Kara-Murza: Death would be too mild a punishment for Putin

Kara-Murza: Death would be too mild a punishment for Putin

Post By World Russia, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Russian dissidents, Russian politics, Vladimir Putin

One of the best-known prisoners freed in a major exchange this summer spoke out about what he envisages for Russia’s future.

“At first I thought they were going to shoot me, then it was like in a very good film.”

Speaking in Berlin, Russian opposition activist Vladimir Kara-Murza reflected on his release from Russian prison this summer as part of the largest prisoner exchange between Western countries and Moscow since the end of the Cold War.

In a brick building resembling a medieval castle, he told his audience of his time in prison in the Siberian city of Omsk and his plans to rebuild Russia from exile.

Kara-Murza is relatively safe now. Yet, when he left Russia, he received a warning not to tell “too much”.

“You know what can happen otherwise”, he was told. But he is now a free man, and told his supporters in the dimly lit dungeon-like hall that it all seems simply surreal.

The atmosphere around his detainment and release is reminiscent of Russia of the 1950s. During Josef Stalin’s last years in power, the so-called “intelligentsia” — Russia’s intellectual elite, to which Kara-Murza’s ancestors also belonged — met in secret to discuss topics that were strictly forbidden and for which one could easily be sent to the gulag.

In April 2022, he was arrested and sentenced to 25 years in prison for treason and spreading false information about the Russian army. At that time, he did not believe he would ever get out alive.

“In prison, cats were my only interlocutors,” said Kara-Murza, describing his everyday life in solitary confinement, where he served most of his two-and-a-half-year prison sentence.

In the entire time he was in prison, he spoke to his wife only once and his children twice. Sitting in his tiny prison cell, he often had no choice but to stare at a blank wall.

“You can go mad”, he said. “You start to forget words.” In order not to lose his mind completely, he ordered a book from the prison’s local bookshop and started learning Spanish.

Free at last

When he was suddenly escorted out of prison, Kara-Murza’s first thought was that the guards were going to shoot him. But everything unfolded differently. From Tomsk, he flew directly to Moscow and from there, to Ankara.

He did not realise he was part of a prisoner exchange until he and other prisoners were brought to the buses that would take them to a Moscow airport.

There, he met familiar faces, among them the Russian opposition politician Ilya Yashin, who was also freed from incarceration. “You look like crap,” Yashin told him as they met again for the first time in two and a half years.

(Yashin was in the front row among the spectators in Berlin, smiling as Kara-Murza told the story.)

When he arrived in Ankara, a woman passed Kara-Murza a phone. On the other end was US President Joe Biden.

“When I was in solitary confinement, I hardly had any contact with people. I hardly had spoken a word in Russian for two and a half years, let alone in English”, Kara-Murza laughed.

When he heard the voices of his wife and children again for the first time in a long while, he was utterly overwhelmed. Something completely unbelievable was happening.

Old mistakes

Kara-Murza was recently welcomed to Germany by Chancellor Olaf Scholz. The two men talked about the future of Russia and the thousands of political prisoners who are still behind bars in Russia and Belarus, serving their prison sentences under the harshest conditions — and about Russian civil society, which Kara-Murza wants to help build up from exile.

He wants to give voice to those Russians who “do not want to live in an archaic, isolated authoritarian pseudo-empire, but in a civilised European state”.

“The only thing needed for the triumph of evil is for good people to do nothing, Alexei Navalny always liked to say,” Kara-Murza recalled. “I stand behind every word. Every totalitarian system only exists with the support of the ordinary people.”

But how did Russia end up becoming the restrictive country it is today?

According to Kara-Murza, this is due to two mistakes made in the 1990s. One mistake came from within the country, and one from the outside. Russia’s mistake, he says, was a failure to come to terms with its past.

“If the evil is not condemned and punished, it will return,” Kara-Murza explained. “All the countries that have successfully mastered the path from totalitarianism underwent a moral catharsis. Germany was forced to do so after 1945. Later, people were allowed to look into archives and deal with the issue.

“This never happened in Russia.”

The other mistake, he said, was made in the West. Other Eastern European countries had a much easier time recovering from their Soviet past and forming democracies because they received a powerful stimulus from the outside. They received the opportunity to become a part of Europe again. But in the 1990s, the West was not yet ready to accept and integrate a democratic Russia.

“Of course, Russia must learn its lessons. But it is just as important that the West is ready to accept a new, democratic Russia that has learnt from its mistakes. Russia inseparably belongs to Europe. Both culturally and mentally.

“If our goal is a peaceful, free and united Europe, then this is only possible with the participation of a peaceful and free Russia.”

‘Death would be too lenient a punishment’

Russia is a multi-ethnic country, But it has yet to become “a truly federal state”, Kara-Murza emphasized. Many Russians fear that Russia could fall apart like the Soviet Union did and therefore support an authoritarian leadership.

“I don’t think there will be such a fragmentation,” Kara-Murza said. To him, it seems more likely that there will be stronger regulation mechanisms and laws that will protect the identity of ethnic minorities in the country.

What the individual regions should be allowed to do, he says, is to speak their native language and teach it to their children in schools.

“Russia is now pursuing a centralised policy. This is wrong.”

To achieve this and other freedoms within Russia, Vladimir Putin would need to relinquish his power.

“Maybe Russia will be free when he finally dies,” someone from the audience remarks. However, Kara-Murza wants Putin to be healthy.

“I want to see him in the dock. I want him to take responsibility for everything he has done in 25 years.

“I know that he will answer for his sins.” said Kara-Murza, pointing his index finger upwards, “but I want him to be held accountable here too. He must take responsibility for Nemtsov, for Navalny, for the Ukrainian children who were killed. Death would be too lenient a punishment.”

Truth and hope

According to Kara-Murza, everyone can contribute to a free Russia. “There is enough work for all of us,” Kara-Murza promised.

“It is important to maintain dialogue, to talk to people and to convince them, so that later, when Russia is ready to change, everything that has been destroyed in the last 25 years can be restored,” he said. “We cannot allow ourselves to lose the connection to our beloved Russia — the Russia of Boris Nemtsov and Alexei Navalny”.

Meanwhile, Kara-Murza dreams of visiting the city of Tomsk, where he spent such a long time in prison.

“It’s a strange dream”, he admitted. He has been to many Siberian cities but had never seen Tomsk outside his tiny prison cell, where he received thousands of letters every month.

“In their letters, people always asked me why I was so optimistic, why I had hope. I always replied that I don’t hope, I know. The truth is on our side.”

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#KaraMurza #Death #mild #punishment #Putin

Hybrid attacks: Is Russia already at war with the West?

Post By World German army, Germany, Russia, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine

This article was originally published in German

Experts warn that politicians need to take Russia’s so-called “hybrid war” more seriously and populations should be better prepared.

Since the start of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 the war has been reported on daily. At the same time Russia is waging a second war that is making fewer headlines.

Russia’s so-called “second war” is directed against the West. “It is a war against (a Western) democratic model,” says Eastern Europe expert Franziska Davies.

Difficult to define, features of what experts have called Russia’s “hybrid war” include everything that does not involve direct military confrontation. According to Davies, actions carried out by Russia have one unifying goal: to weaken and destabilise the West.

One example of Russia’s hybrid warfare is the uncovered plot to assassinate the CEO of Rheinmetall, a German automotive and arms manufacturer based in Dusseldorf earlier this month. The plot, first reported by US broadcaster CNN, was one of a broader plan to attack executives at European defence companies that manufacture weapons delivered to Ukraine.

“What Russia is ultimately striving for is a Europe where Russia can enforce its goals regardless of international rules and laws. A Europe in which Russia can exercise power by force,” explains Franziska Davies from Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in Munich.

The threat of online fake news

Experts say Russia’s hybrid war is made up of several strategies: hacking, attacks on individuals or disinformation and fake news. “We are all targets of these campaigns to influence information,” says Tapio Pyysalo, Head of International Relations at the European Centre for Countering Hybrid Threats.

