Ukraine : Geneva Statement Of April 17, 2014 & Commentary

Saturday, 19 April 2014, 9:51 am
Opinion: The Vineyard of the Saker

The Guardian published the full text of the Geneva Statement. This is what eight hours of negotiations produced:

The Geneva meeting on the situation in Ukraine agreed on initial concrete steps to de-escalate tensions and restore security for all citizens.

All sides must refrain from any violence, intimidation or provocative actions. The participants strongly condemned and rejected all expressions of extremism, racism and religious intolerance, including anti-semitism.

All illegal armed groups must be disarmed; all illegally seized buildings must be returned to legitimate owners; all illegally occupied streets, squares and other public places in Ukrainian cities and towns must be vacated.

Amnesty will be granted to protestors and to those who have left buildings and other public places and surrendered weapons, with the exception of those found guilty of capital crimes.

It was agreed that the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission should play a leading role in assisting Ukrainian authorities and local communities in the immediate implementation of these de-escalation measures wherever they are needed most, beginning in the coming days. The U.S., E.U. and Russia commit to support this mission, including by providing monitors.

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The announced constitutional process will be inclusive, transparent and accountable. It will include the immediate establishment of a broad national dialogue, with outreach to all of Ukraine’s regions and political constituencies, and allow for the consideration of public comments and proposed amendments.

The participants underlined the importance of economic and financial stability in Ukraine and would be ready to discuss additional support as the above steps are implemented.

That's it. Good thing that they called it "initial" because it really contains only vague well-intentioned truisms. They might as well have written something along the lines of "give peace a chance" or "we are the world, we are the children, we are the ones who make a brighter day". So if there is nothing of substance here, what is the big deal? Why did it take so long?

The big deal is that Uncle Sam had to accept Russia as an equal party to the solution of this mess.

The big deal is that Kiev had to accept the East as an equal party to the solution of this mess.

This might look obvious to any mentally sane person, but for die hard imperialist who believe their own hubris and for neo-Nazis thugs who thought that they could built their Banderastan and basically eliminate the East in one way or another, this is a very painful concession one, in fact, they will try as hard as they can to renege on.

Furthermore, this "statement" (it is not even an agreement) has a huge flaw which is already becoming obvious: it was signed by "the Ukraine" as if there was such an entity in the first place. But that, of course, is a fiction. The two biggest forces which really matter are the Right Sector and the Russian-speakers of the East, neither of which was invited. Instead, it is this fictional and wholly illegitimate regime of oligarchs and CIA agents which put it's signature in the name of all Ukrainians. The problem is that this regime is about as representative of the Ukrainian people as the Kerensky regime was in 1917 Russia: it represented only itself.

As for the Right Sector and the Russian-speakers in the East, they are not bound by this agreement and the latter have already declared so. As for the Right Sector, there is one word in this document which refers directly to them, the word "square" as in "all illegally occupied streets, squares and other public places in Ukrainian cities and towns must be vacated". That they won't like one bit. Of course, all the revolutionary junta needs to do is to deliver the "Maidan" a public demonstration permit and, voila, they will be "legal", except that the Maidan is a much bigger threat to the regime than to anybody else. So doing that might be very dangerous.

The bottom line is this: this "statement" is only a "partial acceptance of reality" by the USA and its puppets in Kiev, that's it. What made them cave in is the absolute failure of the so-called "anti-terrorist operation" which far from crushing the East saw several instances of units switching sides (the 24th Airborne Brigade, were most of these defections occurred, is now reportedly being disbanded, thus Kiev is basically getting rid of what is probably the comparatively best trained and most combat capable unit in the entire Ukrainian military).

The most important thing to understand at this point is that the future of the Ukraine will not be decided by this document, but only by the correlation of forces on the ground. That is the only thing which the AngloZionist Empire responds to: force. With the Empire, written agreements, treaties, promises and pledges are not worth the paper they are written on, and the Russians knows that better than anybody else.

Putin gave the Ukrainians one month to, at the very least, resume paying their electricity bill and negotiate a payment plan, then Russia will switch to a monthly pre-payment option in which the Ukies will only get the energy they have paid for in advance. The effect of that will be nothing short of an economic nuclear explosion, especially in the context of the promised Presidential election. And even if by a mix of halfway measure (loans, reverse gas deliveries, etc.) the West managed to keep a few streetlights in Kiev on over the summer, by September the severity of the shortage will be nothing short of apocalyptic.

As for the Russian-speakers in the East, nobody currently has the means to disarm and crush them by force. I see no way this could change in the foreseeable future. What the East will do over the summer is simply to organize itself better and prepare for any attempts by Kiev to crush its people. As for Russia, it now has all the time it needs to covertly assist the Donbass financially, organizationally and even militarily.

Time is most definitely not on the USA's side and with the passing weeks the position of the current oligarchic regime will get weaker and weaker and that will force it to more and more concessions. Frankly, a much better solution at this point would be to have direct negotiations between the Right Sector and the Russian-speakers. I know, this sounds far fetched, and it it, but at least these two parties do most definitely have power and legitimacy (with their own people, that is).

One more thing: some of you have expressed concerns about the planned OSCE monitors mission. You have to understand that all this is is a fig leaf to try to give the impression that all parties want to de-escalate the violence. Furthermore, and I assure you that this is true, nobody on the planet knows the OSCE better than the Russians, especially Putin, as they saw how these "observers" "observed" in Chechnia! As a result, if and when these so-called "observers" show up in the eastern Ukraine, they might as well wear T-shirts with "CIA", "MI6", "DGSE" or "KSI" written in big letters.

The bottom line is this: this agreement is first and foremost a symbolic concession by the AngloZionists and nothing else. It will have zero real impact on the ground. One should not be distracted by all the hot air being currently released in the corporate media and the blogosphere because words are just that - hot air, political flatulence. Only one thing will decide the eventual out come of this crisis: the correlation of forces on the ground and it unambiguously indicates that the "Ukrainian experiment" is over. It is now just a matter of time.

The Saker

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The Saker is a 'legal alien' currently living in the Imperial Homeland

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