Thursday, July 3, 2014

Genocide on its way: Ukraine may see 'total hell breaking loose' – Law Prof.

A total of 110,000 Ukrainians who have left for Russia in an attempt to save their lives probably just want to visit their relatives and then travel back, State Department spokeswoman Mari Harf said at a briefing, thus calling into question the tremendous number of people reported to be now seeking asylum in Russia. The United States generally doubts the UN figures on Ukraine refugees, endorsing Petr Poroshenko's decision to resume the punitive operation in Ukraine's southeast. Meanwhile, the so-called ceasefire is something that never happened, stresses VR's expert Francis Boyle, a professor at the University of Illinois College of Law.
"There was not much about a ceasefire to talk about, Poroshenko's hostilities continued, there was firing across the border with Russia."
The declared ceasefire served as an opportunity, a pretext taken up by Poroshenko to step up the sweeping military campaign and "bring up major military forces that we're now seeing unleashed on the Russian speakers in Donbass." Mr. Boyle comprehends these outrageous acts as war crimes, openly calling these crimes against humanity "verging on genocide." The order clearly arrived from the US, as despite the preceding four-way talks between the European foreign chiefs and the agreement President Putin clinched with his European counterparts, Poroshenko still chose to persist on with his military campaign.
"It's clear that he's been ordered to do this by the United States government just before ending of the so-called ceasefire. President Putin spoke with France's Hollande and Merkel of Germany and thought he'd reached an agreement to deescalate the conflict, but apparently the Americans ordered Poroshenko to go forward with his offensive."
Poroshenko seems to have been pushed into turning a deaf ear to anything that Russia's Lavrov has previously worked out with his EU colleagues, and it's clearly not the decision that Poroshenko took himself. A most biased approach is all there, the expert concludes, adding the coming days may see "total hell breaking loose" in the region.
"I certainly wish foreign minister Lavrov best of luck on this contact group but the problem is that the Americans want that and I don't think they're going to pay the least bit of attention to anything Lavrov has worked out with the French and the Germans and indeed by July 5 there could be total hell breaking loose over there for the Russian speakers in Donbass, and we could see the whole thing quite quickly collapsing into outright genocide against cities and people there."
The situation shows no signs of upcoming change, taking into account the most recent talks yielding little result if any. Indeed, how could a ceasefire breakdown occur if originally there was no ceasefire at all? France and Germany, at least, were apparently confused with the US' efforts, Mr. Boyle remarks:
'I regret to say, with all the respect to foreign minister Lavrov and Putin who really bent over backwards to solve this matter, I'm afraid the offensive against the Russian speakers will continue.'
"The four-way talks showed France and Germany certainly had serious reservations about what the US government is doing here in literally propelling Poroshenko to wage new genocidal onslaught against the Russian speakers in Donbass. But look just before the breakdown of the so-called ceasefire: President Putin reached an agreement with Germany and France and it looks as if the United States ordered Poroshenko to pay no difference to it."
Citing an air of uncertainty around the whole string of Ukraine-related issues, the expert comes up with the most gloomy predictions of what the situation would evolve into in the country's southeast. He says the standoff could develop into "an outright genocide" with the Ukrainian army attacking populated areas with heavy weaponry, making the case similar to that of Bosnia atrocities after Yugoslavia split up in the early 1990s. Mr. Boyle surely has sufficient reasons to equate the two conflicts, as he worked as a lawyer during the Bosnia campaign and won two court orders on embattled Bosnia's behalf in a war that he calls "a war of extermination" against the nation, with the sole purpose of "desisting" Serbs from committing their acts of genocide. The siege of Bosnian populated areas looked very much the same back then:
"I regret to say, with all the respect to foreign minister Lavrov and Putin who really bent over backwards to solve this matter, I'm afraid the offensive against the Russian speakers will continue and it could degenerate an outright genocide where we see Ukraine deploying extremely heavy weapons on the population centers in Donbass. Degenerating in something like Bosnia (I was Bosnia's lawyer in the war of extermination against them and won two court orders on their behalf against Serbia to cease, desist from committing all acts of genocide against Bosnia) So this, I regret to say, is reminding me of the earlier stages of the siege of Bosnian cities and towns by the Serbian army before it degenerated into outright genocide." The Obama administration apparently had a chance of quelling the violence, but they never took it, Francis Boyle sums up. "This could have gone along with the agreements struck by President Putin before this offensive. The Obama administration could go along with the agreement just reached today with the contact group, with Russia-France and foreign minister Lavrov." The fact that they ignored the previously struck deals and encouraged Poroshenko to do the same, signals the US has a somewhat different intention, Brzezinski being the one to decide on the course of action, or more likely Obama's advisor on Russia who happens to be Brzezinski's protégé. The reasons are voiced outright:
"You [radio VR's host] just quoted Ms. Harf there from the State Department saying the Obama administration fully supports Poroshenko's decision, that's correct: Poroshenko's taking his orders from the Obama administration…Brzezinski is really calling the shots here, he was Obama's mentor at Columbia. He stepped all of Obama's national security council with his own people, Obama's top advisor on Russia is Brzezinski's protégé. We know for a fact that Brzezinski hates Russia and the Russians with a passion, wants to see it broken up. Right now it seems to me that Brzezinski wants to provoke Russia into invading Ukraine to protect the Russian speakers."
If Russia takes action and responds to the "provocation", NATO troops are likely to get engaged shortly:
"This then could lead to Poroshenko inviting the NATO troops right now surrounding Ukraine, to inter Ukraine. And you could see they all raced with the Dnepr river with NATO and Russia "eye bolt – eye bolt ", used metaphor from the Cuban missile crisis."
Mr. Boyle finds it essential to be outspoken on the Ukrainian issue, as he openly condemns what the US is currently doing, both as a US citizen and a law expert. This is the line of action to be virtually ashamed of, as the US was originally supposed to stand for a totally different set of values. The danger of the Ukraine standoff shouldn't be underestimated either, he says, as it now demonstrates pretty many similarities with the Cuban missile crisis or the Berlin one:
"This could be just as dangerous as the Cuban missile crisis or the Berlin crisis. It's an extremely dangerous situation. I see no break being put on this by the Obama administration. As a US citizen, lawyer and someone who teaches international human rights the harsh statements [by Mari Harf] are completely outrageous and unacceptable. And I condemn them in the strongest terms possible. She's a disgrace to what the United States of America is supposed to stand for when it comes to human rights."
Read more: http://voiceofrussia.com/2014_07_03/Genocide-on-its-way-Ukraine-may-see-total-hell-breaking-loose-Law-Prof-8125/

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