Have a look how pensions evolved between 1991 and 2014 between Russia and Ukraine. There were at the same level in 1991.
And during that time nothing changed, because of what? Russian corruption, that effected every country that was under its control? who did the then Ukrainian government look to, Kiev, or Moscow?
I can rewrite your last statement with your permission ?
I thought Russia had invaded the sovereign and independent country of Ukraine in 2014 and 2022 ?
And how would you react if someone breaks that agreement ?
That depends of the outcome of the Ukraine War and what will happen to the status of Odessa Oblast. Let's see what comes out of today's Alaska Summit.
And since 2014?
Again, one needs to ask what has happened since 2014, and especially what happened in 2022. One of the two states we're discussing has become more and more closed, the other has opened up.
And your family lives in Crimea ?
The difference in pension levels even got bigger between Russia and Ukraine - between 2014 and 2025.
The more closed up country is Ukraine, the more opened up country is Russia, right ?
Sorry but every one of your posts, comes across as " Russia good, Ukraine bad, You ignore the bit where Russia invaded first the Crimea, then the so called Special military action, You turn every single thing on its head, making out that its Ukraine, not Russian imperialism that's to blame, and because of that, I discount everything you post.
I love the Ukrainian nation and its people. I am myself an Ukrainian by heritage. However, I hate every single Ukrainian government and I'd never move to Russia (because its political system is not sth. I like).
So, presumably as you love the Ukrainian nation you think that Russia should stop the war and pull out of Ukrainian territory, that is the UN recognised territory prior to the 2014 invasion of Crimea.
Of course, Russian imperalism is to blame for this war, no question about that.
Yes !
Yes ! But the Ukrainian troops must pull out as well.
So Ukrainian troops must pull out of parts of Ukraine, that seems very close to Putin's demands.
No ! Russian troops must pull out of Eastern Ukraine, as well.
Russia is not going to attack Indian, Chinese and Brazilian UN troops in Eastern Ukraine. That is an iron-glad security guarantee for Ukraine.
Have you compared pretty much any region of russia in the same way? Nothing has changed except the infrastructure has become more rotten.
Here's an interesting question.
Yes, that's exactly what I just wrote.
You are still following Putin's demands by dictating where Ukraine can have its own troops in its own country and your area extends a long way from being just a DMZ at the border, which incidentally would also need to include Putin's puppet country of Belarus.
Personally I find it laughably naïve to think that the Indian, Chinese and Brazilian Governments would even agree to the deployment of large numbers of their troops to police this proposed UN area.
While I fully agree with you on this, I'm interested in future attitudes if this war ends in a peace deal involving territory concessions of some kind (which will inevitably involve relinquishing Crimea to Russia). This obviously isn't guaranteed as it could also end in a 'temporary' ceasefire, but it's one such outcome.
So, in your view, should Ukraine have stayed part of Russia, and Should NATO, have not expanded beyond its pre cold war boarders, IE stopped at the East German boarder, and Germany never reunified?
The South Korean Armed Forces are also not allowed to move into North Korean territory, although South Korea sees North Korea as their territory. It is the same the other way around.
Not at all - as Russia won't attack Indian, Chinese, and Brazilian UN troops, you won't need many of them to guard the Ukrainian DMZ.
I think the Trump administration has already signalled to recognize Crimea as being Russian territory.
This is not the point. Russia won't deploy any large troop concentrations along the the Ukrainian/Russian border when they are no Ukrainian/NATO troops on the other side of the border.
No Ukrainian Armed Forces (+ NATO) are allowed to stay in the DMZ.
Russia would agree, because this idea would achieve the demilitarization of Eastern Ukraine.
The countries would benefit from the natural resources underneath.
In my view they should have split Ukraine into two parts in the early 1990s - with both new countries guaranteeing religious freedom and language rights.
NATO expansion was wrong.
The legal mechanism on how Germany was reunified, was wrong.
So you are willing to do what Putin asks for, to give up Ukrainian resources to some theoretical peacekeeping force and basically ask nothing of Russia other than to pretty please promise to behave.
Which is likely the legacy of various waves of Russification and suppression of Ukrainian culture going back to the days of the Tsars.
But if Russia did? And indeed why wouldn't Russia? In this scenario you've told Ukraine that they cannot have troops in their own territory whilst the UN forces are thin and based solely deep in Ukrainian territory. Russia could easily strike and conquer most of Eastern Ukraine before the peacekeepers even get out of their bases.
Good for Trump, what about what Ukraine thinks about handing over a piece of its own territory? What about the example it sets to the wider world? Invade your neighbour, brutalise, murder and rape their people, steal their children, destroy their infrastructure and as a reward we'll let you keep a piece of their territory.
And if they do? What then? Why would Chinese, Indian and Brazilian troops go to war with Russia for Ukraine? More to the point as Russia is the aggressor, they invaded Ukraine in 2014 and they did it again in 2022, why should they be rewarded by being allowed to operate as they see fit in their own territory whilst Ukraine is forbidden from doing so in its territory?
