Russia Condemns Ukraine ATO While Conducting Its Own in Dagestan (Video +18)

“Putin stresses the need to immediately end the punitive operation in South-East Ukraine,” “Patriarch Kirill urges Poroshenko to end bloodshed in Ukraine,” “Russia’s Public Chamber urges Kyiv to stop the punitive operation in Donetsk,” Russian agency ITAR-TASS reported on May 27, 2014.

Now changes have taken place in Ukraine. President-elect Petro Poroshenko denied Putin’s right to interpret the Constitution of Ukraine. Petro Poroshenko states that the Russian President Vladimir Putin has no right to call Viktor Yanukovych the acting President of Ukraine citing the Ukrainian Constitution. He stated this in a conversation with a correspondent of the Russian news outlet Kommersant Andrey Kolesnikov.

The same applies to Putin’s advice related to Anti-Terrorist Operation conducted in Ukraine. Russian President Vladimir Putin said during a telephone conversation with Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi that a punitive army operation in South-Eastern Ukraine should be stopped immediately. In line with Putin’s opinion, Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus Kirill has called on Ukraine’s newly-elected President Petro Poroshenko to stop bloodshed in the country and heed to the opinion of all its citizens.

“The Russian Public Chamber is closely watching the developments in Donetsk, where fierce confrontation is underway between the Ukrainian troops and groups of civilians,” said Vladislav Grib, the first deputy chairman of the Russian Public Chamber. “We demand that the Kyiv regime immediately stops the punitive operation. It is vital to stop the criminal actions that have already claimed the lives of peaceful civilians and to sit down at the negotiating table.” The Russian Public Chamber also calls on the Organization for Security and Cooperation (OSCE) to waste no time and begin “implementing its functions.”

When reading these statements, one should keep in mind the way in which Russia chooses to deal with people that they call terrorists in their own country. Neither Putin, nor Russia’s Public Chamber, nor Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church Kirill issued a sound to end bloodshed or to urge Russian militaries to immediately stop punitive operations in Russia’s Dagestan.

As BBC reported, the Russian Republic of Dagestan, which translates as “land of the mountains”, is situated in Russia’s turbulent North Caucasus with Chechnya and Georgia to the West, Azerbaijan to the South, and the Caspian Sea to the East. After the fall of the Soviet Union, the republic’s authorities stayed loyal to Russia, but the region became infamous for its lawlessness and corruption. Organized crime is reported to flourish and kidnappings and violence are commonplace. Firearms are ubiquitous and assassinations are a regular event. Moscow blames much of this on Chechen-based separatism, but others say lust for profit, combined with a gun culture, is the root cause.

How Russia handled and continues to handle these situations over 2010 – 2014 can be seend in the video clips below. No protests from Putin, Russia’s Public Chamber, or Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill on this issue were heard. Russia did not sit down at the negotiating table with the insurgents that Russia named terrorists.

Russian Special Operations in Dagestan (Part 1) – posted November 15, 2010

Russian Special Operations in Dagestan (Part 2) – posted November 15, 2010

War in Dagestan. Russian Spetsnaz in action [MIX 18+] part1 – posted November 19, 2010

War in Dagestan.Russian Spetsnaz in action [MIX 18+] part2 – posted February 3, 2011

Russia – Dagestan – anti-terror – January 18, 2014

Russian FSB-and MVD Special Operation in Dagestan, Derbent, April 26, 2014

Compilation and comments by Dr. Vitalii Usenko, MD, MBA, expert of the Center of Military-Political Studies in the sphere of psychology of communications, and by Dmytro Usenko, student at Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto