now at odds despite sharing pro-Western political goals.
All but one of 12 ministers from Mr Yushchenko's party boycotted Wednesday's cabinet meeting.
"A political and constitutional coup d'etat has started in the parliament," Mr Yushchenko said in a televised speech.
"I will use my right to dissolve parliament and decree early elections if a new coalition is not formed within 30 days," he said.
'Irresponsible behaviour'
But Ms Tymoshenko blamed her rival for the chaos, vowing that the Ukrainian cabinet would continue its work despite the break-up of the coalition.
"I am sorry that the president behaves irresponsibly," she said at a cabinet meeting. "The coalition was destroyed under his instruction."
The BBC's Russian affairs analyst Steven Eke says Mr Yushchenko's popularity is at rock bottom at the moment with opinion polls giving him single-digit levels of support.
The prime minister and president are believed to be jockeying for position before next year's presidential election, though our correspondent says Mr Yushchenko's chances of winning with current popularity levels would be slim.
The crisis follows mounting tension between the president and prime minister with Mr Yushchenko accusing Ms Tymoshenko of treason for allegedly siding with Moscow over the conflict in Georgia.
Mr Yushchenko has been a vociferous supporter of Georgia during the conflict but the prime minister's party on Tuesday blocked a parliamentary resolution condemning Moscow.
The flare-up comes a day before a planned visit to the country by US Vice-President Dick Cheney.
The trip is part of a tour of former Soviet states which the US sees as key allies.
The extremely tenuous political position of Ukraine's current pro-Western President - with his former ally Ms Tymoshenko (who appears to be cosying up to Moscow with a view to seizing power) clearly repudiating him once again, starkly illustrates just how premature it would be for NATO to try and induct Ukraine into its ranks. Heck, there's no guarantee a pro-Moscow government won't be in power within a few months, if not years. The "Orange Revolution" is dead.
Who knows, maybe the Russians will give Ms Tymoshenko all the support she wants - so long as she allows the Russians to exercise an option for renewal on their lease of Sevastopol for oh, say, the next 99 years.
Or alternately, watch the Russians annex the entire Crimea back and correct the 1954 mistake.
I definitely see the risks of NATO cooperation with Ukraine, but it sure seems like there should be some sort of counter-balance to Russia's influence. There ought to be a happy median point between outright alliances with NATO and being under Russia's thumb.
"A country without a Czar is like a village without an idiot."
- Old Russian Saying
The BBC's Russian affairs analyst Steven Eke says Mr Yushchenko's popularity is at rock bottom at the moment with opinion polls giving him single-digit levels of support.
Oh wow, that's epic failure right there. You know you fucked up when George W. Bush can claim three times better rating than you. With numbers like that we can safely say Yushchenko is long past "disliked" and well into "thoroughly hated". So much for the Orange Revolution.
It could be interesting if Ukraine does get into NATO, then the pro-Russia party comes in power, withdraws from NATO, and invites the Russians in. That would be quite the diplomatic blow to the West.
There hasn't been a precedent of a NATO country withdrawing from the alliance right? Aside from the French withdrawing from joint command or something thereabouts, but it wasn't a full withdrawal, nonetheless.
STGOD: Byzantine Empire Your spirit, diseased as it is, refuses to allow you to give up, no matter what threats you face... and whatever wreckage you leave behind you.
Kreia
His government did nothing but quarrel, and for the worst part, tried to outlaw the Russian language. Which most East Ukrainians and Russians speak.
He also tried to grab Pres. powers for himself after he claimed (on elections) that he will reduce presidential powers and make Ukraine a parliamental republic. He even forced a standoff between Parliament-loyal guard and President-loyal police.
So much for a lying ass.
Lì ci sono chiese, macerie, moschee e questure, lì frontiere, prezzi inaccessibile e freddure
Lì paludi, minacce, cecchini coi fucili, documenti, file notturne e clandestini
Qui incontri, lotte, passi sincronizzati, colori, capannelli non autorizzati,
Uccelli migratori, reti, informazioni, piazze di Tutti i like pazze di passioni...
...La tranquillità è importante ma la libertà è tutto!
His government did nothing but quarrel, and for the worst part, tried to outlaw the Russian language. Which most East Ukrainians and Russians speak.
He also tried to grab Pres. powers for himself after he claimed (on elections) that he will reduce presidential powers and make Ukraine a parliamental republic. He even forced a standoff between Parliament-loyal guard and President-loyal police.
So much for a lying ass.
Isn't that ironically similar to what Yeltsin did back in 1992? The only difference I can think of is that the Ukrainian army is probably somewhat divided, unlike the Red Army back then.
How will the Ukrainian army act in event of some serious civil war? Divide according to city lines?
STGOD: Byzantine Empire Your spirit, diseased as it is, refuses to allow you to give up, no matter what threats you face... and whatever wreckage you leave behind you.
