Day: September 15, 2022

Watching the Shadows
Wagner

Russian fascism: enemy of Black liberation

Four Black nationalists affiliated with the Uhuru Movement, an arm of the African People’s Socialist Party (APSP), are on trial for acting as agents of a Russian propaganda network, in what they are calling “the free speech trial of the century.” Regardless of whether their activities were protected by the First Amendment, the case reveals the very strangest of political bedfelows. Tucker Carlson, who similarly serves as a conduit for Russian propaganda, is also mentioned (although not charged) in a new federal indictment. Carlson is scheduled to appear onstage with JD Vance later this month, and recently hosted an uncloseted Nazi-nostalgist on his Twitter program. The absurd irony of the APSP platforming Kremlin demonization of Ukraine as a “Nazi” state is heightened by Russia’s serial massacres of Black Africans in its new military adventures on the continent. The Anti-Globalization Movement of Russia, which seemingly cultivated Uhuru/APSP, is similarly cultivating white supremacists, who are overtly Trump-aligned and marched at the Charlottesville hate-fest in 2017. The ultimate stateside beneficiary of this Kremlin-orchestrated propaganda effort is of course Donald Trump—who as president in 2020 sought to unleash the military against that year’s Black Lives Matter uprising. Yet while too many “radicals” take the Kremlin bait, once-reviled “liberals” like the National Urban League actually take a more progressive position on Russia and Ukraine. In Episode 243 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg explores how the American radical left went through the proverbial looking glass, including with analogies from the (last) Cold War. Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon (Photo: Russian mercenaries in the Central African Republic. Credit: Corbeau News Centrafrique via Wikimedia Commons)

The Andes
Ecuador

UN: poverty, oppression at root of Ecuador crisis

UN Special Rapporteur on Extreme Poverty & Human Rights Olivier De Schutter issued a report citing impoverishment and exploitation as the “root cause” of the fast-mounting violence and instability in Ecuador. Criminal groups exploit the desperate while gang wars deepen desperation, in a “vicious cycle linking insecurity and poverty.” Following a 12-day visit to the country, De Schutter warned against a purely militarized response to the crisis that ignores social and economic factors. (Image: Nicolas Raymond via Flickr)

Europe
St Petersburg

Russia: municipal revolt against Putin

Dozens of municipal deputies from Moscow and St. Petersburg issued a public statement calling on Russian President Vladimir Putin to resign. “President Putin’s actions are detrimental to the future of Russia and its citizens,” reads the petition shared on Twitter by Xenia Torstrem, a deputy for St. Petersburg. The call comes amid claims of vote-rigging in local and regional elections—as well as a dramatic advance by Kyiv’s forces that marks the most significant setback yet in Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. The call’s signatories, numbering some 30, are at risk of long prison terms under laws passed shortly after the invasion was launched, which have facilitated a harsh crackdown on dissent. (Photo of St. Petersburg via FW)

kharkiv

UKRAINE: DEBUNKING RUSSIA’S WAR PROPAGANDA

In a special analysis for CounterVortex, Bill Weinberg debunks Vladimir Putin’s “de-Nazification” propaganda for his invasion of Ukraine, a paramount example of the ultra-cynical phenomenon of paradoxical fascist pseudo-anti-fascism. The Ukrainian state that he demonizes as “Nazi” has been experiencing a democratic renewal since the Maidan Revolution, as Russia has descended into autocratic dictatorship. Putin’s stated justifications for the Ukraine war are either paranoid delusions or outright lies. His real objectives are to rebuild the Russian Empire, re-establish the Russian dictatorship, and exterminate Ukraine as a cultural and political entity. These are the open aims of Alexander Dugin, the intellectual mastermind of Putin’s revanchist imperial project, and the political heir of Ivan Ilyin, the 20th century theorist of “Russian Fascism.”

