Month: December 2005

The Andes

Peru: state of emergency declared amid mass protests

Thousands have filled the streets of cities and towns across Peru since the ousting and detention of president Pedro Castillo. Protesters occupied the airport in the southern city of Arequipa, while mass mobilizations and road blockades also continue in Cuzco and Trujillo. Protests turned violent in Andahuaylas province, where a National Police station was overrun in the town of Chincheros. At least seven are dead in the protests by official figures—six in Andahuaylas, and five under age 18. Defense Minister Alberto Otárola announced that a state of emergency has been instated nationwide. The Defense Ministry tweeted an announcement that the armed forces will take control of strategic points including airports and hydroelectric plants in the affected areas. Alarmingly, neither announcement even mentioned Peru’s new president, Dina Boluarte, who was sworn in by Congress hours after lawmakers voted to remove Castillo last week. (Photo via KawsachunNews)

Africa

Sudan: regime spurring Kordofan violence?

At least 30 people were killed and dozens injured in armed clashes between members of the Hamar and Misseriya pastoralist groups in Sudan’s West Kordofan state. A Hamar militia that had been organized to protect against cattle rustlers was apparently ambushed by Misseriya gunmen in the locality of Abu Zabad, setting off the violence. Hamar leaders charge that state authorities and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) are protecting Misseriya bands that raid their lands with impunity. In Khartoum, the pro-democracy Resistance Committee is meanwhile calling for continued protests despite the new pact for a transition to civilian rule, saying that any deal must include provisions for transitional justice and reform of the security forces. (Photo: Tim Freccia/Enough Project via Dabanga)

Inner Asia

Mining corruption behind Mongolia unrest

Following angry street protests in Ulaanbaatar, the Mongolian government has agreed to open an investigation into the so-called “coal mafia,” a group of state officials and executives accused pilfering the country’s subsurface wealth for personal profit to the tune of some $12 billion. Demonstrators attempted to storm the Government Palace, and blocked the capital’s main boulevard, Peace Avenue. At issue are the vast Tavan Tolgoi coalfields in the Gobi Desert, under exploitation by the Mongolian Mining Corporation, a pillar of the national economy. (Photo via EuroWeekly News)

Syria

Syria: SDF cooperation with Pentagon suspended

With Turkey preparing a new offensive against the reduced Kurdish autonomous zone in northern Syria’s Rojava region, the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) have announced a halt to military cooperation with the United States. In a statement, the SDF said that “all coordination and joint counterterrorism operations” with the US-led coalition battling ISIS remnants in Syria have been suspended. The move is evidently intended to place pressure on the US to do more to constrain Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who reportedly now has his sights on the remaining significant strongholds of the autonomous administration, Tal Rifaat, Manbij and Kobane. The US has some 600 troops embedded with the SDF in Syria. (Photo: SOHR)

Planet Watch

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The world faces multiple, urgent converging crises now: the war in Ukraine and relentless Russian disinformation campaign in its defense; the attendant threat of imminent nuclear war; democracy under attack from the fascist right in Europe, Asia, South America and here in North America; regimes of mass detention and genocide proliferating worldwide; countryafter country collapsing into chaotic warfare; an unprecedented global crisis of displacement; the rapid fraying of the planet’s life-support systems, and the endemic incapacity of the capitalist system to do anything about it. We are an admittedly small voice amid the online cacophony of bloggery, but we think it is a voice needed more than ever—ongoing coverage of under-reported conflicts, a critical dissident-left perspective with 0% unvetted provocation or state propaganda, a CounterVortex to the general downward spiral. We need your support to do it. Please give what you can.

Europe

Podcast: against pseudo-left disinformation on Ukraine III

In Episode 153 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg calls out Putin-apologist Medea Benjamin, whose current book tour has happily met with protest from the Ukraine Socialist Solidarity Campaign. While Benjamin favorably re-tweets the crude spewings of Marjorie Taylor Greene, her Orwellianly-entitled book, War in Ukraine: Making Sense of A Senseless Conflict, is far slicker propaganda, affecting a progressive tone—possibly due to the influence of her co-author Nicolas J.S. Davies. However, the litany of inaccuracy and distortion on nearly every page reveals it as more pseudo-pacifist war propaganda aimed at justifying Putin’s aggression and putting pressure on Ukraine to capitulate in the paradoxical name of “peace.” Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon. (Map: PCL)

The Andes

Peru: thwarted auto-golpe or successful coup?