Before the European elections in June, there was a coordinated attempt to share targeted pro-Russian, anti-vaccine and anti-LGBTQ campaigns on social media.

The Dutch private research instituteTrollrensics found that a large disinformation campaign in Germany promoted and shared content in favour of the far-right German political party Alternative for Germany (AfD).The company suspects that the bots behind this content come from Russian or pro-Russian circles.

Although many European countries have improved their security measures against hybrid attacks since Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014, Estonian expert Pyysalo warns that as countries would be better prepared to face threats if they shared data with one another. Such data sharing, however, often runs counter to individual countries national security laws.

“What democratic states still need to do is generally strengthen their legislation to close gaps that are used by hybrid actors,” Pyysalo said.

How to recognise disinformation?

What needs to happen on a daily basis and what everyone can do is recognise fake news and not spread it, says Pyysalo. “Everyone should play a role in verifying information and making sure that everything they spread is based on facts and not disinformation narratives.”

It helps that disinformation campaigns spread by Russia often follow similar patterns, explains Dr Frank Sauer, security policy expert at the Bundeswehr University Munich.

“It doesn’t matter whether it’s about the MH17 downing or the bombing of the children’s hospital in Kiev: it’s always first said that it was insane, then it was the others and in the end it’s: ‘Okay, it was us, but they deserved it'” Sauer said.

Experts say that to expose disinformation campaigns, it is worth checking whether other media outlets independently verify the information shared. It is also important to check the source of the news, such as which social media profile it originated from.

A Ukrainian Ministry of Defence manual on debunking fake news points out that the usernames of X profiles are often random combinations of numbers, and fake profiles often use old or randomly selected images directly from Google results.

According to Sauer, the aim of Russia’s disinformation is: “To leave people feeling powerless and convinced that they can never know the truth anyway.”

However, hybrid attacks can extend beyond the online sphere. Estonian hybrid threat expert Tapio Pyysalo, says that critical infrastructure in the rest of Europe could also be targeted by Russia, much like Russian attacks on energy infrastructure in Ukraine.

He does not want to cause concern, but “people should be prepared for all kinds of disruptions, for example in the supply of critical services or critical food.”

Pyysalo summarises: “Be prepared for the worst, but of course hope for the best.”

Germany’s “nightmare scenario”

In Germany, Europe’s biggest economy and a target for multiple attacks suspected to be from Russia, the worst – the “absolute nightmare scenario” – is what Frank Sauer calls a total power blackout.

“The general population is not well prepared for such situations. We simply assume that the weather will always be pleasant, the water will come out of the tap and there will be food in the supermarket,” explains Sauer.

The German Federal Office of Civil Protection and Disaster Assistance has taken steps to draw up supply lists, advising people to stock up on enough food for ten days and two litres of liquid per person per day. As part of its advice, an emergency first-aid kit should be available and important documents should be stored to be taken with you quickly in an emergency.

Need to build up civil resistance

In such possible exceptional situations, Sauer maintains that building up civilian resistance is more important than strengthening the military.

The German security expert explains: “We basically need reserves of people who can help in an emergency. We need people who can stack sandbags and get the emergency generators out of the hall and start them up.”

In Germany, the aim should be to ensure that “in an emergency, we can organise things so that everyone has a warm blanket, children have a corner to play in, we have emergency power generators where mobile phones can be charged and someone can cook soup.”

Sauer emphasises that this is not only important in the event of external attacks on the infrastructure; power outages can also be triggered by the climate crisis.

His hope is “that there is a broad social consensus that we as a society should invest money, but also time.” He is talking, for example, about citizens spending twelve months at the Federal Agency for Technical Relief, the fire brigade, the Red Cross or even the German Armed Forces. “So that I know what to do if something breaks down in my community or neighbourhood.”

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#Hybrid #attacks #Russia #war #West

Russia’s Putin says Ukraine’s incursion into Kursk is an attempt to stop Moscow’s eastern offensive

Post By World peace talks between Russia Ukraine, Russia, russia evacuates citizens ukraine attack, Russia Ukraine war, Russia-Ukraine conflict, Ukraine

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Monday (August 12, 2024) that the Ukrainian army’s incursion into the Kursk region, which has caused more than 100,000 civilians to flee and embarrassed the Kremlin, is an attempt by Kyiv to stop Moscow’s offensive in eastern Ukraine’s Donbas region and gain leverage in possible future peace talks.

Russian forces are still scrambling to respond to the surprise Ukrainian attack after almost a week of fierce fighting, but Mr. Putin insisted Moscow’s army will prevail.

Speaking at a meeting with top security and defense officials, Mr. Putin said, “the attack that began August 6, 2024 appeared to reflect Kyiv’s attempt to gain a better negotiating position in possible future talks to end the war.”

He argued that Ukraine may have hoped to cause public unrest in Russia with the attack, adding that it has failed to achieve that goal, and claimed that the number of volunteers to join the Russian military has increased because of the assault. He said, “the Russian military is driving on with its eastern Ukraine offensive regardless.”

Also Read: President Volodymyr Zelenskyy acknowledges Ukraine’s military operation in Russia

“It’s obvious that the enemy will keep trying to destabilise the situation in the border zone to try to destabilise the domestic political situation in our country,” Mr. Putin said.

Acting Kursk Governor Alexei Smirnov reported to Mr. Putin that Ukrainian forces had pushed 12 kilometers (7.5 miles) into the Kursk region across a 40-kilometer (25-mile) front and currently control 28 Russian settlements.

Mr. Smirnov said that 12 civilians have been killed and 121 others, including 10 children, have been wounded in the operation. “About 121,000 people have been evacuated or left the areas affected by fighting on their own,” he said.

“Tracking down all the Ukrainian diversionary units roaming the region is difficult,” Mr. Smirnov said, noting that some are using fake Russian IDs.

The Governor of the Belgorod region adjacent to Kursk also announced the evacuation of people from a district near the Ukrainian border, describing Monday (August 12) morning as “alarming” but giving no detail.

Ukrainian forces swiftly rolled into the town of Sudzha about 10 kilometers (6 miles) over the border after launching the attack. They reportedly still hold the western part of the town, which is the site of an important natural gas transit station.

The Ukrainian operation is taking place under tight secrecy, and its goals — especially whether Kyiv’s forces aim to hold territory or are staging hit-and-run raids — remain unclear. The stunning maneuver that caught the Kremlin’s forces unawares counters Russia’s unrelenting effort in recent months to punch through Ukrainian defenses at selected points along the front line in eastern Ukraine.

Russia has seen previous incursions into its territory during the nearly 2 1/2-year war, but the foray into the Kursk region marked the largest attack on its soil since World War II, constituting a milestone in the hostilities. It is also the first time the Ukrainian army has spearheaded an incursion rather than pro-Ukraine Russian fighters.

The advance has delivered a blow to Mr. Putin’s efforts to pretend that life in Russia has largely remained unaffected by the war. State propaganda has tried to play down the attack, emphasising the authorities’ efforts to help residents of the region and seeking to distract attention from the military’s failure to prepare for the attack and quickly repel it.

Kursk residents recorded videos lamenting they had to flee the border area, leaving behind their belongings, and pleading with Mr. Putin for help. But Russia’s state-controlled media kept a tight lid on any expression of discontent.

Retired Gen. Andrei Gurulev, a member of the lower house of the Russian parliament, criticized the military for failing to properly protect the border.

“Regrettably, the group of forces protecting the border didn’t have its own intelligence assets,” he said on his messaging app channel. “No one likes to see the truth in reports, everybody just wants to hear that all is good.” The combat inside Russia rekindled questions about whether Ukraine was using weaponry supplied by NATO members. Some Western countries have balked at allowing Ukraine to use their military aid to hit Russian soil, fearing it would fuel an escalation that might drag Russia and NATO into war.

