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The New York Times
Topic Started: Feb 23 2014, 07:42 AM (344 Views)
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His Majesty King Carol I
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Rash Repression in Venezuela
By FRANCISCO TORO - FEB. 24, 2014

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PROTESTS have rocked Venezuela in recent weeks, but no one seems to agree on why huge numbers of people have suddenly taken to the streets. Some observers see the demonstrations as a verdict on food and medicine shortages, inflation and economic stagnation. Others see them as the tantrum of a retrograde former elite bent on nullifying the results of the last election. The government, for its part, is sticking to the old script: Venezuela is falling victim to a fascist conspiracy cooked up by American officials who are terrified of its revolutionary aspirations.

Yet none of these competing explanations capture what’s unique about this latest outpouring of anger. Venezuela’s protests are, in a way, self-referential: Faced with a government that systematically equates protest with treason, people have been protesting in defense of the very right to protest.

The crisis started on Feb. 4, when a group of student activists in the Andean city of San Cristóbal took to the streets to protest the crime wave ravaging their campus. The Police Department’s failure to respond to the sexual assault of a first-year student sent students out en masse to demand that the state protect them.

The government’s response was a brutal police crackdown, not against the rape suspect, but against the student protesters. The security forces sprayed the protesters with tear gas; two students were arrested. The next day, a larger demonstration hit the streets of San Cristóbal to protest the previous day’s violence, and student activists in a second city, Maracaibo, joined them in solidarity, only to be harshly beaten and tear-gassed by the National Guard in return. Fifty students were wounded on Day 2.

As the cycle of protests, repression and protests-against-repression spread, the focus of protest began to morph. What was at stake, the students realized, was the right to free assembly.

Repression, in Venezuela, comes not only in the form of tear gas and rubber bullets. The government has also mobilized its sprawling propaganda apparatus — newspapers and radio stations, half a dozen TV stations, hundreds of websites — in a concerted campaign of vilification to demonize the protest leaders as a shadowy fascist cabal in cahoots with American imperialists.

The claim is outlandish, yet its ceaseless repetition reveals that to the Venezuelan government, all dissent is treason. Such a regime has little trouble justifying the use of violence against its opponents.

It’s striking that the government has now settled on “fascists” as the favored epithet to attack dissenters. It seems as if President Nicolás Maduro can’t finish a sentence without denouncing a fascist. The irony appears to be lost on Mr. Maduro, who seems to have forgotten that one of the cornerstones of actual fascism is the refusal to recognize the legitimacy of dissenting opinions.

It’s this intolerance of opposing views, and violent repression, that Venezuela’s students are now mobilized against. Today, after 13 deaths, 18 alleged cases of torture and over 500 student arrests, the protest movement has snowballed into a nationwide paroxysm of anger that puts the government’s stability in question.

The protests’ lack of structure has given them resilience, but also an anarchic edge. There is no single leader in a position to give the movement strategic direction. Its favored protest tactic — the improvised barricade to isolate given neighborhoods from the outside world — appears self-defeating at best, as some of these barricades have led to violence.

The government’s response, however, has been grossly disproportionate — ranging from an almost inexhaustible supply of tear gas and plastic bullets to the use of armored personnel carriers, tanks and paramilitary shock troops on motorcycles. At one point, the Venezuelan Air Force had its Russian-built Sukhoi fighter jets circle above San Cristóbal to cow rock-throwing kids.

The challenge now is to mold the great indignation of the last few weeks into a coherent, nimble, organized political organization able to stand up for all Venezuelans’ basic rights. Henrique Capriles, the leader of Venezuela’s moderate opposition, has made his pitch. In a speech to a large rally in Caracas last Saturday, Mr. Capriles, flanked by high-profile student leaders, made an impassioned call for an end to nighttime protests, roadblocks and other tactics liable to court violence.
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Few outside the rally heard him, however, because government pressure ensured that no broadcast media carried coverage of the event: one more reason to believe the government is invested in a strategy of escalation.

Hugo Chávez was never shy about goading the opposition into a fight. He understood that confrontation was the best way to rally his hard-core supporters while consolidating autocratic control over society. Mr. Maduro, his chosen successor, certainly absorbed that lesson.

