Crisis in the Ukraine

[RedHal]

well... http://avtonomia.net/2014/01/18/open...european-left/


To the members of GUE/NGL faction in the European Parliament,
Gabriele Zimmer
Dear comrades.,
We, the members of leftist, trade union and human rights organizations in Ukraine, as well as individual activists, would like to draw your attention to the recent events in our country.
On Thursday, 16th of January 2014 without the discussion and contrary to its own regulations and to the Constitution of Ukraine, the Ukrainian parliament, passed a series of laws directed at limiting freedom of speech and citizens’ right to peaceful protest. One of the approved items is the infamous amendment to the Criminal Code which bans so-called “extremism”. In this amendment “inciting social discord” is defined as “extremism”. It is clear that any kind of drawing attention to social problems, to the blatant inequality that exists in Ukrainian society, can be qualified as “inciting social discord”, therefore the activities of left, trade union and social activists in Ukraine can be criminalized to a large extent.
The Communist Party of Ukraine (CPU) plays a particularly shameful part in these events. Not only did the Communist Party’s faction unanimously voted for the repressive bills, but the CPU official website also features materials that condemn the recent protests as being inspired by foreign actors with the aim of destabilizing Ukraine. Spreading such opinion, the CPU in fact fulfills the task of the whitewashing of Yanukovych’s regime.
It is true that open anti-communists do play a significant role on Maidan, but this anti-communism is caused mostly by the arrogant position of the Communist Party itself. It is not the first time the CPU has tried to de-legitimize civil protests and adopted a conservative position. In addition to this, in the country that suffered the catastrophic losses caused by hunger and repressions during the Stalinist regime, the CPU refuses to condemn the actions of the USSR’s leaders or at least apologize for them, which makes socialist ideas less popular in Ukrainian society.
Yanukovych’s regime has demonstrated its readiness for repressions. It is evident today that the CPU will use its international connections in order to justify this regime’s actions. That is why we believe that the left all around the world and especially in the European Union must terminate any relations with the Communist Party of Ukraine and condemn its actions.
We believe that the party that treats popular uprisings with open hatred, the party that speaks out against “inciting social discord”, is not fit to be called communist or leftist and is “communist” in name only.
We ask you to bring this letter to the attention of the leadership of the parties which are members of your Union.

Autonomous Workers Union – Kyiv,
18/01/2014

lol full blown neo nazis are now just anti communist, AWU are nothing but Kiev "left" propagandists

[Rusty Shackleford]

I for once don't disagree with the rather unsavory 'communism' of the CPU though. Like with most official CPs they are rather degenerate ideologically.


other than that though...

[Dagoth Ur]

The KPU is a shit party, which is all the more stark considering how good they look compared to Kiev.

[Workers-Control-Over-Prod]

Shit like this reminds me why I'm a communist. We should maybe put some spam warnings on the links with the violent content, I nearly vomited and am sick after viewing that. What makes all this worse is that I researched World War 2 in the Ukraine a year ago, read about the ONU, Bandera, the german collaborators to exterminating the Ukrainian people; that background knowledge makes this all the more worse to take, just sitting here, powerless in front of a computer screen.

And the majority of westerners believe the issue at the moment is Russia, or Russian imperialism in Ukraine, where the real issue that should be brought to the fore is the crisis for human civilization that Fascism poses. What becomes clear is, that even though we may feel the need to, going against the Fascists with violence has no use: we need an international independent working class mass media that exposes the sick and violent game international capital plays with the people.

[FSL]

In Kherson, Ukraine, a southern city. The governor is from tymoshenko's party.

Here is a translation of the Governor’s main comments:

Today, celebrating Victory Day, we remember the turbulent events that occurred during the Great Patriotic War. We remember that people fought against aggressors who tried to take our land.

Those aggressors [Soviet troops] were motivated not just by the desire to take our land and enslave our people, but they also propagated slogans about the supposed liberation of nations of people who were living on the lands that Hitler was trying to seize. If you study history, we see that it was [Hitler] who was the first to propagate the slogans “liberating people from the Communist yoke” and “liberating people from the tyrant Stalin.”

This was Hitler’s first motivation, when he tried to take territory. But our people came together in our willingness to defend our native Ukraine, and presented a united front, showing [Hitler] that people can and will win back their territory. Today, the same thing is happening on Ukraine’s borders.

As Odarchenko spoke of “the tyrant Stalin,” many in the crowd began booing and whistling. According to local news website Khersonskie Vesti, supporters of Ukraine’s Communist Party led the effort to interrupt the speech. Before long, a woman carrying a young child forced her way to the stage, grabbed the microphone from Odarchenko, and threw it to the ground. When the Governor moved to another podium several yards away, somebody else from the crowd approached and ripped away the microphone stand. Someone captured the entire spectacle on camera, and soon posted it on YouTube, where the video has attracted over 300 thousand views in less than 24 hours.

http://globalvoicesonline.org/2014/0...ry-day-speech/

+ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A05s6GrztbQ" title="View this video at YouTube in a new window or tab" target="_blank">YouTube Video

[Sasha]

I really should go back in the forums old treads and dig up the old threads about the Balkan wars, I'm sure anti-imps said the same "anti-fascist" and "socialist" things about massmurdering fascists like Arkans Tigers as they do about these "self-defense forces".
anyone holding a gun in this conflict is just as fascist as the guy on the other side of the baricades, let's not cheer ourselves into another ethnic massacre.

