Ukraine’s Human Organ and Child Prostitution Trafficking Industries: Does Only Russia’s Maria Zakharova Still Care?

June 23, 2023

Source

By Declan Hayes

The facts indicate that Zelensky’s Ukraine is guilty of Eichmann-like crimes, Declan Hayes writes.

This article addresses the claims of Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova et al that Zelensky’s Ukraine is a major criminal hub in the global trafficking of human body parts, and with children into the white slave trade, as well as recent European Union claims that all such “Russian” assertions are mis-information.

Because of the seriousness of such allegations and denials, this preliminary exploration is written in a quasi-academic style and is divided into a number of sections to help interested authorities bring the culprits, from whatever side of the lines they may be on, to account.

Thus, section 1 surveys the global trafficking trade in human organs and child prostitutes to establish that such lucrative industries do exist and, ergo, that, as with Jeffrey Epstein’s Orgy Island, some individuals, organised crime gangs and institutions must be guilty of being involved in such trafficking. Section 2 looks at the pivotal role Ukraine has historically played in such trafficking to hypothesise that there may well be large numbers of Ukrainians currently active in such criminality. Section 3 establishes that, because the West has long been aware of such crimes, those crimes are not the result of Russian dis-information or any such spurious figment. Section 4 concludes by arguing that the onus is on the Zelensky dictatorship and its Western backers to open Ukraine’s morgues and hospitals to reputable investigators and that the Russian authorities are likewise bound to surrender copies of whatever pertinent documents relating to these Ukrainian crimes they have to those same reputable authorities.

1. Global Child Sex and Organ Trafficking Industries

The American National Kidney Association estimates that the illegal organ trade is worth in excess of $1 billion annually. The Gurgaon kidney scandal, whereby poor Indians had their kidneys harvested for Indian and foreign customers is but one of very many scandals showing that this is an organised, global and very lucrative industry that would attract the interest of all unscrupulous criminals in a position to exploit relevant opportunities.

The International Labour Office in Geneva estimates that over 10 million children are trapped in the inter-connected child prostitution and child pornography industries. The Peter Scully case shows that there is a significant global demand for raping and then dismembering vulnerable infants. Scully’s most infamous work was Daisy’s Destruction, where voyeurs paid $10,000 apiece to watch Scully and two other adults torture and rape 18-month old Daisy before killing her in one of the Web’s most “successful” ever snuff movies. A youtube crawl shows that Cambodia remains a hotspot for those in search of sex with prepubescent children and further searches and accounts of the arrests of organised gangs would show that child pornography and child prostitution are both huge and very lucrative industries.

Even leaving the child sex farms of Jeffrey Epstein and MI5’s Kincora Boys’ Home to one side, reports like this Daily Mail article or this Guardian piece show that child prostitution is rife in the United States and, as all of the references given so far pre-date the 2014 Ukrainian coup, they are not the product of Russian propaganda. These are major, global industries that involve the most amoral of people and the most unfortunate of their victims and, if there are amoral people on Zelensky’s side of the Ukrainian lines, Nazi regiments and the like, there are no a priori reasons to believe that such people would not be involved in these long-standing Ukrainian operations.

2. Ukraine’s Role in the Global Child Sex and Organ Trafficking Industries

These 2006, 2007 and 2009 reports note the concern the UN has long held with child sex trafficking and related “industries” in Ukraine. Here, from 15 March 2006, is UN Resolution 60/251 on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography in Ukraine.

The European Centre for Law and Justice is an international, Non-Governmental Organization dedicated to the promotion and protection of human rights in Europe and worldwide. The ECLJ has held special Consultative Status before the United Nations/ECOSOC since 2007. Here is their 2006 report on the case of missing children, lost babies and corpses without organs in Ukraine.

The Child Protection Hub is a Balkan child protection federation. Here is their 2015 report and their subsequent 2016 report saying that Ukrainian orphanages are hubs for child trafficking, child pornography and child prostitution.

Here is a question and answer from the 2007 session of the European Parliament, citing a BBC report, which enquires into the market for baby stem cells and organs from new-born babies in Ukraine. Here is a question and answer from the 2015 session of the European Parliament enquiring about organ harvesting in Eastern Ukraine.

Here is a 2022 BBC report saying how the sex industry preys on Ukrainian refugees. Here is an American report saying how refugees get entangled in prostitution. Here is a much longer report citing the commercial sexual exploitation of children in Canada, the United States and Mexico. Here is a report on how child refugees in Athens have been ensnared into the child prostitution and child pornography industries. These claims would not come as a surprise to anyone familiar with the plight of West Asian or other child refugees who have had to flee any of the wars NATO has launched in recent decades and there is no reason to believe that the same fate would not befall unaccompanied or trafficked Ukrainian minors.

Here are the Ukrainian authorities in 2011 admitting that illegal organ trafficking is out of control. This Belgian report tells us that Ukraine remains Europe’s main hub for illegally harvesting human organs. This 2010 report tells us how Israeli criminal gangs are at the heart of Ukraine’s organ harvesting industry, an important consideration given that demand far outstrips supply in Israel, as it does in the equally lucrative market of Switzerland.

This google search indicates that the illegal harvesting of organs still thrives in Ukraine. Here is a very important Kashmiri report, which details the relevant short-comings of Russia’s media outlets before convincingly arguing, and citing Ukrainian law as support, that Ukraine’s authorities are engaged in the mass harvesting of human organs.

Here is a Japanese report of Ukrainians being offered money for their organs. Here is a 2010 Guardian report of Ukrainian surgeons being arrested for organ harvesting.

Finally, as this USAID report and the larger report it is linked to make it plain that even the CIA is aware of the sheer scale of human and organ trafficking in Ukraine, we can safely assume that such practices remain widespread both within the regions of Ukraine the Nazi forces allied to Zelensky still hold and anywhere further afield where those same forces have gained traction.

We can say that with certainty as, based on all of the above links, these are disgusting industries with the most disgusting and amoral of people involved in them not only globally but in Ukraine as well. And, as Ukraine has only become more, not less susceptible to such criminal practices in recent years, we can only repeat that these allegations about child and organ trafficking need to be transparently examined and the culprits held to account.

3. Western Complicity in the Global Child Sex and Organ Trafficking Industries

As with Afghanistan and Syria, the West is complicit at both the macro and micro levels in these crimes against humanity. At the macro level, the European Union and NATO pump ever more billions into Zelensky’s Ukraine, which has long been recognised as one of the world’s most corrupt countries. The West’s media and other social influencers deny all this and brazenly lie that Zelensky’s Ukraine and pro junta Ukrainians are somehow beacons for all that is good and wholesome.

The European Union’s propaganda wings repeatedly publish “disproofs” of all of these allegations; they are in denial and, as part of the EU’s war effort against Russia, are paid to be in denial and not to produce any actual proofs or “disproofs”. The European Commission claims it “is not aware of any reliable reports on alleged cases of harvesting and trade in human organs in Ukraine”. It is, in other words, up to others to publish those “reliable reports” which the European Union will no doubt downplay or dismiss, as they did about similar cases implicating their jihadist proxies in Syria, whose darkest crimes I am very familiar with and which, though they will haunt me for the rest of my life, form an invaluable template for gauging the crimes of ISIS’ Ukrainian brothers and sisters in arms.

Here in Ireland, as in much of Western Europe, we are now told that most of our unwanted Ukrainian refugees, who have been gifted free houses and pocket money, will stay as life is simply too good and easy for them to pack their Gucci bags and go home. At the same time, NATO-aligned think tanks are telling us that we must do more for these relatives of Ukrainian Nazis and organ traffickers even as Syrians and other deserving people continue to die and to be harvested in droves.

As Ukrainian children and others posing as Ukrainian children continue to pour in, there are at least two main groups that benefit from this modern day exodus. First off are those Western companies I previously wrote about, who have no need of those excess baggage in Ukraine and are glad to be shot of them. Second off are those Western NGOs, suppliers and Nazi apologists, who benefit by having these dead weights here.

Yes, there are externalities, such as those Irish communities who were inundated by Ukrainians using their houses as brothels and Irish broadcasters killed here in hit and runs by Ukrainian men of military age, but NATO would argue that any similarly big enterprise would have similar leakages.

And then there is the low-hanging fruit, the young Ukrainian girls and boys TUSLA, the Irish children’s state care agency, will “take care of”. Diarmaid Ó Cadhla, who can be seen here protesting outside Mountjoy Prison against TUSLA’s in-camera kangaroo courts and their abuse of vulnerable Irish children, quite rightly claims that as “generations of Irish families have suffered under TUSLA ‘care’, any refugee children are doubly vulnerable as they will have nobody else looking out for them”.

Speaking privately to Ó Cadhla and others fighting such unaccountable, omniscient bodies, I would have to concur that heaven help any vulnerable Ukrainian or other immigrant child who falls under TUSLA’s purview or of any of their EU or British cohorts. If the secretive and self-serving British system wantonly sacrificed Baby P and the Rotherham teenagers in care and never copped on to what BBC cigar muncher Jimmy Savile was up to with the hundreds of small children he raped, surely only a fool or a paid Nazi apologist would argue that vulnerable Ukrainian children would fare any better.

The bottom line in all this is that those Ukrainian children who are not tied into the Azov Nazis or some such similar group best watch out. The offers to hire Ukrainian refugees by Amazon and other predatory companies with horrible employment practices is no panacea. Though such offers make for good publicity for mega billionaire Jeff Bezos, they are poorly paid jobs that offer no future for individuals, never mind the millions of Ukrainians and other victims of NATO’s wars we have been lumbered with. The situation is such that supposedly liberal institutions like Oxford are sick of the damage these unwanted spongers cause. The solution lies not in having feel good projects in Birmingham but in ending the carnage that make folk flee for their lives to Irish clearing houses where, the Ombudsman says, they are likely to be gang-raped or worse.

The sad reality behind the half-baked propaganda of MI5’s Kyiv (sic) Independent is that people flee war for the traditional push and pull features that cause demographic shifts in such turbulent times. And, though people may go back to where the fighting is because that is where their heart also is that, like all such propaganda, proves nothing. The reality is that there is a war afoot in Ukraine and there are unconscionable people, many of them on the Ukrainian side of the lines and more still safely ensconced in their NATO NGOs and think tanks, far from the lines, doing the most unconscionable of things, and benefiting handsomely from that war.

4. Solutions and Caveats

Maria Zakharova has made credible claims against the Kiev junta, just as Damascus made similar claims against NATO’s Syrian (sic) rebels, Gary Webb made drug-dealing allegations against the CIA, the Pall Mall Gazette made white slave trade allegations against polite Victorian society, and similar allegations were made against MI5’s Kincora Boys’ Home and the CIA’s Jeffrey Epstein.

Just as all those other allegations were shown to be true, so also do I believe not only that there is much substance to Zakharova’s allegations but that all such allegations against the Kiev junta must be fully examined by the most appropriate means so that the perpetrators might be punished and amends be made to the vulnerable lives their avarice destroyed.

Zakharova has done the victims of Ukraine’s most unconscionable human trafficking industries much good by addressing them. It is now up to the Russian authorities to up the ante on this, to make key sections of their evidence public and to put not only the criminals in Zelensky’s Ukraine but their NGO and State allies further to the west on notice that the guilty amongst them will pay very heavily indeed for these despicable crimes they committed over the last very many years.

And, though NATO can dismiss Zakharova as a Russian and me as a simple Irishman, the facts indicate that Zelensky’s Ukraine is guilty of Eichmann-like crimes and, just like Eichmann, so also must his modern-day Ukrainian and NATO clones answer for their crimes against the peoples of Ukraine, Syria and Russia.

Also by this author

• Women War Criminals: A Vital Cog in NATO’s Plans of World Conquest
• Clown Prince Zelensky’s Nero Decree: Destroy Ukraine
• NATO’s Hello Kitty Leaders Have Brought Us From the Sublime to the Dangerously Ridiculous
• In the Name of the Father: Gonzalo Lira, Julian Assange, Gerry Conlon
• Biden’s Crack Chronicles Kick Off NATO’s Trans Pride Summer Offensive

Odessa Massacre 9 Years On… West’s Shameful Silence

May 5, 2023

This shameful silence is necessary in order to conceal the criminal complicity of the West in Ukraine’s deadly turmoil.

This week saw the ninth anniversary of a shocking massacre of 42 civilians in Odessa by Ukrainian fascists. Only weeks prior to that, the fascists’ political leaders had carried out a violent coup in Kiev.

The barbarity of the Odessa atrocity was unspeakable but emblematic of the NATO-backed fascist regime that seized power illegally in February 2014.

Significantly, and shamefully, the Western media and governments hardly mention that horror, or if they do, they tend to distort the incident and typically, yet baselessly, accuse Russia of disinformation.

On May 2, 2014, hundreds of protesters in Odessa against the fascist Kiev regime became embroiled in violent clashes with supporters of the regime. Thousands of far-right paramilitaries belonging to the NeoNazi Right Sector had been transported from the north to the southern port city of Odessa on the Black Sea under the guise of attending a football match.

Street battles ensued all day with cobblestones, Molotov cocktails and gunfire exchanged by both factions. By evening, the more numerous pro-regime crowds turned their focus on a tent encampment of anti-regime protesters near the Soviet-era Trade Unions building in the center of Odessa. The encampment was a peaceful gathering which included women and children. It had been set up for several weeks to demonstrate opposition to the Maidan events in Kiev.

The anti-regime protesters were opposed to the coup that had taken place in Kiev weeks earlier by the so-called EuroMaidan movement. On February 20, a gruesome sniper massacre in Kiev (later found to have been carried out by CIA-backed fascists) led to the overthrow of elected President Viktor Yanukovych. The latter had maintained friendly with Russia which far-right Ukrainian factions abhorred. Yanukovych’s government was strongly supported by Ukrainians of ethnic Russian heritage mainly in the south and eastern parts of the country.

The fascist regime that came to power in Kiev in February 2014 and which prevails till this day – albeit with a president, Vladimir Zelensky, who is nominally of Jewish ancestry – was opposed from the outset by many Ukrainians. They viewed the new rulers as unelected and illegitimate. They were also fearful of the NeoNazi factions that openly glorified Ukrainian figures like Stepan Bandera who had collaborated with Nazi Germany during the Second World War in the mass murder of their own compatriots.

That is why the people of the Crimea peninsula voted in a referendum in March 2014 to secede from Ukraine and join the Russian Federation. In other parts of Ukraine, the southeast Donbass region also repudiated the Kiev regime and its “anti-Russian” hostility. In May, 2014, the Kiev regime proceeded to launch its so-called Anti-Terror Operation on the self-declared republics of Donetsk and Lugansk with the backing of then CIA chief John Brennan on a visit to the country. The U.S. vice president at the time was Joe Biden who served as Washington’s point man for the new regime. That aggression marked the beginning of the civil war in Ukraine which culminated in the present conflict with Russia, and the joining last year of the Donbass and neighboring regions with the Russian Federation.

This was the context in Ukraine in May, 2014. The country was in turmoil and splitting into ethnic and political divides. Cities like Odessa had strong historical and cultural connections with Russia. The city known as the Pearl on the Black Sea owing to its storied trading economy was founded in 1795 by Catherine the Great, the empress of Russia.

When the NATO-backed putschists seized power in Kiev in a bloody coup and began organizing Nazi-style torchlit processions, many ethnic Russian people in Ukraine and others were horrified. Odessa was one such city with a large Russian population. The city had suffered mass killings by Nazi Einsatzgruppen SS death squads and their local henchmen.

