Can we have the right for dignity?

I’m sure everyone noticed that last week’s news was particularly bad. In fact, it was absolutely horrible. Here in the Netherlands the scale and impact of the MH17 disaster only now begin to be realized, as the victims are brought back for identification, and a seemingly endless caravan of funeral cars rolls on the road.

Sadly, these dignified images have been preceded by much less dignified ones. I’m sure you’ve seen those, too – it was pretty impossible to avoid them. Even the national news showed every obscene detail from the scene, without editing anything out. Why do they do it? We know there was a disaster. We know it is gruesome. We know it. But do we really need to see all the details on the evening news? Just a few years ago, showing parts of dead bodies on national TV would have been unthinkable. The dead were shown covered in a sheet or pixelated, preserving their dignity as a token of respect. Now, the mainstream media seemingly fight a losing battle with Twitter and Whatsapp for who is showing the most eerie images.

Its not even myself I am concerned about. Yes, my stomach turns if I see the victims of the tragedy of MH17 scattered in a field, but at least I am a grown-up person, well capable of dealing with it. But I have a daughter, who’s just one year old. Right now she’s too young to realize the horror of these images and too young to ask questions about them. It won’t take long though before she does ask questions about what she sees on TV and in the newspapers. And its me who will have to provide the answers. Some day I will have to explain to her that the world can be a bad, bad place at times. But I was hoping that I have a few more years before I have to have this conversation with her, and I would like to choose that moment myself and not to be forced upon me by some news editor chasing the ratings.

And actually, well, yes, its myself I am concerned about, too. Because if God forbid I make the news in the wrong way, the last thing I want is for my mutilated remains to be on public display. We now have the right to be forgotten. Can we also have the right for dignity? Please?

How football bankrupted Ukraine

Ukraine has been out of the headlines in the last week, toppled by Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. But after this weekend, Ukraine will be back on top of the news, following the Crimean referendum. Its not going to be pretty for Ukraine and the question everyone will be asking is – how did it get this far? Well, I say football is to blame. This is my version of what happened.

Suppose you have a house. Its a nice house, a big one, that you have inherited from your parents. But it’s an old house, with plenty of problems – the roof is leaking, insulation is non-existent, some windows are broken and the piping is rotten. Your house needs a total overhaul to be restored to its former glory. The problem is – you have just lost your job, your wife is sick and the children need money for new school books, so you’re not exactly swimming in cash.

What would you do? You do have an asset – your house. So a reasonable option would be to take a loan with the property as guarantee, to last you through the tough times and make the repairs before the roof caves in on you. This way, you will have a solid home, your children will benefit from good education, your wife will go to a good doctor and if all goes well, with the new job you will repay the small loan you took and get your family back on your feet.

There is, of course, another option. Mortgage your whole house and spend all the money you get on a huge one-time party, making only cosmetic repairs, so that the roof doesn’t leak into the champagne and caviar you serve your guests. Invite everyone – the boss who fired you, the contractor who “fixed” the leaking roof the last time, hell, invite all your old girlfriends, too – show them how successful you’ve become in life. Who cares that the party will be over and leave you with a huge hangover, a ruined house and a loan you can’t repay? Sell your grandma’s jewelry, too, while you’re at it – no expenses can be spared for a good party!

Unfortunately, the last option is what Ukraine has done when hosting the Euro 2012. Various reports say that the tournament has cost Ukraine 10 to 14 bn USD – four to six times the original estimate! What’s even worse, half the money wasn’t event spent on unnecessary infrastructure like lavish football stadiums – it was just stolen. Who remembers now that Ukrainian media seriously claimed that Ukraine’s road to the EU will start at Euro 2012?

Football alone was not the cause of the downfall of Ukraine. The financial crisis and widespread corruption have hit Ukrainian economy hard, eventually leading to the ousting of the government of Viktor Yanukovych (and a Russian invasion). But hosting the Euro 2012 tournament has undoubtedly made the problems worse.