Though it’s not clear what weapons Ukraine is using across the border, Russian media widely reported that U.S. Bradley and German Marder armoured infantry vehicles were there. It was not possible to independently verify that claim.

Ukraine has already used U.S. weapons to strike inside Russia. But Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said in an interview published on Monday (August 12, 2024) that the weapons provided by his country “cannot be used to attack Russia on its territory”.

Meanwhile, German Defence Ministry spokesperson Arne Collatz said on Monday (August 12, 2024) that legal experts agree that “international law provides for a state that is defending itself also to defend itself on the territory of the attacker. That is clear from our point of view, too”.

Russia’s Defence Ministry said on Monday (August 12, 2024) that reinforcements sent to the area backed by air force and artillery had fended off seven attacks by Ukrainian units near Martynovka, Borki and Korenevo during the previous 24 hours.

The Ministry said, “Russian forces also blocked an attempt by Ukrainian mobile groups to forge deep into the Russian territory near Kauchuk.”

“Russian air force and artillery also struck concentrations of Ukrainian troops and equipment near Sudzha, Kurilovka, Pekhovo, Lyubimovo and several other settlements,” it said. “Warplanes and artillery hit Kyiv’s reserves in Ukraine’s Sumy region across the border,” it added.

Pasi Paroinen, an analyst with the Finland-based Black Bird Group open-source intelligence agency, which monitors the war, said the toughest phase of Ukraine’s incursion is likely to begin now as Russian reserves enter the fray.

Ukraine’s progress on Russian territory “is challenging the operational and strategic assumptions” of the Kremlin’s forces, according to the Institute for the Study of War. It could compel Russia to deploy more military assets to the long border between the two countries, the Washington-based think tank said in an assessment late Sunday (August 11, 2024).

It described the Russian forces responding to the incursion as “hastily assembled and disparate”.

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#Russias #Putin #Ukraines #incursion #Kursk #attempt #stop #Moscows #eastern #offensive

What’s behind Carles Puigdemont’s seven-year exile?

Post By World Carles Puigdemont, Catalonia, Russia, Spain, Spanish politics

A wildcat referendum on independence and stories of dubious Russian connections saw the Catalan leader flee the country. Now, he’s back — and elusive as ever.

After nearly seven years on the run, exiled separatist Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont has returned to Spain, flying in the face of a warrant out for his arrest.

His return comes seven years after Catalonia’s unauthorised independence referendum, a vote that was not sanctioned by Spanish authorities and which attracted a notorious police crackdown.

Not long after that incident, Puigdemont smuggled himself out of the country in the boot of a car to avoid arrest, setting himself up in Brussels as successive Spanish governments sought to have him extradited to stand trial.

Earlier this week, Puigdemont posted a letter on social media network X, followed by a video, stating he intends to come back to Spain to prevent the Catalan parliament from voting in favour of a socialist-led regional government.

This prompted speculation on how he intends to enter the country despite the warrant. However, his brief appearance at his party Junts-organised rally in Barcelona on Thursday left many feeling like they’d seen a ghost of Spain’s unresolved past.

Guess who’s back

Puigdemont, who started out as a journalist for Catalonia’s pro-independence newspaper El Punt, claims to have always been in favour of the rich Spanish region’s independence.

While he enjoyed professional success, rising through the ranks of El Punt to become its editor-in-chief and later founding the Catalan News Agency, his first trouble with the law came during the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, when he was arrested for participating in an organisation supporting Catalan nationalists.

His first foray into politics saw him join the Catalan nationalist coalition Convergence and Union, successfully contesting the election results to enter the regional parliament from Girona.

A two-time mayor of Girona, Puigdemont ran the Association of Municipalities for Independence and was then chosen as pro-Catalan independence parties’ last-minute replacement for corruption-plagued Artur Mas as the region’s next president in 2016.

Known for staunch separatist stances, Puigdemont caused upheaval as the first Catalan president to refuse to take the oath of loyalty to Spain’s constitution and the monarch — standard practice prior to his appointment.

But the real trouble was only beginning to brew.

In October 2017, during his second year in office, Puigdemont decided to respond to increasingly heated exchanges with Madrid by cooking up legislation that would allow Catalonia to organise a referendum on its independence, contravening the country’s constitution.

The conservative government of Mariano Rajoy, reeling from the move, put into effect a much-criticised Operation Anubis, a sprawling police action meant to prevent the referendum and restore constitutional order.

Instead, things spiralled out of control: as Guardia Civil, or Civil Guard —the country’s gendarmerie — raided a number of Catalan government offices and other locations in the run-up to the referendum, sparking protests and strikes that ended up in clashes and arrests, and general pandemonium in Barcelona streets.

Despite this, the referendum went ahead. Undeterred by Catalan secession opponents’ boycott and a low turnout of just 43%, Puigdemont called the vote a success, pushing for a declaration of independence by the regional parliament on 27 October 2017.

This prompted the Spanish Senate to invoke Article 155 of the constitution, dismissing Puigdemont and taking full control of Catalonia. By 30 October, the Spanish attorney general charged Puigdemont and other members of the Catalan government with rebellion, sedition and misuse of public funds — carrying maximum sentences of 30, 15 and six years in jail, respectively.

The same day the charges came down, Puigdemont found himself on the way to Belgium in the boot of a car. There, he took up his seat as an MEP in the European Parliament, claiming immunity from any extradition process.

Meanwhile, the excessive use of police force to quell unrest in Catalonia tanked Rajoy’s popularity, ruining his prior reputation as a quiet if sometimes clumsy leader. Socialist Pedro Sánchez, the leading opposition figure at the time, requested a vote of no confidence on an unrelated issue.

It was only the fourth such motion voted on since Spain became a democracy following fascist dictator Francisco Franco’s death in 1971 — and was the first one to pass. Rajoy’s career was over.

Why would Puigdemont go home now?

Aside from Puigdemont’s issues with Catalonia’s new government — which will likely be completely uninterested in the region’s independence — the politics of the Catalan issue changed somewhat earlier this year, when Spain’s current government passed a highly controversial law granting amnesty to hundreds of separatists involved in the 2017 vote.

First mooted at the end of last year, the amnesty was agreed to by Prime Minister Sánchez as part of an effort to soothe tensions between Catalan leaders and the government in Madrid, and to ease the process of forming a national government.

The proposal met with outrage from protesters who did not want to see the separatist movement legitimised or forgiven — especially given that Puigdemont and several other leaders stand accused of committing assorted crimes, among them the alleged misuse of funds to finance the unsanctioned plebiscite.

It was heavily criticised by the country’s two main right-wing parties, the Popular Party and Vox, and also had critics in the ranks of Sánchez’s socialist party PSOE, some going so far as to condemn the law as unconstitutional. Nonetheless, after weeks of protest, the amnesty was finally approved by the Spanish parliament in May this year.

But soon after the law was passed, the Spanish Supreme Court ruled that it could not be applied to Puigdemont or other leaders accused of embezzlement and collaborating in a project that “affects the financial interests of the European Union” — a reference to the drop in Spain’s EU contributions that would presumably result from Catalan separation.

Yet despite this setback, Puigdemont has now suddenly returned to Spain, addressing a crowd in Barcelona before disappearing — leaving the police to hunt him down while right-wing politicians call for him to be locked up.

The Russia factor

While the Spanish state’s principal grievance against Puigdemont is his effort to stage the 2017 referendum and the disruptive impact his independence campaign has had, he and other separatist leaders also face longstanding allegations of unacceptable dealings with agents of the Russian government.

These stories came to the forefront in 2021, when Puigdemont was four years into his exile. One detailed report from the New York Times revealed that one of Puigdemont’s closest advisers, Josep Lluis Alay, had travelled to Moscow in 2019 to seek help with the independence cause.

Both Alay and Puigdemont acknowledged to the paper that the meeting had occurred but denied they were seeking help from the Kremlin, calling that claim “a fantasy story created by Madrid”.