When the Kiev regime fascists targeted the protest camp in Odessa on the evening of May 2, some 300 of the protesters took refuge inside the Trade Unions building. The mob outside bombarded the historic building with incendiary devices setting it ablaze. The deliberate intention was to incinerate all those inside. The hatred shown by the Right Sector attackers towards the trapped victims was appalling. Several of the people in the building tried to escape the flames by jumping out of high-rise windows. As their bodies smashed the ground below, frenzied crowds clubbed them to death.

In all, 42 people were murdered in the Trade Unions building massacre. Not one attacker was ever prosecuted. The Kiev regime refused to carry out any adequate investigation.

However, the horror of that day was a turning point for many Ukrainians and Russians. It revealed the hideous nature of the regime that had seized power over the country and its vile fascist hostility toward Russia.

This is the regime that was brought to power by Washington and its NATO partners. Since 2014, it has been armed and built up to be a war machine to aggress Russia and obliterate all cultural connections with Russia.

The massacre in Odessa should be remembered for the sake of the victims that day. But also remembered because it helps explain the background of how the present U.S.-led NATO proxy conflict in Ukraine with Russia has come about.

For that reason, Western news media and their governments chose to studiously ignore the Odessa massacre. Their shameful silence is necessary in order to conceal the criminal complicity of the West in Ukraine’s deadly turmoil.

More Editorials

• The U.S. Proxy War Against Russia & China Is Increasingly Seen Globally As A Disaster Made By American And NATO Lies
• The World is Not Enough for Crazy Western Warmongers… NATO Launches Biggest-Ever War Drills in Atlantic AND Pacific
• Collateral Murder 13 Years On… Julian Assange Persecuted for Truth-Telling
• Finland Joins NATO in Foreboding But Fitting Historical Coming Out
• No More Double Standards and Impunity. West Provokes Russia. Result: Nukes in Belarus on NATO’s Borders

Medvedev calls for elimination of Zelensky, Antonov slams US statement

May 4, 2023

Source: Agencies

By Al Mayadeen English 

Russian Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov slams the US for what he described as “cynical and absurd” statements following an attempt at Putin’s life.

Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev (TASS)

Russian Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov vowed to respond to what he described as “Ukraine’s act of terrorism” in the form of an attempted drone attack on the Kremlin at a time suitable for Russia.

Elsewhere in his remarks, he stated that the US officials’ statements on an attempt at Putin’s life “are striking in their cynicism and absurdity.” 

“The U.S. did not find it possible to recognize the obvious thing – it was a terrorist action planned by the Zelensky regime and an assassination attempt targeting the President of the Russian Federation. Moreover, the timing was not chosen by chance – ahead of Victory Day and the May 9 Parade, where foreign guests are planned to take part in,” Antonov added. 

“How would Americans react if a drone hit the White House, the Capitol, or the Pentagon? The answer is obvious for any politician as well as for an average citizen: the punishment will be harsh and inevitable,” he said.

“The theses that this act of terrorism was allegedly a “false flag operation” are blasphemous and deceitful. That is, it was Russia itself that staged a provocation against the heart of our statehood?!”

This comes after US Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken, said when asked about the suspected Ukranian drone attack against the Kremlin that he was aware of the reports without ascertaining their legitimacy, noting that he would take any piece of information from Moscow with a “very large shaker of salt.”

“I’ve seen the reports. I can’t in any way validate them. I’d take anything coming out of the Kremlin with a very large shaker of salt,” Blinken said during an interview for The Washington Post. 

The top Russian diplomat further accused the United States of shielding the “Kiev criminals”.

“The statements of high-ranking officials that Kiev can choose how to defend itself are the textbook example of double standards, a policy of encouraging the Zelensky regime to attack the Russian Federation. The words of the bureaucrats about allegedly deterring the Kiev Nazi regime from hitting targets outside its borders are a false farce,” he said.

Antonov acknowledged that Ukraine has no desire to seek peace, warning that the attempt at Putin’s life will be put into account “while working out our strategy to implement the goals and objectives of the special military operation.” 

On his part, the deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council, Dmitry Medvedev, called for the elimination of Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky “and his clique” following the attempt at Putin’s life.

“After today’s terrorist attack, there are no options left other than the physical elimination of Zelensky and his clique,” he wrote on his Telegram channel.

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky “is not even needed for signing an instrument of unconditional surrender; Hitler, as is known, did not sign it either. There will always be some substitute,” Medvedev stressed.

This comes just one day after the press service of the Kremlin said that two UAVs attempted to target the Kremlin residence of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“Two unmanned aerial vehicles were aimed at the Kremlin,” the statement said.

The Kremlin stated that Putin was left unharmed by the attack and that Russia reserves the right to initiate retaliation against Kiev’s attempt to strike at the Kremlin. 

“As a result of this terrorist act, the President of the Russian Federation was not injured. The schedule of his work has not changed, it continues as usual,” the statement said. 

“The Russian side reserves the right to take retaliatory measures where and when it sees fit,” it added. 

The Kremlin further stated that it considered the attempted drone attack on the presidential palace as a planned terrorist act and an attempted assassination against Putin. 

“We regard these actions as a planned terrorist act and an attempt on the life of the Russian president, carried out on the eve of Victory Day, the May 9 Parade, at which the presence of foreign guests is also planned,” the statement read.

Read more: Ukraine concealing spring offensive plans from US after Pentagon leak

Douglas Macgregor: “Russia IS WIPING THEM OUT, THIS IS IT” in Exclusive Interview

Mar 29, 2023

Red Pilled TV

Premiered Mar 29, 2023 #douglasmacgregor#interview

“Russia IS WIPING THEM OUT, THIS IS IT” in Exclusive Interview Douglas Macgregor is back on the show to talk about the war in Ukraine. Macgregor gives his assessment of where things stand on the ground. They talk about the astounding casualty numbers and the horrifying nature of the battle over Bakhmut. Macgregor then gives some predictions for the next stages of the war. They talk about the rising tension with China. They agree there is no need to go to war with China but discuss what may explain the sudden attention shift towards Beijing. Lastly, they talk about the effects of cronyism in the weapons industry and the probability of a nuclear war.

Douglas Macgregor: “Ukraine IS LOSING, THIS IS IT” in Exclusive Interview

Douglas Macgregor: “Ukraine IS LOSING, THIS IS IT” in Exclusive Interview Douglas Macgregor is back on the show to talk about the war in Ukraine. Macgregor gives his assessment of where things stand on the ground. They talk about the astounding casualty numbers and the horrifying nature of the battle over Bakhmut. Macgregor then gives some predictions for the next stages of the war. They talk about the rising tension with China. They agree there is no need to go to war with China but discuss what may explain the sudden attention shift towards Beijing. Lastly, they talk about the effects of cronyism in the weapons industry and the probability of a nuclear war.

Premiered 13 hours ago

Discussed on the show: “This Time It’s Different” (The American Conservative) “Ukrainian soldiers in Bakhmut: ‘Our troops are not being protected’” (Kyiv Independent) Douglas Macgregor, Col. (ret.) is a senior fellow with The American Conservative, the former advisor to the Secretary of Defense in the Trump administration, a decorated combat veteran, and the author of five books.

Sergey Lavrov Interview for Film on Extremism in Europe – November 2022 – English Subtitles

November 28, 2022

Note from Michael Rossi Poli Sci who subtitled that video:

Dear Patreon Supporters,

First off, thank you once again for your pledged support and votes of confidence on my work.

Unfortunately, YouTube decided to remove the latest video I uploaded today (Sunday November 27) of Sergey Lavrov giving an interview on political extremism in Europe AS “hate speech”. How they came to that conclusion is beyond me, but I suppose it had to do with the video title having the word “extremism” in it, and “nazism” in the description.

Either way, YouTube removed the video and I have received my first Community Guideline strike, preventing me from upload, commenting, or interacting in any way on my channel for a week. I have appealed the strike, but I don’t know when I will hear back.

In the meantime, I have uploaded the video here and made it publicly accessible. Please feel free to share with those whom you think would benefit from it. For the next week, you’re my “ambassadors” of sorts 🙂

I hope to get this straightened out ASAP, because YouTube offers no prior warning or review of content before something gets flagged, and videos with direct “hate speech” get published all the time.

I may start moving more of the translated videos over here and making it Patrons Only.

Best wishes,

Mike Rossi

Apparently, YT reversed its decision.  Still, PLEASE SUPPORT MIKE ROSSI ON PATREON: https://www.patreon.com/MichaelRossiPoliSci

هكذا غيّر بوتين ونصرالله قانون الحرب

 الإثنين 20 حزيران 2022

ناصر قنديل

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منذ العام 2000 والعالم يعيش إيقاع صعود حركتين، حركة يقودها الرئيس فلاديمير بوتين في روسيا، وحركة يقودها السيد حسن نصرالله في لبنان، وقد اعتمدت كل منهما منهجاً خاصاً ومختلفاً وجديداً في صناعة التوازن، وصولاً لتحقيق التفوق الاستراتيجي، ما أتاح لهما التربع على عرش القوة، وتغيير قانون الحرب.

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انطلق بوتين من روابط الدين والقومية التي تجمع مواطنيه على استعادة أمجاد تاريخ العظمة التي أصيبت في الصميم مع انهيار الاتحاد السوفياتي، ما أعقبه من إذلال ومهانة للروس بصفتهم ينتمون للدولة الروسيّة لا غير، واستثمر بوتين على هذه النهضة ليبني معادلة القوة على توظيف الأصول الثابتة للأمة الروسية، بوجه معادلات العالم الافتراضي التي تصنع قوة الغرب. فاستند إلى الطاقة البشرية لبناء جيش مقاتل يستعدّ ضباطه وجنوده للموت والتضحية، مقابل شركات متخصصة للخدمات العسكرية والأمنية واللوجستية وشركات تجنيد المرتزقة والجامعات الإرهابية الرديفة القابلة للتوظيف مثل تنظيمات داعش والقاعدة وفرق النازيين الجدد، تحل مكان الجيش الوطني بمفهومه المتوارث من الحربين العالميتين، ووظف بوتين موارد روسيا من الأصول الثابتة في المعادن والخامات والقمح والحبوب والنفط والغاز، لتكوين اقتصاد يخدم بناء فائض القوة الذي تستدعيه الحروب، مقال اقتصاد المصارف والأسهم والبورصة الذي يستند إليه الغرب ويسيطر عبره على العالم.

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بالتوازي انطلق السيد نصرالله، من منسوب الكرامة الذي حملته ومثلته المقاومة وعزّزه انتصارها الأول في تحرير الشريط الحدودي المحتل عام 2000، وانتصاره بالصمود والثبات والقدرة على منع جيش الاحتلال من دخول الأرض اللبنانية وتحقيق أهدافه بتدمير المقاومة عام 2006، ومعادلات الردع التي أنتجتها الانتصارات، لتشكيل نواة جيش صغير لا ينام وهو يتجهّز ويستعدّ بكل ما تحتاجه منازلة حاسمة مع الكيان الذي يمثل صفوة ونخبة وطليعة جيوش الغرب المقاتلة، راسماً معادلات التسليح والتمكين التقني بمعايير حرب حديثة تستند الى مشاة البر والصواريخ الدقيقة والطائرات المسيّرة، مقابل جيش يملك مئات الطائرات وآلاف الدبابات وقوة نار هائلة ونصف مليون جندي، ويصنف من أقوى جيوش العالم، وقد سبق وخاض حرباً شاملة على جيوش خمس دول عربية مجتمعة على ثلاث جبهات وانتصر فيها بصورة ساحقة خلال ستة أيام، وقد جاءت وقائع الحرب في أوكرانيا تقول إن الحرب الجديدة باتت حرب مشاة البر والصواريخ والدقيقة والطائرات المسيّرة، بعدما كانت كل الحروب التي سبقت منذ الحرب العالمية الأولى حرب الطائرات والدبابات.

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جاءت حرب أوكرانيا لتضع وجهاً لوجه قانون الحرب الأميركية مقابل قانون الحرب الروسية، وفي مقابل عجز جيوش الغرب عن تحمل نزف الدماء قياساً بالجيش الروسي، بفعل تباين التكوين والبنية والأهداف، ولتجنب حرب نووية مدمّرة وغير مضمونة النتائج، مع الفوارق التي راكمها بوتين لصالح التفوق الروسي، بينما اعتمد بوتين على ضباطه وجنوده وتضحياتهم وثباتهم ومن خلفهم شعبهم، واعتمد الغرب وعلى رأسه الأميركيون، على الجيش الأوكراني، ومنظمات القومية المتطرفة والنازية الجديدة، وشركات تجنيد المرتزقة، وشركات الحروب الرديفة والاستخبارية، وقدموا أسلحة وذخائر بمليارات الدولارات لتأمين أعلى نسبة توازن ممكنة في الميدان، حتى يتسنى ربح الحرب في ميدان آخر، حملته حزمات العقوبات القاتلة الأميركية والغربية، التي تستند بصورة محورية على فعالية أنابيب المال الافتراضية والى جانبها أنابيب الاعلام والمعلومات الافتراضية ايضاً، لإسقاط روسيا بالضربة القاضية؛ وبالمقابل حافظ بوتين على برودة إدارته للحرب في الميدان المباشر لضمان تقدم ثابت وتدمير منهجي لمصادر القوة المقابلة، وكان محسوماً ان يأتي التفوق لصالح روسيا في ميدان الحرب التقليدية للجيوش بفعل فوارق القدرة البشرية والتسليحية الهائلة لصالح روسيا، ولذلك وضع بوتين مطمئناً ثقله في ميادين الحرب الموازية، والرئيسية، حرب صمود الاقتصاد الروسي، وحرب بدء إنهاك اقتصادات الغرب، ومع مئة يوم من بدء الحرب ظهر أن أنابيب الغاز والموارد الطبيعية أقوى من أنابيب المال المصارف، وان الأصول الثابتة تنتصر على الاقتصاد الافتراضي، وتكرّست معادلة قانون حرب جديد، حيث قوة الأنابيب الافتراضية تكمن في تدفقها، بينما قوة أنابيب الأصول الثانية تظهر عند توقفها، وعندما تتوقف الأنابيب، يربح من يملك أنابيب الأصول الثابتة ويفقد صاحب الأنابيب الافتراضية قدرة التأثير.

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في احتفال حزب الله بأربعين ربيعاً على التأسيس وانطلاق المقاومة، يحضر كشف حساب التوازن في معادلة المواجهة بين فائض القوة المادي الناتج عن مراكمة المال والسلاح والقوة النارية، مقابل فائض قوة آتٍ من التأسيس على قيمة مضافة تمثلها القضية والفكرة والمعنويات والروح، ويثبت أن فائض القوة الناتج عن قيمة مضافة قابل بصورة متكررة للتحوّل إلى قيمة مضافة جديدة وفائض قوة جديد في عملية مستدامة لا تتوقف، والحفاظ على التفوّق الأخلاقي، يتيح تكرار العملية وتصاعدها، بينما فائض القوة الصافي قابل للتآكل، فيتحوّل إلى مجرد أكوام من الحديد والمعادن، أقرب إلى الخردة، يديرها روبوتات بلا روح، وحيث تهزم الروح تحسم الحرب لصاحب الروح المتوثبة بوجه الروح الخامدة، وتتكرس معادلة انتصار فائض القوة الآتي من قيمة مضافة لقدرته على العودة الى الأصل مجدداً كقيمة مضافة، بينما يبقى فائض القوة الجاف مجرد أرقام في جداول الحساب، تفقد قيمتها عند اختبار الميدان.

