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Yandex to divest its Russia-based businesses

ir.yandex

191–200 of 359 posts

Re: Yandex to divest its Russia-based businesses

#191
post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As the war drags on we can expect to see escalation in Ukrainian strikes against Russian infrastructure targets such as refineries. Russia is already short of air defense systems and isn't able to provide much coverage for civilian targets. Whether this works will depend on the level of sustained foreign aid for Ukraine. https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidhambling/2024/01/25/ukrain...

Kremlin will just use those attacks as an excuse to occupy larger parts of Ukraine. Bombing of Belgorod is now used as an excuse to create "demilitarized zone" that includes Kharkiv (second largest city in Ukraine). I guess another "demilitarized zone" will follow in Odessa, after some attack on Crimea.

Russia has been trying to occupy a larger part of Ukraine for almost 2 years now without success. They don't need excuses.

Re: Yandex to divest its Russia-based businesses

#192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We were all there, the US and UK were warning about the invasion for a long time before it happened. The Russians and their useful idiots in the West laughed, of course they would never invade! Then the invasion actually did happen and now magically history has been rewritten and it was the US that somehow caused it in the first place. Only problem: I do have a memory and I can remember 2 years ago. So yes very clear…

Are you saying Ukraine has not been lobbing bombs into Donbass for the better part of 10 years?

Are you saying that Russia didn't invade Ukraine?

Re: Yandex to divest its Russia-based businesses

#193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course it is not just their choice. Russia has indicated their willingness to accept current holdings (for now, you are right there are no guarantees). Ukraine could and should get better than just that, but this notion of taking back Crimea is a pipe dream and I don’t support continued funding until that goal is realized.

If you want to be extremely cynical and seek to strictly extend and project the USA's power as harshly and effectively as possible, the war in Ukraine was God's gift to the USA. They get to basically take out Russia (China's key geopolitical ally) without losing a single American life, for a tiny fraction of the amount they're used to spending on wars. And yet it's American nationalists themselves who want it all to…

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Re: Yandex to divest its Russia-based businesses

#194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That happens in 2014 when Ukraine lost Crimea. They accepted it and lived on. There is zero safety guarantees for them.

Not quite! The immediate history here plays a huge role in where we're at today. In the 2014 the US backed a [coup, revolution, insurrection - whatever you want to call it] in Ukraine that saw their democratically elected pro-Russian President overthrown. Numerous Ukrainian territories that also leaned pro-Russia refused to recognize the new government and declared their independence, the Donbas region and Crimea amo…

None if this is true. For example, the "pro-Russian President" wasn't overthrown. At Russian pressure, he ditched a very favorable trade agreement with the EU that would've opened up many new business opportunities for Ukrainians. When protesters assembled, he ordered police snipers to shoot at them, killing 108 people. He fled to Russia the next day and Ukraine's parliament voted to remove him from office, and scheduled new elections, which were held three months later.

Re: Yandex to divest its Russia-based businesses

#195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That happens in 2014 when Ukraine lost Crimea. They accepted it and lived on. There is zero safety guarantees for them.

Not quite! The immediate history here plays a huge role in where we're at today. In the 2014 the US backed a [coup, revolution, insurrection - whatever you want to call it] in Ukraine that saw their democratically elected pro-Russian President overthrown. Numerous Ukrainian territories that also leaned pro-Russia refused to recognize the new government and declared their independence, the Donbas region and Crimea amo…

You’re telling the false version of these events spread by the Russian state propaganda.

> US backed a [coup, revolution, insurrection - whatever you want to call it] in Ukraine

People of Ukraine did the revolution. The western backing you’re talking about was limited to vague verbal expressions of support.

> territories that also leaned pro-Russia refused to recognize the new government and declared their independence

That only happened on the territories invaded by the Russians.

Crimea: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_occupation_of_Crimea#H...

Eastern Ukraine: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Igor_Girkin#Sloviansk

Re: Yandex to divest its Russia-based businesses

#196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The comparison between Putin and Hitler is ridiculous. Europe’s economy is in shambles, they do not have the power to push back if Russia and the US were to push for détente never mind that the country with the most EU influence (Germany) is a major dove on this issue.

It's not ridiculous at all. Not all leaders can be negotiated with, that is simply my point. Maybe as an American you do not understand the depth of feeling, it does not affect you because you don't live here and subsequently you don't care. You can regress into the isolationism that the US likes to embrace every now and then. But we still have to live with an imperialist Russia on our door step. > (Germany) is a maj…

> Not all leaders can be negotiated with, that is simply my point.

Putin isn't Hitler. People are way too quick to write off negotiation when it is people's real lives at play.

