Serious news from Europe on Ukraine

[Joseph Tracy]

> On Feb 9, 2022, at 4:51 PM, Hübschräuber <huebschraeuber at protonmail.com> wrote:
> 
> "The treaty was dead on day one after its signing as Moscow’s regular army with their proxies attacked and took Debaltseve.”

I would add here that this latest news from Macron’s efforts makes obvious that, to quote a line from the Princess Bride, Minsk is only mostly dead, which means it’s a little bit alive. 
> 
> Some time ago, if I remember correctly, you chose not to address my reply to that talking point.
> 
> Here it is again:
> 
> -- This is a controversial claim. As you surely know but inexplicably fail to mention, Debaltseve was discussed in Minsk. Poroshenko did not admit that his troops were surrounded and therefore saw no reason for them to surrender:
> 
> "The most important question, the question of the ceasefire, threatened
> to derail the whole meeting. Vladimir Putin presented his trump card.
> His trump card is Debaltseve. In the small town in eastern Ukraine, 70
> km northeast of Donetsk, 5000 men of the Ukrainian armed forces are
> encircled. That's nearly a third of the soldiers Kiev currently has on
> the front lines, one-sixth of all its forces. That weakened the
> Ukrainian president's negotiating position. Putin demanded that
> Ukrainian soldiers surrender before a cease-fire could even be
> discussed. Poroshenko became agitated. There was no cauldron near
> Debaltseve, he said. And the condition of Putin, with whom he is on
> familiar terms, is totally unacceptable, he said. Never, never will he
> hand over Debaltseve."
> 
> https://www.faz.net/aktuell/politik/ausland/die-verhandlungen-von-minsk-ein-russisches-spiel-13428669.html
> 
> As I understand it, Debaltseve was therefore not included in the agreement. --
> 
> Would you mind addressing the issue now?
>