However, in 2022 investigative outlet OCCRP and others, including Bellingcat and El Periódico, showed that Puigdemont himself held a meeting with Russian diplomat Nikolai Sadovnikov right before the Catalan independence vote in October 2017.

The investigation and documents delivered to the Spanish judiciary are said to contain proof that Sadovnikov offered Puigdemont up to “$500 billion and a small army” of 10,000 troops in return for laws favouring cryptocurrencies, in what the judge in charge of the case labelled as a Kremlin attempt to assert “political and economic influence” over an independent Catalonia.

Sadovnikov is believed to be Russian President Vladimir Putin’s trusted lead negotiator in southern Europe, a region he specialises in after having served at the Soviet and Russian embassies in Rome and Milan since 1984.

As it became increasingly clear that the conservative government of Mariano Rajoy would crack down on Catalan separatists’ attempts to split from Spain, the Kremlin was seeking to capitalise on instability in the rest of Europe with chaos in mind — a strategy that became apparent after its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Since Russia ramped up its all-out war against its neighbour, European capitals and Brussels are increasingly demanding thorough investigations into Russia’s malign influence.

This February, the European Parliament voted overwhelmingly in favour of an EPP and Renew-backed resolution urging the Spanish judiciary to investigate the alleged links between Catalan MEPs and the Kremlin, including Puigdemont.

The vote came amid other Moscow-related scandals, including Russiagate, a sprawling probe into a Russian influence operation suspected to have paid sitting MEPs to spread pro-Kremlin propaganda from the heart of EU institutions in Brussels, and an investigation into Latvian MEP Tatjana Ždanoka — who openly supported amnesty for Catalan leaders — for being a Russian informant.

Junts MEP Toni Comín rejected the accusations levelled in February as “false”, claiming an independent Catalonia would have sought to become a full-fledged EU member state.

On the run

Meanwhile, Spanish divisions have come to the surface once again since Puigdemont’s brief appearance in Barcelona on Thursday.

Right after the Junts rally, held in plain sight on one of Barcelona’s busiest squares, the Catalan police, Mossos d’Esquadra, launched a search-and-arrest operation, setting up roadblocks across the city.

However, their early efforts were not a success. Instead, Mossos ended up arresting one of their own officers for allegedly helping Puigdemont escape, according to local reports.

This prompted different law enforcement agencies in Spain to start pointing fingers at each other over their collective failure to apprehend him.

The JUPOL police union accused local officers of facilitating the arrival of the separatist leader to the event. “Puigdemont has entered through the crowd thanks to the Mossos who act as escorts for Junts officials,” a post on X read.

Another police union, SUP, has demanded that the Mossos should be relieved of control of the search, suggesting that Spain’s National Police or Guardia Civil should be in charge instead.

The Mossos’ handling of the operation has been an “absolutely monumental failure” that “makes a mockery of our judicial system,” the SUP spokesperson said, according to the domestic press.

If arrested, Puigdemont will first have to face a judge who will determine whether he will remain in custody or be granted the right to defend himself outside of jail — according to the provisions of the new amnesty law.

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The MEPs who actually matter

Post By Politics Adina Vălean, agriculture, agriculture and food, Andreas Schwab, antitrust, Australia, aviation, Banks, Belgium, Bernd Lange, Big Tech, Budget, Business and competition, cars, Central banking, Chemicals, Christine Lagarde, coronavirus, Decarbonization, Defense, digital, Digital Markets Act, Dumping/Duties, Elections, Elections in Europe, electric vehicles, Emmanuel Macron, Environment, EU election, European Parliament election 2024, Far right, Farm to Fork, farmers, Finance and banking, Finland, food safety, France, Germany, Highways, Hungary, indonesia, Industry, Investment, Japan, Johan Van Overtveldt, Karima Delli, Lithuania, lobbying, Maritime, Markets, Medical devices, MEPs, Mercosur, military, missiles, Monetary policy, National Politics, Negotiations, net zero, Parliament, Pascal Canfin, patients, Peter Liese, Policy, Roads, Romania, Russia, Security, Single Market, Society and culture, South Korea, Stéphanie Yon-Courtin, sustainability, tariffs, trade, transport, Ukraine, United Kingdom, Ursula von der Leyen, Vytenis Andriukaitis, War In Ukraine

This article is part of the Brussels Survival Guide.

There’s plenty to pay attention to in the new cohort entering the European Parliament — including, of course, the people. See below our guide on key figures across the policy palette.

Céline Imart

AGRICULTURAL DISRUPTOR

European People’s Party, France

A cereal farmer from Occitania in France, she is a trade unionist and Sciences Po Paris graduate. Imart, who will most likely join the agriculture committee (AGRI) in the European Parliament, participated in blocking the A68 highway during farmers’ protests in France earlier this year, according to local media, and has close links with French farming unions. She recently supported an alliance with the far-right National Rally in France as she stood by her conservative party’s leader Eric Ciotti — who consequently got ousted for it.

She believes the European Union’s plan to make agri-food more sustainable — the Farm to Fork strategy — is a “delusion” of French liberal lawmaker and former environment committee (ENVI) chair Pascal Canfin. Imart also told French media Libération that farmers are “exasperated by requirements” and angry at “the madness of degrowth.”

— Paula Andrés

Johan Van Overtveldt

BANKING INFLUENCER

European Conservatives and Reformists, Belgium

Strictly speaking, the European Central Bank enjoys treaty-bound independence from politics. But if there’s anyone with a decent shot at influencing the future course of Frankfurt’s policy, look no further than Van Overtveldt, a former Belgian finance minister and journalist whose withering critiques of the ECB’s foray into “green central banking” may soon have added weight due to the rise of his generally climate change-skeptic political grouping, the European Conservatives and Reformists.

An outspoken and prolific member of the influential ECON Committee, Van Overtveldt has long complained about the ECB’s controversial green turn under Christine Lagarde. For all its independence, the institution is obliged to support EU economic policy, and it won’t be able to ignore any rightward shift away from net-zero targets led by politicians like Van Overveldt.

If he remains chair of the budget committee, the hawkish Van Overtveldt will also have a say in the enforcement of the EU’s fiscal rules — which carry considerable implications for monetary policy.

— Ben Munster

Andreas Schwab

COMPETITION POWERBROKER

European People’s Party, Germany

He’s a veteran of the European Parliament and an influential powerbroker on all things antitrust and tech. Schwab played a starring role in shaping the bloc’s flagship Digital Markets Act. Now governments in the United Kingdom, Japan and South Korea are getting their own versions of the rule book to help tame Big Tech’s dominance. He’s also the rare member of European Parliament to make international headlines with his 2014 call for the European Commission to consider breaking up Google.

— Edith Hancock and Giovanna Faggionato

Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann

HEAVY HITTER ON DEFENSE

Renew Europe, Germany

Among those entering the hemicycle for the first time, German liberal firebrand Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann has some name recognition baked in.

That’s because the former chair of the Bundestag’s defense committee has been plastered across massive billboards around Germany and beyond in the run-up to the EU election since she was placed top of the list for the Renew faction.

Despite a less-than-stellar performance in the campaign, Strack-Zimmermann is still poised to be one of the big beasts entering this legislature — with some appropriate experience, given the war in Ukraine.

The native of Düsseldorf is big on defense, having pored over every detail of Germany’s military policy and procurement over the last few years. She also hasn’t been afraid to break ranks with the government (of which her Free Democratic Party is a part) over its failure to dispatch Taurus long-distance cruise missiles to Ukraine.

Expect Strack-Zimmermann to play a major part in the debate over whether to forge a full-fledged defense committee within Parliament this time around.

— Joshua Posaner

Pascal Canfin

GREEN STANCHION

Renew Europe, France

As chair of the European Parliament’s environment committee (ENVI) for the last five years, Canfin played a vital role erecting numerous pillars of the EU’s Green Deal. Canfin has told POLITICO he wants to remain in that role. But he’s facing stronger political headwinds this time around — the mood has soured both EU-wide and within France on green policies.

