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US Removes Piracy Sanctions From Ukraine

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the carrot-on-a-stick dept.

An anonymous reader writes The US has restored Ukraine to their preferred trade partner status after requiring the country to crack down on piracy. The United States had also imposed 100-percent import duties on $75 million worth of Ukrainian exports since 2002." From the article: "Concern over high piracy rates prompted the Bush administration to suspend Ukraine from the program in 2001. At that time, Ukraine was the largest producer and exporter of pirated CDs and DVDs in Europe, USTR said."

18 of 157 comments (clear)

  1. $75 million in trade over three years???? by Anonymous+Crowhead · · Score: 4, Funny

    I'm surprised both of our economies didn't collapse. How could we do without the Ukraine?

  2. I had no idea . . . by Ph33r+th3+g(O)at · · Score: 5, Funny

    . . . Ukraine even had a significant maritime presence, much less was engaged in piracy.

    --
    I too have felt the cold finger of injustice.
    1. Re:I had no idea . . . by ScriptedReplay · · Score: 3, Funny

      Yer better off not meetin'em Ukrainian pirates. It's the blackest of all seas they sail on, arrr ...

  3. New relationship because of the elections by CRCulver · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The US has restored Ukraine to their preferred trade partner status after requiring the country to crack down on piracy.

    More like the US has restored Ukraine after installing a puppet who, even if he doesn't solve the privacy problem, is useful to the US in other ways.

    I was in Kyiv two weeks ago. The consequences of the election of Yushenko are already evident, Ukrainian young people want to align themselves so much with the West that it's suddenly all McDonalds and Coca-Cola (wasn't this bad during my first trip here four years ago). Ukrainian traditional culture is being eroded before one's eyes. This isn't the normal pace of globalisation, this is Ukraine rapidly getting the life sucked out of it by a new administration that doesn't care about its own country. Of course, the other choice would have been a Russian puppet, who would be almost as bad (but at least the Russians are fellow Orthodox). The best turn of events would be an isolationist Ukraine, but no one stepped forward asking to turn the country in that direction.

    Piracy hasn't changed much in Kyiv. There are a few new places to buy media legally (in touristy locals where foreigners hangout), but most markets sell bootlegs.

    1. Re:New relationship because of the elections by KiloByte · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The consequences of the election of Yushenko are already evident. Ukrainian traditional culture is being eroded before one's eyes.

      Do you mean, 300 years of Russian occupation didn't really have any negative effects?
      They have just freed themselves from a powerful, warmongering, authoritarian neighbour. Give them a chance, and forgive them the urge to find new allies with some clout.

      --
      The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
    2. Re:New relationship because of the elections by gkuz · · Score: 4, Insightful
      Ukrainian young people want to align themselves so much with the West

      Deciding this for themselves is, then, anathema to you? They are supposed to want what you want?

      this is Ukraine rapidly getting the life sucked out of it by a new administration that doesn't care about its own country

      Led by a president who very nearly gave his life just as a consequence of running for President, to throw off the Russian yoke -- that's how little he cares about his own country? Who speaks Ukrainian -- not Russian -- at every official function because Ukrainian is the official language. His language. A language Yanukovich doesn't even speak.

      (but at least the Russians are fellow Orthodox)

      Many Ukrainians are not Orthodox. Many of those that are do not belong to the Moscow Patriarchate.

      Please learn some more before you go back again.

    3. Re:New relationship because of the elections by gkuz · · Score: 4, Insightful
      Orthodoxy is the historic faith of most of Ukraine

      One should be careful in using words like "historic" or "always". What faith did Volodymyr take on in 988? Is that even a meaningful question, pre-Schism? So what does "historic" mean? Or "always Russian-speaking"? What was being spoken when Kyiv was golden domes and Muscovy was a swamp?

      A Belgian solution may indeed have been found. But it wasn't. The Ukrainians I talk to know they are Ukrainians. They don't want to be Poles or Belgians or Americans. Let them decide, OK? Your cultural chauvinism, saying what they are "supposed" to want, is as bad as what you deride.

    4. Re:New relationship because of the elections by karuna · · Score: 3, Interesting

      To say that Ukrainian Holodomor was "merely famine" is a very loaded statement. What kind of widespread draughts or plagues were there at this time? The answer is none. It is hard to evaluate how much it was caused by inept but well-wishing policies and what part was deliberate revenge against so-called kulaks but in either way the blame solely lies to Soviet officials who seized the crops and restricted the movement of people out of affected areas. What to speak of trying to help those people with providing food by apealing for help in their own country or internationally.

    5. Re:New relationship because of the elections by gkuz · · Score: 3, Insightful
      How many of these people are devout Orthodox, listen to traditional music, wear appropriate clothing, and spurn Western influences?

      Forgive me, I didn't realize I was talking to Solzhenitsyn.

      What in the world is "appropriate clothing"? What is "traditional music"? Which century would you like these people to live in? If they choose to be 21st century Europeans, that's their choice, not yours.

    6. Re:New relationship because of the elections by martinX · · Score: 3, Insightful

      You know, there was a time when this traditional music you speak of was The Newest Sound Around. And it was probably derided by the traditionalists back then...

