Something's gone wrong again

Recess Monkey congratulates Sky News on its expert coverage of the war in South Ossetia. Almost as good as the Daily Mail's take on it. (Katie Melua is worried about her family out there. She should definitely have been in the Top Ten).

World domination

Last night I started trying to write something about Georgia, but decided there were probably other people out there far more qualified to do so. But here's my two pennyworth... Last time I was in Russia (I did Russian at uni, been there 5 or 6 times) the persecution of Georgians was becoming widespread, with mass rounding up of ethnic Georgians (even those born in Russia), deportations and racial attacks. I met someone involved in the St Petersburg Youth Movement, who told me about an anti-racism campaign, where everyone wore T-shirts in sympathy declaring 'I'm a Georgian'. No-one else at the Conference - which was a couple of years ago - would admit there was a problem at all, which is typically Russian. There was 'no racism' in Russia. This was at a Conference of centre-left/ left Russian political parties.

The other thing I was going to mention was the fear that the Crimea could be next; it's part of the Ukraine, but ethnically Russian and obviously strategically important. About 60% I think are Russians, cf 25% Ukrainians and 12-13% Tatars; nearly 80% speak Russian as their first language, but Ukrainian is the only official language. When I was there (2003 I think, went to Simferopol which is a god forsaken place and then took the world's longest trolley bus ride down through the mountains to Yalta, which is much nicer, tho' a bit touristy) I asked a few people whether they'd prefer to be part of Russia; some did, some wanted to be independent. Needless to say, both would be resisted strongly by Ukraine.