[Hrafn]

I really should go back in the forums old treads and dig up the old threads about the Balkan wars, I'm sure anti-imps said the same "anti-fascist" and "socialist" things about massmurdering fascists like Arkans Tigers as they do about these "self-defense forces".
anyone holding a gun in this conflict is just as fascist as the guy on the other side of the baricades, let's not cheer ourselves into another ethnic massacre.

The enemy of my enemy is not my friend.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

I really should go back in the forums old treads and dig up the old threads about the Balkan wars, I'm sure anti-imps said the same "anti-fascist" and "socialist" things about massmurdering fascists like Arkans Tigers as they do about these "self-defense forces".
anyone holding a gun in this conflict is just as fascist as the guy on the other side of the baricades, let's not cheer ourselves into another ethnic massacre.

I really had the intention to stop posting here, due to a variety of reasons, but this is so horrifyingly hypocritical I can't leave it unanswered. You and the people who support you are the only ones who are cheering - who have been cheering from the beginning of the Glorious People's Fascist Revolution. You are the "Western" equivalent of the AWU - police "autonomists" (their chief Zadiraka, who allegedly knows O. Vernik personally, which might explain a lot to people who are familiar with the debacles of left organisations in the Ukraine, is part of a council in the Interior Ministry of the Kiev Government - the same ministry that is held by fascists no less!) who invent and twist facts so that their beloved Kiev government appears faultless and everything is blamed on "the Russians" - just like certain "left" groups did with the Tuđman and Izetbegović governments and "the Serbs". And then you have the gall to make these extremely vague statements about both sides being "full of fascists" (for the record, the Tigers were not fascists, "fascism" means a bit more than "people I dislike", although telling that to a Dimitrovist is a lost cause). Well, you're cheering on one side full of fascists. You've fallen in line behind the Kiev government just as you've fallen in line behind Obama. Hell, your denunciation of the separation of Crimea can only mean that the bourgeois Ukrainian state and its borders are sacrosanct.

But I don't for a moment believe you're a Ukrainian nationalist. No, you're something worse, a liberal who believes that the Ukraine needs the "civilising" influence of the EU (of course, in practice it turns out that the EU supports the most violent, reactionary element of the Ukrainian, Belarussian etc. societies, but why should pesky facts get in the way of a scheme?). Maybe when the Ukraine joins the EU - after conquering Crimea back, you hope - they can elect a Green government and Obama can come on a state visit.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

I can't edit the above post for some reason, so I will have to post this separately. Here is a list of the members of a "Civic Council" of the Interior Ministry of the Kiev government. Zadiraka is listed at number 12, allegedly representing a "Centre for the Study of Problems of the Civil Society". This same Zadiraka, Vladimir Sergeevich was a member of the Direct Action group with fused into the AWU. Here he is explicitly stated to be a member. Most people from the Ukraine I've spoken to consider him a leader of the AWU.

[Babeufist]

NATO-Nazi-Gladio pogrom.
Bloodthirsty pogrom against pro-Russian protesters

What happened in Odessa yesterday is much worse than what the initial reports had indicated: it was truly a deliberate and blood-curling massacre. To summarize:

In Odessa the pro-Russian demonstrators had never seized a building, all they did was erecting a small tent city and hanging out there. Hardly any violence had taken place. Yesterday, the neo-Nazis finally made their move:

1) They bussed in large numbers of Right Sector thugs.
2) They then got the local football hooligans (paid by oligarchs according to some reports) to begin a nationalist demonstration.
3) The Right Sector thugs then joined the hooligans and together they viciously attacked the pro-Russian tent city: the tents were torn down and the anti-regime demonstrators viciously beat up to a pulp. The local cops stood by and watched. [It's reported they were instructed so.]
4) The anti-regime demonstrators ran literally for their lives towards the building of Unions which had been their normal rallying point at which point they were surrounded and the building set ablaze.
5) Those attempting to leave the building were severely beat up and many murdered. Many were shot while standing in the windows to flee from the flames.
6) The neo-Nazis did not let the firefighters through.
7) With each jumping demonstrator or each person shot in the windows the crowd would scream "Glory to the Ukraine! Glory to he heroes!" Many took souvenir videos. For them, this was a joyful, liberating event.
8) The Ukrainian social networks flooded with joyful messages congratulation the "heroes" in Odessa and promising more of the same to the accursed Moskals.
9) The Western and Ukie press reported the events as a "clash" with "casualties" but with no reference to any one party causing this massacre.
10) The last fatalities figure was at 46. But with many dying from smoke inhalation and, especially, burns, it will probably go up.

Molotov cocktails prepared by Pro-Kiev junta girls
http://thenypost.files.wordpress.com..._crisis-31.jpg
were used to torch the tents of the pro-federalists activists, and later the building, were they tried to escape the death

Odessa slaughter: How vicious mob burnt anti-govt activists alive (GRAPHIC IMAGES)
http://rt.com/news/156592-odessa-activists-burnt-alive/

Certain elements in Kiev also celebrated the holocaust in Odessa.
http://www.vesti.ru/videos?vid=596180

FALSE FLAG? Ukrainian Police Filmed Assisting In Odessa Massacre !
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QpV_Dnd2v9s
http://www.1tv.ru/news/world/257896

Then the visibly smaller group of alleged anti-Kiev activists started to attack the march, apparently provoking the demonstrators. Footage then shows a smaller group men wearing red bands luring the pro-Kiev crowd into a different direction.

At some point, the police line opened up to let the men wearing red bands through and closed back up again. A video then shows a man standing behind the police lines shooting at the pro-Kiev crowd.

