Quote Originally Posted by Hanna View Post
People there are forced to live on really low sums of money - I'd guess a few hundred dollars a month if they are lucky.
You would be surprised to learn that a lot of Russian/CIS areas, and specifically lots of those you traveled to in 2011 have that poverty issue - median salaries of $100-200 a month, it's safe to say that Moldova and Belarus are going through that for sure - those are the poorest countries of the area. Well, I think it's the price they pay for having socialist imbeciles in the office. What's sadder is not all of those areas let people decide on the government they wanna have, but that's another story.

Quote Originally Posted by Hanna View Post
It somewhat unfair though - that Crimea is treated like the Prodigal Son whereas Donetsk/Lugansk are on their own, and really suffering despite turning to Moscow.
The Russians know they broke the international law by the annexation of Crimea alone, and they're not likely to take the risk and gamble with other areas of sovereign countries with that sort of action. Plus, they've had the chance to see what those "Donetsk fighters" really are, and I think at this point, they despise them even more than the Ukrainians do.