> They've sent huge amounts of aid already to Ukraine (~1% of GDP versus 0.2% of GDP for the USA).

False? not sure where you are getting your numbers from but USA has sent both considerably more in magnitude and as a percentage of the GDP through the end of 2023.

Germany doesn't even spend 2% of GDP on all military expenses (they recently pledged to as it is a new NATO requirement), they are not spending half of that on Ukraine allocation.

> It's not realistic. The only person who is going to do that is Trump.

Wavering support for the Ukraine war is not just a Trump-ism phenomenon. I am not sure how the media reports this in the UK but support is collapsing across both parties in the polls.

A majority of Americans think Trump is stupid too and you are very unlikely to meet a supporter on HN.

> Good luck standing up to China alone, in that case

US policymakers already perceive no will to stand up to China among EU lawmakers.

> And how would we benefit exactly from trading away our security? How can the US force us?

EU+UK citizens will not be willing to pay the full brunt of this conflict for an extended period of time.

The fact of the matter is that most Europeans are much more ambivalent about this conflict than you are implying [0] which is obvious from the polling. Ratchet up the spending and energy price impact to considerable portions of GDP and what will happen?

[0]: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/at-your-service/files/be-hear...

Re: Yandex to divest its Russia-based businesses

#197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that animosity is deep rooted between neighbors. But I suspect it is less deep between distant countries that have had working relationships in the past.

I think there's deep animosity between Russia and much of the West. It's very easy for Americans to shrug their shoulders and say "we don't care it's a long way away", regardless of whether or not that would be a historic surrender for the global hegemon, but we Europeans cannot. It's on our doorstep. Russia has not just attacked Ukraine, but all of Europe. There will never be normalised relations with Russia whilst…

I wonder when you will arrive at the understanding that if Russia is not going to have more revolutions, then you are going to have to live alongside Russia on the tiniest of continents and it would be best for both sides to learn how.

Is's not like you're going in with a military action and capturing Volgograd, after all. Adolf Hitler could be neutralized by capturing Berlin. Good luck dealing with Russia that way.

Re: Yandex to divest its Russia-based businesses

#198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Depends on if Trump takes the Whitehouse in the fall and how European elections go :-( In either case, even a Ukrainian defeat means Russia will be a pariah state to countries with reasonable governance. Trade will be difficult and diminished, same as it is with Iran. Putin&Lavrov have clearly made this calculation and decided this is in their own interests. Whether it's in the interest of the Russian people I think…

It's interesting that you bring up Iran. They are actually doing pretty well considering that the US stole all their foreign currency reserves (and also precipitated the original conflict in the first place).

Not to mention having their neighbours destabilized into the most insane civil wars, over the past two decades (with gems like ISIS/Daesh having their year or two in the sun).

If anyone's wondering why Iran has its fingers into Syria and Iraq militias, note they've been invaded (with US support) by one, and are allied with the other.

Re: Yandex to divest its Russia-based businesses

#199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are assuming I am some Trump American-first Republican. I think you are severely misjudging the politics of Ukraine support in the US, which has collapsed in the last few months. Perhaps I am opposed to harsh projections of American power in an increasingly multipolar world? The global playing field is leveling, I think that is precisely the wrong time to be making even bitterer enemies.

Yes I am assuming that very much, but it does not matter that much, either you're America first or you agree with their foreign policy anyway on Ukraine. I understand that Ukraine support has been politicised even when it should not be. This says much more about the utterly dysfunctional state of American politics and the decline of American society whereby you're seriously entertaining reelecting Trump next year. It…

> it does not matter that much, either you're America first or you agree with their foreign policy anyway on Ukraine

It does matter because you basically said "if you really cared about maintaining American unipolarity no matter the cost, you would be all in on Ukraine" - and I don't care about maintaining American unipolarity no matter the cost. A multipolar world is an inevitability.

> you advocate surrender to the same people who wish to destroy you. Weak.

Somehow I suspect that I am not the jingoistic nationalist here.

Re: Yandex to divest its Russia-based businesses

#200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not a new phenom, whereas the draft is.

IT Professionals and most other white collar jobs are draft exempted in Russia [0] To make up for the unfairness, mobilized Russian soldiers are being paid Russian/Eastern European white collar level salaries ($2,500/mo) [1] The issue is if you're a Russian contractor working for a western company, how is the western company supposed to pay you? Russia's banking system has been decoupled from the west, and even Asian…

> To make up for the unfairness, mobilized Russian soldiers are being paid Russian/Eastern European white collar level salaries ($2,500/mo) [1]

$2500/mo is way higher than I would have thought they were paying these soldiers.

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