Ukraine’s woes must be a warning sign to other “emerging” countries that waste their assets on prestige projects. I’m talking to you, Russia and Brazil – chopping the fruit garden around your house and selling your winter coal stock to finance an even bigger party won’t make it better.

The conclusion is obvious – hosting huge events like FIFA World Cups and Olympic Games is possible only when you already have the money, the infrastructure and the judicial system that can cope with such huge money flows. Otherwise, you will be left with a herd of white elephants and a huge debt millstone hanging around your neck, like Ukraine, or Greece. And the last word about the burden of Beijing 2008 Olympics on China’s economy has not been said yet, I’m afraid.

Will Crimea be the last straw for Russia?

By now it is pretty obvious that Russia is taking control over Crimea. The naval base at Sevastopol is essential to the Russian Black Sea Fleet, but is taking control over Crimea and risking a war with Ukraine really the best way to safeguard it? The invasion of Crimea is yet another in a long line of Russian involvements in post-Soviet conflicts. In many cases, these involvements resulted in “frozen conflicts”, leading to the establishment of separatist regions supported by the Russian government – regions like South Ossetia, Abkhazia, Transnistria and Nagorno-Karabakh. Far apart, and each with a different background these regions share one common feature – if it wasn’t for Russian military back-up, they wouldn’t exist in their current pseudo-state form.

A Russian Navy vessel is being towed out of Sevastopol harbour

Over the years since the break-up of the Soviet Union, Russia has been involved in a growing number of conflicts, mostly in the Caucasus but also in the Balkan, in Tajikistan, and more recently, in Syria. The gas-generated cash flow has fuelled the Russian appetite for rebuilding the Empire. While the Russian army achieved limited successes in the 2008 war with Georgia, the scope and nature of that conflict were very limited. However useful for propaganda purposes, these limited successes blind the Russian leaders and Russia’s population to the real capacities of their armed forces in a serious conflict. The bloody Chechen war has illustrated the shortcomings of the Russian army with brutal accuracy. That conflict still drags on, and Russia keeps losing men, money, strength and face in the Caucasus while achieving nothing.

So what will happen in Crimea? It is unlikely that Russia will fully annex Crimea or that the region will move for full independence. Based on past Russian involvements, the creation of yet another pseudo-state with limited to no international recognition seems the most probable outcome. Unfortunately, that would lead to a lose-lose situation for everyone except a couple of Russian generals.

Crimea’s economy is largely dependent on tourism, and a military invasion is not going to be good for business

Already bankrupt Ukraine will be drawn into a low-intensity civil war and will lose its territorial integrity. The Crimean Peninsula is essentially an island, connected to the mainland only at Perekop, a strip of land only a few kilometres wide. In case of a conflict, the 2 million Crimeans will be cut off from all supplies, and will be dependent on Russia to provide them with all they need via the sea. Russia may have the capacity to block Crimean airports, but it is unlikely that it has the capacity to sustain the population through a blockade. The suffering Crimeans will seek refuge in Russia, adding to the millions of refugees from older conflicts already living in Russia. That’s not the end of Russia’s worries – taking control over Crimea from crippled Ukraine is easy, keeping it might prove a whole different story. The peninsula is populated not only by Russians. Ukrainians are a quarter of the population and another 1/8th are Crimean Tatars, Muslim people with a long record of bad blood with Russia. Anyone thinking that they will accept the de-facto annexation of Crimea by Russia is in for nasty surprises.

Many Crimean Tatars are reduced to a cheap tourist attraction

The Russian economy is already strained to the limit by epidemic corruption, runaway military expenses and lavish spending on luxury projects like hosting the 2014 Winter Olympics and the 2018 FIFA World Cup. All-in-all, it might just be that the burden of a conflict over Crimea with Ukraine, Russia’s biggest European neighbour, will be the last straw for Russia. If you have any investments in Russia – now is the time to start worrying.