And good or bad for whom? The so-called rebels (in reality the supporters of the legitimate government overthrown in the Western-backed coup) are apparently pleased. That tells us something. The rulers in Kiev, not so much, but presumably Western pressure has forced acceptance, just as Russian pressure has worked on the other side.
Will this last? Is it the best that could be hoped for in the circumstances? No mention that I can see of Crimea, which I guess is a done deal now.
My own thoughts - anything that stops the killing and prevents escalation is good for all sides.
OTOH, since I don’t consider Putin to be an honest broker, there’s still reason to view this as something that says it will stop killing and prevent escalation, rather than something that does those things.
Pretty much this. This is the second such ‘breakthrough’, and the last one didn’t change anything. I HOPE Putin et al will give this up as a bad job, but I really don’t see why he should from his perspective.
Although that is intrinsically a good thing…it’s disturbing when one side grabs a whole bunch of the other side’s land, and then says, “Whoa! We can all stop fighting now.”
Not to Godwinize or anything, but would that have flown in 1943?
The drop in oil prices has put Putin at a temporary disadvantage. It’s in his interest to quiet things down for now and legitimize his conquests. He can shore up his domestic position and wait until conditions are more favorable for further “adventurism”.
IMHO it is always good to stand for peace; and it is also good for history to know, in the case it goes bad, who is breaking the agreement and in turn who will get the infamy and deserved opposition.
Apart from the pleasure of letting people in the future vicariously dislike tyrants and bullies, does this actually improve the situation in any material sense? Because I don’t find it a good tradeoff to sacrifice actual good for some hypothetical; moral condemnation down the line, especially since history tends to get written by the victors.
As a sympathizer of Novorussia, I don’t think this is ideal. I was hoping for, and still hope for, nothing short of partition of the Ukraine with complete and total independence for Donetsk and Lugansk. If independence was good enough for Croatia, Slovenia, Slovakia, and East Timor, it’s good enough for Novorussia as well.
That being said, at least an end to the fighting is a good thing, and limited autonomy for the east will allow the Novorussians to lick their wounds for a while and consolidate popular support for their cause. Donetsk is the second richest oblast in the country, or was before the Federal government started shelling and bombing it, and hopefully in the long run more people there will tire of subsidizing the rest of the country.
Looking at the agreement itself it looks to be a good deal for the separatists - total amnesty (point 5), pensions to be paid in the separatist territory (point 8), constitutional changes in Ukraine to increase decentralization (point 11) with control over their local elections (point 12). And a law to be passed which addresses the following things:
As events are clearly displaying, the current “ceasefire” is about as much of a joke as the Munich Agreement. Hopefully the United States will start pouring in weapons to Ukraine.