Kreia
Most likely if it comes to a standoff the Parliament will control the Eastern Ukraine and most army units therein, whereas the Pres. will force the Western units and Internal Forces.
Lì ci sono chiese, macerie, moschee e questure, lì frontiere, prezzi inaccessibile e freddure
Lì paludi, minacce, cecchini coi fucili, documenti, file notturne e clandestini
Qui incontri, lotte, passi sincronizzati, colori, capannelli non autorizzati,
Uccelli migratori, reti, informazioni, piazze di Tutti i like pazze di passioni...
...La tranquillità è importante ma la libertà è tutto!
Fingolfin_Noldor wrote:There hasn't been a precedent of a NATO country withdrawing from the alliance right? Aside from the French withdrawing from joint command or something thereabouts, but it wasn't a full withdrawal, nonetheless.
France withdrew from the military command structure in stages from 1958-1966, with all NATO troops being removed from France by 1967. However France still maintained its ground forces in West Germany (mainly because moving them would have cost money and taken up precious French farmland). While France was supposedly still in NATO politically, it attended no official meetings of the organization from 1966-1994 and has still not reentered the military command structure to this day, repeatedly pushing for a ‘European only’ alliance that it could lead. However it does now have representatives at NATO headquarters again, and has taken part in NATO operations in the Balkans.
Basically it came down to French prestige was too great to be seen as subservient to the evil Americans, and France, always the reliable ally wanted to be able to make a separate peace with the Soviets if NATO collapsed in a war. NATO should have just kicked them out the door when the Cold War ended and France ceased to have any strategic value to the alliance.
"This cult of special forces is as sensible as to form a Royal Corps of Tree Climbers and say that no soldier who does not wear its green hat with a bunch of oak leaves stuck in it should be expected to climb a tree"
— Field Marshal William Slim 1956
Stas Bush wrote:Most likely if it comes to a standoff the Parliament will control the Eastern Ukraine and most army units therein, whereas the Pres. will force the Western units and Internal Forces.
And of course, the Russian Army will support their brave brothers in the East ...
His government did nothing but quarrel, and for the worst part, tried to outlaw the Russian language. Which most East Ukrainians and Russians speak.
The only Ukrainians that might not speak Russian would be the youngest school-age children, since Russian was required learning during the Soviet era and early post-Soviet CIS era. It may not be used everywhere in Ukraine, but to attempt to outlaw it would be foolish at best.
Stanley Hauerwas wrote:[W]hy is it that no one is angry at the inequality of income in this country? I mean, the inequality of income is unbelievable. Unbelievable. Why isn’t that ever an issue of politics? Because you don’t live in a democracy. You live in a plutocracy. Money rules.
How closely related are the Ukrainian and Russian languages? Don't both use the Cyrillic alphabet?
Something about Libertarianism always bothered me. Then one day, I realized what it was:
Libertarian philosophy can be boiled down to the phrase, "Work Will Make You Free."
In Libertarianism, there is no Government, so the Bosses are free to exploit the Workers.
In Communism, there is no Government, so the Workers are free to exploit the Bosses.
So in Libertarianism, man exploits man, but in Communism, its the other way around! If all you want to do is have some harmless, mindless fun, go H3RE INST3ADZ0RZ!! Grrr! Fight my Brute, you pansy!
Coyote wrote:How closely related are the Ukrainian and Russian languages? Don't both use the Cyrillic alphabet?
Finnish and English both use the Latin alphabet, but are completely unrelated.
Cyrillic is used for Ukranian and Russian, yes. They are both:
Indo-European > Balto-Slav > Slavic > Southern
languages.
However, Ukranian is:
Southern > Old Ruthenian > Ukranian
while Russian is:
Southern > [The language of Kievan Rus, I don't know the name] > Russian
They split approximately 500+ years ago, depending upon when you consider it to be a split, and occupy different branches of the Southern Slavic family.
You could perhaps call it the difference between Dutch and German, because although they split much later they are still very different.
Ghetto Edit- The problem with knowing exactly when they split is that most writings are in the church's literary language of Old Church Slavonic, like how the Romance languages wrote in Latin, so we only know that post Mongol-invasion they were definitely seperate when vernacular Ruthenian and Old Russian stuff appears. And of course Russian is (while, being Indo-European, quite well known) somewhat less studied than Latin.
fgalkin wrote:Duckie is a grot. Russian and Ukranean are EAST Slavic, not Southern Slavic, which would be Serbian, Croat, etc.
Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin
... Yes. I said South because I was busy musing about how there are no North Slavics and got distracted. Anybody knows that.
Of course, slavic languages are mostly irrelevant and extraordinarily boring, as they are essentially palatialized latin with an even more broken case system, but that's mostly why I don't know too much about them.