But Mr. Chávez also had an instinctive feel for the limits of such tactics and never engaged in repression on this scale. It’s that politician’s grasp of the pitfalls of going too far, too fast that seems lacking in Mr. Maduro. What’s clear, though, is that Venezuela’s students will not stand by passively while basic human rights are flouted. As their protest chant has it:

“No way! No way!


© New York Times
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Trust Eroded, Obama Looks Beyond Karzai
By MARK LANDLER and HELENE COOPER - FEB. 25, 2014

WASHINGTON — President Obama, apparently resigned to President Hamid Karzai’s refusal to sign a long-term security agreement with the United States before he leaves office, told him in a phone call on Tuesday that he had instructed the Pentagon to begin planning for a complete withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan by the end of the year.

But in a message aimed less at Mr. Karzai than at whoever will replace him, Mr. Obama said that the United States was still open to leaving a limited military force behind in Afghanistan to conduct training and counterterrorism operations.

Noting that Mr. Karzai had “demonstrated that it is unlikely that he will sign” the agreement, Mr. Obama told him, in effect, that the United States would deal with the next Afghan leader. He warned Mr. Karzai that the longer it took for Afghanistan to sign the pact, known as a bilateral security agreement, or B.S.A., the smaller the residual force was likely to be.

It was the first time the leaders had spoken since last June, and for all intents and purposes, it marked the end of a relationship that had long since broken down in acrimony.

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A member of the Afghan National Security Forces kept watch as American soldiers met with Afghan officials near Kandahar. While Mr. Obama’s message was not a surprise — administration officials had concluded weeks ago that any agreement would probably come only after elections in April — the White House’s blunt description of his call with Mr. Karzai underscored the depth of the president’s frustration and the erosion of trust in the Afghan leader.

But the call also confirmed that the White House has retreated from its earlier insistence that the Afghan government sign the agreement before the elections or face the threat of a total pullout.

“Clearly, the president is putting pressure on Karzai without closing the door on B.S.A. just as he is preparing the ground for the possibility that B.S.A. may not happen,” said Vali Nasr, the dean of the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.

Indeed, in the call with Mr. Karzai, Mr. Obama made clear that he views a residual force as a way to prevent Afghanistan from becoming once again a haven for terrorist groups.

“Should we have a B.S.A. and a willing and committed partner in the Afghan government, a limited post-2014 mission focused on training, advising, and assisting Afghan forces and going after the remnants of core Al Qaeda could be in the interests of the United States and Afghanistan,” the White House said in a statement issued after the call.

The White House had hoped to seal the security pact before a meeting this week of NATO defense ministers in Brussels, where Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel plans to discuss the logistics of the American troop reduction in Afghanistan and the shape of a potential postwar force with other alliance partners.

Military planners have faced deep uncertainty in preparing for a mission to train, advise and assist Afghan forces after combat operations officially end this year. The governments of nations that contribute troops must approve any sustained deployments months in advance.

The major candidates for president in Afghanistan have all signaled they would sign the security agreement. But if history is any guide, the April election might necessitate a runoff, which could lead to months of political uncertainty, further delaying the security deal.

A senior administration official said Mr. Obama was sending a message to Mr. Karzai that there would be a cost to further delays, both in the rising chance that the United States might go down to zero troops and in the more limited size and scope of a residual force.

Mr. Obama’s decision to look beyond Mr. Karzai, the official said, was driven by Mr. Karzai himself, who has told the administration that he believes his successor should sign the agreement because the future government will have to live with its consequences.

Appearing before troops at Fort Eustis and Langley Air Force Base near Newport News, Va., Mr. Hagel said the military would now engage seriously in contingency planning for a complete troop withdrawal, known as the “zero option.” While he held open the option of a continued troop presence after 2014, he told reporters that as long as the agreement goes unsigned, “our options narrow and narrow.”

But he declined to give another deadline for when the United States must decide that it will go down to zero. Some Afghanistan experts have criticized Mr. Obama for imposing deadlines, given the mercurial nature of the relationship between him and Mr. Karzai.

For all the tough talk, few people in the Obama administration are willing to say publicly that they believe leaving no residual force behind is a good idea, in large part because of the fear that without any American or NATO troops, Afghanistan could revert to its status as a staging ground for terrorist plots against the West.

