In 1998 the Good Friday Agreement was signed committing Ireland to the peaceful removal of borders.
That very principle - which has been part of Irish law for nearly 30 years - has become fundamental to international law and order, and relations and is at the heart of the Russia/Ukraine conflict.
This is according to Dr Kevin Howard, history lecturer at Dundalk Institute of Technology who was speaking about the conflict on Shannonside/Northernsound earlier today.
He says that Russian aggression on the Ukraine - as witnessed in recent days - is connected to ethnic Russians living in Eastern Ukraine whose loyalty is to Russia and who have a "different sense" of cultural allegiance.
Dr Howard added that there is an argument for the creation of a 'local federation' within the State of Ukraine.
He says that Putin is now on course to take over "the whole of the Ukraine".
"What Putin has done is he has said that these ethnic Russians in the east of the county have been subjected to genocide," Dr Howard continued.
"This is simply not the case; but he sent in his tropes, initially, to support them, however this conflict has taken on a much wider scope.
"It now looks like he is trying to take over the whole of Ukraine.
"So the justification was bogus and the claim that ethnic Russians were somehow being persecuted or subjected to genocide is blatantly false."
