The State of Affairs in Russia

[alfred russel]

Russia's problems are overstated, they made a $50b investment in Sochi about a year ago that will probably start paying off its dividends real soon.

Yeah, that's looking better and better in retrospect, isn't it?

The most glorious of all events could be a 2018 World Cup in a collapsed/collapsing Russia with people furious their leaders spent billions for stadiums when the country is bankrupt. Against all odds, I'm hoping that is better than 2022 in Qatar.

[CountDeMoney]

If FIFA had real balls and were truly interested in world peace and the spirit of international norms, they'd pull out of Russia now before it's really too late.

[Syt]

Russia's problems are overstated, they made a $50b investment in Sochi about a year ago that will probably start paying off its dividends real soon.

Yeah, that's looking better and better in retrospect, isn't it?

The most glorious of all events could be a 2018 World Cup in a collapsed/collapsing Russia with people furious their leaders spent billions for stadiums when the country is bankrupt. Against all odds, I'm hoping that is better than 2022 in Qatar.

Didn't affect things in Brazil too much.

[Syt]

If FIFA had real balls and were truly interested in world peace and the spirit of international norms, they'd pull out of Russia now before it's really too late.

Fat chance.

[alfred russel]

Russia's problems are overstated, they made a $50b investment in Sochi about a year ago that will probably start paying off its dividends real soon.

Yeah, that's looking better and better in retrospect, isn't it?

The most glorious of all events could be a 2018 World Cup in a collapsed/collapsing Russia with people furious their leaders spent billions for stadiums when the country is bankrupt. Against all odds, I'm hoping that is better than 2022 in Qatar.

Didn't affect things in Brazil too much.

I don't think Brazil is analogous to Russia. It is corrupt and developing of course, but it isn't collapsing, is democratic, generally respects human rights, and isn't taking land from its neighbors.

[CountDeMoney]

If FIFA had real balls and were truly interested in world peace and the spirit of international norms, they'd pull out of Russia now before it's really too late.

Fat chance.

Even Tour de France bicyclists shake their heads in disappointment at FIFA.   

[DGuller]

Territorial sentiments like this always puzzled me. Especially in Poland where we got rid of the really shitty part.

Yeah, same for Germany. 

[Admiral Yi]

The IMF?? WTF?  That's loony tunes even by Guardian standards.

[Jacob]

How about Goldman-Sachs?

[Admiral Yi]

I missed that.  What a bunch of goofballs.

[Ed Anger]

Just needs some Jews now.....

[Neil]

The IMF?? WTF?  That's loony tunes even by Guardian standards.

It's cut off.  It's actually 'TIME', as in Time Magazine.  The way they choose their person of the year in criminal.  I mean 'You'?  Fuck off.

[Syt]

Another journalist who might want to carry a geiger counter in future ...

http://www.themoscowtimes.com/news/article/russia-wants-reuters-reporter-fired-over-darfur/513552.html

Russia Wants Reuters Reporter Fired Over Darfur

Russia's United Nations mission has cracked down on the leading news agency Reuters, demanding that it fire a reporter who accused Russia of withholding information about Darfur.

Louis Charbonneau's report was a piece of "dirty journalism," the mission said in a statement carried by Russian news agency RIA Novosti.

A story with Charbonneau's byline claimed that a Russian representative on the joint UN-African Union Mission was withholding information from the UN headquarters and the Security Council on the bloodshed in Sudan's Darfur region.

The story, out Monday, cited unnamed UN diplomats as saying Russian diplomat Karen Tchalian's effort distorted the facts about war-torn Darfur, creating the impression that things there were improving.

The story had comments from Tchalian and Russia's UN mission, both saying they were not aware about any complaints concerning the alleged fact-rigging.

The mission took offense of Charbonneau's claim that the U.S., France and Britain had all sought Tchalian's removal, saying the claim was misreporting that should result in the firing of the reporter and his editor.

Reuters had not commented as of Wednesday evening.

According to UN estimates, about 300,000 people have died since 2003 in Darfur, where ethnic Arab militias backed by the Sudanese government have conducted ethnic cleansing of non-Arab inhabitants of the arid region.

Russia was accused by Amnesty International of supplying arms to the Sudanese government in violation of a UN arms embargo, a claim Moscow denied.

The International Criminal Court said last week it was shelving the probe against Sudanese authorities because it was unable to advance the investigation.

[Capetan Mihali]

That being said, the Balts took to Holocaust much more gleefully than the other nations under nazi rule. I remember reading an account that would be grotesque if it wasn't so gruesome of a professional Lithuanian football team that played a match with a German team (composed of SS or Wehrmacht - not sure). The Lithuanians won and, as a prize, were taken on a trip a local ghetto so they can shoot themselves some Jews.

Whether this is because, say, Poles hindered Holocaust more to spite the nazis or out of sympathy for the Jews is another story, of course.

The entire region is pretty fucked up.

One book of mine has some grainy photos of an event that took place quite early in the Nazi occupation of Vilnius.  Convicts were brought from the criminal prison to beat Jews to death with pipes and bats, in a public square.  The audience was large; people lifted their children onto their shoulders so they could get a look.

That said, I don't know enough to make a wholesale accusation against the Balts.  I also read a contradictory letter from around the same time by a German officer in Lithuania complaining that it was a huge pain in the ass to get the local population sufficiently riled up against the Jews.

[Tamas]

As soon as the Dual Monarchy's authority waned following the panicky retreat from Italy in 1918, the first recorded incident was Slovenians pogroming local Jews. It is the thing you do when you are European and there is no police to stop you.