Crimea Adopts Ruble as Ukraine Continues Battling Rebels

[dipsydoodle]

Source: Bloomberg News

Crimea adopted the ruble in a further step toward integration with Russia, which annexed the Black Sea peninsula in a move Ukraine and its allies the U.S. and European Union have denounced as illegal.

Crimean shops will no longer use double pricing in hryvnia and rubles, and all transactions will be carried out solely in the Russian currency, Russia’s central bank said in a statement. The currency switch comes as Ukrainian forces battle to stop pro-Russian separatists from carving off more territory in the country’s east as President-elect Petro Poroshenko tries to right the economy and keep the country from splitting apart.

Read more: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-06-01/crimea-adopts-ruble-as-ukraine-continues-battling-rebels.html

[Demeter]

1. Only makes sense.

[Benton D Struckcheon]

2. Crimean Vacation Time!

Link: https://www.facebook.com/eurokharkiv/photos/a.382117655259003.1073741827.382115471925888/464218837048884/?type=1&theater

I guess the disruption caused by having to switch to rubles must've kept everyone off the beach. Yeah, gotta be.

[Benton D Struckcheon]

3. Russia Interferes With Civilian Shipping off Lithuania, for the THIRD Time

http://www.lithuaniatribune.com/68660/russian-ships-once-again-interfere-with-shipping-activities-in-lithuanias-economic-zone-201468660/

So, what's the excuse for this? Fascists in Lithuania too?

[stevenleser]

4. Crickets nt

[Xithras]

5. You realize that the EEZ and territorial waters aren't the same thing, right?

There is nothing even vaguely illegal about any nations military ships entering the EEZ of another nation. Territorial waters are considered to be within the borders of a nation. The EEZ is simply an extension beyond those territorial waters where a nation holds exclusive rights to profit from extracting from the environment (fishing, mining, etc). Ships from any nation can sail them, hold wargames on them, or whatever.

NATO and Russia have both been holding naval wargames in the Baltics for the better part of the past century. NATO holds them there because some Baltic nations are in NATO. Russia holds them there because Russia is a Baltic nation with a Baltic Fleet and several major Baltic ports. They use Lithuania's EEZ because Russia shares a sea border with Lithuania and the Lithuanian EEZ is right off the Russian coast.

There are enough valid issues with Russia to worry about. Stoking fear over something that is perfectly normal and expected seems a bit unnecessary. Try sailing a civilian ship into the middle of a U.S. Navy exercise in the Pacific and see what happens. No navy in the world would allow civilians to wander through the middle of a military exercise.

[Iterate]

7. Lithuania presents diplomatic note to Russia over sea incident

Friday, May 30, 2014 4:47 pm
The Lithuanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs called on Russia to consistently comply with the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea and other international legal norms and ensure that similar incident would not repeat in the future, the ministry said in a statement on Friday.

There have been two reports this week about Russian ships interfering with shipping activities in Lithuania’s exceptional economic zone, directing civilian ships to change their route because of a Russian at-sea military exercise. A similar incident took place several week ago too.
http://www.lithuaniatribune.com/68665/lithuania-presents-diplomatic-note-to-russia-over-sea-incident-201468665/

We can assume the Lithuanian Ministry knows the law. This was an intentional provocation, not a misunderstanding. Some of the ships ordered to divert were installing a power cable between Lithuania and Sweden. In early May Russia suspended a 2001 agreement with Lithuania for joint military inspections and notifications.

Russia to carry out Open Skies mission over Latvia, Lithuania
The Voice of Russia-Jun 1, 2014
Russia will fly two consecutive observation missions aboard an An-30B aerial surveillance plane over Latvia and Lithuania under the Treaty on ...
Russian inspectors to carry out observation flights over Latvia ...
ITAR-TASS-Jun 1, 2014
http://voiceofrussia.com/news/2014_06_01/Russia-to-carry-out-Open-Skies-mission-over-Latvia-Lithuania-6930/

Russia may come to defence of its fellow nationals to Baltic states – Lithuanian Minister of Defence
The new doctrine of Russian President Vladimir Putin to defend rights of Russian-speaking communities abroad may become a pretext for intervention in the Baltic states, Lithuania’s Defence Minister Juozas Olekas has warned.