      --
      When they came for the communists, I said "He's next door. Take him away. Goddam commies."
  4. There's more to this... by SQFreak · · Score: 3, Insightful

    You know there's more to this story than just piracy legislation. Also in the news today, Ukraine's Yushchenko Wants to Join EU. That's a trend; Yushchenko is a pro-Western, mostly anti-Russian leader. Is there any doubt that the US is going to help a nation trying to reform its democracy as Ukraine is doing? This is just one of the ways the US will help.

  5. **AA Goverment by jonfr · · Score: 4, Insightful

    /scarsam

    When did the MPAA and RIAA get into the U.S goverment ? I am also sure that Ukraine goverment has been "figthing" piracy. Since there is so much less real crime in that country.

    Somebody in the U.S goverment needs to be reconnected to reality.

    scarsam/

  6. Letter from Dubya by nodnarb1978 · · Score: 3, Funny

    Mr. Viktory Yushchenkoff,

    You're welcome. May we have some nice light sweet crude and/or Liquified Natural Gas, please? If you can send us both, I can totally hook you up with some nice F-16 Fighting Falcons. Get back to me.

    Your pal, Dubya

  7. Denying Holodomor? How Russian! by mi · · Score: 4, Informative
    Contrary to the popular in US belief, the drought and famine in 30's were natural disasters.
    My grandmother and her family survived Holodomor, thanks to the occasional $10 or $20, sent by the relatives in Connecticut, who left in tzar's times, with which one could by flour in the "foreign currency only" stores ("Torgsin") -- in the Ukrainian village of Narodichi. You are lying. USSR was exporting grain while its own citizens were dying of hunger. It was not a "natural disaster", but a targeted campaign to genocide the (relatively) rich Ukrainian peasants for being less than anxious to join the proletariat and the poorer Russian peasants (worse climate, worse soil made them poorer).

    You call these numbers "natural disaster"? From Robert Conquest's "Harvest of Sorrow", quoted by Wikipedia:

    At the height of the famine, while confiscating crops from the starving peasants, the USSR exported 1.70 million tons of grain in 1932 and 1.84 million tons in 1933 (close to a quarter of a ton per each victim in each year). The Soviet authorities also banned travel out of the famine affected areas under the pretext that people travelling for food spread "anti-kolkhoz agitation".

    Peasants of the Russian "Povolzhje" (along Volga) were, likely, similarly targeted, although they never had the Diaspora to keep the memory alive. Their lands were also fairly decent and, consequently, they also had something else to lose "besides their chains".

    Holodomor deniers are hardly better than Holocaust deniers -- and my family was hit by both of these genocide attempts...

    And while you visit Wikipedia, check out Godwin's Law. Calling the newly free Baltic countries "Nazis" was remarkably stupid and offensive. Russia has a lot to atone for, and you are not even trying...

    --
    In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
    1. Re:Denying Holodomor? How Russian! by dunkelfalke · · Score: 4, Informative
      well, my grandparents also survived it living in ukraine back those days. and no, it wasn't a conspiracy but a bad year and stupid policy. the famine that year was not only in ukraine btw.

      and about baltic countries... i actually was born and grown up in one of them (estonia). i visit estonia almost every summer. and yes, there is some truth to those "neonazi" claims.

      --
      Conservatism: The fear that somewhere, somehow, someone you think is your inferior is being treated as your equal.
  8. Denying Holodomor? How Russian? by 21mhz · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Russia has a lot to atone for, and you are not even trying...

    Don't take this stupid troll for the voice of Russia whole.
    I feel for the hunger victims and the purged, were they in Ukraine, Russia or Poland. In a sense, one might say that Russia too was occupied by a hostile force, but... oh well.

    --
    My exception safety is -fno-exceptions.
  9. [Piracy review] Currently in Kyiv, Ukraine... by Zx-man · · Score: 5, Interesting

    ...And we have a new piracy-related industry here since the USSR broke down: so-called "Computer Clubs"... It's interesting to see how it evolves.

    Imagine an Internet-Café without the Internet. A bunch of computers set up specifically to play games on, connected to a LAN with servers filled with pr0n, muzak and warez. Basically, this is it. You may come to play some games, bring your HDD / iPod / pack of DVD-R's or amuse yourself with the most interesting feature: the pirated Windows that says it is not Windows.

    The clubs' owner usually cooperate in order hire several cracker who RES-EDIT an MSWin distribution - change the interface, icons, text and sometimes rewrite the EXPLORER.EXE to look entirely different - it is almost a tradition to use Borland Dephi for this.
    Here are the screenshots: http://tinyurl.com/9ddgo

    One of the popular "pre-modified" distributions in "BedOS 2 [Tanya]" - a heavily hacked Win98. Yet the computer illiteracy of the "copyright protectors" lets people who run the "Computer Clubs" to get past the law by claiming that what they are using _is not actually Windows_ (!). See http://winbeos98.km.ru/ for further deteil

  10. Re:I just hope.... by octopus72 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Dominating sky as part of US Air Force attacking poor contry (which was under sanctions for a decade) is easy for any plane, fighting modernised Sukhoi/MIG planes with good ground support is completely different thing.