The provocations succeeded in triggering clashes, as both sides began to throw stones, and shots were heard.

The alleged anti-Kiev activists then disappeared and angry pro-Kiev supporters headed to the opposition camp based in front of the House of Trade Unions.

However, none of the original attackers with the red bands were there. Instead, a few dozen pro-autonomy activists were surrounding the camp. When the activists saw the angry mob approaching, they took shelter inside the House of Trade Unions.

Survivors of the fire say they had to barricade themselves inside the House of Trade Unions to hide from the agitated mob, which torched their tent camp.

Radicals then began throwing Molotov cocktails at the Trade Unions building, setting it on fire. Witnesses say those who managed to escape the blaze were severely beaten outside by the besiegers of the burning building.

But the Ukrainian Interior Ministry offers a different version of events, saying the victims of the violent unrest started the fire themselves when they began throwing Molotov cocktails from the upper floor.

Multiple videos of the incident, however, show Molotov cocktails flying from outside the building. Another video shows that some radical pro-Kiev elements were also inside the building, waving a Ukrainian flag.

The evidence leads one to conclude that the football fans could have been manipulated while unknown forces instigated the violence.

Local mass media quoted a source in the Interior Ministry as saying that militants from the special task force battalions Vostok (East) and Shturm (Storm) clad in civilian clothes had been involved in the killings and beatings in Odessa. Reports said they were manned with nationalists ready for mass clashes and sponsored by Ukrainian oligarchs Igor Kolomoisky and Pyotro Poroshenko.

There are lots of photos and videos of what was going on in the city on Friday and there are lots of details attracting special attention. Information to consider is quite enough for full investigation. It was taken by Pavel Ptshelkin.

At the very height of punitive action in the country when tensions in Russian-speaking Odessa reached the top level there was a football match. ;Metallist; from Harkov was playing with ;;Chernomorets;, Odessa. Several thousand ultras of both teams came to the city. These fans are nationalists, proponents of Maidan and they get a permission to march along the streets of Odessa in support of united Ukrain. They gathered here, near Sobornaya Square. Meanwhile from Alexandrovsky Avenue towards them there moved a group of well-equipped young men armed with batons and reinforcement. Many of these wear ;Georgian bands; but the main distinctive feature all of them have a mark made of red scotch on the sleeve. The authorities called them pro-Russian militants but it seems somebody needed everybody to believe it. And lots of eyewitnesses made these very conclusions.

And here is the first strange thing and ;mismatch; with junta;s official version. The same red marks were on the sleeves of some policemen. The most interesting thing is it was where these policemen stayed that the ;break; of ;separatists; to the members of the march happened.

Here we can see the red marks on the sleeves of the attackers and nearby the same bands on the sleeves of the policemen in cordon. The number of attackers is much smaller than the members of the march and it;s obvious they are not going to disperse them. They haven;t got enough power. But it is that very place where the break happened and another small group separated. What for? Soon it became quite obvious. They seduced a crowd of fans and succeed. Here the members of the march crying:

Fifty people that;s that means we can get them from side-lane, there;s few of them

The crowd changes the direction of movement and drives into Grecheskaya street. The main collisions happened over there. And here we can also see lots of strange things. The police chains part letting the attackers through and close down again. There are stones from both sides. Here we see a man with a red band on the sleeve he starts firing from the roof. And it was here where the first people were killed. The guns were on both sides but here is a strange frame the militant firing and a policeman is behind him. The bloggers recognized the deputy police head Dmitry Fuchedze. And here he is surrounded by those with red bands before the collision. And here he is walking with a group of those people to the place where the collisions with the members of the march happened.

And here - according to his chevron - an officer of Ukrainian Ministry of Internal Affairs is obviously instructing the attackers with red bands.

;You should clearly understand what each unit is doing. They ran and ran. Where they ran? Look, every time there are some problems;

But it is much more difficult to believe in these pictures here a man in a bullet-proof vest starts firing the members of the march straight from behind the policemen. And now it becomes quite clear the main aim is to infuriate the crowd of fans and Maidan proponents.

Why? It became clear further when the attackers with red bands immediately left and a furious crowd aiming to Kulikovo Pole where the camp of protestors to current authorities is situated. These protestors were still there and for several months the authorities couldn;t afford to tackle with them. Naturally no people with red bands were in the camp. There on watch were some some dozens of activists. Trying to escape from the crowd they barricaded themselves in the building of Trade-unions.

And now some words about those in the crowd. Thousands of fans accustomed to street battles according to the plan were likely to become cannon fodder. According to the police staff there in the crowd were two battalions of police ;East; and ;Storm; recently staffed with nationalists from Right Sector in civil clothes.

According to surprising coincidence just that very day in Odessa there appeared a former commandant of Maidam Andrei Parubiy. The police appeared here after an hour and the fire-brigade after the police. That means there was a sign to make a pause. The leader is Parubiy. He was in Odessa yesterday and the day before yesterday. Everything was going on under his control.

And here is one more character. A man in a bullet-proof vest surrounded by clearly non-civil companions is falsely complaining to somebody about the attackers. He is clearly working for Ukrainian TV camera.

;They are armed, they are aggressively inclined, they have got pyrotechnics. My four guys are wounded and me too;.

He is clearly lying that he is not armed. Here he is near the flaming building of Trade-unions he is firing not to let people seeking shelter in the building to climb out of the windows.