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معادلتا الأصول الثابتة والقوة الافتراضية، وفائض القوة والقيمة المضافة من جهة موازية، معادلتان جديدتان نظرياً في علم الحرب، تؤكدان نظرية الاستقطاب التفاعليّ لكتابة التاريخ، حيث الحروب ليست مجرد تقابل بين الجيوش عدداً وعدة، وبين الدول مالاً ومقدرات.

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Sitrep Operation Z – Where are we?

May 11, 2022

Source

The main observation which one cannot help but agree with, comes from Andrei Martyanov and I rephrase somewhat:

The rate of change is markedly accelerating as the first result of the crumbling and implosion of the Ukraine as a state and the structure of its armed forces.

Things will go quicker now and they are, as discussed further!

First though, pure fantasy. We call it ‘narrative’ but it is fantasy!

This was found on a Ukrainian site : https://t.me/ice_inii

Take a look at a few things here: The US influence, the fantasy of being the Robin Williams character in the movie Good Morning Vietnam and the fantasy of being the gook! These fighters live in a movie. And then, the breakdown of the fantasy. This is another example of exactly what Martyanov means.

We stay for a moment in fantasy.

Andrei Martyanov commented on Lieutenant-General Kellog who, contrary to his statement about “everything he learned about war”, never learned shit.  http://smoothiex12.blogspot.com/2022/05/when-bs-meter-goes-off-scale.html

A quick comparison of the US and the UK commentary on Putin’s speech

Here we have UK Defense Secretary Ben Wallace. This can only be classified as repugnant and if Kellog according to Martyanov ‘never learned shit’, this one only ‘talks shit’. https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/speech-by-defence-secretary-on-russias-invasion-of-ukraine

A short snippet:

“I thought about the scale of their (ordinary Russian soldier) suffering across the Soviet Union, but also how the suffering was used, then as it is now, to cover up the inadequacy of those ruling in safety and comfort from behind the Kremlin walls above and within the General Staff nearby.

Foreign Minister Baerbock has no idea what she is saying and her grasp of history is non-existent.

“Germany is responsible for the defense of Ukraine and all of Europe,”

Zelensky, besides his other problems, is tone deaf ..

Rebranding Nazism

May 09, 2022

Source

by Roddy Keenan

As a teacher of history, the topic of Nazi Germany is always one which generates numerous questions from students. How were the Nazis able to convince the public to vote for them? How did they convince the people to go along with their fascist agenda and barbaric policies? How was the Holocaust allowed to take place?

Despite discussing the role of propaganda and censorship, as well as the fear of opposing the Nazi regime, one still finds students often somewhat bemused. Moreover, many invariably argue that nowadays, due to social media, the Internet, and other methods of communication, the evils of Nazism could never succeed in flourishing again.

However, that is about to change. One only has to look at the manner in which the Azov Battalion, a fully-fledged Ukrainian Nazi militia, with significant influence, has been whitewashed in the space of ten weeks. Whereas prior to February 24th 2022, they were recognised as a neo-Nazi battalion, these fascists are now being portrayed as valiant defenders of an oppressed people, fighting bravely against insurmountable odds.

In the past, we have become only too well aware of the role played by the media and big tech in propagandising and manufacturing consent. Whether it’s the mainstream media parroting establishment talking points, Facebook, Twitter and Youtube censoring dissenting views, or Paypal denying media outlets access to their own accounts apparently due to their political stances, Western disinformation full-spectrum dominance appears to be at its zenith.

Yet, the perennial Western purveyors of fake news, such as The New York Times, CNN and the BBC, declare themselves to be gatekeepers of truth, integrity and morality. And this, despite their lies which facilitated the slaughter and deaths of over a million men, women and children, in the invasion and occupation of Iraq.

But still it goes on, right up to the present. From the Ghost of Kiev to Snake Island, the Collective Western media has acted as stenographers for the Western and Ukrainian regimes. The examples are too numerous to mention, but the media coverage of the air strike at a railway station in Kramatorsk provided a striking example of the overt and cynical propaganda role the western media has played throughout this conflict.

The missile strikes that killed over fifty people and injured more than one hundred were initially widely reported, with images on front pages across the Western media. However, within forty-eight hours the story had disappeared and barely received a mention. This was due to an Italian news team identifying one of the missiles as being of the type used by Ukrainian forces. The narrative of Ukrainians killing civilians obviously didn’t fit into the propaganda of the Collective West, and consequently, the dead and injured found instant irrelevance.

Now the Western media has turned its malevolent myth-making to the Nazi Azov battalion in the Ukraine. An overtly Nazi formation, descended from the Fascist Banderites of World War 2, it is now being staunchly defended by the Collective West.

Interestingly, it had been previously accepted that the Azov were a far-right, Nazi militia, and indeed, their presence and influence was widely viewed as a dark force within the Ukraine. It’s fascist rituals and regalia, worship of the fascist Stepan Bandera, and its adherence to Nazi ideology, left nobody in any doubt that these were committed fascists, and they were commonly described as neo-Nazis in numerous Western media outlets.

However, since February 24th there has been a stunning shift.

Now, the fact that the Azov battalion is a Nazi organisation is glossed over. The BBC, a propaganda arm of the British State, ran a nine-minute puff piece, arguing, almost pleading, that the Azov fighters were not fascists, but simply a battalion integrated into the Ukrainian army. Meanwhile, MSNBC interviewed Azov Nazis teaching elderly women how to use weapons, and newspapers from the Financial Times to the New York Times are now portraying the Azov as brave defenders of the Ukraine.

An obvious aim of this shameless media operation is to delegitimise the Russian claims of denazification, by arguing that there is no Nazi problem in the Ukraine. Even on the rare occasion that the media refers to the ideology of the Azov units, and indeed, the presence of other fascist and far-right groups such as C14, Right Sector and Svoboda, it claims they have minimal impact on the politics of the Ukraine, pointing to their weak electoral performances. What they fail to point out, is that the mainstream’ parties are implementing policies that the fascists support. Moreover, the notion that parliamentary representation is a metric of influence is absurd when one looks at the likes of Al Qaeda and Isis.

In fact, a leader of the fascist group C14, Yevhen Karas, described the 2014 Maidan coup as a ‘victory of nationalist ideas’. He went on to assert that without the influence of fascist groups, Maidan would have been nothing but a ‘gay parade’.

But this is now an inconvenient truth for the Collective West. Consequently, Azov and their fellow travellers are no longer Nazis or fascists. Instead, they are merely ‘misunderstood patriots’.

Of course, this is nothing new. When it comes to hypocrisy, the Collective West has it in spades. Whether it’s supporting the Mujahedeen in Afghanistan, ISIS and AL Nusra in Syria, or the fascists in Ukraine, the Collective West has shown itself to be devoid of any morality when it comes to serving their own interests.

Now, just as Isis and Al Nusra are ‘moderate rebels’, the fascists of Azov are well-meaning nationalist warriors.

So, according to our so-called liberal democracies, even though there might be bad Nazis, there are also good fascists, whose adherence to Nazism is just an ideological quirk. Obviously, those who are on our side are the good Nazis. And it’s the Collective West that always gets to decide who is who.

But one thing is now evident – the blatant manner in which Nazism has been made palatable due to an unrelenting, systematic propaganda campaign, will answer those questions posed by students regarding how German Nazis were able to attain power in 1933 and to subsequently pursue the policies that they did.

‘Scratch a liberal and a fascist bleeds’, I was once told many years ago.

The events of the past months have proven just how accurate that old adage is.

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Originally from Ireland, Roddy Keenan is a teacher and freelance reporter based in the UK. Roddy specialises in international politics and is the author of US Presidential Elections 1968-2008: a narrative history of the race for the White House’.

Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s interview with India Today television channel, Moscow, April 19, 2022

April 20, 2022

https://www.mid.ru/en/foreign_policy/news/1810023/

Question: The big question that most are asking is the reason for this operation, the reason for President Putin to take the country to war at a time when we have seen negotiations and talks taking place. What was the reason? We know that America said that Russia was going to carry out operations. New Delhi certainly was not aware of it. Many countries said that it is not something that is going to happen, but it did happen.

Sergey Lavrov: The real reason is the complacency of most countries of the world after the end of World War II, when our Western colleagues, led by the United States, declared themselves winners and in violation of the promises to the Soviet and Russian leadership started moving NATO eastward. They kept saying: “Don’t worry, this is a defensive alliance, it is not a threat to Russian security.” It was a defensive alliance when there were NATO and the Warsaw Treaty, and there was the Berlin Wall, as you remember, both physical and geopolitical. It was very clear what was the “line of defence” for this “defensive alliance.”

When the opponent disappeared, both the Warsaw Treaty disappeared and the Soviet Union disappeared, they decided that they will move the “line of defence eastward.” They did this five times without explaining against whom they are going to defend themselves, but in the process building up their advanced assault capacities and choosing the former Soviet republics, especially Ukraine, as the springboard against the Russian interests.

As early as 2003, for example, when they had a presidential election in Ukraine, the West was publicly and blatantly demanding Ukrainians: you must choose, are you with Russia or with Europe? Then, of course, they started pulling Ukraine into the European Union Association Agreement. The agreement provided for zero tariffs for Ukrainian goods in Europe, and European goods in Ukraine. We had a free trade area agreement with Ukraine in the context of the Commonwealth of Independent States. So, we told our Ukrainian neighbours: guys, we have zero tariffs with you, but we have protection with the European Union, because we negotiated WTO entry for 18 years. For some time, we did manage to protect some sectors of the Russian economy – agriculture, insurance, banking, and some others – with considerable tariffs. We told them: if you have zero [tariffs] with Europe and zero [tariffs] with us, we are not protected against European goods, which was part of the deal when we entered the WTO.

Then in 2013, when the Ukrainian President understood the problem, he asked the European Union to postpone the signature of the Association Agreement. We suggested that the three of us – Russia, Ukraine, and the EU – could sit together and discuss how to proceed. The European Union in a very arrogant way said that this is none of your business, we do not put our nose in your trade with China or other countries, so this is going to happen. Then the President of Ukraine decided to postpone this ceremony. The next morning, the demonstrators were on Maidan in Kiev.

In February 2014, the European Union helped negotiate a deal between the President and the opposition. Next morning, the signatures of the European Union representatives – France, Germany and Poland – were absolutely ignored by the opposition, who staged a coup and declared that they are creating a “government of the winners,” that they will cancel the special status of the Russian language. They threatened to throw ethnic Russians out of Crimea, they sent armed groups to storm the Crimean parliament. That is how the war started. The Crimeans said: “We don’t want to have anything [to do] with you, leave us alone.” As a I said, there was a threat from armed groups. The eastern areas of Ukraine said: “Guys, we do not support your coup, leave us alone.” They never attacked the rest of Ukraine. The putschists attacked them, having called them terrorists. They called them terrorists for eight long years.

We managed to stop this bloodshed in February 2015 – the so-called Minsk Agreements were signed, providing Eastern Ukraine with some special status, language, the right to have some local police, special economic relations with the adjacent Russian regions. It was basically the same as [the agreement] the European Union negotiated for the north of Kosovo where Serbs live. In both cases, the European Union failed totally to deliver on what was guaranteed by the signatures of its members. For eight long years, the respective governments of Ukraine and Presidents of Ukraine were saying, blatantly and publicly, that they were not going to implement the Minsk agreements, that they will move to Plan B. They continued to shell the territories of these [self-] proclaimed republics during all these years. We warned the Europeans, the Americans, and Ukraine that they are ignoring something which was endorsed by the United Nations Security Council. To no avail.

People do not want to go back into this history because they prefer to take events on their immediate merit, but these particular events are rooted in the desire of the United States and what we call the collective West, to rule, to dominate the world and just show everybody that there would be no multipolarity. It would be only unipolarity.

And that they can declare Iraq, Syria, Libya, Yugoslavia, located tens of thousands of miles from the United States, threats to their security, and can do whatever they please there, levelling cities, like they did with Mosul in Iraq, and Raqqa in Syria. Russia has been warning all its colleagues that just on our borders you have been creating a springboard against us: you have been pumping arms into Ukraine, you have been totally ignoring the legislation of Ukraine, which prohibited, completely prohibited the Russian language, you have been encouraging neo-Nazi ideologies and practices. The neo-Nazi battalions were very much active against the territories which proclaimed themselves independent and who were promised special status. It’s inside Ukraine.

It was all linked with Ukraine becoming NATO’s springboard, and NATO expansion. They were saying that Ukraine will be in NATO. Nobody can stop Ukraine if it so wishes. Then President Zelensky said that he might think about coming back to possess nuclear weapons. In November last year, my President suggested to the United States and to NATO to sit down, to cool off, and to discuss how we can agree on security guarantees without NATO’s further eastward expansion. They refused. In the process, the Ukrainian army radically intensified the shelling of those republics in violation of all the ceasefire agreements. We didn’t have any other choice but to recognise them, to sign mutual assistance treaties with them, and, in response to their request, to send our troops as part of special operation to protect their lives.

Question: You provided the basics: the history, as well as the present context. But you also said, President Putin himself said, that this is not targeting civilians or the citizens, people of Ukraine. It is to do with the administration. We know that in international foreign policy parlance it is used quite often: not in my backyard. America says it all the time, and many other countries say it. But should an entire people, and entire population be punished for an administration wanting to carry out independent foreign policy?

Sergey Lavrov: I don’t think it’s about any independence. Since 2013, and maybe even earlier, hundreds and hundreds of US, UK, and other Western security and military experts have been openly sitting in the Ukrainian Ministry of Defence and the Ukrainian security apparatus. They basically were running the place.

As for the civilians, immediately when this special operation started in response to the request from Donetsk and Lugansk in full compliance with Article 51 of the United Nations Charter, when it was announced by President Putin, he said that the sole purpose of this operation is to demilitarise and denazify Ukrainians – these two problems of the country are intimately linked. We have been targeting only military infrastructure. Unfortunately, the Ukrainian army and the so-called nationalist battalions, which are using Nazi insignia, swastikas, which was borrowed from Indian history, but twisted the wrong way, and insignia of Waffen-SS battalions, these people were using and continue to use civilians as human shields. They were placing heavy weapons in the middle of towns and cities, next to schools, next to kindergartens, to hospitals. The internet is full of the testimonies of the people who were living in these places, and who were asking these people not to do this.

Unfortunately, nobody in the West actually pays attention to the facts, which we have been providing. Instead, they are staging some fake situations, like a couple of weeks ago with the place called Bucha. The Russian troops left on March 30, I think, and for three days the city was back in the hands of the Ukrainian administration. The mayor of Bucha Anatoly Fedoruk was publicly saying that the city is back to normal life. Only on the fourth day, they started showing images of dozens of corpses lying in the street, which was only a few days before shown as being back to normal. Then a few days later in the city of Kramatorsk, which was fully in the Ukrainian hands, they summoned people to the railway station, and attacked them with a Tochka-U missile. It was proven beyond any doubt that the missile was fired by the Ukrainian army. That’s why the next morning it was out of the news in the West because everybody understood the obvious nature of this provocation. Now, The New York Times says that they have the proof that cluster bombs were used by the Ukrainian army.