“The preponderance of opinion across the government is that some reasonable post-2014 presence in Afghanistan is necessary to lock in our very hard-fought gains,” Michelle Flournoy, a former top Pentagon official, said in an interview.

Faced with continued uncertainty, American and NATO commanders have drawn up plans to deploy a force this summer that is tailored to assume a training mission in 2015 but also small enough to withdraw, if no deal for an enduring presence is reached. The plan would give Mr. Obama and other political leaders maximum flexibility.

Some analysts said the administration erred by tying the decision on troops too closely to its relationship with Mr. Karzai, which became toxic this month after Afghanistan released 65 prisoners that the United States said had the blood of American soldiers on their hands.

“Making it about President Karzai is simply not the right thing to do,” said Husain Haqqani, Pakistan’s former ambassador to the United States. “President Obama needs to decide what’s in America’s interest, and whether America can continue to fight global terrorism without an effective military presence in the Central and South Asian theater of war.”

(c) New York Times
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U.S. 'Suspends' Role in Russia G8 Summit After Obama, Putin Speak
By M. Alex Johnson and Kristen Welker

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The U.S. is preparing to pull out of the next summit of industrialized nations — scheduled in Russia — in protest of Russian military moves in Ukraine, the White House said Saturday after President Barack Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke directly by phone.

As tension in Ukraine threatened to boil over, Obama told Putin in the 90-minute call that he was deeply concerned over Russia's "clear violation of Ukrainian sovereignty and territorial integrity," the White House said in a statement, adding that the president warned Putin that Russia's "standing in the international community" was at stake.

The statement said the U.S. was suspending "upcoming participation in preparatory meetings" for the G8 summit scheduled for June in Sochi, Russia.

"Going forward, Russia's continued violation of international law will lead to greater political and economic isolation," it promised.

The Kremlin press office, which said Obama initiated the call, said Putin stressed what he called "the provocative and criminal actions on the part of ultranationalists," who he said were supported "by the current authorities in Kiev."

Citing "a real threat to the lives and health of Russian citizens," Putin told Obama that "Russia retains the right to protect its interests and the Russian-speaking population," the Kremlin said.

But Obama responded that the appropriate way to address those issues is peacefully "through direct engagement with the government of Ukraine," the U.N. Security Council or the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the White House said.

"Unless immediate and concrete steps are taken by Russia to deescalate tensions, the effect on U.S.-Russian relations and on Russia's international standing will be profound." - President Obama finalised his statement.

Partly derived from NBC News
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Crimea Vote Deepens Crisis and Draws Denunciations
By DAVID M. HERSZENHORN


SIMFEROPOL, Ukraine — The pro-Russian regional Parliament in Crimea voted behind closed doors on Thursday to secede from Ukraine and become part of Russia — an aspirational, even quixotic, gesture that had no immediate practical effect but deepened the political crisis here, drawing swift denunciations from the West and from the fledgling national government in Kiev.

With Russian armed forces holding a tight grip on the peninsula, the Parliament also scheduled a public referendum on the issue for March 16, reaching for a tool that has long been used in times of geopolitical unrest to legitimize facts on the ground and channel popular passions, with or without for existing legal processes. The City Council of Sevastopol, which has a special administrative status separate from the rest of Crimea, took matching steps to hold a referendum and join Russia.
Leaders of the Parliament in Simferopol, the regional capital, said they were confident that Crimean voters would choose Russia over Ukraine. “We want to confirm our decision with a referendum,” the vice speaker, Rustam Temirgaliyev, said at a news conference.

Secession, however, is hardly assured.

Speaking at the White House on Thursday, President Obama denounced the Parliament’s move as illegal both under the Ukrainian Constitution and international law. “In 2014, we are well beyond the days when borders can be redrawn over the heads of democratic leaders,” Mr. Obama said.

In Kiev, the acting president of Ukraine, Oleksandr V. Turchynov, said the national government would invalidate the decision to hold the referendum and would dissolve the Crimean Parliament. Crimea, part of Ukraine since 1954, has enjoyed substantial autonomy since shortly after the collapse of the Soviet Union, but its Constitution generally defers to the Ukrainian Constitution on jurisdictional matters.

Mr. Turchynov scoffed at the plan for a referendum, noting that Russian forces had taken control of Crimea’s borders and ports and were blocking Ukrainian military bases and occupying other security installations. “This will be a farce,” he said in a televised address. “This will be false. This will be a crime against the state.”