This man is called Micola and he is a leader of one of hundreds Maidan fighters. It has recently arrived in Odessa. It is well known that Ukrainian Ministry of Internal Affairs later announced that people who died in that building fired themselves because it is impossible to throw a bottle to the third floor. This cynical statement is easily disapproved. Here is what one of the survived told in his blog:

Meanwhile there was a message the maidans are breaking through the other corridor how did they happen to get there I ran there and helped to block the door. In the corridor I met two girls they tried to move an old iron safe. I helped them to move it to the door, blocking. While I moved it and blocked there came a white-green smoke from under the door... the air from my lungs was kicked out at once. One moment I thought I would choke

In other words the Maidan fighters were also inside the building. Here they demonstrate the Ukrainian flag in the window followed by the crowd approval. And here are other pictures made some minutes later. You can see that in that very window at the 3d floor the fire starts. At that very moment the governor Vladimir Nemirovsky actually gives the fighter the licence for murder:

;The actions of Odessa inhabitants aimed at neutralization and detention of armed terrorists are considered to be valid;

As we have already told the majority of those who came to fire the building of Trade-unions were not from Odessa but inside the building they were all odessits. The fighters from Right Sector were the first to enter the building and they started at once to seek for the documents of the dead. Later the Ukrainian propagandists tried to lie stating the dead had Russian passports. These passports were in the Internet and the lie was easily destroyed the same passports with the same family names appeared in a message on 16 April concerning alleged Russian diversionists.

April 2 in Odessa the people were burned alive and those who tried to escape were finished off with sticks. Besides as it appeared later among the dead there were lots of people with gunshot wounds. And moreover the police even didn;t think to interfere. All in all the facts lead to one conclusion. The reason of this tragedy in Odessa is a provocation in order to disperse and arrest the members of a numerous protests on the Kulikovo Pole against acting authorities. The fans were just used for this. On both sides there were skilful instigators. Considering all in all there was hardly anyone to plan the massacre but the crowd excited by the blood and impunity couldn;t stop.

Emergency Care Jewish Doctor: Neo-nazi thugs attacked doctor treating wounded!
My name is Igor Rozovskiy. I am 39. I live in Odessa, Ukraine. I am an Emergency Care doctor with 15 years experience.Yesterday, on May 2, 2014 a frightful tragedy happened in Odessa: over 40 people were burned alive in the Trade Union Building.As a doctor, I tried to help the burned injured survivors. I was confronted by one of the armed neo-nazi Ukrainian nationalists who rudely pushed me away from the injured. He also threatened that soon me and other Jews of Odessa will be burned too.I
Meir Segal, Odessa (4/5/14)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VdSexaH-ggw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=je1neAJT4Hs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s9AMjLBIliw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vv9_z6Cdf3g
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vv9_z6Cdf3g
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rsViVUr1CbY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QpV_Dnd2v9s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPwbpVbF6R8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OEjziCDbTXY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?annota...&v=s9AMjLBIliw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?list=P...KRdyQDI#t=1106
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Rx5VaTQR6k
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NoeaDHoxb18



Provocation gone wrong: Murky forces instigating Odessa violence?
http://rt.com/news/156744-video-footage-odessa-fire/

How the thugs killed Odessa inhabitants in the Trade Unions House - the details of bloody scenario
http://ersieesist.livejournal.com/813.html

http://frallik.livejournal.com/781599.html

http://hinter-der-fichte.blogspot.co...irgendwie.html
http://thenypost.files.wordpress.com..._crisis-31.jpg

[Babeufist]

[FONT=Times New Roman]Oligarch and coup-appointed governor of Dnipropetrovsk Kolomoisky is advertising huge cash bounties for killing pro-Russian separatists http://www.kyivpost.com/content/ukra...ts-343970.html
See also http://www.theguardian.com/world/201...gor-kolomoisky

$10,000 per pro-Russian activist, $200,000 for getting an occupied building back. This is the creep whom Putin singled out as a "unique impostor." One dangerous character all right.
The clumsy hoax about a $50 fee for Jews to register, evidently invented to defame Donetsk, went wildly viral on the Net. But the Jewish oligarch Kolomoisky can blatantly solicit the murder of activists on giant billboards at $10,000 a head, and a giant yawn swallows up the story.

Oligovernor Kolomoisky said he has already paid the first $10,000 for a "captured saboteur," in an announcement on his page on VKontakte. http://www.profi-forex.org/novosti-m...008208163.html The most direct proof that this is a struggle between the money power and the people.

[/FONT]
Billionaire criminal oligarch Kolomoisky was appointed governor of Dnipropetrovsk province by the illegal Kiev junta.
Billionaire criminal oligarch "Gas Princess" Yulia Tymoshenko has a different tack, raising a private militia to put down Donetsk uprising. http://www.theguardian.com/world/201...ev-geneva-deal (final paragraphs)

Kidnapped by Kolomoisky's bounty hunters? Pro-Russian leaders in Donetsk oblast are missing.

Dozens of FBI, CIA agents in Kiev 'assisting Ukraine security' http://rt.com/news/156692-ukraine-cia-fbi-agents/hed time: May 04, 2014

Agenten von CIA & FBI beraten Kiew http://www.bild.de/politik/ausland/n...7724.bild.html

After initially denying it, the White House acknowledged that CIA Mr. Brennan had in fact visited Kiev over the weekend.
http://vz.ru/news/2014/4/15/682084.html

One of Brennan's advisors told a reporter that the CIA director was in Kiev "to seek information and rescue twenty Greystone Ltd mercenaries of whom there has been no news." Clearly, they too surrendered to provocative grannies serving up tasty pastries. And that's certainly elite level work!
Brennan wasn't supposed to let on his Gladio operatives were in Ukraine, though. Slip of the tongue there. Must have been the jet lag.

