Is Putin Bovvered?

[ToraToraTora]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-25088608.
Rollocking from the EU! Bet he's quaking!

[sandyRoe]

He does seem to be bovvered. He's got his hackers to smash the link to that BBC report.

[sp1814]

TTT

I'm getting 'Page not found'.

Have you got another link to the same story?

[ToraToraTora]

try this: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-25088608

[bazwillrun]

Highly unlikely whatever the story is, we seem to be the only country that takes note of what they say...down to the last dotted i and crossed t

perhaps we could let Ukraine have our place , they seem to want in badly...oh yeah they want the freeloaders handouts from countries like us

youd think with their history theyd have learnt their lessons about being ruled by corrupt and distant slavemasters

[VHG]

One of the man reasons that EU leaders want countries from Eastern Europe to join the EU is so they look West rather than East to Russia.

As more countries from Eastern Europe join the EU then Russia are losing more and more countries that are friendly to them, and so Russia loses its world influence.

I have often felt the enlargement of the EU is more political than anything else.

[tonyav]

Does that mean that we stand a better chance of winning the Eurovision song contest, VHG .

[ichkeria]

VHG's comments, while understandable, are well wide of the mark.
There is absolutely nothing preventing Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia and Azerbaijan from being "close to Russia" if they want. The point is, they don't want and the EU wishes to help them.
Russia has a history of bullying and economically blackmailing its neighbours. It wants countries within what it considers its "sphere of influence" to join its own "free trade" group, and the suspicion is that it has "leant on" the Ukrainian government, who are in any case a pretty corrupt and incompetent bunch, to hold back from signing the agreement in Vilnius this week. A further condition was the release of ex-PM Yulya Tymoshenko, who has reportedly now started a hunger strike in prison. However that seems to have been sidelined for now.
Whether Putin is "bovvered" by the EU statments is irrelevant. If Ukraine decides to sign up, despite everything, then there's nothing he can do about it.

[VHG]

>>>VHG's comments, while understandable, are well wide of the mark.

>>>There is absolutely nothing preventing Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia and Azerbaijan from being "close to Russia" if they want. The point is, they don't want and the EU wishes to help them.

These two comments of yours seem to contradict themselves.

I said the EU wants countries from Eastern Europe to join the EU to get them looking West rather than East, and in your first comment above you say that is wide of the mark.

But in the second comment you say that the EU wishes to help these countries, which I assume by inviting them to join the EU is part of that process.

Which basically backs up my original statement.

[ichkeria]

The point being that the EU is responding to the wishes of the people and governments of those countries. You say the EU wants those countries to 'look west' . They already are.

[emmie]

bet he isn't quaking, don't think that is programmed into his DNA, as to those other countries more tinpot nations joining the euro club, how nice...

[ichkeria]

The 'tinpot' countries aren't joining the EU. This is about closer trade links for the foreseeable future. Ukraine in particular would have to totally reform it's judiciary before ever being admitted.
If these countries had a neighbour - in Russia - which was any way 'normal' then these conflicts would not arise

[emmie]

aren't they, how do you know?

[emmie]

Romania, Bulgaria, Greece, heaven help us, closer ties should be with people we have something to trade with, and the EU is a long term failed experiment that has caused almost nothing but sorrow, no matter who signed the deal and the endless revisions thereafter.

[bazwillrun]

"This is about closer trade links for the foreseeable future."

you mean like when we were lied to and conned into joining...and now theyre trying to take us over and handing down laws and dictats on a practically daily basis, getting everything nice and "harmonised"...harmonised for what exactly !?

oh , the great takeover

[bazwillrun]

(wifi dropped)

cont...

when they can finally enslave us and turn us into a province in their empire, when they finally get their hands on our financial sector etc etc

[emmie]

think the Arabs will get there before the EU does, they seem to have all the cards, with oil being sadly one commodity we can't do without.

[Kromovaracun]

"There is absolutely nothing preventing Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia and Azerbaijan from being "close to Russia" if they want. The point is, they don't want and the EU wishes to help them. "

Except that the Russians have effectively delivered all their neighbours an ultimatum - join the Eurasian Customs Union or be considered an enemy. This leaves countries in Eastern Europe with a choice -ECU or EU - for their allegiance. The Russians won't let them be both and in all honesty neither probably would the EU. Ukraine (unlike, say, Belarus) is leaning further towards the EU camp, much to the chagrin of Moscow.

[jake-the-peg]

This is all to do with the oncoming EU-US free trade zone

These countries want in before this gets signed up to

Join that or join the Russian camp - bit of a no brainer!

So yes putin is 'bovvered' he's very 'boverred' that's why he's trying to turn the screws.

But hey maybe we can join the Russian free trade zone when all the Euroskeptics vote us out of the worlds largest free trade zone!

[youngmafbog]

//But hey maybe we can join the Russian free trade zone when all the Euroskeptics vote us out of the worlds largest free trade zone!//


Sounds just like the bullying tactics of Putin, so perhaps we would be just as well off with him.

It is all nonsense of course. Don't imagine the EU wont want to trade with the UK, after all the EU exports more to the UK than the other way round.