CounterVortex

Europe

Podcast: against Putin’s Big Lie

In Episode 115 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg continues to dissect Vladimir Putin’s ultra-cynical fascist pseudo-anti-fascism. Putin presides over Nuremberg-type mass rallies celebrating war and conquest, spews overtly genocidal rhetoric, and prepares concentration camps for the Crimean Tatars. Alexander Dugin, “Putin’s Rasputin” and the intellectual mastermind of his revanchist imperial project, has openly called for “genocide” of the Ukrainians. In areas of Ukraine occupied by Russia, a forced mass deportation of the populace is reported. Putin is clearly approaching a genocidal threshold in Ukraine—while imposting a totalizing police state within Russia. Yet, with unimaginable perversity, all this is done in the name of a campaign to “denazify” Ukraine. The painting of Ukraine as a “Nazi” state on dubious basis of a few ugly right-wing paramilitaries on the Ukrainian side is vigorously repudiated by the leadership of Ukraine’s Jewish community. Yet this “Big Lie” is credulously (or cynically) echoed by elements of the “left” as well as far right in the United States—who arrogantly refuse to listen to Ukrainians. Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon. (Photo: Wikipedia)

Europe

World Court orders Russia to halt invasion of Ukraine

By a vote of 13 to two, the International Court of Justice at The Hague ruled that Russia “shall immediately suspend military operations” in Ukraine. The two dissenting votes were from the justices representing Russia and China. The court’s ruling is in response to a suit filed by Ukraine, accusing Russia of manipulating the concept of genocide to justify its military aggression. Although ICJ verdicts are binding, the court has no direct means of enforcing them. Russia chose not to participate in oral proceedings, but presented a document stating its position that the ICJ lacks jurisdiction in the case. In delivering the ruling, the ICJ president, Joan Donoghue of the United States, outlined the necessary conditions that were met to give the court authority. She especially stressed that Ukraine’s assertions are plausible, and the condition of urgency was met in that acts causing irreparable harm can “occur at any moment.” (Photo of Ukrainian delegation at hearings: UN News)

Mexico

Mexico: gunfire, explosions rock Nuevo Laredo

Gunfire and explosions were reported from the Mexican border town of Nuevo Laredo following the arrest of a local gang leader by federal police and army troops. Juan Gerardo Treviño, AKA “El Huevo” (The Egg), is said be leader of the Tropas del Infierno (Troops of Hell), paramilitary arm of the Cartel del Noreste (Northeast Cartel), an offshoot of the notorious Zetas. Facing charges both sides of the border, he was nonetheless turned over to US authorities, apparently because he is a US citizen. He was handed over at a border bridge in Tijuana, far to the west of Nuevo Laredo, presumably to avoid attempts to free him. In the outburst of violence that greeted his arrest in Nuevo Laredo, the city’s US consulate was hit with gunfire. Gang members also closed off streets with burning vehicles, attacked army outposts, and lobbed grenades at buildings. (Photo: social media via Laredo Morning Times)

Iran

Iran claims missile strikes on Iraqi Kurdistan

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) claimed responsibility for ballistic missile attacks on northern Iraq’s Kurdish regional capital of Erbil, saying that the strikes targeted an Israeli “strategic center” in the city. Iranian state media reported that the missiles were aimed at “Mossad bases” in Erbil. The IRGC had days earlier vowed to seek revenge against Israel, saying the Zionist state will “pay the price” for killing two of its guards in recent Israeli air-strikes on targets in the Syrian capital Damascus. Erbil’s governor Omed Khoshnaw denied any Israeli military or intelligence presence in the city, calling the accusation “baseless.” The estimated 12 rocket strikes took no casualties, but caused damage to civilian properties and triggered panic among the populace in neighborhoods of Erbil. (Map: UNHCR via ReliefWeb)

East Asia

Russian indigenous leaders protest Putin’s war

Exiled leaders of Russia’s Itelmen, Kamchadal, Udege, Shor, Saami and Selkup indigenous peoples issued a statement declaring that they are “outraged by the war President Putin has unleashed against Ukraine. At the moment, the entire population of Ukraine is in grave danger. Old people, women and children are dying. Cities and towns of an independent country are being destroyed because their inhabitants did not want to obey the will of a dictator and a tyrant.” The statement adds: “As representatives of Indigenous peoples, we express solidarity with the people of Ukraine in their struggle for freedom and are extremely concerned about ensuring the rights of Indigenous peoples during the war on Ukrainian territory, including the Crimean Peninsula that remains illegally occupied by Russia.” (Photo of Itelmen people in the Kamchatka Peninsula via Wikipedia)

Europe

Podcast: against pseudo-pacifist war propaganda

In Episode 114 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg continues to dissect Vladimir Putin’s cynical fascist pseudo-anti-fascism—now abetted by pseudo-pacifist war propaganda. “Anti-war” voices in the West join with Putin in relentlessly portraying Ukraine as a neo-Nazi state on the dubious basis of right-wing paramilitary groups on the Ukrainian side—while turning a blind eye to the totalizing dictatorship now unfolding in Russia, and the plethora of equally ugly right-wing paramilitary groups on the Russian side. The inevitable Noam Chomsky sees fit to protest a hypothetical No-Fly Zone (which has been rejected by NATO) rather than Russia’s very real bombardment and aggressive war against Ukraine. “Anti-war” clicktivists are also avidly sharing a video from the right-wing pundit John Mearsheimer, who essentially blames the Ukrainians for getting invaded. “Leftists” closing ranks with their supposed right-wing enemies behind Putin’s illegal war of aggression recalls George Orwell’s observation that pacifism “is secretly inspired by an admiration for power and successful cruelty.” Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon. (Photo via Wiadomosci)