He insisted that Ukraine would “protect the sanctity of our territory.”

Officials in Kiev had already declared that the Crimean Parliament had acted illegally, and a court issued an arrest warrant for Sergei Aksyonov, the leader of the breakaway effort, who was installed as prime minister of Crimea after armed men seized the Parliament building last week.

Leaders of the Peninsula’s large Crimean Tatar minority also denounced the move. “Today’s decision by the Parliament is completely illegal,” said Refat Chubarov, the leader of the main Tatar organization and a member of Parliament. He refused to take part in the parliamentary voting on Thursday because he said it was illegitimate.

“More troubling for us is that this decision could provoke and lead to further escalation of tensions,” Mr. Chubarov said in an interview. “A referendum under the conditions of the presence of foreign troops on the streets is called something entirely different in world practice — it’s a coup. It’s the seizure of territory.”

In Moscow, Dmitri S. Peskov, a spokesman for Mr. Putin, was quoted by Russian news agencies as saying that the Kremlin was aware of the developments in Crimea but had no further comment. Prime Minister Dmitri A. Medvedev has said that Russia would simplify procedures for people who have lived in Russia or elsewhere in the former Soviet Union to secure Russian citizenship.

If the referendum is held and a majority of voters opt for secession, it could create a thorny problem for the West. The United States and its allies typically support the idea of democratic self-determination in general, but oppose independence referendums within their own boundaries. Spain is trying to keep its Catalonia region from holding one in November, and Britain is confronting one in Scotland scheduled for September.

Unlike Catalonia, Scotland or Quebec, where voters have twice rejected proposals for independence from Canada, Crimea is not dominated by a single linguistic, cultural, religious or ethnic identity. Though somewhat more than half the population is ethnic Russian, many are relatively recent arrivals, and there are also large numbers of ethnic Ukrainians, Tatars and smaller groups from dozens of other backgrounds, including Greeks, Germans and Jews.

Many Crimeans said they were thunderstruck that the regional Parliament had voted to join Russia without waiting for the outcome of the referendum.

“I’m in shock,” said Ludmila Milanich, an ethnic Russian who was in Simferopol for an early celebration of International Women’s Day. “We’re now going to Russia,” she said with dismay.

“It’s completely illegitimate,” said Bilal Kuzi-Emin, 25, a Tatar who works as a waiter and barman. “Why don’t we just join Turkey?”

In Sevastopol, pro-Russian demonstrators who were picketing a local security service headquarters said they were thrilled. “We’re already Russian,” said one, Natasha Malachuk.

One man climbed up to place a Russian flag where the Ukrainian banner had hung outside the building. The small group of picketers cheered and chanted, “Russia, Russia!”

“We’re citizens of Russia — we’re returning home,” said Vyacheslav Tokarev, a construction worker.

Meanwhile, Russian troops and their local supporters continued to block Ukrainian military installations. At one local military office in Simferopol, anti-Kiev demonstrators used a crane to place heavy concrete barricades meant to obstruct military vehicles leaving the compound.

(c) New York Times
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Russia’s Move Into Ukraine Said to Be Born in Shadows
By STEVEN LEE MYERS

MOSCOW — The day after he returned from the Winter Olympics, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia gathered the 12 members of his national security council for a crisis meeting to manage a political implosion in Ukraine that, by all accounts, had surprised Russia’s political and military elite and, above all, infuriated Mr. Putin himself.

One prominent member of the council, Valentina I. Matviyenko, chairwoman of the upper house of Parliament, emerged from the meeting declaring that it was impossible that Russia would invade Crimea, yet a couple of days later Russian troops were streaming into the peninsula.

When Mr. Putin made his first public remarks on the crisis on Tuesday, he said that Russia would not support Crimea’s efforts to secede. On Friday, the Kremlin allowed a mass pro-secession rally in Red Square while senior lawmakers loyal to Mr. Putin welcomed a delegation from Crimea and pledged support to make it a new province of the Russian Federation.

An examination of the seismic events that set off the most threatening East-West confrontation since the Cold War era, based on Mr. Putin’s public remarks and interviews with officials, diplomats and analysts here, suggests that the Kremlin’s strategy emerged haphazardly, even misleadingly, over a tense and momentous week, as an emotional Mr. Putin acted out of what the officials described as a deep sense of betrayal and grievance, especially toward the United States and Europe.

