Ukraine War Lisicansk Ukrainian military checkpoint - Ukraine News
Ukraine War Lisicansk Ukrainian military checkpoint - Ukraine News Ukraine War Lisicansk Ukrainian military checkpoint - Ukraine News Ukraine War Lisicansk Ukrainian military checkpoint...
By: naymer mehun
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Ukraine War Lisicansk Ukrainian military checkpoint - Ukraine News - Video
Ukraine's revolution began with a status update on Facebook.
Angered by another high-handed move by an increasingly unpopular government, activist reporter Mustafa Nayyem called for a rally on the country's most famous square, Maidan Nezalezhnosti ? Independence Square.
"As soon as there are more than 1,000 of us, we will start organizing," Nayyem wrote.
He got hundreds on that damp evening of Nov. 21, 2013, the start of a protest movement that eventually would draw hundreds of thousands into the square, topple the government and propel the world into a dangerous new diplomatic phase.
One year after that status update, Ukraine formed a coalition government Friday with a mission to overhaul the economy, combat corruption and steer the country toward integration with Europe.
In Washington, State Department spokesman Jeff Rathke welcomed the coalition agreement as "an important and transparent step."
He said Ukraine is welcome to apply for ascension to NATO: "Our policy is that the door remains open."
Yet despite that apparent success, the dreams that brought Nayyem and his followers into the square seem fainter than ever. Ukraine is battling to stave off economic collapse and waging an exhausting war against Russian-backed separatists in the east.
Ukrainians marked Friday's anniversary with elegies to those who died during the political upheaval that drove out disgraced President Viktor Yanukovych in February. His successor, Petro Poroshenko, laid a wreath at a memorial on the Kiev street where many were shot dead.
But when thoughts turn to what has been achieved since those lives were lost, sorrow often turns to bitterness.
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Ukraine's Facebook Revolution, 1 Year Later
Eight months ago, David Arakhamiya was running a small IT company in the southern Ukrainian city of Mykolayiv. Today, as an adviser to Ukraines defense minister, he oversees a massive crowdfunding effort that since March has raised about $300million from ordinary citizens. The money is being used to equip Ukraines army with everything from uniforms, water, and other basic supplies to high-tech gear such as reconnaissance drones.
Yaroslav Markevich, another IT entrepreneur with a small company in Kharkiv, once a Soviet hub for aviation technology, presented a plan to the commander of one Ukrainian battalion to create a drone unit after hearing stories about the efficiency of Russian drones. The commander said yes, and by the time his battalion was deployed early this summer, it was the only one in the army equipped with a fleet of short- and long-range drones. Short-range drones are used to help guard roadblocksthey carry infrared-vision devices that detect approaching enemy soldiers at nightand long-range drones are used to locate artillerytargets.
Markevich regularly travels to the front lines to persuade army commanders to use aerial reconnaissance. We would come to an artillery unit, launch the drones, and show them targets located 20 kilometers away on the screen. It made them ecstatic, he says. His work with drones raised Markevichs profile, helping get him elected to Ukraines parliament inOctober.
A crowdfunding effort used to equip Ukraines military
IT experts across Ukraine have been an important part of the volunteer effort to supply the army with equipment. They may enjoy different music than the IT crowd in the U.S.they listen to underground Soviet bands from the 1980sbut theyre still geeks.
The Ukrainian army had no drones at the start of the war, while the rebels were using sophisticated Russian drone technology. Back in summer, reconnaissance drones would have saved many, many lives, says Andriy Horda, a volunteer scout with the Ukrainian army in the war zone. Now, Horda and others say, the troops are equipped with foreign-made drones and homegrown ones built in workshops across the country.
From the minute the army started using drones, the engineers and commanders realized it was cheaper to assemble them locally than to buy them from abroad, Markevich says. Western drones cost upwards of $200,000 apiece; the Ukrainians brought the cost down to about $60,000. About 10 informal groups of technology and aviation experts, all volunteers, are making about 40drones a month, using open-source software and cameras and other parts bought mostly from China.
We started cooperating with scientific institutes in Kiev and Kharkiv, Arakhamiya says. They helped us a lot with aerodynamics. The high-altitude drone systems are now comparable to Western versions, he says.