“The new Putin’s doctrine that the Kremlin has a duty to protect Russian compatriots abroad, wherever they may be, puts us in a new situation. It could give Putin a pretext for intervention to protect Russians or Russian-speaking residing in the Baltic states, as well,” Olekas said at a Vilnius meeting of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly’s Defence and Security Committee on June 1.
http://www.lithuaniatribune.com/68682/russia-may-come-to-defence-of-its-fellow-nationals-to-baltic-states-lithuanian-minister-of-defence-201468682/

[Xithras]

10. I'd be curious to see what they cited in the LOS.

UNCLOS does not contain any provisions banning military exercises within another nations EEZ, and that was not an accidental oversight. A number of coastal nations wanted the UNCLOS to grant nations the right to exclude foreign military vessels, but a number of other major powers (including the United States and China) opposed the move because it would have placed a lot of power over strategic waterways into the hands of smaller nations. After a number of failed attempts to find a compromise, they gave up and just removed the topic so that it wouldn't derail the rest of the treaty.

The only prohibition on military actions within an EEZ pertain to military use of an EEZ to threaten the nation claiming it. Is Lithuania claiming that the ships are actually there in preparation for an invasion?

[Iterate]

11. Not enough info to second guess

specifically how they felt threatened. Clearly they are on edge. Right now I can't even find an exact location of the incidents. Lithuania is pretty open with documents, so maybe I can find it tomorrow.

If I had to say now, judging from the small number and types of ships, this was another impromptu and disruptive exercise in the sea lanes. As with the clear skies overflights, it's legal, intimidating, and unnecessary.

If this was any other time we might not have heard anything of it, but given Crimea, other Russian conflicts, and how this fits into the Lithuanian perception of Russian military doctrine, it's an issue.

[Benton D Struckcheon]

6. Yeah, but as reported in the article,

it was the 2nd this week, and the third time this year. As the saying goes, once is chance, twice is coincidence, three times is enemy action.

[Iterate]

8. Yes, "Lithuanians are fascists"

I've seen it stated on several online Russian news sites in Russian, but didn't post it here (or even bookmark it for that matter). I've not seen it in an online Russian site in English.

If memory serves, that was nominally the same justification used in Hungary for the '56 invasion.

[Benton D Struckcheon]

9. Yeah, I kinda figured.

No doubt they can go back far enough in history to defame pretty much anyone in Eastern Europe because of WWII, thereby deflecting attention away from their own present-day support, including financial, of European neo-Nazis.
Which is why my patience for the apologists for this disgusting regime is somewhere between zero and a negative number at this point. They've had plenty of time to research the actual facts, I've posted them many times by now, and if anyone is still taking the Russian side it's because of a conscious decision to support a regime they know is actually supporting fascists in Europe right now. Never mind it's not exactly a left wing example of anything, given its flat tax regime (remember Depardieu?) and its unrelenting promotion of fossil fuels to the point that Russia is way behind any other even semi-advanced country in adoption of renewables.
Which is doubly ridiculous, by the way, given that every mw of energy they produce via renewables (in their case, wind doubtless makes the most sense) is a mw of energy embodied in the fossil fuels they have that they can export and make money on. But that regime is too stupid and corrupt to even be able to figure out something as elementary as that, something even Saudi Arabia has figured out.

[Iterate]

12. Crimea seeks change

The suspension of the hryvnia is landing blows to the nerves and pockets of Crimeans

Kerch – In annexed Kerch, shopkeepers and customers are having difficulties with the suspension of the hryvnia. They cannot give Ukrainian coins as change in shops and supermarkets any longer, and there is still no supply of Russian change on the peninsula.

Shopkeepers are trying to put the solution of the problem on the buyers’ shoulders, demanding that they pay on obligation, or offering them to buy goods on a rounded sum. On their part, the customers argue with the shopkeepers, demanding that they are given Russian change.

Many customers have to give up part of their purchases in order to approximate the end sum to a round number.

“This is torture! I cannot take my purchases because the cashier doesn’t have any change. See for yourself: a loaf of moulded bread costs 9 roubles and 12 kopets. ‘Selianskoye’ milk – 33 roubles and 72 kopeks. Now pay without change, they tell me at the cash register. Where will I find change for them? I still have Ukrainian coins that nobody needs, but it is still money,” complains pensioner Irina Vitalyevna.

...

And it turns out that Crimeans don’t have a clear understanding of what is happening. It is best seen at cash registers, where similar confusion, anger and helplessness can be seen on both the shopkeepers’ and buyers’ faces. These are feelings of people that are beginning to grasp that first, they will have to pay more. And second, there will be more and more unpleasant discoveries like this one every day.

http://euromaidanpr.com/2014/06/02/the-suspension-of-the-hryvnia-is-landing-blows-to-the-nerves-and-pockets-of-crimeans/