Speaking of civilians and the rules of international humanitarian law, I can once again assure you that our army operates against the military infrastructure and not against civilians.

Question: Mr Lavrov, you said that Russian forces have only targeted military facilities. Even if there were military facilities or tanks that have been placed in civilian areas, Russian forces did not show restraint in taking them down. Hence, there are civilians who have been killed. There has been bloodshed, whether it is the outskirts of Kiev, primarily Mariupol, Volnovakha – absolutely raised to the ground. Some responsibility has to be taken by the Russians also on the bloodshed?

Sergey Lavrov: It is always terrible when military activities bring damage to the civilians and to the civilian sector, to civilian infrastructure. As I said, when people have been killing ethnic Russians, citizens of Ukraine, in the east for eight years, no TV representatives, be it Asian, be it African, be it Latin American, be it European, be it the United States, paid any attention to this. The Russian journalists have been working on the contact line, on the side of the republics, round the clock, showing the atrocities committed by the Ukrainian neo-Nazis and Ukrainian armed forces. And during all those years not a single foreign journalist cared to come to the other part of this line of contact to see what was going on there.

The statistics available from the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe indicate that the damage afflicted on the civilians and the civilian infrastructure on the side of the republics, the [self-] proclaimed republics, was five times more and bigger than the same figure for the territory controlled by the Ukrainian government.

This is not to say that we can just ignore the victims and the damage to the civilian infrastructure, but once again I want to emphasise a very important thing. This outcry started only when the Russians decided to protect Russians who are citizens of Ukraine and who were absolutely discriminated. There was no outcry when the city of Raqqa, for example, in Syria was levelled with dozens and hundreds of corpses lying there unattended for weeks and weeks. The American military never had any scruples about achieving their military goals, be it in Syria, be it in Iraq, be it in Afghanistan, for that matter.

This is a tragedy, when people die. But we cannot tolerate the situation when our Western colleagues say that they can do anything they want. They can encourage the government in Kiev to be as Russophobic as it takes. They would not tell them to stop prohibiting the Russian language in education, in media, stop banning all Russian speaking channels, including Ukrainian channels, they would not tell them not to prosecute the opposition, who favours dialogue with Russia, and to stop violating the commitments to give special status to the territories where the Russian speaking population dominates.

Question: You made a very important point because India Today has travelled to Donetsk and we have been putting out these reports. It is very important because it is important to understand the plight of Russian descent and Russian speaking people in Ukraine. There is no taking away from that. We will talk about Donbass. But coming to the allegations against Russia of genocide, of war crimes, and on the fact that chemical weapons have been used by Russian forces, what do you have to say to the visuals? You said that there were no bodies. There were bodies in the basements that have been found much later that would have been found anyway much later. Will there be no investigation that will be carried out? Why just say that it did not happen?

Sergey Lavrov: We are investigating the atrocities of the neo-Nazi battalions of Ukraine and of Ukrainian armed forces. There is a special commission created by the Russian chamber – there is a public organisation which is very experienced. They have been discovering the fakes staged by the so-called White Helmets in Syria, in many other cases. We will not cease our efforts to establish the truth.

We are used to the fact that the United States, the United Kingdom, and other Western countries have a very interesting habit: they just throw in news when they believe this news will work ideologically for their benefit, and then, when it comes to the facts, and when more facts are discovered, putting a big question mark on their assertions, they just lose interest.

2007, London. Poisoning of Mr Litvinenko. Huge outcry. The investigation begins, and after a few weeks a public inquiry is announced, which in the UK  means that it is secret. Until now, we cannot get the facts about what had happened to Mr Litvinenko.

2014, Malaysian Airlines Boeing. Shot down over Ukraine. We presented a huge amount of facts. We requested that we be part of the investigation – no way. Ukrainians who did not close their skies during the conflict were invited to this investigation group, Russia was not. Malaysia, as the owner of the plane, was invited only five months later after the Australians, the Dutch. They and the Malaysians agreed among themselves that anything coming out of this room must be subject to consensus, meaning that Ukraine, which did not close the skies, had a veto power on this investigation. We could not get the truth on this one as well.

2019, Salisbury poisoning. The people disappeared. The only proof which was made public is “highly likely,” as Theresa May said. The Brits insisted on the expulsion of Russian diplomats by most of the European countries. When I asked my friends, did they provide proof beyond the public statements about “highly likely” it was Russia, they said “no, but they promised to.” I checked one year later, whether this was done, it was not done. And so on, and so forth.

2020. Our opposition blogger Mr Navalny was poisoned. We asked the Germans. We immediately responded to the German request to let him go to the Berlin hospital. Twenty-four hours after the request he was flown to Berlin. We don’t have any confirmation who was flying with him, where did they get the bottle which is the key element in this investigation. When we asked the Germans to show us the formula which they discovered in his blood, they said this is a military secret.

It is us who until now insist on the truth about Litvinenko, about the Skripals, about Malaysian Boeing, and about Navalny. The stories that they stage in Ukraine these days are of the same nature.

Question: Going back to the investigations, you are saying that that Azov battalion is absolutely shameful, yes, they should be investigated. They are neo-Nazis, and they should not have been incorporated or integrated into any military regime in any country. But if you introspect and look at your own people as well, is there any instance of denying and rejecting claims? Will there be investigations against your own people if they have done wrong? Will they be held accountable?

Sergey Lavrov: We have a law that prohibits the military to do anything which is not allowed under international humanitarian law. Any violations are registered and investigated.

On Azov, it is interesting that you mentioned it. Azov was listed in the United States in 2014 or 2015 as a group that cannot be supported, that cannot legitimately operate, and it was prohibited by Congress to provide any assistance to this battalion. Everybody forgot about this or rather they certainly remember what this group is about, and they decided to put their money on this group.

In Japan, as you know, they passed a special decree by the government that Azov is no longer a neo-Nazi group, and the Japanese government apologises for listing Azov as such. And of course when President Zelensky in his camouflage was asked about Azov by some journalists, who felt that something was wrong with these neo-Nazi trends, Zelensky said quietly: Azov, they are what they are, we have many groups like this. They are part of our army.

You, I mean the media, started asking questions about Azov only when the military operation was launched. For eight long years, nobody lifted a finger, nobody bothered about what was being groomed in Ukraine, as a continuation, or rather a resurrection, of what was boiling in Europe in 1930s.

Question: President Zelensky said that Russia plans to use tactical nuclear weapons.

Sergey Lavrov: He says many things. Depends on what he drinks and what he smokes. He says many things.

Question: Do you think it was a strategic miscalculation by President Zelensky to take on Russia when there was no certain assurance from NATO and the European Union that they would actually back Ukraine?

Sergey Lavrov: President Zelensky came to power with the promise of peace. He said that he will reach peace on the basis of the Minsk Agreements. A few months later, he said he cannot implement the Minsk Agreements because the Minsk Agreements are “unimplementable.”

Question: It was the Russian forces, the DPR.

Sergey Lavrov: No, he never said that it was because of the military situation on the ground. He said that it is unthinkable for Ukraine to give special status to any part of his territory. But it was very “thinkable,” if I may say so, when Ukraine was created, to put together the territories which now (those in the west) never celebrate Victory Day, May 9, and the eastern territories, which would never celebrate the heroes honoured in the west: those who collaborated with Hitler. With this difficult composition of territories, to say that Ukraine can only be a unitary state, and that it would not give special status to these people even if the Security Council demands so, I believe that this was not very far-sighted.

Had he cooperated as he promised to his electorate when he was elected, had he cooperated in implementing the Minsk Agreements, the crisis would have been over long ago.

Question: Did the West betray Zelensky?

Sergey Lavrov: No, I think the West played Zelensky against Russia and did everything to strengthen the desire to ignore the Minsk Agreements.

The “West” is a broad notion. It’s the United States and the Brits. The rest of the West, including the European Union, is just an obedient servant.

Question: Tactical nuclear weapons. Will Russia ever use them?

Sergey Lavrov: Ask Mr Zelensky. We never mentioned this. He mentioned this. So, his intelligence must have provided him some news. I cannot comment something which a not very adequate person pronounces.

Question: As a P5 member, as a nuclear power, will nuclear be an option at all, on the table at all?

Sergey Lavrov: When the Soviet Union and the United States in 1987, Gorbachev and Reagan, decided that they have special responsibility for peace on this planet, they signed the solemn declaration that there could be no winners in a nuclear war, and therefore a nuclear war must never be launched.

After the Trump administration came to office, we have been telling them, because tensions were aggravated: “Why don’t we try to send a positive political message to the entire universe and to reiterate what Gorbachev and Reagan pronounced?” During all the four years of the administration, they refused to do so.

But we were really encouraged when President Biden was inaugurated. Five days after his inauguration, we repeated this offer, he first agreed to extend the [New] START treaty without any preconditions. In June 2021, when they met with President Putin in Geneva, they issued this declaration. This declaration was issued on our initiative. After the Americans and the Russians said that there must be no nuclear war, that they won’t think about it, we started to promote the same commitment in the context of the P5. Not the United States, not UK, not France – Russia. Eventually, earlier this year, in January this year, the P5, at the level of presidents and heads of government, issued the statement which we initiated and which we were pushing through for all these years.

Question: So nuclear is off the table?

Sergey Lavrov: This statement, both the Russian-American statement, and the P5 summit statement, were issued on the strong insistence of the Russian Federation.

Question: Coming back to the Donbass region, DPR, LPR. The independence of these republics is non-negotiable for Russia when you talk to Ukraine. What happens if the negotiations succeed between Ukraine and Russia and should there be a settlement, will Russia withdraw from other areas: Sumy, Kharkov, Zaporozhye, Kherson, Nikolayev?

Sergey Lavrov: I thought you are a journalist, but you can be a spy. I am not discussing the military operation, for obvious reasons it is never the case.

On the territorial situation, we recognise DPR and LPR within the administrative boundaries of the former Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. The Minsk agreements were signed when these two territories were split roughly half and half. Now the militias of these republics are fighting to get their territory back.

When they had a referendum in 2014, it was held on the entire territories of the former regions. But then the coup leaders started the war, which they called an anti-terrorist operation, and they took a considerable chunk of both regions. So, yes, we recognise LPR and DPR within their declared territories as a result of the referendum.

Question: Which in fact includes Mariupol and Volnovakha, as part of Donetsk.

Sergey Lavrov: Yes.

Question: My question is, if there is a settlement between the two sides, and they recognise, which President Zelensky said he would not, he said that they are going to fight for Donbass to the very end, so where are the red lines?

Sergey Lavrov: I cannot intelligently discuss what President Zelensky says because he always changes his mind diametrically.

He was the initiator of the negotiations, which we accepted. At some point we were disappointed because they were changing their mind every time, coming late, leaving early, but then in Istanbul, about one month ago, it was on March 29, they brought a paper, saying that we are not going to be a member of any military alliance, that they will be neutral. In return, they asked for security guarantees, preferably P5, maybe some others, and it was written and initialled by the head of the heads of delegations. The security guarantees they were asking for would not cover Crimea and the territories in the east of Ukraine.

It was not our language, it was their language. Now President Zelensky says “no way.” They started backtracking even earlier. But this is a paper with the signature of the head of the Ukrainian delegation. So, before we can intelligently discuss what he says one day or another, we need to have clarity about the credibility of this person and about his team.

Question: Was there any understanding in Istanbul on the withdrawal of Russian troops from Kiev, as well?

Sergey Lavrov: We changed the configuration of our presence. This was announced immediately after Istanbul that since we believed that they brought something which could serve as a basis [of an agreement], we made a goodwill gesture, and we changed the configuration in the Kiev and Chernigov areas.

This was not appreciated at all. Instead, this Bucha thing was immediately staged and played, like Skripals were played in Salisbury, like the Malaysian Boeing, like Navalny, played, but immediately put aside when the hard facts were presented which they cannot challenge.

Question: There are mayors who have been appointed now by Russia in Berdyansk and Melitopol, and they are saying that they will hold a referendum, that they are not going to go back. Is that the plan?

Sergey Lavrov: That’s the outmost democracy, right? A referendum – people saying what they want.

Question: Which means that you are securing your land boundary in Sumy and Kharkov, but also the waters, if you look at Zaporozhye, Nikolayev.

Sergey Lavrov: People have been suffering in all these places for eight long years, when neo-Nazis were prohibiting them to speak their own language, prohibiting them to commemorate the heroes of World War II, of the Great Patriotic War, prohibiting to have parades and to have any events to commemorate the fallen, the parents, the grandparents of these people.

Now when they have thrown away these neo-Nazis, and say that now we will decide who will be running the place – this is our mayor, this is our legislature, I believe that this is a manifestation of democracy after so many years of oppression.

Question: It seems that Ukraine has lost more land than it would have gained by negotiating on Donbass.

Sergey Lavrov: It’s the decision of those who have been running Ukraine, of those who have been sabotaging the Minsk agreements, in spite of the UN Security Council decision. We are not up for regime change in Ukraine. We have said this repeatedly. We want the Ukrainians themselves to decide how they want to live further in a way, which would not repeat the Minsk agreements, when they did decide that they did not want to do anything with the coup leaders, who immediately said that they are against anything Russian: culture, language, everything what these people cherish. Then they were promised something by the European Union and cheated.

We want the people to be free. To decide how they want to live in Ukraine.

Question: Russia is one of the most sanctioned countries in the world. How long can you sustain?

Sergey Lavrov: I don’t think we are thinking in the context of sustaining. Sustaining means, you know, you sustain, you take some hardships, and hope that, sooner or later, this would be over.

Russia has been under sanctions all along – Jackson–Vanik, then it was repealed, but Magnitsky Act was introduced, then we were punished for the free vote of the Crimeans, we were punished for supporting those who were in favour of keeping the Minsk agreements, but the Ukrainian government did not want them to get what they promised, and so on and so forth.

So, now we have come to a very straightforward conclusion. We cannot rely on our Western colleagues in any part of our life, which has strategic significance, be it food security, which we managed to ensure ourselves after 2014, be it, of course, defence, and be it some strategic sectors where high-tech is developing and indicating the future of the mankind. We did not have time to achieve self-sufficiency in all these areas, but in most cases, we resolved this issue. Of course, we are open to cooperation with all other countries who do not use illegal, illegitimate unilateral measures in violation of the UN Charter.

India is among those. We cooperate bilaterally. I visited a couple of months ago, and we cooperate in many international organisations.

Question: Speaking of India, India is under immense pressure to sever ties, to cut down imports of energy, of fuel, but India has stood its ground. In terms of reliability, is there a concern that India should have with regards to the kind of defence cooperation both countries have? Could there be delays in deliveries of critical weapons systems that India is buying from Russia, such as the S-400s? What is the conversation you have been having with New Delhi on this ground?

Sergey Lavrov: India is our very old friend. We called our relationship a long time ago a strategic partnership. Then, about 20 years ago, the Indian friends said: why don’t we call it a “privileged strategic partnership?” Sometime later, they said that this was not enough. Let’s call it “especially privileged strategic partnership.” This is a unique description of the bilateral relations between India and Russia.

With India, long before all this became such a hot potato, we supported Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s concept “Make in India” and we started substituting simple trade with local production, shifting production of the goods needed by India on your territory. It was for quite a number of years already that we have been promoting the use of our national currencies in settlements between the governments of the two countries.