[FONT=Times New Roman]Amateur footage shows an angry mob in Kramatorsk, eastern Ukraine yelling at Kiev forces as a new anti-terror operation is underway. Locals are calling soldiers fascists and telling them go back to Kiev because they dont need them in Kramatorsk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75dlup0WXGY

[/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYLyJrOhpVQ&sns=tw[/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YasV0J1ogR0 [/FONT]

[Sasha]

(for the record, the Tigers were not fascists, "fascism" means a bit more than "people I dislike"

Remember kids, if you are getting gangraped and murdered by paramilitaries for being the wrong ethnic group check wheter said paramilitaries are wearing Celtic crosses on their uniform, it matters.
Sheesh, that I as an lifelong anti-fascist would ever come to agree in part with the left-com position on (anti-)fascism....

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Remember kids, if you are getting gangraped and murdered by paramilitaries for being the wrong ethnic group check wheter said paramilitaries are wearing Celtic crosses on their uniform, it matters.
Sheesh, that I as an lifelong anti-fascist would ever come to agree in part with the left-com position on (anti-)fascism....

That's hardly fair to the left communists. Your position on anti-fascism is, as I said, substantially the same as that of Dimitrov, occasionally the chief of the ComIntern, noted supporter of popular fronts and working together with the liberals and cops.

The rest of the post is empty bluster - unlike you, I don't think that nationalist paramilitaries that are not fascist are somehow better than those that are fascist, or vice versa. And unlike you, I don't view fascism as defined by the overt ideology of fascist groups, which is nonsense - the PFR had little in common with the FET y JONS (in fact they had more in common with your SP). Fascism is not an ideology, or a cluster of ideologies, but a particular type of reactionary movement. Distinguishing between fascism and non-fascism is important, not because non-fascists are the "lesser evil" but because they call for different tactics.

[Sasha]

My SP? Wut...

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

The Dutch Socialist Party.

[Sasha]

A mine as in you dutch, not mine as in Q who is a active member, got it.
But anyways, it might shock you to hear that I actually quite agree with your analysis of (anti-)fascism (though probably les so in proposed praxis against it)
I do think for exactly that reason though that a group like arkans tigers where more fascist (as in behaving in the traditional role of fascists and needing to be physically/politically countered in the way one needs to counter fascism) than most self declared fascists.
I don't know where you get the idea I'm a popular frontists or anything, I dont mind liberals or Stalinists beating or otherwise hindering fascists during anti-fascist actions but they are more coincidental temporary fellow travelers, as AFA here in the Netherlands we only mobilse fellow libertarian revolutionary organizations, we never work actively with organisations that are not and at least my group would never appeal to the state for repression of the extreme right, individuals of all progressive persuasions are obviously always welcome, we are not a cadre organisation we are a fluid direct action network with revolutionary basis principles.
My beef here is mostly with the people who play right into the hands who want to balkanize the Ukraine by overemphatising the fascist influence on one side and minimize (or even deny) the fascist presence on the other. There are fash on either side, both also in influental/prominent positions. But they are not determinial on either side either. Making this s fash - anti-fash or even a junta - oppresed workers conflict is counterproductive, its a blooming ethnic nationalist conflict fueled by competing bourgeois imperialist factions. Only the flat out refusal to participate in this false dichotomy by the proletariat can prevent civilwar.
And yes, I really don't think that that in conflict with my initial understanding why leftists would participate in the maidan uprising, not because I believe in European fairytales but because confloct with the state creates room for politicizing, now we have to conclude though that the possibilities to make this a progressive struggle have passed and this devolved into an purely inter reactionary brawl for now.

[PhoenixAsh]

http://325.nostate.net/?p=10278#more-10278


On Friday, the 2nd of May, the House of Trade Unions in Odessa caught on fire. Altogether at least 42 people lost their lives during the clashes in the city, most of them in the fire and the others in streetfights. There is an excellent Russian language, eyewitness account of the events available here.

Events began to unfold when armed pro-Russian AntiMaidan fighters attacked a demonstration organised by football hooligans with nationalist sympathies. This attack resulted in lethalities, but soon the pro-Russians were overpowered. They escaped back to their protest camp in the Kulikovo field, but pro-Kiev demonstrators followed and lit the protest camp on fire. The pro-Russians then escaped to the House of the Trade Unions, which soon caught on fire. The fire spreading, is visible in this video. At the 2 minute mark, you can see a flame behind a closed window, making it plausible that some of the fires were started from the inside. For example, due to accidents with Molotov cocktails which were used by both sides during the fight. However, you can also see pro-Ukrainian nationalists throwing Molotov cocktails, making them at least partially responsible for the fire.

There are doubts as to whether the core group of pro-Russians who attacked the demonstration with firearms were outside provocateurs. But certainly, there were people in the House of Trade Unions, who had nothing to do with the attack. In a number of photographs, you can see police protecting the core group of attackers. Otherwise, police were very passive during the fire, and did not interfere in the events. Even if the police were not part of a conspiracy, at the least, they acted completely unprofessionally.

During the weekend, troops of the central government and local «federalists» had been waging war in the city of Kramatorsk in Eastern Ukraine. This means, that what is happening in the Ukraine can already be considered a civil war. In the upcoming weeks, it will become clear how widely the warfare will spread and if Russia will interfere.

