XPost: ucb.math, alt.society.civil-liberty, ca.environment
XPost: alt.mountain-bike

By Lidia Kelly

MOSCOW, March 16 (Reuters) - A Kremlin-backed journalist issued
a stark warning to the United States about Moscow's nuclear
capabilities on Sunday as the White House threatened sanctions
over Crimea's referendum on union with Russia.

"Russia is the only country in the world that is realistically
capable of turning the United States into radioactive ash,"
television presenter Dmitry Kiselyov said on his weekly current
affairs show.

Behind him was a backdrop of a mushroom cloud following a
nuclear blast.

Kiselyov was named by President Vladimir Putin in December as
the head of a new state news agency whose task will be to
portray Russia in the best possible light.

His remarks took a propaganda war over events in Ukraine to a
new level as tensions rise in the East-West standoff over
Crimea, a southern Ukrainian region which is now in Russian
forces' hands and voted on Sunday on union with Russia.

Russian television showed images of ethnic Russians in Crimea
dancing, singing and celebrating the referendum but followed
them with accusations that Kiev's new authorities and the West
have allowed ultra-nationalists to attack Russian-speakers in
eastern Ukraine.

Kiev and the West blame the violence in eastern Ukraine on pro-
Russian groups and say the Crimea referendum is illegitimate.
The United States has warned of imminent sanctions against
Moscow.

OUTSPOKEN COMMENTS

Kiselyov is an outspoken defender of Putin and once caused
outrage by saying the organs of homosexuals should not be used
in transplants.

His show portrayed the Ukrainian authorities as unable to
maintain law and order. Putin made a similar charge in a
telephone conversation with U.S. President Barack Obama on
Sunday.

Such remarks have caused concern in Kiev that Moscow might send
troops to eastern Ukraine, acting on a vote in Russian
parliament allowing him to use the armed forces if compatriots
are deemed in need of protection in Ukraine.

As the crisis escalated, the news in Russia has taken on shades
of Soviet-era propaganda, with reporters peppering reports with
references to what they say was the cooperation of some
Ukrainians with the Nazis in World War Two.

There is also now growing menace in some of the reports, as well
as echoes of the Cold War.

Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev gifted Crimea to Ukraine in
1954, when Ukraine and Russia were both parts of the Soviet
Union.

Many people in Crimea hope union with Russia will bring better
living conditions and make them citizens of a country capable of
asserting itself on the world stage.

Others see the referendum as a land grab by the Kremlin as
Ukraine's new rulers try to move the country towards the
European Union and away from Russia's sway.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/16/ukraine-crisis-russia- kiselyov-idUSL6N0MD0P920140316
 

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)