Facing a third round of impeachment (or “vacancy“) proceedings, Peru’s president Pedro Castillo ordered the dissolution of Congress and announced a “government of exception” that would rule by decree. But his government immediately collapsed as protesters, many armed with clubs, filled the streets of Lima. Most of his cabinet resigned, with foreign minister César Landa tweeting: “I strongly condemn this coup d’état and call on the international community to assist in the re-establishment of democracy in Peru.” Defying the dissolution order, Congress quickly approved a “vacancy” measure, calling for Castillo’s immediate ouster. The Public Ministry, the government’s prosecutorial body, confirmed that Castillo has been arrested, charged with “breaching constitutional order.” His vice president Dina Boluarte, who also condemned Castillo’s action, was sworn in as Peru’s new mandatary. National Police troops have flooded the streets of Lima, which remains under curfew. (Photo via Twitter)

Africa

Massacre claim overshadows DRC peace talks

A third round of peace talks between the Democratic Republic of Congo and rebel movements opened in Kenya. More than 50 armed and civil society groups are present at the dialogue. Rwanda, accused of backing the M23 rebels, has also been invited to this round—but not the M23 themselves. And the talks are overshadowed by accusations of a massacre of 50 civilians by the M23 in the town of Kishishe, Noth Kivu province. In a statement, the M23 rejected the claims and accused the DRC government of preparing a “genocide” against Congolese Tutsi. The M23 meanwhile continue their advance on the provincial capital of Goma. (Map: CIA)

Planet Watch

Bicycling in China & the origins of Critical Mass

Legendary transportation activist George Bliss will be presenting a slideshow and hosting a discussion of his 1991 trip to China at the Museum of Reclaimed Urban Space (MoRUS) in New York City on Friday Dec. 9. What would NYC be like if we got rid of cars and everybody rode bikes? In 1991, Bliss and filmmaker Ted White visited Guangzhou, China (then pop. six million). Only one in a thousand owned cars. Bikes cost about $50. There was no theft because cheap attended bike-parking was everywhere. Riding en masse was fun, and traffic flowed safely and efficiently with almost no red lights. The term “critical mass“—first applied to this phenomenon by Bliss in White’s film Return of the Scorcher—soon became a rallying cry in the global bike movement. While that China is long gone, its legacy points to the city we could yet have, even half a world away. (Photo: George Bliss)

Europe

Podcast: Ukraine: against the ‘Nazi’ calumny

In Episode 152 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg calls out the relentless propaganda exploitation of the Azov Battalion to tar Ukraine as “Nazi” by the same pseudo-left hucksters (e.g. the inevitable Grayzone) who engage in shameless shilling for the fascist regime of Bashar Assad in Syria—which is beloved of the radical right and which employed fugitive Nazis to train its security forces. These hucksters also (of course) join with far-right figures such as Marjorie Taylor Greene and NickFuentes in openly rooting for Putin and opposing aid to Ukraine. And while hyperventilating about the Azov Battalion (which years ago purged its far-right leadership), they make no note of the Nazis fighting on the Russian side in Ukraine. This is both pseudo-pacifist war propaganda and fascist pseudo-anti-fascism. Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon. (Image: Denis Pushilin, head of the Russian-backed Donetsk “People’s Republic,” giving an award to one of his thugs who is wearing two Nazi insignia on his sleeve. Credit: The Sun. Fair use rights asserted)

Africa

Qaeda franchise claims deadly assault in Togo

The Group for Support of Islam & Muslims (JNIM by its Arabic rendering), al-Qaeda’s West African franchise, claimed credit for an assault on Togolese forces that left at least 17 soldiers dead near the border with Burkina Faso. Togolese media reported that fighters in large columns of vehicles mounted with heavy machine-guns raided a military outpost at Tiwoli village, in northern Savanes region. This is the second such claim of responsibility for an attack within Togo by JNIM in the last two weeks, and the third this year. The attacks are raising fears of insurgency spreading from conflict-torn Burkina Faso into West Africa’s littoral states. (Map: Togo Department of Health)

Watching the Shadows

Podcast: antivax is fascist II

In Episode 103 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg, still suffering from possible COVID-19 symptoms, again notes how the radical right, including neo-Nazi elements, is in the vanguard of anti-vax protests, from Germany to Romania to England to Brooklyn. A virtual industry churns out relentless online disinformation that is easily refuted by anyone who makes the effort to break out of the confirmation-bias bubble. Contrary to the conspiranoid propaganda, COVID-19 deaths are actually being underestimated. The juvenile Nazi-baiting of the anti-vax machine is another example of the propaganda device of fascist pseudo-anti-fascism. Meanwhile, Tuskegee experiment survivors are encouraging vaccinations, and the Peoples Vaccine Alliance protests the actual crimes of Big Pharma—failing to make the vaccine available to Africa and the much of the Global South, in what has been decried as “vaccine apartheid.” Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon. (Photo via Twitter)