I consider myself an expert on the Russian context as I lived in Moscow for more than 12 years, but this does not mean that I am an expert on the Ukrainian one. I have only visited the country three times in the last years, and have hardly more than 20 friends there. Still, when getting myself acquainted with the Ukraine, I quickly understood that civil war could be a possible scenario there. All of my Ukrainian friends, however, were absolutely certain, that nothing like that would ever happen there. That even with all the differences between Eastern and Western Ukraine, no-one was prepared to kill in their name. They were convinced, that Ukraine could never become another Yugoslavia. All of them had acquaintances, friends and loved ones on both sides of the river Dnieper, both Ukrainian and Russian speakers. But if you only ever take into consideration your own friends, you will fall into the trap of scaling, obstructing those mechanisms which create hatred on a large scale.

War does not require personal hatred between people, geopolitical and economical reasons are good enough for that. And in the Ukraine, the geopolitical interests are far greater than in Yugoslavia. If you have an interest in flaring up ethnic hatred or war, a rather small ethnic rift is enough. A few abuses, murders, and kidnappings, and everyone will be ready for battle. This has succeeded now in Ukraine, just as it has succeeded in many other places.

At the moment, the Western «left» seems to be pretty much clueless in terms of the events taking place there. This is because the «left,» broadly speaking, is not a very useful concept in the former Soviet Union, as it can mean anything from social-democrats and anarchists, to stalinists supporting Putin. Personally, I prefer to always write the word in quotation marks. I identify with anarchists, not the «left,» since, for quite a while now anarchists have been the only political force in Russia which united the ethos of opposing racism, sexism and homophobia to the ethos of social equality. Until very recently, there had not been much of any Western «new left» in Russia, with the exception of a handful of Trotskyists.

A split within the «left» in Ukraine is completely predictable and even necessary. In Kharkiv the streetfighting, Stalinist organisation, «Borotba» (meaning Struggle) has been on the opposite side of the anarchists. In this region of the former Soviet Union, 99.9% of the «left» will always support imperialism for the sake of «being with the people.» It is about time that anarchists refuse the «left» label. We have nothing in common with these people.

But anarchists, too, can be easily manipulated with buzzwords such as «self-organisation» and «direct democracy.» For example, Boris Kagarlitsky, a Russian intellectual widely known amongst the Western «left» and a frequent guest of World Social Forums, has found favorable ground in the West by using these buzzwords.

Apparently, the Ukrainian and Russian anarchists could not foresee the developments which lead to the civil war. Maidan had only been discussed from the point of view that it could offer something better than the Yanukovich regime. It was not expected that Russia would react to a Maidan victory with a conscious escalation of the conflict, and which could eventually lead to civil war.

Whereas Russia is the major propaganda machine and arms provider in the conflict, Western countries are not doing much better, as they only acknowledge the interests of the new government in Kiev and present the movement in Eastern Ukraine as mere Russian puppets.The armed wing of the «federalists» are definitely Kremlin puppets, but if it were not for the widespread discontent and protests against the new regime in Kiev, this armed wing would not have emerged.

I do not believe that a civil war was the Kremlin’s aim. First of all, it wanted to destablizie Ukraine to the maximum in order to have Kiev give up any attempts to gain back control over Crimea. Now the situation is out of the Kremlin’s control, and it may have to send regular troops to Ukraine in order to fulfill the promise of support it has given to the «federalists.»

The government in Kiev has given so many «final ultimatums» which were quickly forgotten, and has announced so many unexisting «anti-terrorist operations,» that it is clear it has very few battle-ready troops. A few times, the central government troops have actually taken action and the results have been tragi-comic. Thus, the government understands that it’s still in question whether it would succeed in a full-scale civil war. However, it also understands, that war can help discipline society and stabilize the new order to the extent, that any promises given to Maidan would be forgotten. With time, both sides have come to understand that a full-scale war might be necessary for their interests, even if neither was initially planning for this.

Disagreements within the anarchist movement

Over the course of events, the Ukrainian and Russian anarchist movements have split into three different sides. A first group concentrated on producing internet-statements against both sides of the conflict. For them, keeping out of any social processes is a matter of principle, and they only want to monitor and assess. Participation in the social protest is not a goal for them, as they prefer to keep their hands clean. Since every process has input from either disgusting liberals, hated nationalists, awful stalinists, all three at the same time, or other undesirables, one can never fully participate in anything and the only alternative is to stay home and publish statements on the internet about how everything is going from bad to worse. However, most of the time these statements are just self-evident, banalities.

A second group, was made up of those who got excited about all the riot-porn and anti-police violence in Kiev, without considering who was carrying out this violence and in whose interests. Certain antifascists drifted as far as to defend the «national unity» in Maidan, and threatened particular Kiev anarchists due to their criticism of Maidan and refusal to participate. Most of the people in this camp are just fans of anti-police violence without any theoretical frame, but some want to give Maidan an imagined anti-authoritarian flavor, by equating the general meeting of Maidan («Veche») with the revolutionary councils established during 20th century revolutions. They base this claim on the social demands occasionally presented at Maidan, but these demands were always at the periphery of the Maidan agenda.

One of these peripheral demands was the proposal that oligarchs should pay a tenth of their income in taxes and was generally in tune with nationalistic populism. However, the demands of the Kiev Maidan were still far from returning the billions stolen by oligarchs back to society. In Vinnytsa and Zhitomir, there was an attempt to expropriate factories owned by German capital , but this was the only case going beyond the national-liberal context that I am familiar with.