Continue ReadingUKRAINE: DEBUNKING RUSSIA’S WAR PROPAGANDA 
Europe
ISIS

French firm charged with abetting ISIS atrocities

France’s highest court overturned a lower-court decision to dismiss charges of complicity in crimes against humanity by cement company LaFarge, which is accused of paying ISIS and other militant groups at least 13 million euros to keep its factory in northern Syria running. The ruling by the Court of Cassation marks a major setback for Lafarge, which contested its responsibility for acts committed with funds it provided to the extremists. The Paris Court of Appeal accepted the company’s argument that the payments were not aimed at abetting ISIS atrocities. But the Cassation Court found that “one can be complicit in crimes against humanity even if one doesn’t have the intention of being associated with the crimes committed. Knowingly paying several million dollars to an organization whose sole purpose was exclusively criminal suffices to constitute complicity, regardless of whether the party concerned was acting to pursue a commercial activity.” (Photo via MEMO)

Syria
Daraa

Armed struggle re-emerges in regime-controlled Syria

Bashar Assad’s Russian-backed reconquest of most of Syria over the past two years is beginning to look like a Pyrrhic victory, as protest and even armed resistance re-emerge in regime-controlled territory. Insurgency is especially mounting in southern Daraa province—where the revolution first began in 2011. Brig. Gen. Talal Qassem of the army’s 5th Division was shot dead this week by gunmen on a motorcycle in the northeast of Daraa. He was the second regime general slain in the province since Assadist forces retook southern Syria in July 2018. They were among more than 200 regime soldiers and officials slain in attacks over this period, and the pace of the attacks is fast escalating. Among regime figures slain in the past month are the mayor of the town of Lajat, a military intelligence officer, and a member of the “reconciliation committees” attempting to rebuild regime support. (Photo: EA Worldview)

Syria

Thousands rally in Idlib as Assad offensive looms

In the latest of ongoing weekly demonstrations in Syria’s besieged Idlib province, thousands took to the streets after Friday prayers, calling on the world to act to prevent the impending massacre there. One of the biggest demonstrations was held in the city of Maarat al-Nouman in central Idlib, where some 25,000 gathered for the march called by the civil resistance. “There will be no solution in Syria without Assad’s fall,” read one prominent banner. Russian-led air-strikes have already opened on Idlib ahead of the anticipated offensive by the Assad regime and its allies to take the province, now the last significant area of Syria still controlled by the opposition. Air-strikes last week reportedly destroyed a hospital run by the White Helmets in the town of Hass. The UN has provided Russia with the GPS coordinates of 235 schools, hospitals and other civilian sites in Idlib, in the hope the move will help protect them from being attacked. But Russia and Assad have been repeatedly accused of intentionally bombing hospitals over the course of the Syrian war. (Photo: Freedom)

The Andes

Peru: pending law threatens indigenous lands

Indigenous rights advocates in Peru are protesting a law being prepared by the administration of President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski that would allow the government to abrogate the land titles of indigenous and peasant communities for development projects that are deemed "high-priority." Peru's alliance of Amazonian peoples, AIDESEP, is dubbing Law 1718 the "Law of Dispossession," and calling on Congress to reject it.

PANAMA: CRIMINALIZATION OF THE NGÄBE

by Tracy Barnett, Intercontinental Cry

Manolo Miranda, leader of an indigenous community recently flooded by Panama’s Barro Blanco dam, now faces up to two years in prison for causing delays and financial losses to the company that has ruined his community’s way of life.

Miranda began trial Aug. 18, together with two other leaders of the Ngäbe-Buglé who opposed the dam, regional cacique Toribio García and religious and protest leader Clementina Pérez. All three face up to two years in prison for trespassing and interfering with the “inviolability of work” for their alleged role in an encampment that blocked the entrance to the hydro dam site in May and June of 2015. Charges against two other activists who were present at the encampment, Oscar Sogandares and Carmen Tedman, have been provisionally dismissed.

Continue ReadingPANAMA: CRIMINALIZATION OF THE NGÄBE 

ANOTHER WEEK CLOSER TO FASCISM

?Putin Shows What Trump Has in Store for America

by Michael I. Niman, The Public

It might seem like I’m writing a lot about fascism lately. It’s just the drought of journalists using the F-word that makes any use of the word stand out—this as a bona fide fascist is within striking distance of the White House.

In case you were on the fence and reluctant to believe that the Republican candidate for president—the one who claimed he could shoot a man in the middle of Fifth Avenue without losing steam among his supporters—is a fascist, this week’s pronouncements by him and his allegedly more palatable running mate reiterate the point.

As he climbs back up to a statistical dead heat in the polls, Trump complimented Vladimir Putin for his leadership style. Media criticism focused on the fact that Putin ordered the invasion and occupation of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula. Others dusted off Cold War tropes to remind us that we hate the Russians. All of this misses the point that Trump zeroed in on Putin’s leadership style. This demands that we look at how he treats his own people—how he leads his own nation.

Continue ReadingANOTHER WEEK CLOSER TO FASCISM