Canfin, a former Green lawmaker before joining French President Emmanuel Macron’s party in 2019, insists the EU election didn’t produce “a majority to dismantle the Green Deal.” Fair enough — but Europe’s right is certainly lining up at least a few green targets it wants to pick off. And don’t expect much new environmental legislation.

— Nicolas Camut, Cory Bennett

Stéphanie Yon-Courtin

FINANCIAL DEALMAKER

Renew Europe, France

Yon-Courtin made a name for herself as one of the economic and monetary affairs committee’s (ECON) most controversial MEPs last mandate for her unorthodox negotiating style and industry-friendly stance on EU retail investment rules.

Hailing from French President Emmanuel Macron’s Renaissance party, which was wiped out by the far right during the election, she was reelected by a hair’s breadth, as 13th on the party’s list for 13 seats won.

Yon-Courtin, who also followed Big Tech files last time around and had a side job working for the French bank Crédit Agricole until her election in 2019, will likely retain leadership of the retail investment file, which is now heading for final negotiations with EU governments and the Commission.

She is also positioning herself to take part in the EU’s economic security push, praising new tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles and saying “pragmatic Europe at the heart of the territories is the commitment of my mandate!”

— Kathryn Carlson

Vytenis Andriukaitis

HEALTH ADVOCATE

Socialists and Democrats, Lithuania

Born in Siberia to parents living in exile, Vytenis Andriukaitis returned to Lithuania and became a trauma and heart surgeon. Despite his surgical duties, his career path led him to politics, where he adopted a leftist approach. He kept his health background alive, eventually becoming Lithuania’s health minister in 2012.

Two years later, Andriukaitis left national politics to join the Commission as commissioner for health and food safety, where he ushered through medical devices regulations, which have so far caused all manner of headache for industry and patients. Will he seek to fix it as an MEP?

Since 2020, he has been a special envoy of the World Health Organization for universal health coverage in the European region. He advocates for expanding the EU’s role in health and is a critic of the “weak” Lisbon Treaty when it comes to health policy.

— Giedre Peseckyte

Adina Vălean

TRANSPORT SPECIALIST

European People’s Party, Romania

Current Transport Commissioner Adina-Ioana Vălean is expected to leave her seat in the College to take up her MEP job — which won’t be new to her, as she has been sitting in the Parliament for more than 10 years (holding relevant posts such as vice president, and chair of the ENVI and ITRE committees).

While Romania could pick her again as a commissioner, the chances of a second mandate at the Berlaymont for Vălean seem slim. However, her experience in the transport sector is likely to play in her favor when political groups assign the top jobs and dossiers in the new legislature. And the TRAN Committee chair remains vacant after Karima Delli didn’t stand for reelection.

In the last five years, Vălean had to negotiate delicate dossiers concerning the road, rail, maritime and aviation sectors. She also had to deal with border closures within the single market due to Covid and the war in Ukraine, including the establishment of solidarity lanes with the country invaded by Russia. Why not put all this wealth of experience to the service of the Parliament?

— Tommaso Lecca

Peter Liese

SOLDIER OF INDUSTRY

European People’s Party, Germany

Several Green Deal policies have targets on their backs right now — and Liese is the EPP’s chief archer. Immediately after his group claimed victory in the European election, the high-ranking politician declared that a 2035 ban on the sale of combustion engine cars “needs to go,” arguing the election results vindicate his party’s push for a less restrictive Green Deal.

He has also led the charge against the new EU law to restore nature — successfully weakened in Parliament and squeaking by in the Council — as well as a long-awaited and now long-delayed revision of EU chemicals legislation.

A proposed phaseout of ubiquitous, toxic “forever chemicals” is also in his crosshairs: He’s been lobbying hard for assurances of industry carve-outs from Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.

Brussels should “reduce all the legislation that stands in the way of the decarbonization,” he told POLITICO in an interview. Cue applause from business groups and moans from environmental nongovernmental organizations.

— Leonie Cater

Aura Salla and Dóra Dávid

META MAGNETS

European People’s Party, Finland
European People’s Party, Hungary

Meta magnates

They are a package deal: Both are new to the European Parliament, and both have or had links to United States tech giant Meta.

Salla used to run around Brussels, presenting EU officials and lawmakers with Meta’s talking points, as the top lobbyist for Meta in town between 2020 and 2023. Last year, she moved on to become a lawmaker in Finland, her home country.

Dávid is the company’s product counsel but has now been elected in Hungary, for the party of Viktor Orbán rival Péter Magyar. Does this mean Meta has an easy way in? Not necessarily — but Salla has already said she wants to roll back “overregulation” in tech to help Finnish small and medium-sized enterprises.

— Pieter Haeck

Bernd Lange

TRADE DEAL MAVEN

Socialists and Democrats, Germany

Trade deal maven

A key figure for trade policy, returning EU lawmaker Bernd Lange has chaired the Parliament’s international trade committee (INTA) since 2014 — and it’s no secret he is eying yet another turn at the helm of the committee.

The veteran lawmaker and fan of collectible cars was reelected despite heavy losses suffered by his Social Democratic Party in Germany, as he ranked fourth on his party’s national list. A strong proponent of new trade deals with the Mercosur bloc of South American countries, Australia and Indonesia — as well as more sustainability provisions in trade deals — the MEP is a member of the Parliament’s delegation for relations with the ASEAN bloc of Asian nations and an expert on transatlantic relations.

— Antonia Zimmermann

CORRECTION: This article has been updated to clarify that Stéphanie Yon-Courtin stopped working for Crédit Agricole in 2019.

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An Olympic-sized fight has erupted among anti-doping officials, and it’s just getting started

Post By World anti-doping, Brent Nowicki, China, Olympic Games, paris olympics, Russia, USA, USADA, wada, Witold Banka

The stream of threats, recriminations and anti-doping innuendo flowed freely again on Thursday when tensions over a US law designed to combat drugs in sports escalated on the eve of the Paris Olympics.

It’s a fight that’s been simmering for a decade, sparked by Russia’s brazen doping scandal at the Sochi Olympics.

The reaction from the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and International Olympic Committee (IOC) was criticised as too weak by many, including the United States. So much so, that the US passed a law in 2020 giving federal authorities power to investigate sports doping and cover-ups.

After details emerged about 23 Chinese swimmers who tested positive for a banned substance — Chinese authorities blamed it on contamination from a hotel kitchen — but none were suspended and some went on to win medals at the Tokyo Olympics, the US launched an investigation.

ABC Sport is live blogging every day of the Paris Olympics

The latest round of backlash played out in a trio of news conferences in Paris, the highlight of which came when leaders at WADA suggested they might sanction one of their biggest critics, the US Anti-Doping Agency, over the law.

“As a global regulator, one of our duties is to make sure our stakeholders are following our regulations and rules, and that the national legislation is in accordance with the world anti-doping code,” WADA president Witold Banka explained.

While some tried to calm things down, others could see a worst-case scenario: that the US not be allowed to host big-time events such as the Olympics in the future.

Banka’s statement came a day after the IOC awarded the 2034 Winter Games to Salt Lake City, but cast a pall over that celebration by extracting a promise that organisers pressure US lawmakers to scuttle the law, along with a related investigation into the Chinese doping case.

A law that passed unanimously

Chances of that are slim — the American Congress passed that bill in 2020 without a dissenting vote — so another strategy would be to go after the US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA).

If WADA determines the law, called the Rodchenkov Act, doesn’t adhere to the rules, it could start the process of finding USADA in noncompliance.

That, in turn, could trigger sanctions, which can jeopardise America’s ability to host international events. It’s the same treatment WADA handed to Russia’s anti-doping agency during that country’s long-running drug scandal.

Congress recently held a hearing about the Chinese doping scandal and there have been suggestions that the US government might withhold its annual funding from WADA.

The chair and ranking member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee — Cathy McMorris Rodgers and Frank Pallone Jr — released a statement.