In any case, the main problem at Maidan wasn’t the lack of a social agenda and direct democracy, but the fact that people did not even demand them. Even if everyone kept repeating that they did not want another «orange revolution» like in 2004, nor for Yulia Timoshenko to return, at the end of the day chocolate industrialist Poroshenko and Vitaly Klitchko are leading the polls. This was the choice the people made as they grew weary of the revolutionary path as proposed by the radical nationalists of the Right sector. As of now, people want to return to «life as usual,» to life before Yanukovich, and are not prepared to make the sacrifices that further revolutionary developments would demand. Representative democracy is indeed like a hydra, if you cut one head, two will grow in its place.

However, none of the fears of «fascist takeover» have materialized. Fascists gained very little real power, and in Ukraine their historical role will now be that of stormtroopers for liberal reforms demanded by the IMF and the European Union — that is, pension cuts, an up to five times increase in consumer gas prices, and others. Fascism in Ukraine has a powerful tradition, but it has been incapable of proceeding with its own agenda in the revolutionary wave. It is highly likely, that the Svoboda-party will completely discredit itself in front of its voters.

But anyone attempting to intervene, anarchists included, could have encountered the same fate — that is, to be sidelined after all the effort. During the protests, anarchists and the «left» were looking towards the Right sector with envy, but in the end all the visibility and notoriety, for which they paid dearly, was not enough to help the Right sector gain any real influence.

If Kiev anarchists would have picked the position of «neutral observers» after Yanukovich had shot demonstrators, it would have completely discredited them. If after being shot, the working class, or more exactly «the people,» that is, the working class along with the lower strata of the bourgeoisie, would have failed to overthrow Yanukovich, Ukrainian society woul have fallen into a lethargic sleep such as the one Russian and Belarusian societies are experiencing. Obviously, after the massacre there was no choice left except to overthrow the power, no matter what would come in its place. Anarchists in Kiev were in no position to significantly influence the situation, but standing aside was no longer an option.

And thus, we come to the third, «centrist,» position taken by anarchists — between the brainless actionism and the «neutral» internet statements. The camp of realist anarchists understood, that even if the Maidan protests pretty much lacked a meaningful positive program, something had to be done or the future would be dire.

The limits of intervention

In Kiev, anarchists took part in a number of important initiatives during the revolutionary wave — first of all the occupation of the ministry of education, and the raid against the immigration bureau by the local No Border group, which was looking for proof of illegal cooperation with security services of foreign countries. But the most succesful anarchist intervention was the one in Kharkiv, where Maidan was relatively weak but also freeer of nationalistic influence.

Still, such centrism has its own problems. For one, you might unintentionally help the wrong forces gain power, also discrediting radical protest. A second problem would be that you might end up fighting a fight which is not your own. When AntiMaidan attacked the Maidan in the city of Kharkiv, its imagined enemy were not the anarchists, but NATO, EU or Western-Ukrainian fascists. Since anarchists had joined Maidan, it would have been cowardly to desert once the fight started. Thus anarchists ended up fighting side by side with liberals and fascists. I do not want to criticize the Kharkiv anarchists, after all they made, perhaps, the most serious attempt among Ukrainian anarchists to influence the course of events, but this was hardly the fight, and these were hardly the allies they wanted.

And so, comes the point when desertion becomes imperative, and that is when civil war begins. As of now, it’s still too early to make any final assessment of the anarchist attempts to influence Maidan, but after the beginning of a civil war, Maidan will no longer play a role. From now on, assembly will gradually turn to the army, and assault rifles will replace Molotov cocktails. Military discipline will replace spontaneous organisation.

Some supporters of the Ukrainian organisation, Borotba (meaning Struggle) and the Russian Left Front claim that they are attempting to do the same things as the anarchists did at Maidan, that is, direct protest towards social demands. But AntiMaidan has no structures of direct democracy, not even distorted ones. It quickly adopted the model of hierarchical, militaristic organisations. The AntiMaidan leadership consists of former police and reserve officers. It does not attempt to exert influence through the masses, but with military power and weapons. This makes perfect sense, considering that according to a recent opinion poll, even in the most pro-«federalist» area of Lugansk, a mere 24% of the population is in favor of armed takeovers of government structures. That is, AntiMaidan cannot count on a victory through mass demonstrations.

Whereas at its essence Maidan was a middle-class liberal and nationalistic protest, supported by part of the bourgeoisie, AntiMaidan is purely counter-revolutionary in tendency. Of course, AntiMaidan has its own grassroots level. One could attempt to intervene, but an intervention by joining would mean supporting a Soviet, imperialist approach. The Communist Party of the Russian Federation, Borotba, the Russian Left Front and Boris Kagarlitsky have all joined this Soviet chauvinist camp. Intervening in Maidan made sense only as long as the enemy were Berkut police forces and paid thugs. When the opponents are mislead AntiMaidan participants, it no longer makes sense to fight in the streets.

When looking at either side of the conflict one can see a dangerous tendency, which every anarchist and anti-authoritarian will face in the future: the recuperation of anti-authoritarian rhetoric and terminology for the purposes of hierarchical ideologies. On the one side, «autonomous nationalists» who have found sympathy amongst many anarchists, and on the other, intellectuals such as Boris Kagarlitsky. Both characterising warring factions with attributes such as «direct democracy» and «self organisation.» In reality, these characteristics are either present in a distorted form or not at all. When two different flavors of nationalism are «self-organising» in order to maim and murder each other, there is nothing to celebrate. Subsequent to the events in Ukraine, it is clear that anarchists must explain the essential difference between «self-organisation» and self-organisation to the world.

