{"id":946,"date":"2014-02-24T10:00:32","date_gmt":"2014-02-24T09:00:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/?p=946"},"modified":"2014-02-24T12:30:26","modified_gmt":"2014-02-24T11:30:26","slug":"the-ukraine-venezuela-and-thailand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/2014\/02\/24\/the-ukraine-venezuela-and-thailand\/","title":{"rendered":"The Ukraine, Venezuela, and Thailand"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>While I was enjoying the <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/dgdw\/\">Doing Good Doing Well conference<\/a>\u00a0on Friday and Saturday, the world appeared to be starting to change once again. Events in the <strong>Ukraine<\/strong> and <strong>Venezuela<\/strong> over the week-end have the potential to sharply re-draw the geo-political map in two critical parts of the world and are also <strong>deeply linked to the issue of energy<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<h3><b>Ukraine: The cost of freedom<\/b><\/h3>\n<figure style=\"width: 239px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"  \" alt=\"ft.com\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/files\/2014\/02\/images-1.jpg\" width=\"239\" height=\"134\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Yulia Tymoshenko. Source: FT<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Ten years after its <strong>orange revolution<\/strong>, Ukranians went to the streets months ago to protest against what appeared to be a hijacking of their dream of becoming a normal, free, European country. After President <strong>Viktor Yanukovitch<\/strong>\u2019s interior ministry opened fire on protesters on Thursday, the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/world-europe-26299670\">BBC<\/a> cites sources saying that<strong> 77 people died<\/strong> on both sides as the situation deteriorated.<\/p>\n<iframe class='xavier' width='100%' height='400' frameborder='0' allow='fullscreen' allowfullscreen src='https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Hvds2AIiWLA'><\/iframe>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>In the span of 72 hours a political compromise was made but then rejected by protesters resulting in the opposition politicians taking control of the government in Kiev and releasing <strong>Yulia Tymoshenko<\/strong> who had been jailed by Yanukovitch.<\/p>\n<h3>Venezuela<\/h3>\n<figure id=\"attachment_953\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-953\" style=\"width: 150px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-thumbnail wp-image-953 \" alt=\"Nicolas Maduro. AP Photo\/Fernando Llano\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/files\/2014\/02\/maduro2-150x150.jpeg\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-953\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Nicolas Maduro. AP Photo\/Fernando Llano<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<figure id=\"attachment_952\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-952\" style=\"width: 150px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-thumbnail wp-image-952 \" alt=\"imyourvoicevenezuela.com\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/files\/2014\/02\/capriles2-150x150.jpeg\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-952\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Henrique Capriles. imyourvoicevenezuela.com<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>In <strong>Venezuela<\/strong>, the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/world-latin-america-26309917\">BBC<\/a> reports that <strong>10 people have died<\/strong> in a series of protests against the government of <strong>Nicolas Maduro<\/strong> who narrowly beat opposition candidate <strong>Henrique Capriles<\/strong> in an questionable election in April. Capriles never accepted the election result and Venezuelans appear to be protesting the economic and security situation as well as Maduro\u2019s \u00a0government.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h3>Gas or oil?<\/h3>\n<p>As mentioned in a previous post, at the core of its relations to Europe lies Russia\u2019s export of natural gas. <a class=\"inline-twitter-link inline-tweet-click\" href=\"#\" onclick=\"inline_tweet_sharer_open_win('https:\\\/\\\/twitter.com\\\/intent\\\/tweet?url=https%3A%2F%2Fblog.iese.edu%2Fdoing-business%2Fwp-json%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fposts%2F946%2F&text=Most+of+the+gas+runs+through+pipelines+through+the+Ukraine+and+the+Ukraine+is+also+critical+for+Russia++');\" title=\"Tweet This!\">Most of the gas runs through pipelines through the Ukraine and the Ukraine is also critical for Russia  <span class=\"non-dashicons\"> <\/span><\/a>as the current home of most of the Black Sea Fleet as well as a source of steel, coal and grains like barley, corn and wheat.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_954\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-954\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-954 \" alt=\"news.bbc.co.uk\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/files\/2014\/02\/47726090_bsea_rex-300x200.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/files\/2014\/02\/47726090_bsea_rex-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/files\/2014\/02\/47726090_bsea_rex-624x416.jpg 624w, https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/files\/2014\/02\/47726090_bsea_rex.jpg 766w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-954\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Source: news.bbc.co.uk<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><strong>Venezuela<\/strong>, according to a <em>Bloomberg<\/em> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/news\/2012-06-13\/venezuela-overtakes-saudis-for-largest-oil-reserves-bp-says-1-.html\">report<\/a> in 2012, has the world\u2019s largest known oil reserves and exported 40% of its oil to the Unites States in 2011 according to the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.eia.gov\/countries\/cab.cfm?fips=VE\">EIA<\/a>. Nicolas Maduro <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2014\/02\/22\/world\/americas\/venezuela-maduro-accusations\/\">claims<\/a> that protests against the regime are in fact financed by right wing interest allied with the U.S.<\/p>\n<p>As discussed in an <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/2014\/02\/03\/shale-gas-and-fracking-3\/\">earlier post<\/a>, record gas production in the United States due in part to the exploitation of shale gas has made it possible to consider energy independence for the United States and even it becoming a new exporter of gas and oil.<\/p>\n<h3><b>Thailand: No impact, no headlines<\/b><\/h3>\n<figure style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"cnn\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/files\/2014\/02\/thai-300x168.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"168\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Source: CNN<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>While the Ukraine and Venezuela go through their particular trauma, <strong>Thailand\u2019s government is also being besieged by anti-government protesters who are being shot at and bombed by unidentified killers<\/strong> according to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2014\/02\/23\/world\/asia\/thailand-protests\/\">CNN<\/a>. <strong>Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra<\/strong> has promised to catch the murderers who are thought to be allied with her brother, the former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"line-height: 1.714285714; font-size: 1rem;\">Unlike Venezuela and the Ukraine, <strong>Thailand<\/strong> imports rather than exports energy and the conflict between the pro and anti Shinawatra factions appears to have little to do with the larger geopolitical discussion or the world\u2019s energy balance.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>More on this next week!<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>While I was enjoying the Doing Good Doing Well conference\u00a0on Friday and Saturday, the world appeared to be starting to change once again. Events in the Ukraine and Venezuela over the week-end have the potential to sharply re-draw the geo-political map in two critical parts of the world and are also deeply linked to the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":788,"featured_media":959,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[588,26749],"tags":[90124,1359,76572,67643],"class_list":["post-946","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-energy","category-geopolitics","tag-energy","tag-thailand","tag-ukraine","tag-venezuela"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/946","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/788"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=946"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/946\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":967,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/946\/revisions\/967"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/959"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=946"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=946"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/doing-business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=946"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}