“It speaks volumes that the IOC would demand a one-sided contract condition to protect WADA rather than work together to ensure it is fulfilling its mission to protect clean sport,” they said.

Threatening USADA

The mere threat of putting USADA on a noncompliant list marks the latest broadside in a mushrooming exchange of rhetoric.

USADA’s CEO, Travis Tygart struck back.

“You know it’s a broken system when WADA … threatens a compliance case against USADA for a US law enacted by Congress that has cleaned up sport consistent with the WADA rules and has been in existence for several years,” he said.

At his own news conference in Paris, US Olympics and Paralympic Committee (USOPC) chair Gene Sykes, who was just made a member of the IOC, said he hopes this pattern of “throwing rocks at each other” would calm down soon.

“I think the tempers between WADA and USADA as reflected in the statements that go back and forth between the two of them are unfortunately just too emotional,” Sykes said.

Some athletes, including Caeleb Dressel, don’t trust the system

World Aquatics, which runs swimming, held its own news conference, where swimmers and executives were asked about the Chinese case.

American swimmer Caeleb Dressel says he does not trust the anti-doping system.(AP Photo: Michael Conroy)

American swimmer Caeleb Dressel was asked if he had confidence in the anti-doping system.

“No. Not really.” Dressel said.

“I don’t really think they’ve given us enough evidence to support them in how this case was handled.”

A few seats away was World Aquatics executive director Brent Nowicki who recently received a subpoena from US investigators as part of their probe into the China case.

“We have to regain his trust and those athletes’ trust who share that same opinion,” Nowicki said.

“I’d like you to ask that same question of Caeleb in LA (at the 2028 Olympics). My hope, my goal, is that his mind changes.”

Some IOC leaders worried about travelling to the US

The Nowicki subpoena is part of the first known use of the Rodchenkov Act for an international incident.

It illustrates the wide net US investigators might cast to fight doping — wide enough that it seems some folks are avoiding the United States, altogether. For instance, WADA moved a conference it had planned after the Olympics from New York to Montreal.

“I don’t think I would share my private travel schedule in a press conference,” WADA director general Olivier Niggli said, drawing laughs, when asked if he had plans to visit the US.

The law was passed to allow American authorities to prosecute doping conspiracies in any sports event involving US athletes — which includes the Olympics and pretty much every major competition around the world.

Brent Nowicki recently received a subpoena from US investigators as part of their probe into the China case

WADA has long lobbied against this law, specifically its “extraterritorial” clause, which it says gives US authorities a separate and inappropriate role in enforcing anti-doping rules against foreigners.

“It’s highly incorrect that one country tries to impose jurisdiction on anti-doping decisions on the rest of the world,” Banka said.

None of this was on the radar of leaders in Salt Lake City, who came to Paris expecting a celebration, and maybe even a pat on the back for offering to host the Winter Games — an event cities aren’t lining up to underwrite anymore.

Salt Lake City organising president Fraser Bullock said despite the language in the contract “in my mind, there’s zero doubt” that Utah will host the Games, as promised.

“For us, we feel bad that we did get pulled into it,” Bullock said.

“But we understand that’s an issue that has to be addressed. It’s just very unfortunate timing.”

What is WADA?

The World Anti-Doping Agency was formed after the International Olympic Committee called for changes in the wake of some of sports’ most sordid drug-cheating episodes — among them, Ben Johnson’s drug-tainted ouster from the Seoul Games in 1988 and a doping scandal at the 1998 Tour de France.

Canadian lawyer Richard Pound, a heavyweight in the Olympic movement, became WADA’s founding president in 1999, launching the agency one year ahead of the Sydney Olympics.

Who funds and runs WADA?

In 2024, the Montreal-based agency has a budget of about $US53 million ($81 million). The IOC’s contribution of $US25 million ($37 million) is matched by the collective contributions of national governments worldwide.

Some say the IOC’s 50 per cent contribution gives it too much say in WADA’s decision-making and a chance to run roughshod over the way it runs its business.

The power of governments is diluted because several dozen countries make up the other half of the funding, with no single nation accounting for much more than about 3 per cent of the budget.

What does WADA do?

The agency describes its mission as to “develop, harmonise and coordinate anti-doping rules and policies across all sports and countries.”

It does not collect and test urine and blood samples from athletes. It does certify the sports bodies, national anti-doping agencies and worldwide network of testing laboratories that do.

It drafts, reviews and updates the rules that govern international sports and manages the list of prohibited substances.

WADA also runs its own investigations and intelligence unit, which has broad scope to get involved in cases worldwide.

WADA v The IOC

An IOC vice president, Craig Reedie, was WADA’s leader in 2016 when the Russian doping scandal erupted weeks before the Rio de Janeiro Olympics.

Reedie and Pound, who had led a key investigation of the Russian cheating system, wanted Russia out of the Rio Olympics. IOC President Thomas Bach did not.

At a heated IOC meeting in Rio, Bach won a near-unanimous vote that allowed Russia to compete. It was a severe undercutting of Reedie and, some say, WADA.

What is the Rodchenkov Act?

American authorities were upset with the IOC and WADA handling of the Russian case, so they moved to pass a law named after Grigory Rodchenkov, the former Moscow lab director who became a whistleblower and eventually fled to the United States as a protected witness.

The Rodchenkov Act gave the US government authority to investigate “doping conspiracies” in sports events that involve US athletes, which brings the Olympics and most international events under its umbrella.

It agitated WADA and IOC officials, who don’t want the US enforcing its own anti-doping code. They lobbied against it, but in a sign of WADA’s standing in the United States, the bill passed without a single dissenting vote in 2020.

Why is this coming up now?

Earlier this month, US authorities issued a subpoena to an international swimming official who could have information about the case involving Chinese swimmers who were allowed to compete despite testing positive. WADA did not pursue the case.

With the Summer Games coming to Los Angeles in 2028, then the Winter Games in Utah in 2034, it will be hard for world sports leaders to avoid coming to the US, where they, too, could face inquiries from law enforcement.

AP/ABC

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Olympics 2024: Why there are calls to ban Israel from the Paris Olympics

Post By World Belarus, boycott, genocide, international olympic committee, Israel Gaza war, israel in olympics, olympics 2024, Palestine, paris olympics, Russia

Story so far: Paris is gearing up to host the 2024 Olympic Games from July 22 to August 11, when 10,500 athletes from over 200 countries will participate in 32 sports. Two nations – Russia and Belarus – will not be represented due to a ban imposed by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Athletes from Russia and Belarus will, however, be part of the Games, competing as individual neutral athletes (AINs) without the flags, anthems and emblems of their countries. Their participation is also subject to a thorough vetting process as per IOC’s eligibility criteria. Russia and its ally Belarus have faced global condemnation and strict sanctions over the Ukraine war.

However, another nation which is part of a different war has not been banned from the Olympics, faces minimal economic sanctions, and evenly split support and condemnation. Israel, whose war on Gaza has killed 38,000 Palestinians in less than 10 months, will be represented by 88 athletes in the Games.

Why are there calls to ban Israel from the Paris Olympics?

Since October 2023, Israel has waged war on Gaza with the objective of dismantling Hamas — the Islamist militant group controlling the enclave. Laying siege to Gaza, Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) have carpet-bombed the area, killing over 38,000 Palestinians, including 15,000 children, and displacing nearly all of the enclave’s population of 2.3 million.

IDF has also launched continuous air-strikes from Northern Gaza and steadily pushed deeper into Rafah in the south, claiming to have killed or captured about 14,000 Hamas fighters till date. Israel’s attack is in retaliation to an attack by Hamas on October 7, when militants breached the Israel-Gaza security barriers via motorcycles and bulldozers and launched a 5000-strong rocket strike, killing more than 1100 Israelis and taking hundreds hostage.

