Now Would Be a Pretty Good Time to Launch a Nuclear Attack on Russia

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ADevilYouKhow said:
Didn't Abbot have a huge spat with Putin awhile back.

:lolbron:

You're right about them being the same person
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this isn't a parody

http://www.theguardian.com/world/20...hirtfront-vladimir-putin-over-downing-of-mh17

Tony Abbott says he will “shirtfront” Vladimir Putin over the downing of MH17, claiming his conversation with the Russian president at the G20 would be “the toughest conversation of all”.
The prime minister resorted to the Australian Rules football term for roughing up an opponent to describe his approach to Putin’s presence in the country next month.

“I am going to shirtfront Mr Putin – you bet I am – I am going to be saying to Mr Putin Australians were murdered, they were murdered by Russian backed rebels,” Abbott said.

The government has confirmed Putin will be attending the world summit in Brisbane after G20 countries agreed “by consensus” that Russia should not be sidelined.

It is alleged Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 was shot down over eastern Ukraine in July by Russian-backed rebels, killing all 298 passengers and crew, including 38 Australian citizens and residents.

Abbott said while Australia was the temporary president of the G20, it could not make unilateral decisions on behalf of the body.

“It has to be by consensus and the G20 consensus is that Russia should come,” Abbott said. “I think there will be a lot of tough conversations with Russia and I suspect the conversation I have with Mr Putin will be the toughest conversation of all.

The opposition leader, Bill Shorten, acknowledged Australia had no control over the invitation list but took a swipe at the government for “laying out the red carpet”. He also accused Putin of knowing “more about what happened with MH17 than he’s let on”.

“It’s an international conference, not a conference run by Australia, so if Putin has the arrogance to turn up to visit a nation whose nationals died in this plane crash, he can,” Shorten said.

“But I’m like most Australians, I wish that Putin would at least show enough conscience to be able to not come to Australia, because he’s rubbing our faces in it.

“Also what I happen to think is that when you deal with international bullies, the way you do it isn’t by laying out the red carpet.”

Paul Guard, whose parents, Roger and Jill Guard, were killed in the MH17 crash, said little would be achieved by Putin staying away.

“It wouldn’t achieve much by uninviting him because dialogue is the way forward and I hope the G20 might be a good platform on which to strongly voice our disapproval of his government’s policy and approach to Ukraine,” Guard told Guardian Australia.

“It might be uncomfortable for people to shake hands with him [but] at the end of the day, what do you achieve by not inviting someone like that? It would only play to his domestic politics.”
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Tony Abbott’s threat to “shirtfront” Vladimir Putin has been labelled as “immature” by a Russian embassy official, who pointed out while Abbott may be a fit cyclist, the Russian president was a judo champion.

Embassy second secretary Alexander Odoevskiy also told Guardian Australia that the west, including Australia, had lost interest in the investigation into the crash of MH17, with Abbott preferring instead to play politics and conduct “megaphone statements and muscle flexing”. He also accused Bill Shorten of “unfriendly language”.

Odoevskiy said the Russian government had received no request from Abbott for a bilateral meeting during the G20 summit. He characterised Australian-Russian relations as at a “historic low”, compared with a high under the Howard government.

“We don’t treat it as tough language, we treat it as immature language,” Odoevskiy said.

“From a personal perspective, I would just say that Tony Abbott is very good at cycling, he is very fit, but president Putin is a judo champion.”

Odoevskiy said Abbott’s comments were directed almost entirely at a domestic audience, as not many people outside Australia would know what the term “shirtfront” meant. It generally refers to a front-on chest bump or rough handling, a move which Odoevskiy pointed out was illegal.

“I had to do research on it. Personally I note this is no longer used in the current game. It is outdated, it is illegal and you do get penalised for it,” he said. [:dead:]

“We are reluctant to comment officially on the statements. They are not helpful in any way, we are concentrating on making peace in Ukraine. We have 100,000 refugees from Ukraine in Russia. It’s very difficult so we are not involved in exchanging megaphone statements and muscle flexing.”

Odoevskiy said, in spite of the megaphone diplomacy, the west had lost interest in the investigation into MH17. He said at the crash site – where 298 passengers and crew were killed when MH17 was shot down – there were still large pieces of the Malaysian Airlines plane.

“There have been a lot of question marks raised by the Russian ministry of defence which have been unanswered by Australia, Holland and Kiev,” he said.

He said Russia had “co-operated from day one” of the MH17 crash, while Australia sponsored a UN resolution condemning the shooting down of the plane and demanding full access to the site.

“We all know from day one, [Australian] leadership promoted the start of a blame game and it was not helpful to real investigation,” Odoevskiy said.

“My feeling is more could be done to put people on the ground. There is lots of evidence, on the ground, large fragments on the ground, still lying there. In a normal investigation, those pieces would have been collected. The aircraft would have been reconstructed [but] the west has lost interest. Everyone talks about politics. This is frustrating.”

He described Russian relations at an “historic low”, down from the high in 2007 when former prime minister John Howard invited Putin to separate bilateral meetings during the Apec summit.

“That was a big success, then relations were on a historic high. Now under this Liberal government, relations are on a historic low,” he said.

“Then the Coalition took a stance to develop a relationship with Russia … since then the bilateral relations are on historic lows due to recent developments.”

Abbott rejected Russian criticism of his comments as immature and refused to back away from his colourful description – repeating that the “plane was brought down by Russian-backed rebels using Russian-supplied equipment”.

“We have all seen the impact of Russian policy in eastern Europe, we have all seen the impact of Russian policy on the innocent people on board flight MH17.

“I think it’s the very least I can do, speaking for Australian dead and the families of Australian dead and indeed speaking for the world’s victims is to have a very robust conversation with president Putin.”

Asked why his office had still not requested a one-on-one meeting with Putin, Abbott said the G20 was still a month away and his program was still being finalised.

“I certainly expect while he’s a guest of Australia, he will undertake to have a conversation with the Australian prime minister,” Abbott said.
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