Some of those decisions, particularly the one to invade Crimea, then took on a life of their own, analysts said, unleashing a wave of nationalistic fervor for the peninsula’s reunification with Russia that the Kremlin has so far proved unwilling, or perhaps unable, to tamp down.

The decision to invade Crimea, the officials and analysts said, was made not by the national security council but in secret among a smaller and shrinking circle of Mr. Putin’s closest and most trusted aides. The group excluded senior officials from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs or the cadre of comparatively liberal advisers who might have foreseen the economic impact and potential consequences of American and European sanctions.

“It seems the whole logic here is almost entirely the product of one particular mind,” said Fyodor Lukyanov, a Russian analyst and editor of the quarterly journal Russia in Global Affairs.

Some of Russia’s plans were clearly years in the making, including one to sever Crimea from Ukraine through Moscow’s political support for sovereignty and even reunification. Nevertheless, Mr. Putin’s strategy in the last two weeks has appeared ad hoc, influenced by events not always in his control.

“We shouldn’t assume there was a grand plan,” said Mark Galeotti, an expert on Russia’s security forces from New York University who is in Moscow and regularly meets with security officials. “They seem to be making things up as they go along.”

Mr. Putin’s decisions since the crisis began reflect instincts, political skills and emotions that have characterized his 14 years as Russia’s paramount leader, including a penchant for secrecy, loyalty and respect, for him and for Russia. They also suggest a deepening frustration with other world leaders that has left him impervious to threats of sanctions or international isolation, such that he shrugged off threats by members of the Group of 8 countries to boycott this year’s summit meeting in Sochi, Russia.

Because of Mr. Putin’s centralized authority, Russia’s policies and actions in moments of crisis can appear confused or hesitant until Mr. Putin himself decides on a course of action. That was the case in the days when violence erupted in Kiev, Ukraine’s capital, prompting a frantic effort by the Europeans to mediate a compromise. Mr. Putin, perhaps preoccupied with the Olympics, did not send a representative to those talks until the agreement was ready to be initialed.

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Protesters in Kiev on Feb. 21, before the fall of President Viktor F. Yanukovych’s government

Dmitri Trenin, the director of the Moscow Carnegie Center, said that Russia’s role in Ukraine’s upheaval was “very passive” up until the moment that the government of President Viktor F. Yanukovych collapsed. This was true, he said, despite the Kremlin’s wariness about any new Ukrainian trade agreement with the European Union and its pledge in December to provide a $15 billion package of assistance to shore up the country’s faltering finances. Jolted by the government’s collapse, Mr. Trenin said, the Kremlin “sprang into action almost immediately.”

He and other officials and analysts said that Mr. Putin’s reaction stemmed from the collapse of the agreement on the night of Feb. 21. Mr. Putin, by his own account at a news conference on Tuesday, warned Mr. Yanukovych not to withdraw the government’s security forces from Kiev, one of the demands of the agreement being negotiated.

“ ‘You will have anarchy,’ ” Mr. Putin said he told him. “ ‘There will be chaos in the capital. Have pity on the people.’ But he did it anyway. And as soon as he did it, his office and that of the government were seized, and the chaos I warned him about erupted, and it continues to this day.”

By then, however, Mr. Yanukovych had already lost the support of his party, whose members joined others in Parliament in ordering the security services off the barricades that they had maintained around government buildings in Kiev. Mr. Yanukovych, fearful because of reports of armed protesters heading to Kiev from western Ukraine, packed up documents from his presidential residence and fled in the early hours of the next morning. That night Mr. Putin was still assuring President Obama in a telephone call that he would work to resolve the crisis.

By the next day, however, Ukraine’s Parliament had stripped Mr. Yanukovych of his powers, voted to release the opposition leader Yulia V. Tymoshenko from prison and scheduled new presidential elections. Russia’s initial response was muted, but officials have since said that Mr. Putin fumed that the Europeans who had mediated the agreement did nothing to enforce it. Mr. Putin and other officials began describing the new leaders as reactionaries and even fascists that Russia could not accept in power.