We promoted national information systems, transmission systems, like SWIFT. You have your own, we have our won. They are being used more and more. Payment cards: we have MIR, you have RuPay. They are mutually supportive. It is not, you know, a huge percentage, of the overall volume of trade, but it is steadily growing. On defence, we can provide anything India wants. Technology transfers in the context of defence cooperation are absolutely unprecedented for any of India’s outside partners.

Question: We have got away with a waiver from the United States for the S-400s, but future collaborations, could they become difficult?

Sergey Lavrov: You know, when the Americans say that they are in favour of democracy all over the world, they mean only a very specific thing – that it is up to them to decide who is democracy, and who deserves to have some good attitude on behalf of Washington. When they convened this summit of democracies, you only need to look through the list of invitees, to understand that it is not about real democracies, it is about something else. The Americans now run all over the world, their ambassadors have priority number one to go to the foreign ministry, to the government of the country where they serve and say: “You must stop talking to Russia, you must join sanctions against Russia.”

Well, long before this crisis, I have been talking to the Americans, to the Europeans, I told them: when you say democracy, democracy, and at the conferences you always want this language on rule of law and democracy, I asked them about adding that apart from the national level, we want democracy and the rule of law internationally. They don’t like it. When they push everybody in this anti-Russian camp, when they go to India, when they go to China, to Turkey, to Egypt, countries with their own thousands years of history of civilization, of culture, and when they are not even ashamed to publicly tell you what to do, I believe something is wrong not only with manners, which always has been the case, but something is wrong with the mentality.

When Antony Blinken, the US Secretary of State, says publicly: “We, the United States, has not yet decided whether to introduce sanctions against India for the S-400s,” they have not decided what is good for you. His under-secretary Wendy Sherman later said: “We must help India understand what is important for its security.” How about that?

Question: I suppose your counterpart gave them a befitting reply on how to conduct one’s foreign policy?

Sergey Lavrov: Absolutely. I respect Subrahmanyam Jaishankar very much. He is a seasoned diplomat, and he is a real patriot of his country. He said that we will be taking the decisions on the basis of what India believes it needs for its development, for its security. It’s respectful. Not too many countries can say something like this.

Question: You mentioned China. For us, the China factor is very important. Russia has a unique relationship when it comes to ties with China and ties with India. You mentioned the United States of America, so again, I am going to go back to the US. Recently, in one of the visits, deputy national security advisor said that should India continue ties with Russia, there will be consequences. If, he said, there is another incident at the LAC, then the US will not come to India’s rescue. The statement is flawed, because there are two points. One is that he said “should there be another incident,” not recognising that the Chinese are still on Indian soil. Secondly, he said that they will not come to India’s rescue, but they did not come in the first place. But where does Russia stand?

Sergey Lavrov: We stand in favour of resolving any conflicts on the basis of arrangements negotiated directly between the parties, like, just like it was in Ukraine, when the two parties, the rebels, as they are called, the separatists, as they are called, for us they are self-proclaimed republics, on the one side, and the government, which came to power as a result of the coup, on the other side had a deal, negotiated and endorsed by the Security Council. It is another matter that the government, with the instigation of the West, failed to deliver, but the method is the one which we believe should be applied everywhere.

After those incidents on the border, we welcomed the resumption of the discussions between the military of India and China, the discussions between the politicians, at the level of the foreign ministers, and we hope that this would be resolved. We cannot use those threats, which are absolutely normal for the Americans, who say “or else, there would be consequences.” It is their favourite statement.

What we would like to do, as Russia, we would like to promote the formats where India, Russia, and China participate together. It started in 1996-1997, when Russia’s Foreign Minister at that time, Yevgeny Primakov, suggested the RIC format – the troika formed by Russia, India, and China. It happened, and we continue to convene in this format. I think, last November there was probably the 20th ministerial meeting. Not only foreign ministers, but also ministers of economy, ministers of trade, political scientists meet, which may not be very much publicised, but it is a very useful format.

We were very much in favour, even we were the leading force in the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation to promote this, of the full membership of India, together with Pakistan, in this organisation. This is another premise for China and India to be together in the company of their neighbours, and to build more confidence.

Question: Finally, before I let you go, sir, Europe is looking to halt gas from Russia. Come summer, policies might get harsher. But you are looking for the dedollarisation of the global energy market by dealing in roubles. How do you propose to do that, should they start halting?

Sergey Lavrov: There will be no change for the Europeans and other countries who buy our gas. The reason for this decision was very simple and obvious. When they froze the Russian assets in dollars, euro, yens, and the pound sterling for the amount of more than 300 billion euros or dollars, those were mostly the money kept in Western banks after we received payments from them, from the Western countries, for our gas deliveries.

In other words, they paid us, and they stole the money from us because those were the currencies which are linked to the Western banking system. So what we told them to do: they would not be paying directly to Gazprom’s accounts abroad, but they would be paying to a bank called Gazprombank. It is an independent entity. They would be paying the same amount which they have to pay under the existing contracts, but they will pay these amounts to a special account which they have to open with this bank. There would be a parallel account in roubles. So they pay euros, and then inside this bank these euros are transferred to the rouble account, and from this account Gazprom receives roubles.

Question: So you are not running losses at all on the money Russia is to receive from Europe? There is no money that has been stopped?

Sergey Lavrov: Exactly. As of now, they would not be able to keep the money in their banks, the money that they not even owe us, but which they paid to us already. I believe this is something which does not contradict contracts. They would still be paying in euros or dollars or whatever was the currency of the contract, but we will have insurance that this robbery would not happen again.

Question: Finally, sir, before I let you go, I have to go back to that question on eastern Ukraine. Intensification of war efforts now in eastern Ukraine – is the trigger the flagship warship Moskva that sunk. What really happened there? Is that one of the triggers now why we see more intensification against Ukraine?

Sergey Lavrov: No, this operation in the east of Ukraine is aimed, as was announced from the very beginning, to fully liberate the Donetsk and Lugansk republics. This operation will continue. Another stage of this operation is beginning. I am sure that this will be a very important moment of this entire special operation.

Question: What happened to the warship?

Sergey Lavrov: It is for the Ministry of Defence. They explained what happened and I cannot add anything to this.

Question: On that note, many thanks for joining us here on India Today. It was indeed a pleasure, sir.

Sergey Lavrov: Thank you very much.

Question: That was the Foreign Minister of Russia speaking exclusively to India Today.

---

Notes on information availability from the Russian Federation:

The best video is on Telegram:  https://t.me/MFARussia/12362
This is the first complete address from the Russian MFA that they posted on Telegram since the attack on the availability of Russian information started.  It is also a complete interview in English and without translators.

The Indian interviewer is smart and respectful.  Mr. Lavrov is patient and clear.

It is still a hit-and-miss exercise to get complete information from Russian professional sources.   You can see these interviews live on Ruptly but there is no playback.  The videos and transcripts are on the Russian Foreign Ministry site, but frequently there is no playback.  In copying this transcript just a while ago, the Russian MFA site went down again.

It is important to see or read these completely in order to find nuance and context. It seems to be a fashionable journalistic method to report on one or two snippets only. In that, the Russian media sources are not helping us to help them. Here is an example.  Mr. Lavrov’s takeaway quote on being asked about Zelenski, is:  “He says many things, depending on what he drinks or what he smokes.”   RT decided to shorten that, and said:  “He says many things, depending on what he drinks.”   Incorrectly reporting even direct quotes does not serve the Russian cause.

Amarynth

Testimony Reveals Zelensky’s Secret Police Plot to ‘Liquidate’ Opposition Figure Anatoly Shariy

April 14th, 2022

Accounts from the Ukrainian SBU’s torture prison reveal Zelensky’s plot to assassinate exiled opposition figure and leading journalist Anatoly Shariy.

By Dan Cohen

Source

KIEV, UKRAINE — On March 7, Anatoly Shariy, a Ukrainian opposition figure and one of the country’s most popular journalists, received an email from Igor, an old acquaintance with whom he had not communicated for years (Igor is an alias used to protect his identity).

“Please help me find a place to live, suggest an apartment or an agent. I’m ready to do any work for you, whatever you say,” the email read.

“I realized that he was in the hands of the SBU,” Shariy told me, using the acronym for Ukraine’s domestic intelligence agency, notorious for its persecution of anyone accused of sympathy for Russia. “I understood whom I was talking to and did not particularly answer anything.”

Shariy suspected that the SBU wanted Igor to surveil him for an assassination attempt.

Four days later, Shariy received an email from a different address. This time, it was Igor, confirming Shariy’s suspicion that the first email had been written by an SBU agent. Igor explained that he had been interrogated and tortured for his ties to Russia.

“I realized that the SBU officers were preparing an assassination attempt on Anatoly and decided to agree to warn him that his life was in danger,” he told me in a phone call.

Shariy has lived in exile since 2012, having fled during the presidency of Viktor Yanukovych and received political asylum in the EU. His opposition to the 2014 Maidan coup d’etat grew his profile and made him a target of Petro Poroshenko, who came to power in its wake. The neo-Nazi movements he had exposed in prior years had gained serious political power and intensified their aggression against him. In 2015, Lithuanian media branded Shariy as a “favorite friend of Putin,” and the Lithuanian government soon revoked his asylum. Shariy, meanwhile, had sought protection elsewhere and relocated to Spain, where he has continued to grow into one of the most popular critics of President Volodymyr Zelensky.

However, his predicament has hardly improved. In 2019, Alexander Zoloytkhin, a former soldier of the neo-Nazi Azov Battalion, published the address and photos of the house where Shariy, his wife Olga Shariy and young child live, as well as photos of Olga’s car. Ukrainian neo-Nazis demonstrated outside his house and he received numerous death threats.

Today, he is a top target of the Kiev government, neo-Nazi paramilitaries, and the SBU.

‘I helped him to become the president’

Shariy began his career in journalism in 2005, first writing for women’s magazines, and then conducting investigations into Ukrainian oligarchs, organized crime, and neo-Nazi networks.

He became a well-known critic of the 2014 U.S.-orchestrated Maidan coup d’etat, using his YouTube channel video blog to amass an enormous online following. Today, he has nearly 3 million subscribers on YouTube, 340,000 on Facebook, and 268,000 on Twitter, becoming one of the country’s most popular journalists despite living outside its borders for a decade.

In 2019, months ahead of the presidential election, Shariy founded a center-right Libertarian political party, naming it after himself: The Party of Shariy. Appealing to young professionals and small and medium business owners, Shariy’s online popularity transformed him into an important player in building a coalition, consistently polling between three and six percent.

Shariy actively supported Zelensky during the campaign, attacking the incumbent Poroshenko. “I thought he [Zelensky] was determined to follow up on his election promises. I helped him to become the president. It’s true me and my team did anything for him to get the post,” Shariy told m

Shariy’s activists were effective in disrupting Poroshenko’s campaign events.

“We were following Poroshenko everywhere we went with his pre-election tour. There were so many people in each city and town organizing themselves in groups and asking Poroshenko hard questions,” Shariy recalled.

In one July 2019 event, Shariy’s supporters trolled Poroshenko’s campaign motto – “Army – YES, Language – YES, Faith – YES” – answering “Shariy” instead of “YES.”

But Zelensky’s carefully-crafted campaign image of a political outsider dedicated to stamping out rampant corruption – copy-pasted from his hit television series, “Servant of the People” – turned out to be a farce.

Zelensky cut deals with oligarchs and stacked his cabinet with the same figures he spent his campaign criticizing. He spurned the coalition-building efforts that typify Ukraine’s multi-party parliamentary democracy, preferring to cut backroom deals for votes. He even sided with his former bitter rival Poroshenko’s own party in Odessa’s 2020 municipal elections despite his famous quote during the pre-election debates when he told Poroshenko, “I AM YOUR VERDICT” – “Я – ваш приговор”.

“When I realized he was not intending to change anything, the corruption was the same or even worse, we changed our mind,” Shariy said.

Following Zelensky’s victory, he proceeded to eliminate state funding for parties that received under 5% of the vote in the elections. Shariy’s party, having received only 2.23%, was among those that were cut off.

Spurned by the new president who he helped get elected, Shariy publicly denounced Zelensky, remarking that he should “curtail their state funding and shove it up their ass.”

Zelensky betrayed his campaign promises of reform and meaningful progress in the Donbass stalemate, leading to a rapid decline in popular support. This left a niche open which was quickly filled by the Party of Shariy. While older voters traditionally supported Viktor Medvedchuk’s “Opposition Platform – For Life”, Shariy’s online presence and style appealed to younger generations.

On the ground, Party of Shariy activists began to protest Zelensky with the same tactics they had wielded in his favor against Poroshenko, appearing at his events and demanding his resignation.

As Shariy gained political capital and was even considered a possible contender for the presidency in a future election, the war of words between him and Zelensky turned into a bitter rivalry.

Zelensky lashed out at Shariy, accusing him of “trying to increase your rating at the expense of my rating, the rating of the president.”

Ukrainian journalist Yuri Tkachev, who was recently arrested by the SBU, commented that Shariy’s party is much stronger than the polls indicate. “It is strange to think that the government would spend so much energy on an insignificant opposition party. All this makes us think that their ratings are higher than they are trying to show us,” he remarked.

Hunting dissidents on a political ‘safari’

Throughout the election, the anti-Poroshenko antics of the Party of Shariy were met with severe violence from the president’s base, which included ultra-nationalists and neo-fascists. Some who dared to ask Poroshenko difficult questions were beaten. In Zaporizhzhya, a man’s car was set on fire and a woman was assaulted by Poroshenko himself.

This violence continued after Zelensky won the election and his rivalry with Zelensky intensified.

At a June 2020 demonstration in which Party of Shariy members demanded an investigation into the politically motivated attacks on their members, neo-Nazi groups attacked using smoke bombs and tear gas, followed by brawls inside the subway. Afterward, these groups announced a political “safari,” offering rewards for attacks on Party of Shariy members. This marked the escalation of violence meted out against the political opposition, especially targeting the Party of Shariy and its supporters.

In one incident, masked men beat a young man in Kharkiv, leaving him severely injured and hospitalized. In Vinnytsia, men from the neo-fascist group Edelweiss beat a party member in broad daylight, breaking his ribs and puncturing a lung. In another incident, a member of the U.S.-trained neo-Nazi Azov Battalion attacked a member inside their party office.

While members of his party were beaten in the streets and inside their offices, Shariy was under threat. On July 8, 2020, he accused Zelensky of ordering his assassination, publishing a confession given to Catalan Police by Zoloytkhin, the man who had published his address the year before. Zoloytkhin was wanted in Ukraine for numerous serious crimes, including participation in the 2016 kidnapping and beating of journalist Vladislav Bovtruk. Zoloytkhin confessed to police that top figures in the Zelensky government had instructed him to murder Shariy, and Shariy published a video confession from Zoloytkhin.

In February 2021, the SBU charged Shariy with treason, accusing him of “spreading Russian propaganda,” and summoned him to an interrogation by the SBU. After he declined to appear, he was put on the national wanted list.

Shariy is blacklisted on Myrotvorets (Peacemaker), an online database of what its owner declared “enemies of the state,” containing personal information and addresses. The blacklist is affiliated with the Ukrainian government and SBU and was founded by Anton Herashchenko, now an advisor to Ukraine’s Ministry of Internal Affairs. The site accuses Shariy of violating the sovereignty of Ukraine and financing terrorists.