Other military hardware is under development, including encryption devices to protect communications in the field. Early on in the conflict, IT volunteers built a radio communications system that allows frontline commanders to direct the movements of soldiers using a tablet. Arakhamiya says it cost about eight times less than the army would have paid for a system from a commercial supplier.
Estimated cost of a Ukrainian-assembled reconnaissance drone
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Ukraine's IT Brigade Supports the Troops
Russias military intervention in Ukraine is unacceptable and rebel elections this month were a Kremlin-orchestrated farce, U.S. Vice President Joe Biden said during a visit to Kiev.
Russia shelled Ukrainian territory for the first time since a Sept. 5 cease-fire agreement was signed in Minsk, Belarus, military spokesman Andriy Lysenko said in Kiev yesterday. Russia is moving tanks, artillery and air-defense systems into Ukraine in blatant violation of international law, North Atlantic Treaty Organization Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said during a visit to Kaunas, Lithuania.
Biden condemned the threat to Ukrainian sovereignty and territorial integrity posed by Russian aggression, in a speech after meeting Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko. It is simply not acceptable in the 21st century for countries to attempt to redraw borders by force in Europe or anywhere, or to intervene militarily because they dont like decisions their neighbor has made, he said.
Bidens visit coincided with the first anniversary of the start of the Euromaidan protests that ousted President Viktor Yanukovych in February and triggered the conflict. Authorities in Kiev named Nov. 21 a new national holiday, the Day of Dignity and Freedom. Poroshenkos political bloc and four other pro-European Union parties signed a ruling coalition agreement following Oct. 26 elections. The president reiterated an ambition to apply for membership in the block by 2020.
Reforms must be started immediately, Poroshenko said yesterday in a national address on state television. Their aim is to reach European standards of living gradually so that in 2020 we will be able to apply for EU membership. That is what the draft coalition agreement is about.
Thousands of people gathered, many wrapped in Ukrainian flags and bearing candles and flowers, at a monument in central Kiev where about 100 protesters were killed in violent clashes with police before Yanukovychs ouster.
In the past 24 hours, four Ukrainian soldiers were killed and 10 were wounded, while pro-Russian rebel forces shelled government positions 79 times, the Ukrainian Defense Ministry said today on its Facebook page. Insurgents also shelled civilian areas in Donetsk, and Luhansk 18 times, the ministry said. One civilian was killed by mortar fire in the Luhansk town of Zolote, regional Governor Hennadiy Moskal said on his website.
Russia, which denies involvement in the conflict, is opposed to Ukraine deepening ties with the EU, while the government in Kiev and its U.S. and European allies accuse Russian President Vladimir Putins government of supporting the separatists with cash, weapons and fighters.
The conflict has intensified since rebels in the breakaway regions of Donetsk and Luhansk held elections earlier this month, which Biden condemned along with Russias March annexation of the Crimea peninsula.
They were not democratic elections, he said. They were a Kremlin-orchestrated farce. Let me say as clearly as I can: America does not and will not recognize the Russian occupation and annexation of Crimea.
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Biden Visits Ukraine as NATO Accuses Russia Over Weapons
The Russian question
Russia has clung to its Soviet sphere of influence with tenacity in the decades since the former USSR was disbanded. After Maidan protestors overthrew the Russian-approved President Viktor Yanukovych in February 2014, Russian has made no secret of trying to influence Ukraine -- and block Kiev from making closer ties with the European Union (EU) or the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).
The annexation of Crimea in March, after citizens voted to join the Russian Federation, was followed by Russian support for separatists in the eastern Ukrainian regions of Donetsk and Luhansk. The conflict has so far led to more than 4,000 deaths in eastern Ukraine and the downing of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 over Ukraine in July.
Russia itself is hurting economically, following Western-imposed sanctions and declining values of the oil price and ruble, but has stuck to its support for the separatists.
Yet the Kiev government has remained staunch in its commitment to closer ties with Europe. As President Petro Poroshenko, a candy tycoon who came to power in May, said on Twitter Wednesday: "There is no alternative to European integration."
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Ukraine revolution one year on: Change for the better?