“It was probably not just thought of today,” Aleksei A. Chesnakov, a political strategist and former Kremlin aide, said of Mr. Putin’s move in Crimea, “but the trigger came when it was clear that the authorities in Ukraine were not able to return to the compromise of the 21st.”

Two days later Mr. Putin attended the closing ceremony of an Olympics that he hoped would be a showcase of Russia’s revival as a modern, powerful nation. He then ordered the swift, furtive seizure of a region that has loomed large in Russia’s history since Catherine the Great’s conquest. The decision to order in Russian forces appears to have occurred late Tuesday or early Wednesday among a smaller circle of Mr. Putin’s advisers.

(c) New York Times
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Kerry condemns Russia's 'incredible act of aggression' in Ukraine
BY WILL DUNHAM

WASHINGTON - U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Sunday condemned Russia's "incredible act of aggression" in Ukraine and threatened economic sanctions by the United States and allies to isolate Moscow, but called for a peaceful resolution to the crisis.

"You just don't in the 21st century behave in 19th century fashion by invading another country on completely trumped up pre-text," Kerry told the CBS program "Face the Nation."
The Ukraine crisis has taken already strained U.S.-Russian relations to new lows. Kerry did the rounds of the Sunday morning television news shows to emphasize the Obama administration's condemnation of Russia's moves.
Russia still has "a right set of choices" that can be made to defuse the crisis, Kerry said. Asked on the ABC program "This Week" if the United States has "any military options on the table" to address the crisis, he said that President Barack Obama "has all options on the table."

However, he added, "The hope of the United States and everybody in the world is not to see this escalate into a military confrontation. That will not serve the world well, and I think everybody understands that."
He told the NBC program "Meet the Press," "We want a peaceful resolution through the normal processes of international relations."

Putin won permission from his parliament on Saturday to use military force to protect Russian citizens in Ukraine, ignoring warnings from Obama and other Western leaders. Russian forces have already bloodlessly seized Crimea - an isolated Black Sea peninsula where Moscow has a naval base.
"It's an incredible act of aggression. It is really a stunning, willful choice by President (Vladimir) Putin to invade another country. Russia is in violation of the sovereignty of Ukraine. Russia is in violation of its international obligations," Kerry said.

'BROAD ARRAY OF OPTIONS'
Kerry said Obama told Putin in a 90-minute phone call on Saturday "that it was imperative to find a different path, to roll back this invasion and un-do this act of invasion."
Kerry said G8 nations and some other countries are "prepared to go to the hilt to isolate Russia" with a "broad array of options" available.

"They're prepared to put sanctions in place, they're prepared to isolate Russia economically, the ruble is already going down. Russia has major economic challenges."
Kerry mentioned visa bans, asset freezes, trade isolation, investment changes as possible steps, adding: "American businesses may well want to start thinking twice about whether they want to do business with a country that behaves like this."

"There are very serious repercussions that can flow out of this. There are a broad array of options that are available, not just to the United States but to our allies," Kerry added.
Kerry also called on the U.S. Congress to work with the Obama administration on an economic package to assist Ukraine.

Kerry's comments came amid a chorus of condemnation from Washington and its allies.
Ukraine has asked for help from NATO, Britain and the United States, as co-signatories with Moscow to a 1994 accord guaranteeing Ukraine's security after the breakup of the Soviet Union. Ukraine's security council has ordered the general staff to put all armed forces on highest alert.

Kerry said the United States is "absolutely prepared" to boycott a scheduled G8 meeting in Sochi, Russia, in June. The city also hosted the Winter Olympic Games last month.

Obama canceled a visit to Moscow last September to protest Putin's refusal to help rein in Syrian President Bashar Assad in that country's civil war, although he did attend a G20 summit in St. Petersburg.

The White House said on Saturday the United States will suspend participation in preparatory meetings for the Sochi summit. Kerry said recent events "put at question Russia's capacity to be within the G8."

"If Russia wants to be a responsible nation, it needs to behave respnsibly," he added.

The crisis began in November after Viktor Yanukovich, Ukraine's Russian-backed president who was ousted a week ago, triggered protests by spurning a political and trade deal with the European Union.