Palestinians inspect a house destroyed in an Israeli strike, amid the Israel-Hamas conflict, in Nusairat refugee camp, in the central Gaza Strip, on July 9, 2024.
| Photo Credit:
Ramadan Abed

Cease-fire talks mediated by Egypt and Qatar, and backed by the U.S, are currently on hold as both parties are yet to agree on terms regarding hostage release, withdrawal of troops and other issues. Images of cities in Gaza reduced to rubble, heavy civilian casualties and the miserable living conditions of survivors in refugee camps have earned Israel global condemnation.

Ten nations led by South Africa lodged a case against Israel in the International Court of Justice (ICJ), accusing Tel Aviv of committing a genocide of Palestinians in Gaza. The ICJ has ordered Israel to take preventive measures to stop the genocide in Gaza, but did not call for an immediate ceasefire. Several college campuses across Europe, Asia and the U.S. have seen pro-Gaza protests by students.

Citing these reasons, calls to ban Israel from participating in the Paris Olympics 2024 have emerged from several Muslim activist groups, sporting bodies, activists, and politicians. They argue that till Israel complies with international ceasefire demands, Israeli sport associations, including its teams, clubs, and participants, must be barred from participating in international competitions.

Who is calling to ban Israel from the Olympics?

Days after videos of Israeli soldiers turning one Gaza’s oldest sporting facilities— Yarmouk Stadium — into a makeshift camp to hold Palestinian detainees were released, the Jordan Football Association called upon the global sporting community to ban Israel from participating inpopular competitions.

Similarly, the Palestinian Football Association (PFA) wrote to the IOC and Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) seeking a probe into “occupation crimes against sports and athletes in Palestine.” The PFA claims that over 400 sportspersons, coaches and officials have been killed or wounded by the IDF since the war began.

In February, a group of 26 French lawmakers (chiefly belonging to left-wing parties) wrote to the IOC, seeking to stop Israel from participating in the Games. Similar to Russian and Belarusian athletes, Israel’s athletes must participate under a neutral flag, the lawmakers insisted.

Several human rights organisations, activists, and celebrities too have sought Israel’s exclusion from the Games. Citing IOC’s charter, which states that “every individual must have access to the practice of sport, without discrimination of any kind in respect of internationally recognized human rights within the remit of the Olympic Movement,” groups have alleged that Israel’s war has violated the rights of Palestinian athletes.

Are these different from calls to ban Russia?

On February 28, 2022, four days after Russia invaded Ukraine, the IOC banned the participation of Russian and Belarusian athletes and officials in the 2022 Winter Paralympic Games. Calling the attack a “blatant violation of the Olympic Truce,” the IOC allowed such athletes to compete as AINs.

“We are committed to fair competitions for everybody without any discrimination,” the IOC said in a statement. While individual athletes who meet all anti-doping criteria and have not actively supported the war in Ukraine are allowed to compete in the Games, Russian and Belarusian teams cannot.

Ukrainian refugees protest against any participation of Russian and Belarusian athletes at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games before the visit of Thomas Bach, President of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to the Ruhr Political Forum in Essen, Germany, March 22, 2023. The placard reads “any Neutral flag for Russian athletes is covered with blood” and “No Olympics for Russia and Belarus.”
| Photo Credit:
JANA RODENBUSCH

IOC’s statement came in the wake of global sanctions by top European nations – United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, Finland, Norway, and Sweden and other global powers like the U.S., Canada, Australia, and Japan. Russia was already banned by the IOC due to a state-sponsored doping programme, and its athletes had attended the 2021 and 2022 Games under the name ‘Russian Olympic Committee (ROC).

Calls to ban Israel have arisen after almost four months since it first attacked Gaza. Moreover, most of the above-mentioned powers have not sanctioned Israel (economically or otherwise). Turkey has refused to resume trade with Israel until a ceasefire is secured. The U.K., U.S, Canada and France have sanctioned some Israeli settlers in the West Bank — an Israeli-occupied Palestinian territory.

The U.S, Germany and Italy have continued to sell arms and provide military aid to Israel despite global calls to halt this. While both U.S. and Germany have called on Israel and Hamas to sign a ceasefire, Washington has vetoed several U.N. resolutions condemning Israel. Hence, the calls to ban Israel from the Games have not had the same impact as those calling for a similar ban of Russia.

What are the reactions to the calls for a ban?

Sparse protests seeking Israel’s ban from the Paris Games are scattered globally. In Switzerland, protestors smeared red handprints on the IOC’s office in Lausanne to highlight the humanitarian crisis in Gaza. In France, which is home to the second-highest Muslim population in Western Europe, protestors have camped outside the IOC’s office in Paris seeking a boycott of Israel.

Protestors in Paris display banners reading ‘Stop Genocide in Gaza’, seeking boycott of Israel from 2024 Olympics

Banners reading ‘Genocide is not a sport’ and ‘Boycott Israel’ have been displayed by pro-Palestine protestors camping outside IOC’s office in Saint-Denis, outside Paris.

Eight Palestinian athletes participating in the Games have been touted as a ‘symbol of Palestine’s resistance’. “Through this participation, we want to present the suffering of the Palestinian people and the unprecedented killing taking place in Gaza,” said Palestine Olympic committee head Jibril Rajoub. Of the eight athletes, one secured a place through regular qualifying and seven were given special invitations.

A picture taken on June 22, 2024 shows Palestinian lightweight boxer Wassim Abu Sil (R) sparring at a gym in Ramallah city in the occupied West Bank, as part of his preparations after qualifying for the upcoming 2024 Paris Olympic games

Calls to ban Israel from sporting events is not new. Palestine-based group Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS), which has been seeking global sanctions on Israel since 2005 for its occupation in West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza Strip, has repeatedly called upon FIFA and IOC to ban Israel from their events. It has also condemned FIFA for sanctioning clubs which have supported Palestine.

What does IOC say?

In response to these calls for a ban, Paris 2024 Olympics Organising Committee chief Tony Estanguet told Reuters in January, “You have to stay in your place, not think that the Games are a magic wand that will solve all the problems and armed conflicts in our world.” He added that the Games can pacify relations and open the door for dialogue. Similarly, in March, IOC president Thomas Bach confirmed that Israel faces no threat to its Olympics status despite the war in Gaza.

Since the 1972 Munich Olympics, when eleven Israelis (sportsmen, coaches and a referee) were killed by Palestinian militants, security arrangements for Israeli athletes have been tight. This year, arrangements have been made such that Israeli cyclists and marathon runners will compete in secured venues in Paris.

With the Gaza and Ukraine wars in focus in Paris, the Olympic Games find themselves yet again cast under a dark political shadow.

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Will Rutte’s political savvy help him manage a growingly complex NATO?

Post By World China, Mark Rutte, nato, Russia, Ukraine, War

Former Dutch PM Mark Rutte will take over as secretary general of the alliance on 1 October. He will have to use his political survival skills as an astute negotiator to persuade members to spend more on defence and keep supporting Ukraine.

On 1 October, when Dutch liberal-conservative former prime minister Mark Rutte will officially step up to the plate as NATO secretary general, the US will be at the height of one of the most polarised, radicalised, and potentially destabilising presidential electoral campaigns in recent history.

To be up to the task, the Dutch politician will have to fall back on his 14 years of experience at the helm of capricious coalition governments, often under fire from Geert Wilders’ hardline populist opposition and a major political scandal concerning some of his allies that left him untouched.

Thanks to his political flexibility, craftiness, pragmatism, and a good dose of political opportunism, Rutte earned the nickname of “Teflon Mark” back home. Could this political survival kit be useful for the NATO secretary general’s mission in the increasingly polarised world?

His personal history in international politics is marked by the dramatic momentum of the Moscow-backed separatists’ downing of the MH-17 civilian passenger plane in Ukraine’s eastern region of the Donbas. The disaster 10 years ago was a turning point for Rutte, who realised that the eastern flank of Europe and world politics in general are not just about trade and business opportunities.

In fact, it is about precisely defined strategic objectives that sometimes demand doing what is right rather than what is simply profitable.