According to the opinion poll referenced above, in Eastern Ukraine as a whole, only 12% of the population supports the «federalists’» armed actions, whereas the Kiev government is supported by some 30%. The remaining 58% supports neither, and in conditions of civil war, this is the majority on which we should count. We should encourage desertion and conflict avoidance. Under any other conditions, and if anarchists had more influence, we could form independent units against both warring factions.

Unarmed civilians have stopped bloodbaths in several places by moving in between the troops as human shields. If not for this kind of civil disobedience, a full-scale war would have been launched much earlier. We should support this movement, and attempt to direct it against both «federalist» and government troops simultaneously.

In case Russia reacts either by occupying parts of Eastern Ukraine or the country as a whole, we could take the example of anarchist partisans in World War II era France and Italy. Under such conditions, the main enemy is the occupying army, as it will antagonise the whole population very quickly. But it is also necessary to keep the maximum distance from the nationalistic elements of the resistance, as any alliance with them would hinder anarchists from realising their own program in the framework of the resistance.

The events in Odessa are a tragedy, and it is possible, that among those who died in the House of the Trade Unions were also people who played no part in flaring up the violence. People who threw molotov cocktails at the House should have understood the consequences. Even if the fire igniting was not solely due to them, it is not for lack of trying.

In case civil war spreads, these deaths are just the beginning. No doubt that on both sides the majority only wants a better life for their close ones and their motherland, and many hate governments and oligarchs to an equal extent. The more sincerely naïve people die, the greater the pressure to support one of the factions in the war, and we must struggle against this pressure.

Whereas it may occasionally be worth it to swallow tear gas or to feel the police baton for a bourgeois revolution, it makes no sense at all to die in a civil war between two equally bourgeois and nationalist sides. It would not be another Maidan but something completely different. No blood, anarchist or otherwise, should spill due to this stupidity.

Antti Rautiainen

[cyu]

not that I disagree with what that article actually says
but that headline is fucking ridiculous...

It could be argued that if the United States was never involved in Ukraine, the coup would have never succeeded.

It could also be argued that if Russia had not taken in Snowden, there wouldn't have been so many American officials calling for a more anti-Russian policy in Ukraine.

It might then be argued that if the White House didn't act so hypocritically when getting on its high horse about human rights when dealing with other nations, Russia wouldn't have wanted to stick it to them by giving Snowden asylum.

One might then say that if Whitehouse policy weren't just to use adulterated democratic principles in order to push the agenda of business interests, it wouldn't have had to act so hypocritically with regard to human rights abroad.

...and so on...

[Workers-Control-Over-Prod]

Originally posted by Sasha:
its a blooming ethnic nationalist conflict fueled by competing bourgeois imperialist factions

This comment shows exactly how little you have bothered to investigate the developments in the Ukraine. It's quite clear that the large Federalist movement in Ukraine has next to no sponsorship whereas the Fascist movements (and by this I am naturally including the conservatives of the Fatherland party, not just the open neo-nazis) not only have US State department funding in the tens of millions but also the support of a large portion of the Ukrainian capitalist ruling class.

The pro-Russian separatists in particular and the federalist militias have an unbelievable lack of resources. If Russia had a genuine interest in taking over the region, it would do like the US and EU have done, that is: not only send in billions of dollars of street cash bribes and government check "sweeteners" but also send in its own army officers on the ground and intelligence officers to assist in the defense of Donbass. Obviously, Russia has no interest in emulating NATO which is sending in Bundeswehr officers and its CIA chief to aid the Kiev gangsters in taking control of the whole country.

If this really were a simplistic little equal conflict between two imperialistic oligarch camps, as western liberals like to think, "Russia" would have won a long time ago. As it stands, however, the poor people from the industrial eastern part of Ukraine who have peacefully disarmed and ransacked a large portion of the Ukrainian Army (styled after the old Bandera organization), are winning against the petty-bourgeois "rebels" and establishment of Ukraine which are burning trade-unionists and communist sympathizers alive.

[Rusty Shackleford]

A BMP was captured by civilians in Mariupol.



A long video outside the Police building which the national guard attacked:

Also this from a friend on Facebook:

Some notes about yesterday's massacre in Mariupol (southern Ukraine). How it started: in the morning of May 9, the newly appointed head of the police department Andruschuk (accompanied by the head of special battalion 'Denpr' - newly formed death squad of neo-nazis) - has called a council of local police personnel. During the meeting the head of police department read to the policemen the order to disperse the rally on V-Day and arrest 'the most active citizens'. The policemen refused to fulfil the order then the head of department Andruschuk shot from a pistol at one of the rank-and-file policeman. His colleagues immidiately shot back - the head of the police department was wounded, the head of a death squad 'Dnepr' - killed on the spot. The personnel of police refuse to obey any orders and declare that they would not wage a war against their people. Immidiately APCs, 'National guard' and Right Sector militants sent to suppress the riot of police. Local residents try to defend their policemen but 'National Guard' shoots down at civilians in the streets. Then APCs and 'National Guard' surround the police department and shot down it from machine guns. Policemen shoot back, the the department is set ablaze. Some rebellious policemen were burnt inside. Then immidiately starts the riot of localcivilians. One of the APCs was seized by them. People chase on the streets the Right sector militants and build barricades. The rest of ploice personnel joins them. After the strong confrontation (21 killed and some 80 wounded) 'National Guard' and Right sector militants have to retreat from the town. The mayor flees the town. Today there started a spontanious rally under slogan: 'Glory to policemen - defenders, down with police-murderers and 'National guard'.

+ YouTube Video