SOURCE - © Reuters.
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Clinton secure as Chris Christie, Ted Cruz withdraw

WASHINGTON -- Chris Christie and Ted Cruz have announced their withdrawal from the presidential Republican nomination after a series of defeats rendered their continued candidacy unviable. In a statement to the press, Christie announced that he would not continue contending the nomination after failing to win a number of states near his home state of New Jersey in the late April primaries. Ted Cruz's candidacy had proved slow from the start, and despite running a wave of enthusiasm for his Tea Party politics, Republican moderates have blocked him from amassing delegates.

"Ted Cruz is more unelectable than Ron Paul was in the last primaries," said a Fox News correspondent on air. In a continued panel discussion the often Conservative-identified news station agreed that his continued candidacy would be futile, given that despite higher vote percentages during Super Tuesday, his on-ground organization proved incapable of amassing the required delegates. "Ron Paul came in lost in terms of popular vote, yet carried the second largest amount of delegates at the Convention, even with significant attempts to block this from happening."

The race has down dwindled to just four candidates - Jeb Bush, Paul Ryan, and Rand Paul. Rand Paul proved an early leader in the primaries building off of the successes of his father in the 2008 and 2012 races. Winning the straw poll and a plurality of delegates in Iowa and New Hampshire. Jeb Bush reentered the race with successive consecutive victories in Florida, Nevada, Colorado, Missouri and Minnesota. Maine turned to Rand Paul however late February saw Ryan take Michigan and Arizona, with Wyoming going to Santorum.

Early March saw Washington go to Rand Paul in the opening to Super Tuesday held on March 6th. The result saw Alaska, Vermont, North Dakota, Virginia and Tennessee go to Rand Paul, with Oklahoma going to Santorum. Bush carried Georgia, Idaho, and Ohio, while Ryan carried Massachusetts. A poor result and limited campaign funds caused Santorum to withdraw a day after Super Tuesday. Mid-March saw Kansas won by Ryan, and Jeb Bush carrying Alabama and Mississippi. Hawaii was won by Rand Paul. Paul Ryan again carried a resounding victory in Puerto Rico and Illinois, but succumbed in Louisiana to Jeb Bush again.

Chris Christie had continued his candidacy aggressively up until this point, having hoped to carry states due in late April near his home of New Jersey. Washington D.C., Maryland, and Wisconsin were carried by Paul Ryan who smartly navigated through Bush and Paul taking the core of the moderate vote and retaining his home state of Wisconsin. April 24th proved what had already been true: poor economic performance in New Jersey, and failure to shake of the image of "Bridgate" had doomed Christie's run. Rhode Island, New York, and Connecticut turned to Paul allowing him to yet again take the lead in the nomination race, leaving Ryan with Pennsylvania, and Bush with Delaware. Hillary Clinton however has continued her smooth cruise towards the nomination, not dropping a single state since the nomination process began in January.

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Democrats pull ahead in polls

WASHINGTON -- The Democratic Party has pulled ahead of its conservative rival in nation-wide polls, suggesting a secure majority in both the Senate and House of Representatives, alongside a resounding victory for Hillary Clinton.

In the run-up to the US' general election in early November this year, new polls show the Democratic Party has a comfortable lead over the Republican Party in crucial swing-states. Political analysts and pundits cite the respective performances of Clinton and Warren in the first presidential debate and the only vice-presidential debate. Elizabeth Warren defeated Marco Rubio in the vice-presidential debate on October 12th, with 71% of polled voters stating she had one the debate - compared to just 21% for Marco Rubio, and 8% who thought both candidates had tied. With over 80 million viewers, the vice-presidential debate broke the previous record in 2008 which saw 70 million viewers. Addressing numerous issues, including the economy, social security, student loans, and foreign policy, Warren was praised even in moderate Republican circles for her performance.

Hillary Clinton challenged Jeb Bush in an earlier debate on domestic and economic issues, where she outlined for the first time her specific plans on welfare and social security. Clinton praised the Affordable Care Act citing statistics which have shown that hundreds of thousands of Americans have been given access to insurance due to its existence. Jeb Bush insisted throughout the debate on repeal, and a ground-breaking reform of social security which would make the system simpler and more rewarding. With 69 million viewers - slightly more than in 2012 - the debate proved to be a tight squeeze for Clinton who, representing the establishment wing of the Democratic Party squeaked through with 51% of support from polled individuals. 26% of those asked stated that they believed Jeb Bush won, a poor showing, with the rest believing the candidates were tied.

