FEMEN v. Putin, Merkel

Catch them if you can!





Hit the gym, boys.

Sources:
http://femen.org

Yanukovych: Ukraine ‘Must Be Made Unsafe’ (Gaffe)

It's not the first time. Maybe he means it?

Yanukovych: I’m being told that this must be done ahead of Euro 2012. Not just then, dear colleagues. Not just then. We believe that our whole territory...of our state must be made unsafe to live in for our citizens. And undoubtedly, once guests start coming to us, even more so.

Yet another reason for Merkel to stay at home for Euro 2012...

...and do some geography homework. 

Sources:
http://censor.net.ua/video_news/206956/teritoryu_nasho_krani_treba_zrobiti_nebezpechnoyu_dlya_jittya_gromadyan_novaya_ogovorka_yanukovicha
http://censor.net.ua/video_news/206924/merkel_ne_smogla_pokazat_na_karte_stolitsu_germanii_eto_ne_berlin_a_chto_eto_rossiya_video
http://5.ua

An Italian Look at the Reset Button

With Obama and Merkel playing incubus and succubus to Medvedev and Putin, what does the future hold for Ukraine?

Kligg Magazine weighs in.



Sources:
http://www.kliggmagazine.com/?p=488

Obama Reaffirms NATO's Open Door Policy

On the eve of NATO’s 60th anniversary, U.S. President Barack Obama made an overture to countries squeezed hard by the reset button.

A quote from REMARKS BY PRESIDENT OBAMA AND NATO SECRETARY GENERAL JAAP DE HOOP SCHEFFER AFTER MEETING:

We've also discussed the role that NATO plays with respect to Russia and how this administration, my administration, is seeking a reset of the relationship with Russia, but in a way that's consistent with NATO membership and consistent with the need to send a clear signal throughout Europe that we are going to continue to abide by the central belief that countries who seek and aspire to join NATO are able to join NATO.

President Obama, however, did not mention any specific steps, such as his presidential campaign view of Ukraine as being ready for a Membership Action Plan (MAP).

Meanwhile, Ukrainian PM Yulia Tymoshenko, in Japan, promoted the idea of European collective security, attributing it to Sarkozy and Merkel.

Gee, I thought this whole European collective security counter-concept to NATO was the pet project of Chirac and Schröder.

Granted, neither France nor Germany has been a supporter of NATO expansion. But hasn’t France decided to reunite with the NATO military structure?

Looks like the guys who write talking points/articles for Tymoshenko have been drinking too much French wine.

Sources:
http://www.pravda.com.ua/news/2009/3/26/92019.htm
http://www.pravda.com.ua/news/2009/3/26/92021.htm
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Remarks-by-President-Obama-and-NATO-Secretary-General-Jaap-de-Hoop-Scheffer-After-Meeting/

Stalin Big Boards to Discipline Donetskites

As the Dons of Donetsk file criminal charges against Lutsenko and take over banks and universities in Kyiv, the mortal denizens of Donetsk are having less fun. First, their utility bills tripled. Second, Generalissimo Stalin made a comeback — this time, in a slice-of-death advertising campaign launched by a local utility company slapped with mass non-payment.

According to company management, the use of Stalin as a visual image personality creates powerful associations with order and discipline. Not an unfounded claim in a city that had gone by the name of Stalino from 1924 to 1961. Of course, those creative people forgot to trace the blessings of “order and discipline” to Stalin’s experience in bank robbery and genocide.

Anyway, the message reads: “Comrades, this is not a movie. This is life. They who don't pay will be punished.”

Perhaps Angela Merkel should consider adopting these scaremongering practices to combat her country’s rampant unemployment. Don’t they have a mustached zombie of their own in Germany? So how about this: “Achtung! This is not a drill. They who don't work will be deported to Donetsk?”


Sources: http://www.pravda.com.ua/news/2007/3/19/55951.htm

Bonus tracks: Soviet Anthem (English version, 1949)

Janukowytsch Does Deutschland

The land of beer and sausages has supplied a sizzling update to Yanukovych’s catalogue of faux pas. Pravda picks on the following episodes, in which Yanukovych

1. Bowed prematurely during the anthem ceremony with Chancellor Angela Merkel.

2. Rebuffed Merkel’s gastronomical niceties with, “I didn’t come here to dine, but to tell you about Ukraine.”

3. Put words in Merkel's mouth on Ukraine’s EU accession prospects.

4. Misspelled the name of former German President Richard von Weizsäcker as “Richard von Weizer…Weizer-berg.”

5. Projected a Boratish sense of humor, “Sitting here between two Alexanders, Kwaśniewski and Rahr, I can make a wish according to Ukrainian tradition. Whether it will come true I will tell you later.”

Scheiße! The German tour was off to a bad start when Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung came out with a scathing op-ed “Von der Marionette zum Lenker” (From Puppet to Chief) by Konrad Schuller. It wrought havoc on a soapy article “Janukowytsch für Neutralität der Ukraine” (Yanukovych for a Neutral Ukraine) published earlier in Die Welt by Russian-speaking political pundit Alexander Rahr.

Pravda quotes Yanukovych as saying, “Rahr is an interesting analyst and expert, and we’ve invited him to cooperate.” Well, well, well, Paul Manafort seems to have hired a German subcontractor for his reputation laundering operation in Ukraine.

Perhaps, there’s an opening position for boxing legend and former Orange Revolution fixture Vitaliy Klychko? (He happens to be the darling of Germans by virtue of having launched his career there.) How else should we interpret his increasingly frequent public appearances in close proximity to Herr Janukowytsch?