UPDATE:  My point exactly:  “One month in, Ukraine truce exists in name only”

I’ve been busy this past week and haven’t had a chance to post, but Ukraine (and my wife) are never far from my mind.  Overall, you could say that this week was a “no news is good news” sort of week.  If something was going on in Mariupol, I would make the time to write about it; since I was able to be distracted, you can take that as a sign that things remain stable.

Stable, at least in Mariupol, but still tense.  There was a Coast Guard related incident on Thursday to the east of Mariupol, but there was nothing too significant in the city itself.  The same cannot be said for other parts of Eastern Ukraine.

Sadly, Ukraine is being forgotten by the media.  I think that when people heard about the truce and ceasefire a month ago, they thought, “thank goodness that’s all over now,” and moved on to other things. However, there has been ongoing fighting since that truce/ceasefire was announced, mostly in and around Donetsk, but many other locations as well.  One reporter in the area tweeted that he hadn’t really seen any reduction in the fighting at all.

This week a map starting making the rounds showing territory that had been seized by the Russians since the truce/ceasefire was announced.  It is astounding.  It seems the only party adhering to the ceasefire is the Ukrainian military; although they will respond when fired upon, being non-assertive has allowed the Russians to just start taking more area.

Also this past week:

• Russian increased the persecution of the Crimean Tartars — essentially following the game plan that was used in 1944.  They are also starting to amass troops along the border with mainland Ukraine, and they have enacted additional laws making any form of dissent punishable by deportation.
• Partisan leaders in Donetsk acknowledged — apparently without permission from Moscow — that members of the Russian army were assisting them, in “advisory” roles.  This seems to be at odds with statements by partisan fighters this week that put the division of military personnel fighting at the Donetsk airport as 90% Russian, and only 10% Ukrainian.
• A poll of Russian citizens showed over 60% did not want to commit troops to Ukraine, with only 12% saying that troops were already in Ukraine.  This is why the Kremlin continues to conduct very quiet burials of dead service members, and continues to lie to their families. It really pays to have total control of the information flow, doesn’t it?

I don’t know what more to say.  Until the world starts paying more attention to this ongoing (and growing ) threat in Ukraine, Russia will continue to run roughshod over international laws and treaties — all for the grandiose ambitions of that petty Putin, who seems determined to be the next Stalin or Hitler.