Obama to welcome Ukrainian Prime Minister

US President Barack Obama welcomes Ukraine’s interim prime minister at the White House on Wednesday, a high-profile diplomatic gesture aimed at emphasising Western recognition of Ukraine’s fledgling government.

Prime Minister Arseny Yatseniuk will be greeted at the White House with all of the grandeur of a state visit, including an Oval Office meeting with Obama. The two men are expected to make comments to the media following their discussions.
White House spokesman Jay Carney said Yatseniuk’s visit is meant to signal “that we strongly support Ukraine, the Ukrainian people and the legitimacy of the new Ukrainian government”.
Ukraine’s parliament installed Yatseniuk as head of the country’s interim leadership after pro-Kremlin president Viktor Yanukovich fled the capital Kiev following three months of popular protests against his decision to reject an economic agreement with the European Union in favour of pursuing closer ties with Moscow.
Vice President Joe Biden, who has served as a primary administration contact with Ukraine’s old and new governments, will also attend the meeting. Secretary of State John Kerry, who met with Yatseniuk in Kiev last week, is expected to have a separate meeting with the prime minister.
Yatseniuk will, above all, be seeking financial assistance when he arrives in Washington to help Ukraine defend itself against Russia, which he has described as being “armed to the teeth”.
The United States has so far promised Ukraine $1 billion in loan guarantees, as well as technical support as it moves towards elections. The European Union has pledged $15 billion in assistance to Ukraine, though that falls well short of the $35 billion in international rescue loans that Kiev says it will need over the next two years.
Ukraine’s acting president, Oleksandr Turchynov, said Tuesday that Russian leaders were “rejecting a diplomatic solution” by rebuffing dialogue with their Ukrainian counterparts.
"They are refusing all contact at foreign ministry and top government levels," he told AFP.
He told the parliament in Kiev that he wanted the United States and Britain, as guarantors of a 1994 treaty that saw Ukraine give up its Soviet-era nuclear weapons, to intervene to fend off Russian "military aggression".

"The US and the European Union must force Russia to stop this military aggression and these provocations against Ukraine," Turchynov said.
But despite NATO air patrols of the Polish and Romanian borders, and US naval forces preparing for exercises in the Black Sea, the West has made clear that – as when Russia annexed parts of Georgia in 2008 – it has no intention of risking a military conflict with Moscow over Ukraine.
An ‘illegitimate’ referendum
Yatseniuk’s talks with the Obama administration come as the largely Russian-speaking region of Crimea prepares for a referendum Sunday on whether to become a part of Russia or remain a semi-autonomous enclave of Ukraine.
Russia sent troops to occupy the enclave last week after Ukraine’s pro-Kremlin government was ousted. Russian President Vladimir Putin has so far ignored threats from the West to impose visa bans, economic sanctions and halt an international economic summit Russia is scheduled to host in June.
The United States and Europe have declared the Crimea referendum illegitimate, saying that Ukraine’s central government must be involved in decisions about its territory.
But Russia does not recognise Ukraine’s new government, nor the presidential elections Ukraine has planned for May.
Yanukovich, for his part, declared in a televised appearance Tuesday that he remained Ukraine’s rightful ruler.
Crimea’s parliament declared the same day that if the public votes to become part of Russia, the peninsula will declare itself independent and seek to become a Russian state.
The Russian parliament has already approved the accession, in principle, of Crimea, which was given to Ukraine by Soviet rulers nearly 60 years ago.
A poll released this week showed that two-thirds of Russians support the Kremlin's moves in Crimea.
But it is not clear whether or how soon Russia would formalise an annexation as it remains engaged in a complex confrontation with the West over the Black Sea territory.

Contra view of the Situation and visit to Washington from Ukrainian PM

- http://merih-news.com/ukraine-interim-pm-to-bolster-take-over-with-dc-rubber-stamp/

 

 

Russia Today Live – RT

Russia Today Live – RT

eritrea-chat.com

eritrea-chat.com

The crackdown against the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt has intensified, with the government formally listing the group as a terrorist organization and accusing it of being behind a recent suicide attack that killed 16 people.
The new categorization gives the government new powers to detain any member of ousted President Mohamed Morsi’s regime by charging them with belonging to a terrorist group. Anyone found to be promoting or financing the group can also be charged.
"All of Egypt…was terrified by the ugly crime that the Muslim Brotherhood group committed by blowing up the building of the Dakahlyia security directorate,” an emailed statement from the interim government’s cabinet office said, according to Reuters. "The cabinet decided to declare the Muslim Brotherhood group a terrorist organization,” the statement continues.
On Tuesday, explosions at a police headquarters in Mansoura, located north of Cairo, killed at least 16 people and injured at least 140 others. Sinai-based militant group Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis claimed responsibility for the attack, Reuters reported.
Although the Muslim Brotherhood condemned the attack, the Egyptian government accused the group of being responsible. It also vowed to seek justice for the perpetrators. Interim Prime Minister Hazem el-Beblawi described the Brotherhood as a terrorist organization in an official statement on Wednesday.

In response to being listed as a terrorist group, the Muslim Brotherhood vowed to continue its protests. "The protests will continue, certainly," Ibrahim Munir, a member of the group's executive council who is in exile in London, told AFP. He called the move “illegitimate" and “an attempt to frame the Brotherhood.”
The Egyptian military-backed government has been pursuing a crackdown against Morsi and other Muslim Brotherhood leaders since Morsi’s overthrow in July.
Hundreds of Mosri supporters have been killed in the crackdown, with protests raging almost every day.
The government has pursued several criminal cases against Morsi. One of them accuses him of inciting deadly violence during the December 2012 protests. He is also facing a criminal trial over an episode in January 2011, when he - along with 129 others - escaped from a prison.
Just last week, Egypt’s political forces charged Morsi and other top Brotherhood leaders with terrorism and plotting with foreign groups. Both crimes can be punishable by the death penalty.
In September, a court in Egypt banned all activities of the Muslim Brotherhood in the country, allowing for the confiscation of all assets.
Journalist Shahira Amin described the situation to RT as a vicious cycle with more bloodshed to come.
“This is a new escalation in a long-running feud between the security state and the Muslim Brotherhood. What they are trying to achieve is to crush the Islamist group altogether and not to leave any room for that group to enter into political life again,” she said. “Declaring the Muslim Brotherhood a terror group will mean criminalizing their activities, criminalizing their financing, and also criminalizing their membership. Their protests are already outlawed. Their leaders are already behind bars and thousands of their supporters languish in prisons.”

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