The second presidential debate proved more comfortable for Hillary who, emphasizing the facts she skipped in the first - namely solid growth of the American economy. "Former President George W. Bush and his party caused an economic calamity that was unseen since the Great Depression - now they're pretending as if they're responsible for the recovery by grid locking Congress? President Obama has led this country out of the Great Recession, and recent reports show unemployment as the lowest in eight years, inflation at the near-optimal point of 2%, growth at over 3%, and the federal deficit at one of its lowest levels since 2008. The Republicans would squander this fantastic economic performance as they did when they took office in 2000," she said in response to Jeb Bush, who criticized the current recovery as "jobless" and creating only part-time jobs which are not sufficient to raise a family on. Clinton was favored by voters, 57% of whom said that she had won the debate, compared to 39% for Jeb Bush.

On the back of these recent debate performances, and in the run-up to the third and final one which is likely to garner more international attention due to its foreign policy orientation, the Democrats have successfully begun competing in numerous marginal seats which will decide the makeup of the House. The Senate is being described as "solid Democrat" by both the NY Times, and Larry J. Sabato's Crystal Ball, with the House turning from "Leaning R" to "Tossup." According to the newest predictions, the Democrats would manage to defeat the Republicans gaining a majority of just one seat. The NY Times also changed its House prediction to "Tossup," with a predicted six seat majority for the Democrats. "The Republicans have been successful in nurturing a more moderate image over the past two years. With more moderate candidates, they have proven far more competitive - however an economy out of crisis, President Obama's delicate handling of the situation in Iraq, and successfully pressuring Moscow to withdraw from Ukraine have made this a difficult race for the Republicans," said a contributor to Sabato's Crystal Ball.
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Expanded ballistic missile defense shields likely - Pentagon

WASHINGTON -- Pentagon officials have said that it is a "strong possibility" that the United States may resurrect Ground-Based Midcourse Defense deployment plans should Iran continue to make advancements in ballistic missile technology. Speaking on the condition of anonymity, the possibility of a future deployment of the system in Poland was considered by US officials, and is "still not off the table." Further reports mentioned that it was "widely discussed" between US defense officials and the Polish government during the Secretary of Defense's visit to the country earlier this month, which may greatly impact the current situation in Europe.

A Pentagon spokesperson officially denied that the United States has any intentions at this time to institute changes to its strategy in missile defense, however admitted that as Iran moves closer towards nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them, more advanced options can be considered in the future. "The plans we have undertaken thus far, including the recent agreement in Poland, are for the moment enough to deter any potential threats. However in the future, as these threats evolve, our defense must as well, and it is no secret that Poland has long been identified as an optimal point to station interceptor missiles, defending our European allies from the Iranian threat."

The White House only confirmed that it will be moving ahead with the introduction of the Ground-Based Midcourse Defense in the Eastern part of the continental United States. Currently sites are located in Fort Greely, Alaska and Vandenberg Air Force Base, California. Both of them act as a ballistic missile defense shield against possible North Korean launches. "A deployment in the Eastern United States is very likely at this point - it has been discussed since 2013. The technology has matured somewhat, giving us better flexibility in terms of deployment and ultimate effectiveness," said a US defense official.

The introduction of a then third site was planned by then-President George W. Bush, with an agreement reached with Poland and the Czech Republic. Incoming President Obama cancelled the plans in September 2009, instead proposing a more mature solution which will be implemented in Romania and Poland over the next several years. "We have made significant inroads in terms of ballistic missile defense in both Europe, and here at home. However we are evaluating the situation and adjusting our position as is required in order to maintain the security of our allies and ourselves," said President Clinton during a press conference. She categorically denied that the new agreement and potential resurrection of the GMD was aimed at Russia.

The Ground-Based Midcourse Defense is the United States' system for intercepting incoming warheads in space. It is a major component of the American missile defense strategy to counter ballistic missiles, including intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) carrying nuclear, chemical, biological or conventional warheads in a ballistic flight trajectory. The system consists of ground-based interceptor missiles and radar which would intercept incoming warheads in space. Boeing Defense, Space & Security is the prime contractor of the program, tasked to oversee and integrate systems from other major defense sub-contractors, such as Computer Sciences Corporation.
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