Europe

Crimean Tatars take up arms for Ukraine

The Tatar people, whose homeland on the Crimean Peninsula was illegally annexed from Ukraine by Russia in 2014, are now mobilizing across their diaspora to resist the Russian invasion of the Ukrainian heartland. The World Congress of Crimean Tatars released a statement calling the invasion “banditry,” and calling on Tatars everywhere to “fight against this immoral attack of Russia.” Crimean Tatars have also organized a volunteer battalion to resist the Russian invasion. In a video statement, battalion commander Isa Akayev taunted that “there is enough land in Ukraine to bury all invaders—and don’t forget to put seeds in the pocket so sunflowers grow.” This is a reference to the viral video in which a Ukrainian woman confronted a Russian soldier, saying: “Take these seeds and put them in your pockets so at least sunflowers will grow when you all lie down here.” (Image via Twitter)

The Caucasus

Chechen rebels take up arms for Ukraine

The long-simmering conflict in the Russian Federation’s Chechen Republic appears to be playing itself out in Ukraine. As Vladimir Putin launched his invasion, the “official” (Moscow-installed) Chechen president Ramzan Kadyrov boasted that elements of the Russian National Guard from Chechnya are taking part in the “military operation.” The Chechen Republic of Ichkeria rebel government-in-exile meanwhile announced that volunteers from across the Chechen diaspora are preparing to fight for Ukraine. Two Chechen volunteer battalions have fought against Russian-backed separatists in Ukraine’s Donbas region since 2014. Most of their fighters fled Russia after the fall of the de facto independent government that controlled Chechnya between 1996 and 2000. (Photo of the the Sheikh Mansur Battalion: OC Media)

Europe

New wave of anti-war protest sweeps across Russia

Police detained more than 4,300 people in over 50 cities across Russia as activists mounted a second wave of protests against the invasion of Ukraine. From Moscow and St. Petersburg to the Siberian city of Irkutsk and the Pacific port of Vladivostok, thousands chanted “No to war!” and “Shame on you!”—a message directed at President Vladimir Putin. In the Urals city of Yekaterinburg, a mural glorifying Putin was defaced—prompting a charge by the riot police. The independent monitoring group OVD-Info reports that over 8,000 have now been arrested in anti-war protests across Russia since the Ukraine invasion was launched. After the first wave of protests, the Duma passed a law imposing a 15-year prison term for anyone who opposes the war—or even calls it a “war.” Reporters have been arrested for defying the edict that the invasion only be referred to as a “military operation.” (Photo: protesters in St. Petersburg. Sign reads “In war we will lose everything.” Via OVD-Info)

Planet Watch

IPCC: ‘rapidly closing window’ for humanity

The threat that climate change poses to human well-being and the health of the planet is “unequivocal,” says the latest report from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The expansive review—which forms the second part of the IPCC’s sixth assessment report since 1990—warns that any further delay in global action to slow climate change and adapt to its impacts “will miss a brief and rapidly closing window of opportunity to secure a liveable and sustainable future for all.” (Image: blende12/Pixabay)

Europe

Ukrainian self-determination: Bandera or Makhno?

In Episode 113 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg continues to dissect the cynical fascist pseudo-anti-fascism of Putin’s war propaganda, which portrays any expression of Ukrainian identity or national aspiration as “Nazism.” Much of this hinges on the legacy of Stepan Bandera, the Ukrainian nationalist who collaborated with the Nazis in World War II. Bandera is indeed viewed favorably today by some in Ukraine—just as some in India look favorably upon the Axis-collaborationist independence fighter Subhas Chandra Bose, and some Palestinians lionize the wartime Mufti of Jerusalem who similarly looked to the Axis for support against British imperialism—a reality exploited by Israel’s propagandists. But there is another tremendously important figure who fought the Russians and Germans alike a generation before Bandera, and is nearly forgotten by both “sides” in the current propaganda war—Nestor Makhno, the great Ukrainian anarchist leader of the Russian Revolution. And there is now an anarchist armed resistance to the Russian aggression emerging in Ukraine, reviving the Makhnovist tradition. Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon. (Graphic: CounterVortex with images via Marxists Internet Archive, Ukrainian Youth Union)

Europe

Belarus ‘votes’ to abandon nuclear-free status

Amid an atmosphere of repression, Belarus voted in a referendum to approve constitutional changes that consolidate the power of long-ruling strongman Alexander Lukashenko—and drop the country’s nuclear-free status. On the eve of the vote, Lukashenko expressed his willingness to redeploy nuclear arms in the country’s territory, saying: “If [the West] transfers nuclear weapons to Poland or Lithuania, to our borders, then I will turn to [Vladimir] Putin to bring back the nuclear weapons that I gave away without any conditions.” After the break-up of the Soviet Union in 1991, Belarus ceded the nuclear weapons deployed on its territory to Russia, and the Belarusian constitution declared that the country would remain a “nuclear-free zone.” This clause has now been expunged from the document. (Map via PCL Map Collection)