The lines of the DMZ in this scenario are drawn entirely to the advantage of Russia. The Korean DMZ took territory from both sides to establish it (and is a hell of a lot narrower than the one you're proposing here). Russian forces should not be allowed in the DMZ and the DMZ should encompass Russian territory otherwise it clearly is not an equitable agreement.
But Russia wants more than just the demilitarization of Eastern Ukraine and, again, why should Eastern Ukraine be demilitarised whilst nearby Russian territory is not? Russia invaded Ukraine. Not the other way around.
So now Ukraine has to give up its own natural resources to allow its own territory to be policed by outside powers? This is a good outcome for Ukraine? Really?
They did, even Crimea (though it was closest there than anywhere else). I can't help but suspect that if you re-ran that election today the results would be the same (perhaps even more strongly pro-Ukrainian). Though this is of course impossible as Russia would never allow free and fair votes on such matters as Russia doesn't actually care what the people of Eastern Ukraine and Crimea think.
They don't make the point you think. They are examples of countries that did/do not formally recognise the other half of a successor state, but do not seek to overthrow it by force. If we explore the comparison further, the DMZ in Korea is to prevent the North and South Korean armies engaging, where the Northern forces are the ones taking an offensive posture. And the Berlin Wall was erected by the DDR to keep it's people in - a DDR that was instrumental in helping Vladimir Putin form his world view.
Well, if that is really his objective, I might agree. The evidence of the last 20 years doesn't suggest that Putin's interpretation of "demilitarisation" aligns with the dictionary.
In the aftermath of the last 11 years, the idea that a DMZ could be solely one side of the international frontier is implausible; doubly so if on the side that has been invaded but not on the side from which invasion has come.
An interesting choice of forces, given the (loose) BRICS alliance. I think Ukraine might have concerns about that disposition of forces.
You mean against the wishes of the Ukrainian population in a referendum? And if Western Ukraine should have been independent and neutral, surely the same should have applied to a hypothetical independent eastern Ukraine?
In what way "wrong". These were decisions freely entered into by these countries, as they looked to build after the period of Soviet domination.
So the people of Ukraine even in the early 1990s should have been denied the right to self-determination? They voted for independence, overwhelmingly, in 1991 as Ukraine. Not as some weird artificial construct but as Ukraine.
But it is interesting to think about why all those Eastern and Central European countries raced to join NATO as soon as they could isn't it? I wonder why they did? I wonder why Sweden and Finland finally decided to abandon their own neutrality after 2022?
History has plenty of examples of people of invaded countries allying themselves to the invader, for a range of reasons. If we look at a couple of famous/notorious examples, there were the likes of Quisling and Antonescu, who were ideologically aligned. Alternatively, there were defeatists like Petain who could not see past the immediate cost of fighting to what could be in future.
That is what Ukraine has already done - giving up Ukrainian resources for America.
Russian Armed Forces would have to leave DPR and LPR.
Nope ! South Korea has never recognized North Korea.
What can we tell the people of Iraq - with its right to self-determination - , whose country Ukrainian troops invaded in an illegal war of aggression in the 2000's ?
Correct - because the people were promised neutrality, which was embedded shortly thereafter in the Ukrainian Constitution.
Why Yushchenko wanted to join NATO in the mid 2000's - to tilt a domestic dispute between Ukrainian and Russian-speaking people in Ukraine to the favour of the Ukrainian-speaking population. That is the reason why Merkel und Zarkozy - exercising their right of self-determination - freely closed the the door for Ukraine in 2007.
You mean the Ukrainian/Russian DMZ, which would extend to x kilometres either side of the border, right?
Suppression of Ukrainian culture on Crimea ? There was never ever any large presence of Ukrainian culture on Crimea. Why did Russia fought against Britain on Crimea in the 1850's ?
I'd recommend to speak to the people in Cyprus. NATO member Turkey invaded Cyprus in the 1970's and was awarded territory.
The fact is: South Korean troops are not allowed to enter North Korea (due to the 1953 ceasefire agreement), although, South Korea has never recognized North Korea.
This idea was put forward by Zelenskyy in his Victory Plan, which he presented to the world in autumn of last year.
It stops the war and killings.
In Minsk II protocol both Ukraine and Russia had agreed that such elections/referenda were run in Donezk and Luhansk Oblasts. It was the Ukrainian authorities that had refused to cooperate with the LPR and DPR authorities to organize these elections.
Ukraine itself decided, under fear of US throwing them under the bus admittedly, to do a deal with the US, you are advocating third party confiscation of Ukrainian resources.
Are you really sure that a large South Korea don't want to overthrow the Kim regime in North Korea ?
Ukraine does not wield any veto power in the UN Security Council. Once USA and Russia reached an agreement, China will fall in line. The question is whether UK is voting against USA. Trump may cancel the recent trade agreement and impose tariffs.
The people of Eastern Ukraine could have decided to hold a referendum to merge with Russia.
Well, there was never a referendum held in Eastern Germany, whether this country wants to get absorbed by West Germany.
No, Eastern Ukraine would become a DMZ, incl. Donezk and Luhansk Oblasts.
The idea - natural resources for security guarantees - was proposed by Zelensky in his Victory Plan of 2024. Biden was the US President then.