Multiple figures were killed soon after their names were added to the list. On April 15, 2015, Oleh Kalashnikov, a politician from the pro-Russia Party of Regions, the party of ousted president Victor Yanukovych, was shot to death in Kiev. The next day, Oles Buzina, a prominent journalist and author who advocated for unity among Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia and campaigned to outlaw neo-Nazi organizing, was shot and killed near his apartment. The culprits were found to be Andrey Medvedko and Denis Polishchuk, neo-Nazis who had served in government and military positions – their confessions were published by Shariy. Yet Buzina’s murderers not only walk free but have received government funding.

The scene of Oles Buzina’s murder. Credit | Ruptly

Zelensky has opened numerous criminal cases against Shariy. He personally enacted sanctions against him, his wife Olga Shariy, and his wife’s mother, Alla Bondarenko. Shariy’s political party was banned in Zelensky’s sweeping March 20 decree that criminalized all opposition parties, accusing them of ties to Russia.

‘An ordinary person confesses at least to the murder of John F. Kennedy’

Prior to the Russian offensive, Shariy appeared often on Russian television, positioning himself as a neutral alternative to Zelensky and his regime of pro-EU neoliberals and neo-fascists. When Russian tanks rumbled across the Ukrainian border, he immediately denounced the invasion, calling the Kremlin foolish for invading a country that he believed would collapse on its own. Nonetheless, the threats against him intensified and Zelensky sought to eliminate Shariy from political life and kill him altogether.

On March 2, Ukrainian intelligence agents arrived at the Kiev home of Igor. The following is an account he gave to MintPress over the phone on April 7.

They took him into custody, handcuffing him and placing a sack over his head, then took him to a sports complex-turned temporary prison, connected to the main SBU headquarters, located in central Kiev between Vladimirskaya, Irininsky, Patorzhinsky, and Malopodvalna streets. Originally constructed as a Trade Union Palace following the Russian revolution, this building became the Bolshevik headquarters of Ukraine. Since 1938, it served as headquarters of the Gestapo during the Nazi occupation, the NKVD of the U.S.SR, and today, as a torture center for Russian prisoners of war and Ukrainians accused of having ties to Russia.

Inside the narrow underground rooms converted to an expansive state security complex, Igor says, SBU agents oversee members of the “Territorial Defense” – ultra-nationalist civilians and criminal elements who the government gave weapons in the streets in the first days of Russia’s offensive – as they beat, torture and even kill their prisoners.

Numerous prominent figures have been kidnapped and tortured by the Territorial Defense and the SBU. Among them are mixed martial arts fighter Maxim Rindkovsky, who was beaten on video and allegedly killed, Denis Kireev, the Ukrainian negotiator who was murdered after being accused of treason, and Volodymyr Struk, the Mayor of Kreminna, who was murdered after being accused of supporting Russia. Even Dmitry Demyanenko, former SBU head of the Kiev region, was shot dead in his car on March 10, accused of sympathy for Russia.

Russian MMA fighter Maxim Ryndovsky was captured by Ukrainian forces.

There is a horrifying video of him being tortured. I will not post it, but it's becoming a big story in Russia.

Authentic Ukrainian war crimes are now being used to justify escalating the war. pic.twitter.com/9xYrxJbSnn

— Clint Ehrlich (@ClintEhrlich) March 5, 2022

In fact, the SBU is a project of the CIA. Following the 2014 coup, the security service was headed by Valentin Nalyvaichenko, who was recruited by the CIA when he was the Consul General of Ukraine in the United States. The CIA reportedly has an entire floor in the SBU headquarters.

In November 2021, Zelensky appointed Oleksandr Poklad to head the SBU’s counterintelligence. A former lawyer and cop with ties to organized crime, Poklad is nicknamed “The Strangler” – ​​a reference to his favorite method of obtaining testimony from his victims. One article describes another torture method known as ‘The Elephant:’

“A gas mask is put on the victim of torture, and pepper tear gas from a spray can or a poisonous aerosol such as dichlorvos is launched into the gas mask hose. After such torture, an ordinary person confesses at least to the murder of John F. Kennedy.”

Shariy say Zelensky's SBU intelligence – which he likens to Hitler's SS – is using the Russian offensive as a pretext to carry out crimes.

"No one can help these people now." pic.twitter.com/1XsuuQqrUo

— Dan Cohen (@dancohen3000) March 20, 2022

The United Nations and Amnesty International have both documented SBU torture prisons.

The SBU also closely collaborates with neo-Nazi groups including Right Sector, Azov, and C14, which was contracted by the Ukrainian government to conduct street patrols.

‘A small Guantanamo’

Inside the sports complex-turned temporary torture prison, Igor says the sack over his head was replaced with a blindfold, leaving him only he could only see his legs.

A Ukrainian businessman who had long worked in transportation logistics – including stints in Moscow – a story typical of many Ukrainians, since returning to Kiev, Igor had maintained business ties to Moscow and Crimea, which had joined the Russian Federation after a successful referendum in 2014.

Several family members, including his mother, live in Russia and he regularly visited them until relations between the two countries reached a boiling point in 2021. “With the conflict between Russia and Ukraine and the events of February 24, my mother started to call me very often because she was very afraid of my status,” he told me.

Territorial Defense began to round up anyone suspected of sympathizing with Russia, as well as Ukrainians with cross-border ties, whether family or business.

Inside the makeshift prison, Igor says he identified 25 to 30 distinct voices of imprisoned men, and saw 10 to 12 men in Russian military uniforms, what he believes were prisoners of war. Two of the Russians were severely beaten in order to motivate the others to give on-camera testimony about their hate for Putin and opposition to the war.

Other detainees were religious people known for assembling at military installations to pray for peace and homeless people who had no way to abide by the evening curfew and were swept up by nighttime patrols.

While many of those inside the complex were kept for a couple of hours and released, others were severely beaten. “It was like a small Guantanamo,” Igor recalled.

Igor says that he was interrogated three times, with each session lasting between 15 and 30 minutes. The beatings were carried out by Territorial Defense volunteers while SBU officers instructed them on how to torture and asked him questions.

“They used a lighter to heat up a needle, then put it under my fingernails,” he told me. “The worst was when they put a plastic bag over my head and suffocated me and when they held the muzzle of a Kalashnikov rifle to my head and forced me to answer their questions.

But he says the suffering he endured was minor in comparison to the torture of the Russian prisoners of war, who were beaten with metal pipes while the Ukrainian national anthem played on repeat in the background. “I could hear it because all the torture was done in a nearby room. It was psychologically severe. This was done at night, the sounds of beatings were constant. It was difficult to sleep.”

Listening to conversations of other prisoners, Igor understood that two prisoners from Belarus were beaten to death, identifying one as a man named Sergey.

‘Like a Jew in Nazi Germany’

The existence of the torture prison was corroborated by an account I received from Andrey, a man with citizenship from Russia and a western European country (Andrey is also an alias to protect the identity of the source).

When he was first brought to the prison, Andrey recalls, he witnessed police beating what they told him was a Russian saboteur.

“It’s like mob justice, you know? You just find somebody that roughly fits the description and you take it out on him,” he said.

Tied to a chair, police repeatedly punched the man in the torso, the face, and back of the head as blood poured from his mouth.

“The police weren’t even interested in what he had to say. They would ask a question, he would start speaking slowly and they would hit him in the head,” he said. “They were taking out aggression and fear on him like a punching bag.”

Andrey says police threatened him with the same but he was spared because he held citizenship from a western European country. “I was told that If it wasn’t for my second passport, I’d be killed. I don’t know how much of that was to influence and scare me, or how much it was real,” he said.

During one interrogation, he says he was blindfolded, his hands were taped behind his back, and he was driven to an unknown location. After being taken into a building and up and down flights of stairs, he was thrown to the floor and kicked in the head.

Andrey recalls hearing ultra-nationalistic Ukrainian music in the prison. “Hard bass, electro, rock, rap – it was either to deprive us of sleep or to mask what was going on behind the music.”

Inside the prison, Andrey met Igor, who slept on an adjacent mat. He recalled being uncertain if Igor was an actual prisoner or if he was a plant that would attempt to extract information. In their brief exchanges, Andrey memorized a phone number Igor gave him and contacted him after he was released.

Andrey remains inside Ukrainian borders since his release, worried that the anti-Russia hysteria engulfing Ukraine could lead to his injury, or worse. “I’m like a Jew in Nazi Germany,” he told me.

The Ukraine Crisis with Dan Cohen and Scott Ritter

Dan Cohen is joined by former United Nations Weapons Inspector Scott Ritter to discuss the crisis in Ukraine.

Dan Cohen•Mar 1

They were very interested in his daily routine’

During Igor’s interrogation, SBU agents found contact information for his uncle, a former Soviet military officer. Believing that his uncle had influence in the Russian military, SBU agents called him to demand he facilitate an exchange of Igor for prisoners of the Snake Island incident.

When SBU agents found videos of Shariy on Igor’s phone, officers from a separate department were called in. From then on, they began to treat him better, removing his handcuffs and giving him larger quantities of food.

Igor’s connections to Shariy were minimal, limited to occasional contact via text message. In 2015, Shariy published a video about an incident in which Igor’s truck cargo was held for ransom by Aidar Battalion militants at a border crossing between Crimea and Ukraine.

Igor subsequently filmed interviews and events for Shariy, though they never met face to face. Nonetheless, SBU agents apparently saw Igor as an opportunity to gather sensitive information about Shariy’s habits.

Hours later, the chief officer came to interrogate him about materials and interviews he had worked on for Shariy. He was then given a blanket and allowed to sleep for two days.

After another interrogation, they instructed him to travel to Spain, where Shariy is taking refuge.  “Their main intention was that I would stay at Shariy’s side, assist him in preparing materials, and report to the officers what he is working on, what his status is, what his family is doing, what foods he eats, and where he shops. They were very interested in his daily routine, his movements, and people close to him. They wanted me to be as close as possible to him and at his side as often as possible.”

It was then that Igor realized Shariy’s life was in danger.

“As far as I understood, based on the information that I had to convey, the liquidation of Anatoly Shariy was being prepared, since he poses a danger to the government of Ukraine and criticizes the actions of the SBU, the government, and President Zelensky,” he told me.

The SBU told him an agent stationed in Spain would contact him after his arrival and provide him with further instructions.

Another department of the SBU notified his brother of his arrest, demanding a $1,000 bribe for his release. “For the SBU, this is just a way of making money. They were detaining people and asking for money in exchange,” he said. His brother paid the bribe on March 10, freeing Igor, though Igor’s car was confiscated as collateral. “There are many cases like this. They take civilian cars for the needs of SBU and the Ukrainian army.”

SBU agents had assured Igor that he would be able to pass through Ukrainian borders and enter the European Union, a nearly impossible task for Ukrainian males aged 18 to 60 who are subject to mandatory conscription.

After his release, Igor says he stayed in Kiev for ten days, resting and regaining his health. He then traveled to Transcarpathia, a region in Western Ukraine. Instead of following the orders of the SBU, Igor went to a different western European country. On April 2, he contacted Anatoly Shariy by email, informing him that he believes he is under threat.

“I warned Anatoliy Shariy that there could be an attempt to kill him in Spain.” Shariy understood that Igor’s call represented an extraordinary threat. “I was very tense with questions about the fact that he could be sent to me so that he could find out the places I visit, up to where I eat. The direction of these questions clearly indicates that they have the idea of ​​my physical elimination,” Shariy told me by email.

Now in an EU country, Igor is facing an uncertain future and is unable to return to Ukraine. “I am afraid, not only for my own life but for my relatives and my friends,” he says.

Medvedchuk’s face is clearly bruised, apparently a result of beatings from Zelensky’s SBU goons. Don’t expect any questions about this image to appear in the pages of the NYT or in CNN’s 24 hour media circus. Can’t allow anything to undermine the pro-war narrative. pic.twitter.com/A0qhhmeaj8

— Dan Cohen (@dancohen3000) April 12, 2022

With opposition leader Viktor Medvedchuk, bruised and apparently beaten, in the custody of SBU, the threat against Shariy is clear. He continues to receive death threats against him and his family, sometimes 100 per day, he says.

Left: “Look it’s your future.” Right: “I hope they will find you soon.” Screenshots courtesy of Anatoly Shariy

Dan Cohen is the Washington DC correspondent for Behind The Headlines. He has produced widely distributed video reports and print dispatches from across Israel-Palestine. He tweets at @DanCohen3000.

A History of NATO and Nazis, with Asa Winstanley

March 18th, 2022

Source

By Lowkey

Asa Winstanley explores post-WW2 European history and reveals how Nazis were rehabilitated and dispatched as Cold Warriors.

his week Lowkey is joined by Asa Winstanley, an investigative journalist living in London, who writes about Palestine and the Middle East. He hails from the south of Wales and has been visiting Palestine since 2004. He writes for the groundbreaking Palestinian news site The Electronic Intifada, where he is an associate editor, and also writes a weekly column for the Middle East Monitor.

Following the NATO Bucharest Summit in 2008, several conclusions were reached and published in a joint statement of those attending. One read: “NATO welcomes Ukraine’s and Georgia’s Euro-Atlantic aspirations for membership in NATO. We agree today that these countries will become members of NATO.”

At the time, the Russian government made absolutely clear that Ukraine becoming part of NATO was an existential threat to Russia’s security. In 2003, the Ukraine NATO Civic League was founded with the aim of gradually integrating the state into the military alliance. Across the decade-and-a-half since, the U.S. has pushed further and further, steering Ukraine to the point of no return.

Today, Russia has NATO missile systems pointed at it from Poland and Romania. If missiles were to be placed in Ukraine aimed at Russia, they would be only 500 km from Moscow. Asa Winstanley makes the point that, were someone to suggest an equivalent arrangement by Russia with Mexico against the United States, the U.S. would likewise respond with force. The economic side of this war has seen Russia cancel from the global economy and effectively separated from Europe. The closing of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline is a major victory for U.S. liquid natural gas producers, who can now take over the market for gas in Europe overnight.

Since 2019, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has integrated Neo-Nazis into the Ukrainian state to serve as a bulwark against Russia. We now have the clear situation of NATO arming and training Nazi organizations. But this is not an aberration of history. NATO and the United States have embraced Nazis many times before. Lowkey and Winstanley delve into the sordid story of these strange bedfellows. “This is a big unspoken part of our history,” Winstanley said.

Winstanley explores the post-WW2 period of European history and reveals examples of Nazis being rehabilitated, subsumed into the U.S. machinery of empire, and dispatched as Cold Warriors. He points to an irony of history that the Soviet Union itself tried to join NATO at one point:

If you look at the history of NATO, the Russians, the USSR at the time, knew what this was about — it was about creating an anti-Russian military alliance at the beginning of the Cold War. The Russians said OK, it is a defensive alliance, we’ll join. They applied to join and of course, they were rejected.”

Winstanley also expands on his investigation into Israel’s controversial arming of Ukraine’s Neo-Nazi Azov battalion with Taavor rifles. Another unspoken aspect of the present is the relationship between Ukrainian-Israeli oligarch Igor Kolomoisky and President Zelensky. Kolomoisky was his top funder in the 2019 election and also a key benefactor of the Azov battalion. Pointing out this uncomfortable truth has led to significant ramifications in the digital sphere. Winstanley, who is currently suspended from Twitter for pointing out the NATO alliance with Neo-Nazis, said, “We are reaching a really dangerous moment where this McCarthyism is being whipped up.”

Extremely important statements by Putin (MUST SEE!)

