I WRITE in connection with the situation in the Ukraine where attempts seem to be made to project it into Guyana. May I point out a few things about that situation:

(1) The Ukraine problem is a purely European problem and not a world problem and the Europeans should be allowed to settle the problem by themselves than to have other intervening, complicating and making it even more difficult to solve.
(2) The genesis of the problem: Ukraine has always been in the Slavic-Russian sphere. There has always been free migration either way and many people in the highest governmental and other circles in the Russian Federation are Ukrainian or of Ukrainian origin. There is little difference between Ukrainians and Russians and it hurts the psyche of both sides when people are being killed.
After the overthrow of the last pro-Russian President, a pro-Western President took over and he wished to bring Ukraine into the European Community (EU) and join the NATO military alliance with NATO now coming to Russia’s borders. In so doing, he was attempting to yank Ukraine from its Slavic roots and at the same time ignore the wishes of a large percentage of his population. With an almost 19th century adventurism, the EU and the West assiduously started to assist the pro-Western President in his designs.
(3) The Russian Federation belatedly responded when their interests had been almost completely extinguished. To try to restore some equilibrium, they seized Crimea which was part of Ukrainian territory. Crimea had always been part of Russia until Khrushov, President of the USSR, detached it from Russia and joined it to Ukraine.
(4) Solution: (a) the rest of the world should allow Europe to solve the Ukrainian problem and should not get involved since non-European involvement would make the problem more intractable.
(b) The Russian Federation should immediately work out a Crimean solution whereby they would permit free movement and settlement of Ukrainians into Crimea with all rights of citizens. Elements of such a solution would be found in the relations between Britain and Ireland from Irish Independence onwards.
(c) Ukraine itself should work out some kind of Federal or near-Federal Constitution whereby they could unify and integrate the whole nation again.
(d) Ukrainian neutrality should be guaranteed by the West and Russia and they both should give the Ukrainians the billions of dollars they were both offering when the Ukrainian problem started. The Ukrainians, from being an unhappy people would then be one of the happiest in the world.

R. WILLIAMS