MARCH 07, 2022

As some of you know, Putin spoke at length with a group of Russian flight attendants.  This is such an important statement that I asked one of our interpreters (thanks E.!) to subtitle the video.  I am also posting the transcript below.  In this exchange, Putin spells out in quite some details WHAT Russia is doing and WHY she is doing it.
Andrei
PS: please press “cc” to see the English language captions

Putin explains the military situation and why Ukraine might lose its future

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijDurbjevnQ

Translated and subtitled by Eugenia

My question concerns the current situation in Ukraine. We all support your actions and the special operation that is underway there. Naturally, the most important question, which, one way or another, all of us have asked ourselves, is why this special operation has started. Could it not have been avoided? Rationally, we do understand and support your actions, but as women we cannot help but worry: for our family, relatives, for those who are in Ukraine. We know that the civilians are not impacted. But nevertheless, tell us, reassure us: what are we to expect at the end of this road? What will be the end result of the military operation in Ukraine?

I will be brief but still will have to start, as they say, from “the center of the field”. I said about this at the start of the operation and also spoke about this before this decision has been made, a hard decision, without a doubt.

What is this about? The fact of the matter is that after the anti-constitutional coup in Ukraine, which, unfortunately, was strongly supported by the Western countries – let us face it. They do not even hide the fact that they have spent $5 billion on it, not to mention cookies given away on Maidan, and so on. And after that, instead of bringing the situation back on track, even if it had spiraled out of control, even if it had been the act of the overzealous locals – there is such legal term, i.e. planned one thing, but the result turned out to be something else – they still could have, and should have, returned the situation back onto the political track.

Furthermore, shortly before the coup, the foreign ministers of the three countries came to Kiev in 2014 and signed an agreement with the Ukrainian government acting as guarantors of this agreement to ensure that the situation would be developing in the political sphere. But nothing like that occurred. They organized a coup d’état and supported the perpetrators. What followed were the well-known events related to the Crimea and the southeast of Ukraine, Donbass, where people refused to support the coup. As we know, the Crimea made a decision; people came to vote in a referendum to return to the Russian Federation. Naturally, yes, naturally, we cannot but support that decision, al the more so, since they felt they were in danger from the nationalists and neo-Nazis. There is strong evidence that they were absolutely right in that.

Later, or, rather, in parallel, the events in Donbass were taking place. What have these events led to? People resisting the results of the coup were persecuted. Eventually, the new Kiev authorities initiated a military operation on that territory. They have conducted two large-scale punitive operations using of heavy weapons and combat aviation. They directly attacked Donetsk destroying the city squares with aviation, using tanks and artillery. Both these military campaigns failed. The Ukrainian army suffered defeat. After that, so-called Minsk agreements, or the Package of Measures, to use the official term, have been concluded. The agreements offered a path for a peaceful settlement of the conflict.

We did everything we could to direct the events along this path, to restore the territorial integrity of Ukraine as well as to protects the interests of the people living in these territories. What did these people demand? Nothing but the basic things: the right to speak their mother tongue, i.e. the Russian, and maintain their traditions and culture. These were by no means extraordinary demands. But no. These territories were put under economic blockade; disconnected from the banking system; the supplies of food were stopped; the payments of the pensions and social assistance were suspended. Sometimes, some handouts were given, but in order to get those pensions and benefits a person had to cross the separation line.

Now listen. I will now say something that may sound rough but the situation compels me to say it. You know that occasionally in some regions packs of stray dogs attack people, injure or even kill them (this is a separate problem, and it is for the local authorities to deal with). But then these animals are poisoned or shot dead. But people of Donbass are not stray dogs. Approximately 13,000-14,000 people have been killed during these years. Over 500 children have been killed or injured. But what is particularly intolerable is that the so-called “civilized” West has preferred all these years to look the other way. All these years – 8 years! Eight years!

Moreover, lately the Kiev authorities started to say openly and publicly that they are not going to fulfill the Minsk agreements. They are saying this from the TV screens and online. They are saying this everywhere on the record: We don’t like them; we will not do it. And all this time, Russia has been accused of not fulfilling the agreements. This is simply nonsense; the theater of the absurd; white is called black and black is called white. Lately, things got even worse. Actually, the talk has started long ago, but intensified of late. More and more often we hear that Ukraine would be admitted into NATO. Do you understand what this could lead to? Or can lead to still?

If Ukraine is a NATO member, then according to the North Atlantic Treaty, all other members must support the country in case of a military conflict. No one besides us has recognized Crimea as a Russian territory. The yare conducting military operations in Donbas but also could move onto Crimea, and in such case we would have to fight with the whole of NATO. What is that? Do you understand the consequences? I think everyone understands.

Now they (Ukraine) are talking about acquiring the nuclear status, i.e. developing nuclear weapons. We cannot possibly ignore such things, particularly considering that we know how the so-called West behaves with regard to Russia. First, Ukraine has some nuclear competence left from the Soviet time. As far as enrichment and nuclear material are concerned, they would be able to organize that work. They have missile abilities: suffice is to mention Yuzhmush. This company used to build intercontinental ballistic missile equipment for the Soviet Union. They could recover that ability and do it. And those from across the ocean would even help them do it. And after that would say: “Well, we do not recognize the nuclear status; they have done everything themselves”. And then they would put these complexes under control, and from that moment on, from that very second, the fate of Russia will be completely different. Because in that case, our strategic adversaries would not even need intercontinental ballistic missiles. They would keep us right here at the nuclear gunpoint, that is all. How could we disregard such a thing? These are absolutely real threats, not some far-fetched silly fantasy.

Our boys who are now fighting and risking their lives, they are fighting and giving their lives for our future, for the future of our children. This is something perfectly obvious. And the people who do not want to understand that, particularly those among today’s leaders (of Ukraine), have to understand that if they keep doing what the have been doing – I have spoken about this before – they put at risk the very future of the Ukrainian statehood. If this happens, that will be entirely their fault.

What is going on now? I have already mentioned our objectives in this operation. First, of course, is to protect the people living in Donbass. How? By demilitarizing and denazifying Ukraine as well as establishing its neutral status. Why? Because the neutral status means Ukraine will not be joining NATO. They have it written in the Constitution that the country will be joining NATO. You understand – they have included that into the Constitution!

Denazification – what does this mean? I have spoken with my Western colleagues about this. They say:” What is the problem? You also have the radical nationalists”. Yes, we do. But we do not have them in the government, but everybody agrees that they (the Ukrainians) do. Perhaps, we have some idiots running around with swastika, but do we support that at the government level? Do thousands of people march with torches and swastikas on the streets of our capital or other cities in Russia, like it happened in 1930s in Nazi Germany? Is something like that happening in Russia? But it happens in Ukraine, and it is supported. Do we support those who killed the Russians, Jews, or the Poles during the war? Do we hail them as heroes? But in Ukraine, they do.

The current events are also very important. Look, the foreign citizens have been taken hostages in Sumy and Kharkov – over 6,000 young people, students. They have been driven together into a railway station and kept there for 3 days. Listen, they have been held there for the third day. We have told everybody about this and informed the current Ukrainian authorities. They said: “Yes, yes, of course, we will deal this this right now”. We have informed the leaders of the major European countries, I personally talked to them. “Yes, yes, we will put pressure on Ukraine right now”. We informed the UN Secretary-General: “Yes, yes, we will solve the problem right away”. Nobody is doing anything.

People who are considered the citizens of Ukraine are treated even worse. They are simply used as a human shield. Right now, in this very moment, this is happening in Mariupol. The Kiev government called our military: ”Provide humanitarian corridors so people could leave”. Naturally, our people instantly responded, even suspended the military activities, and were observing what was happening. But no one was allowed to leave. You understand, no one was allowed out. They do not anybody leave but instead use the people as a human shield. Who are they? The neo-Nazis, of course.

We already observe the presence of the militants from the Middle East and some European countries. We know about them; we can hear them speak on the radio. They are using so-called jihad-mobiles, i.e. cars stuffed with explosives, which they drive towards the Russian troops. But they do not achieve anything, and they will fail in the end. Who are they, then, if not neo-Nazis? By such actions, they are destroying their own country and their own statehood.

That is why one of our key demands is demilitarization. In other words, we are helping people of Donbass by working towards the neutral status of Ukraine and the demilitarization of the country. We have to know with certainty what weapons are there, where they are deployed, and who controls them. A number of options are on the table. We are discussing them now, including with the Kiev government representatives in our talks in Belarus. We are grateful to the President Lukashenko for organizing the meetings and helping us to conduct these negotiations. Our proposals are on the table for the groups of the negotiators from Kiev to study. We hope that Kiev will respond positively to our proposals. This is pretty much all I wanted to say.

Please, let us continue.

Schvidko, Yulia, the second pilot of the Aeroflot airline. Vladimir Vladimirovich, good afternoon. My question is about the current situation. Many rumors are circulating about possible introduction of the marshal law, drafting of volunteers and reservists, and that the draftees will be sent to Ukraine. Could you clarify whether the marshal law will be declared and whether the drafted soldiers will be deployed to Ukraine.

Many of what we now see and what is happening is undoubtedly a technique to fight against Russia. By the way, the sanctions imposed today are close to a declaration of a war. But fortunately, we are not there yet. I believe that our so-called “partners” still retain some understanding of what a war would mean and what danger it presents for everybody. That is despite that irresponsible statements, such as made by the British Foreign Minister, when she blurted that NATO could involve itself in the conflict. At that point, we had to immediately make a decision to put our strategic forces on high alert. They reacted by saying that they did not mean anything of the sort. However, nobody put the Minister in her place, and nobody disavowed her statement. No one said anything to us about that statement, like it was her personal opinion, do not pay attention, or something like that. Nothing. What are we supposed to think about that? That is why we reacted the way we did.

Now about your question. The marshal law is introduced by the order of the President supported by the Federation Council in the case of the external aggression, specifically in the regions where the military activity takes place. We are not in that situation now, and I hope will not be. This is first. The second point – there is also, in addition to the marshal law, a special status. This status is also declared by the Federation Council in case of a significant internal threat. The third regime is the state of emergency, which is usually declared in particular regions, although could also be adopted in the entire territory of the country. This regime is for technological and natural disasters. Thanks God, this is also not happening. We are not planning to declare any of these regimes on the territory of the Russian Federation. There is no need for that today.

We can see that attempts are being made to stir up trouble in our society, which is again a conformation of my words that we are dealing with not just the radicals but with the neo-Nazis. Here people are expressing their opinion about what they like or dislike in our action in Ukraine. But there, in Ukraine, people that express the opinions similar to those expressed by the so-called ‘liberal” part of our society, are being detained on the streets and shot – we do have confirmation of that. Our special services are now collecting this information and we will be presenting it soon. Our liberal intellectuals are protesting, whereas in Ukraine people that say anything in favor of Russia are been executed without trial.

I repeat, that the marshal law is declared in case of the external aggression, which I hope will not happen despite irresponsible statements of some officials. We hear that a no fly zone should be established over the Ukrainian territory. This is impossible to do in the territory of Ukraine itself; this is only possible to organize from the territories of the neighboring countries. However, we will consider any movement in this direction as active participation in the military conflict by a country, the territory of which is used to create danger for our servicemen. We will in a second consider them as a party to the military conflict. I hope this is also understood, and it will not come to that.

Only professional military personnel are taking part in this operation, officers and contract servicemen. Not a single drafted soldier is participating, and we are not planning to send them to Ukraine, and we will not. I repeat only men who have made a voluntary responsible decision in their lives – to defend their country – are in Ukraine, and they are doing their duty with honor. Why this is the case, why we have the right to say these words, I have just explained to you. This also applied to reserve personnel undergoing periodic military training – we are not planning to deploy them to Ukraine. They are summoned to the military training on the regular basis – this happens now and will be happening in the future – but we will not enlist these people for the active military service, and they will not participate in this conflict. We have sufficient resources to achieve our objectives employing only our professional army.

I would like to comment on the military operation itself. I know many rumors and stories are being circulating. I do not have much time to learn about this, but I have been informed that people talk a lot about what is happening and how the operation is proceeding. All analysts know what is going on, so I am not going to reveal any secrets here. We could have acted in many different ways. We could have helped the Donbass republics directly on the separation line, i.e. on the front, using our Russian army to support them. But in such case, considering the unconditional support by the West of the radical nationalists, the Ukrainian side would have received constant support by weapons, material, ammunition, and all.

That is why our General Staff and the Ministry of Defense decided on a different strategy. First that was done is the elimination of the military infrastructure. Not entirely, but largely. The weapon depots, ammunition depots, aviation, air defense systems. The destruction of the air defense systems requires certain time. You are civilians but you do work in aviation. You understand that these systems need to be uncovered and then destroyed; by now this work is largely done. That is what brings about the demands for a no fly zone. However, an attempt to put this into effect would lead to enormous and catastrophic consequences not only for Europe, but also for the entire world. I do believe that the people on the other side do understand that. That is why we have chosen this path, correctly, as it turned out. Our military is working responsibly doing everything possible to protect the civilians. Unfortunately, those neo-Nazi bandits do not have any consideration for the people. They even shoot their own servicemen who do not want to continue fighting – we do have evidence of that. Yes, those nationalists, neo-Nazis shoot their own servicemen. The nationalists are embedded in practically every Ukrainian military unit, several dozens of them in each, and they act in such a cruel way.

I repeat one more time: we will not deploy draftees or reservists to Ukraine to participate in this military operation. I am convinced that our army will achieve all our objectives. I do not doubt that for a second. This is evident from the way the operation is proceeding, which is strictly according to the plan, to the schedule; all is happening the way it had been planned by the General Staff. Oh, regarding volunteers, the young people who come to the recruiting stations – we are grateful to them for their patriotic sentiments, the desire to support their country and its army in this time. The very fact that they come is significant. However, their help is not required at this time. And I am convinced will not be needed. Now I am turning towards the camera. They will see me and hear what I am saying – thank you.

I’m A Proud American-Pole With Ukrainian Ancestry: Here’s Why #IStandWithRussia

25 FEBRUARY 2022

Source

By Andrew Korybko

As crazy as it may sound to some, Russia embodies my principles much more than the three governments associated with my triple identity. I can’t in good conscience support the American, Polish, and Ukrainian interpretations of this crisis since they’re based on false claims aimed at gaslighting the public into misperceiving Russia as the ‘aggressor’ when it’s really the US and its NATO allies like Poland that are exploiting Ukraine as a platform from which to attack Russia in the future.

The US-led Western Mainstream Media is waging an intense information warfare campaign against Russia’s ongoing special operation in Ukraine. One of the top narratives right now is that Americans, Poles, and Ukrainians don’t support Russia for whatever reason it is that they claim, usually one that’s predicated on false pretexts and due to the propaganda that they’ve been fed from their respective governments. While acknowledging that perhaps there’s some truth to that claim since everyone is of course entitled to their own views regardless of whether they’re based on facts or not, there’s a notable exception to this narrative, and that’s me personally.

I’m an American-Pole whose surname has Ukrainian ancestry and I very proudly stand with Russia. That’s because I’m keenly aware of the reality behind what’s happening as I’m also a Moscow-based political analyst who closely follows my host country’s foreign policy and have been doing so for most of my life actually even before I moved here in August 2013. I read President Putin’s “Expanded Meeting With The Defense Ministry Board” from 21 December, his “Security Council Meeting” and address to the Russian people from 21 February when he recognized the Donbass Republics as independent states, and his early Thursday morning address to the Russian people announcing his special operation in Ukraine.

From the objectively existing and easily verifiable facts that the Russian leader shared, I’m confident that “President Putin Didn’t Spark World War III, He Just Averted It!” The US and NATO were secretly establishing diverse military infrastructure in neighboring Ukraine – including air, land, and sea bases – for the purpose of advancing their grand strategic goal of neutralizing Russia’s nuclear second-strike capabilities. That would have placed the country in a perpetual position of nuclear blackmail vis-à-vis the US had it succeeded, but President Putin preemptively thwarted that scenario by commencing Russia’s ongoing special operation in Ukraine. I’m also very well aware of the immediate humanitarian motivations behind this campaign, too.

The indigenous Russian people of Donbass have been blockaded and bombed by Kiev for eight years already. Their lives have remained in peril this entire time, and if there’s one constructive critique about President Putin that even his most vehement supporters here all share in my experience over the years interacting with countless Russians from all echelons of society, it’s that he didn’t do enough to protect them. Instead, the Russian leader patiently opted for a diplomatic solution to the Ukrainian Civil War, hoping to resolve this very sensitive issue through political means instead of the military ones that he had at his disposal this entire time. After reading his article from last summer “On The Historical Unity Of Russians And Ukrainians”, I now know how much he sincerely cares about those fraternal people.

The last thing that President Putin wanted to do was inadvertently add fuel to the US’ infowar fire for further dividing Russians and Ukrainians in order to ultimately rule them both. He wisely knew that launching a humanitarian intervention at the onset of this crisis nearly a decade ago wouldn’t have been properly understood by the Ukrainian population at large that had been largely brainwashed by their Western-backed ultra-nationalist (fascist) “perception managers” into wrongly regarding Russia as “imperialist”. That’s not to say that all Ukrainians believed those lies, but just that plenty of them did or at least were very susceptible to it around the time that the “EuroMaidan” coup succeeded.

Immediately intervening would have fed into the false optics of so-called “Russian aggression” allegedly initiated to restore ousted President Yanukovich to power, which wasn’t Moscow’s intentions in either the soft power or political senses. Being as sensitive to the Ukrainian peoples’ concerns (including those that they’ve falsely come to believe due to foreign-backed propaganda campaigns emphasizing fascist narratives) as he is due to his expertise in understanding these fraternal people, President Putin patiently sought a diplomatic solution to the Donbass conflict over the past eight years. He truly didn’t want to do anything that could feed the US’ infowar campaign.

As time went on, though, he became increasingly pessimistic about the prospects of the Minsk Accords succeeding since Ukraine’s US-backed post-coup fascist authorities showed no sincere will to implement their international legal obligations that were endorsed by the UNSC in a relevant resolution passed in 2015. President Putin might also have thought that the Ukrainian people themselves would successfully reform their country’s power structure through peaceful political means but must have become despondent upon realizing the seemingly irreversible authoritarian trajectory that the country entered into in recent years following President Zelensky’s rise to power.

As Ukraine became nothing more than a US puppet state controlled by its overseer’s permanent military, intelligence, and diplomatic bureaucracies (“deep state”), President Putin realized that he could only resolve this crisis by dealing directly with America. That explains his proactive diplomatic outreaches to former US President Trump and incumbent President Biden, though both were for naught, which is attributable to the subversive influence of that country’s anti-Russian “deep state” faction. His last-ditch attempt at diplomacy came in December when he shared his country’s security guarantee requests with the US and NATO.

These called for legally binding agreements halting NATO’s eastward expansion, the removal of strike weapons from Russia’s borders, and a return to the continental military status quo enshrined in the now-defunct 1997 Russian-NATO Founding Act. Regrettably, the West didn’t sincerely negotiate with Russia, nor did it take that country’s security guarantee requests seriously. Realizing that war between them was unavoidable due to Russian intelligence’s confident assessment to that end as revealed by President Putin early Thursday morning and recalling how eerily similar the build-up to that scenario is to Hitler’s invasion of the USSR, President Putin felt compelled to take decisive action without delay.

Everyone’s entitled to their own views, but to me as a person who regards peace as the highest goal that all countries should strive towards, I feel morally obligated to support Russia’s preemptive move to avert World War III through its ongoing special operation in Ukraine. Like many, I would have preferred for there to be a diplomatic resolution to this undeclared US-provoked missile crisis in Europe but knew that it’s better for there to be a limited proxy conflict between Russia and NATO in Ukraine right now than to wait for a direct one between them sometime later down the line when it would obviously be much more deadly for everyone involved.

There are those who claim that all military actions are “aggressive” and that’s their personal right to think so, but sometimes military means must be employed for peaceful ends, especially when a country risks having its nuclear second-strike capabilities eventually neutralized and thus subsequently placed in a perpetual position of nuclear blackmail. If Russia would have “peacefully” submitted to the US like its critics wish happened, then there’s no doubt that this multiethnic federation would have then been dismantled through the most militant means possible after the West resumed its support of terrorist-separatist movements like those that it previously backed during the Chechen Conflict.

The amount of death and destruction that would have inevitably followed the Yugoslav-like “Balkanization” of the Russian Federation would have been many orders of magnitude greater than the impressively minimal collateral damage that’s thus far occurred throughout the course of Russia’s special operation in Ukraine. That’s not even to say what would have come afterwards with respect to China upon Russia’s “Balkanization”. America would then have assuredly turned its sights towards it in attempting to replicate the exact same sequence that would have then earlier succeeded against Russia.

The nuclear second-strike capabilities of the People’s Republic would have been neutralized, after which multidimensional Hybrid Wars would have been unleashed against it for “Balkanizing” this civilization-state of around 1.4 billion people. The horrors of World War II would have paled in comparison to the evils that the US would have been bound to unleash in such a terrifying scenario. By preemptively putting a stop to these genocidal plans for restoring the US’ declining unipolar hegemony over the plaent, President Putin quite literally saved billions of lives in the process.

I’m fiercely proud of my identity as an American-Pole with Ukrainian ancestry and believe that everyone should be proud of who they are too, but our ethnicities and nationalities don’t predetermine our political beliefs, nor should they ever. Thinking otherwise is literally fascist because it presupposes that political beliefs are transmitted through blood, which isn’t true. Those who thought such carried out the genocides of World War II on that false ethno-racial basis, believing as they wrongly did that doing so would “rid the world of the evils” supposedly associated with people of a given identity such as Jews, Slavs (including Poles such as myself), Roma, and many others.

There is no way that I as a fiercely proud Pole could ever accept someone demanding that I hold one or another political view on the basis of my ethnicity when our ancestors fought, suffered, and were even literally genocided by Nazi Germany due to our resistance to those debunked fascist ideas. In fact, an estimated 17-25% of the Polish population was exterminated during World War II. As an American citizen, I’m also very fiercely proud of our constitutionally enshrined freedom of speech that grants me the right to express my opinions about whatever it may be, including contrarian ones that contrast with my own government’s interpretation of events. Those who want to deny me that are thus un-American.

As for the Ukrainian angle of my identity, I fully support President Putin’s treatise on our historical unity with our fraternal Russian brothers. I’m obviously aware of various Polish and Ukrainian narratives about our peoples’ relations with Russia across the centuries and understand why my co-ethnics might feel a certain way, but I don’t believe that the problems of the past should stain the promise of our future. Reconciliation is an importance principle in my life and I believe that all of our people should focus more on working together with Russia than on obsessing over our supposed differences. I also don’t believe it’s fair to blame the Russian Federation for what the USSR and Imperial Russia did.

All that I want is for the three most prominent parts of my identity – American, Polish, and Ukrainian – to pragmatically cooperate with Russia in the interests of peace, prosperity, and stability. We all gain much more by working together than feuding. The US shouldn’t have sought to use Ukraine as an impending platform from which to attack Russia with the rest of NATO, including Poland, sometime in the coming future. Russia has legitimate national security red lines that must be respected. The failure to do so prompted it to decisively react to the imminent threat that the US-led West poses to it from Ukraine. I’m personally very thankful that President Putin commenced his special operation there.

I can’t imagine what would have happened in the next few years had he not done so and the US eventually succeeded in neutralizing Russia’s nuclear second-strike capabilities. World War III would likely have broken out with time as NATO’s tanks rolled over the Russian border from Ukraine, the US intercepted most Russian missiles launched in self-defense at America, and Moscow was thus forced to nuke the most massive invasion army since Hitler while still on its territory out of sheer desperation. This could even have been preceded by the Hybrid War-driven “Balkanization” of Russia that was earlier explained. Countless people would have died, and that’s not even considering those in China afterwards.

It’s for these reasons why I as an American-Pole with Ukrainian ancestry have nothing but pride in standing with Russia during its ongoing special operation. As crazy as it may sound to some, Russia embodies my principles much more than the three governments associated with my triple identity. I can’t in good conscience support the American, Polish, and Ukrainian interpretations of this crisis since they’re based on false claims aimed at gaslighting the public into misperceiving Russia as the “aggressor” when it’s really the US and its NATO allies like Poland that are exploiting Ukraine as a platform from which to attack Russia in the future. In all sincerity, I’m truly thankful for Russia’s operation.

Russian options in the LDNR – my personal take

February 18, 2022

Okay, this will be a short bulletpoint reminder of how I see the Russian position and options in response to the Ukronazis attack.

First, a few key assumptions:

• Russia does not want to invade/liberate the Ukraine
• Russia would prefer not to get openly involved in the LDNR
• The best outcome for Russia would be for the LDNR to be able to hold without overt Russian support
• Throughout this entire battle, Russia will always prefer to do less than to do more.

Next, here is a summary of how I expect Russia to act in the next couple of days:

Event	Consequence	Russian option
Ukronazi shelling but not ground attack	Civilian casualties and infrastructure destruction	Let the LDNR handle it while reporting about this at home
Ukronazis attempt to move ground forces across the LOC	Risk to the LDNR defenses	Ideally, Russia would only use “indirect” means such as counter-battery fire, strikes on advancing Ukronazi forces, EW.
Ukronazis forces break through the LDNR defenses	Potential existential risk to the LDNR	Imposition of a no-fly zone, sustained artillery/rocket attacks on Ukie forces
Full scale Ukronazi attack	Existential threat to the LDNR	Russia moves her forces into the LDNR and stops it all.

Notice that in all the scenarios above, Russia does not initiate a fullscale attack on the Ukraine.

Why?

Because the decision to launch a fullscale attack on the Ukronazi state would be based not on events along the LOC (line of contact) but upon a much “bigger picture” of what the West might, or might not do, in the Ukraine and the rest of Europe.

In other words, the problem of the LDNR is separate from the much greater problem of the future security arrangement of Europe.

Also, another much needed reminder: when does it makes sense to negotiate with your enemies?

• Not when you “trust” them.
• Not when you hope to “convince” them.
• Not when you hope to “show a peaceful face” to the general public.

No, it makes sense to negotiate with your enemy when:

• You hope to achieve more by negotiations then by using military force.
• Time is on your side.
• When you need to buy more time (for whatever reasons).

The US and its EU colonies have been predicting a Russian intervention for months now.  That intervention has not happened (yet) and this is driving the leaders of the West into total despair.  This is good for Russia and that is how she wants to keep the situation for as long as possible.

I am personally convinced that the only way to solve both the specific LDNR option and to create a new security architecture in Europe will have to be achieved by Russian unilateral military operation: the folks in the West need yet another military defeat to come back to their senses (they need one about every century or so).  If the Russians also see that as inevitable, they still have two things they need to do first:

• To delay an open intervention as much as possible in order to subvert the western narrative
• To engage in what could be called the “psychological preparation of the theater of operations” which, in plain English, to create such a level of anger in the LDNR and also inside Russia that the public opinion will DEMAND an intervention.

There WILL be real negative economic and political repercussions for Russia when she intervenes.  Thus it is vital for Putin and the government to create such a political dynamic inside Russia that the Russian people will not only support an intervention, but DEMAND one.  Then, when the western “sanctions from hell” are imposed, the people will not blame Putin for the very real price Russia will have to pay to prevail.

Right now, you could say that the Russian bear has been awoken by all the noise, it has come out of its lair and is just looking.  Just that has the entire West in a state of total panic.

Good.

But when that bear will actually attack will not be decided by anyone but that bear.

The Ukies have declared on numerous occasions that they will not implement the Minsk Agreements.  That is very good.

Now their attack on the LDNR seems to show that the Ukies now want to provoke a Russian response.  This is also very good, as the level of public outrage on the RuNet and even on Russian TV has gone through the roof.  The Russian PSYOP preparation of the battlefield is progressing in the right direction.

As for the LDNR defenses, they seem to be holding, but the real, major, Ukie ground offensive has not begun yet!

That is the next thing we need to look for: a Ukie ground attack.  Specifically, we don’t need to worry primarily about the initiation of that coming Ukie attack, but what it yields in the first 4-6 hours or so.  Once the Ukies are fully committed, then they become a legitimate target for counter-strikes.

So this is The Big Question now: will the LDNR defenses hold?

==>>So this is the key thing to observe is this: is the LOC moving and, if yes, how far and how fast?<<==

My personal guess is that yes, they will, which will leave only two options to the Ukronazis:

• Give up
• Launch a massive, full-scale attack

The latter is much more likely than the former.

And, in the meantime, the pain dial for the West is slowly turning up pretty much on all fronts.

So for Russia it makes sense to let that process take as long as possible before deciding to interrupt it and overtly intervene.

I hear one argument: what about the innocent civilians murdered in the LDNR?

What about them?

Does anybody seriously think that a Russian intervention will result in less casualties than what is currently taking place?

The horrible truth is that loss of life will happen no matter how the situation evolves.  So the only real choice is not “save civilians or let them die” the choice is “make sure that every civilian death counts”.  Sound cynical?  It is, but that is the reality of real warfare (as opposed to the Hollywood & Tom Clancy nonsense folks in the West are brainwashed with since birth).

So, to all those who are constantly demanding that Russia intervene *now* and who don’t understand why Lavrov agreed to meet with Blinken, I will say this: do not project your own emotions and reactions unto Putin or, if you prefer, the “Russian bear”.  The Russians did not create the biggest country on earth and defeated all their enemies by being naive or by being unable to calculate when/how to react against a foreign aggression.

If you think that you know better, good for you, just don’t expect Putin to act the way you would in the same situation.

Lastly, there is something morally repugnant in the attitude of those who see warfare as anything but the weapon of last resort.  Christ said “blessed are the peacemakers” not “blessed are the warmakers”.  Yes, as I said, I believe that Russia will have to intervene, openly and directly.  But I also believe that Putin will wait as much as possible.  That is not only operationally wise, it is morally correct.

Andrei

ADDENDUM: I remember how the western media said that the city of Sarajevo was “intensively shelled” by the Serbs.  Utter nonsense!  These folks simply don’t understand modern warfare.  When a shell lands every few minutes or so this is NOT any “intense artillery fire”.  Now, when an area the size of one, or even several, football field instantly goes up in flames, that is a serious artillery strike.  What we see as of right now in the LDNR is what could be called “disturbing fire”.  When the Ukies used de-mining vehicles yesterday that could be part of a preparation for a ground assault.  This has NOT happened YET.  As for a ground assault, so far the Ukies have only sent in special forces and, apparently, they got detected, took casualties, and had to retreat.

All this is way below the threshold at which Russia will have to intervene.