One of the last crucial decisions Rutte took before stepping down as prime minister in 2023 was to deliver 24 Dutch F-16 fighter planes to Ukraine in spite of Russian warnings not to do so.

The conclusions of the Washington summit and the Pledge of Long-Term Security Assistance for Ukraine, which sets out €40 billion of military aid per year for Ukraine, set out the mandate for the incoming NATO leadership quite clearly.

And it is now NATO that will directly manage and coordinate the funding and military support for Ukraine in the war against Russia.

So far, these tasks have been carried out by the US-led Rammstein Group, an international contact body of 57 countries, including NATO and the EU.

What does Rutte’s new job entail?

The alliance’s secretary general has to coordinate and create consensus among the members. Since the NATO decision-making process is based on unanimity and members have a wide variety of strategic interests that do not always converge, the job also entails formulating common policy via mediation.

Rutte could also flex his economic acumen when battling certain partners’ alleged excessive deficit issues. In fact, he was one of the prominent figures representing the so-called “frugal states” club during the EU’s debt crisis and the economic collapse caused by COVID-19, and he has learned how to find a common way out after having to wrestle with the anti-austerity bloc.

The incoming autumn is expected to bring three crucial answers to the world political arena: who will be elected US president, what is the true operational military effectiveness of NATO’s air weaponry that has been delivered to Ukraine, and how functional the EU institutions will be after the challenging electoral quakes of June and July.

The common feature of these three issues is the increasing fragility of the contemporary political order, which has become a genuine stress test for international organisations and national institutions.

In Washington, after three decades of self-rumination, the 32 member states have asserted that NATO is a military alliance called to protect a rule-based world order. Yet, there are many questions the allies will be forced to answer in the upcoming period.

The public wants to know who will pay to build strong armies, what the costs will be, where the threats are coming from, and why they should engage their respective armies in remote areas of the planet.

Almost every country has its own security concerns that are often incompatible with others, especially in times of trouble. The enlarged alliance has stretched the scope of how risks and threats are commonly handed and created hazardous rifts even among the strongest Cold War allies.

Rutte’s political experience is expected to fill these gaps.

Broker and prime minister

”Rutte has been able to keep three coalitions government together. Despite downsides and political scandals, he has managed to survive, since 2010 until 2024. So this shows that he is a master at bringing parties together, negotiating compromises and creating bridges to bring parties together,” Dick Zandee, head of the Security and Defence Program of The Hague-based Clingendael Institute, told Euronews.

“That is exactly the role the secretary general has to play’.’

The secretary general has no right to take on any legislative initiative since NATO is a military alliance and not a normative international organisation. But there are ways of settling scores, Zandee explained.

”Good relations are essential. And he has excellent ties with (French President Emmanuel) Macron, traditionally a good entente with Berlin, more on the monetary issues than the military ones, and with the governments and the administrations of the UK and the US’.’

In fact, Rutte shares the same political benchmarks with the rest of the leaders: free-market, global trade, individual freedom and strong transatlantic relations.

Yet, leadership can be fickle and transitory. The people in charge change, the opinion of the electorates is increasingly erratic, and NATO also has member countries that don’t share the same sensitivity for the so-called ”liberal values”.

While Rutte will replace the current secretary general of NATO, Jens Stoltenberg, a former Norwegian social-liberal PM, might seem like a minor shift, coming from an EU member state could be the key difference in Rutte’s advantage.

”Mark Rutte and Jens Stoltenberg are both extremely pro-Atlantic. The difference between the two politicians is that Rutte comes from an EU country,” Federico Santopinto, a senior research fellow at the French Institute for International and Strategic Affairs (IRIS), told Euronews.

“The Dutch former prime minister could perhaps have the interest to combine better the interests of the European Union with the NATO ones.”

Despite their fiscal strife, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Belgium, the Netherlands and the UK will have to invest their resources in the defence industry. In the medium term, they might face a dilemma between increasing their public debts or asking their voters to pay more taxes.

Santopinto explained that the risk is that there might not be enough money to finance initiatives under the North Star flag and construct an EU military-industrial complex.

”The EU has been focusing on a defence industrial policy since it has an industrial capacity that NATO by its own nature cannot have, even if it made some attempts in the most recent past,” he said.

“Mark Rutte could finally make clear that NATO has operational dimensions on how to use the troops and to establish the complementarity among the different armies by the standardization of their equipment.”

After a history degree at the University of Leyden and before entering politics, Rutte was an HR manager at Unilever for a couple of years. He might use this past professional experience to persuade the member states to make painful financial and political decisions.

The ‘frugal Dutchman’ dilemma

As for NATO spending, ”the problem is no longer reaching 2%. It is done,” said Zandee.

“According to some politicians, especially in Eastern Europe, it is not enough. We have to go for 3%, whereas the Poles are already spending above 4% of their GDP. So that will be the issue because to modernise all the armed forces in Europe, not to speak about expanding them, one will need more than 2%.”

”The secretary general does not have his own basket of money where he can get money out of it. He can count on his ability to chair the meetings, visit the capitals and put some pressure on the governments.”

As for the war in Ukraine, the biggest challenge for NATO in Europe since the Berlin crisis in 1961, Rutte could have to mediate among the Alliance’s members, who are divided on three big strategic moves toward Russia: containment, rollback, and engagement.

Like the European liberal family, Mark Rutte has proved, as a prime minister, to promote the roll-back that implies the Russian withdrawal from Ukraine to the borders of 2014 (including Crimea and the Donbas) and no political relations with the current Kremlin regime.

”Rutte is a staunch supporter of the transatlantic relations. Like Stoltenberg, he defends the liberal (internationalist) approach to Ukraine. Recently, when he was still prime minister, he was one of the first to propose the F16 to Ukraine” reminds Federico Santopinto.

MH-17 flight, 10 years later

As a Dutch politician, Rutte tends to be more pragmatic and occasionally opportunistic rather than idealistic.

Nevertheless, in foreign policy and in relations with Russia, his liberal approach began prevailing over business-as-usual practicality on 17 July 2014, when the Malaysia Airlines MH17 flight between Amsterdam and Kuala Lumpur was shot down by a Russian antiaircraft missile while flying over the Donbas.

The battery and the crew were Russian and were operating for the Donbas pro-Moscow separatist militias of the so-called People’s Republic of Donetsk, acting in the conflict in the region under the orders of Igor Girkin, aka “Strelkov”, a former GRU operative who was among the people convicted by a Dutch court for shooting down the airliner.

All the 298 people on board, including passengers and crew members, lost their lives. 193 of those victims were Dutch.

”He did not have this forward-looking attitude toward Russia, despite there were indicators that Putin was modernizing his armed forces. Rutte’s government continued doing business with Russia like the Germans and the others,” Zandee said.

“But the pictures of the MH17 represented a sort of key turning point because it had a tremendous impact that showed the ugly face of Russia.”

”The MH17 was the turning point followed by other events. It played an important role deep in his soul, in his mind. He’s always mentioning it as an important milestone in changing his attitude (toward Moscow).”

The liberal supporters of the roll-back approach towards Russia in NATO and in the EU are looking with some apprehension at the political events in France and in Germany, with a special focus on the US’ November presidential elections.

They are deeply concerned that reaching a ceasefire and containing Russia along the frozen conflict front line could eventually prevail.

And, in case of relevant political changes, they are afraid that some Western power could even start a renovated policy of engaging Putin’s Russia, or at least some sort of detente.

”Everybody is waiting for the US presidential election because Rutte has much more sympathy for Biden. Meanwhile, relations with Donald Trump could become more complicated,” said Santopinto.

As the head of the Dutch government, Rutte met Trump during his administration between 2016 and 2020.

Little lies of an honest broker

”He can be extremely smart in the negotiations. Some Dutch diplomats remember that at a NATO summit, Rutte told Trump: ‘Donald, you know, now we, the Europeans, are spending 40 or 45 billion more on defence since you have been at the White House. That is thanks to you.’ Of course, it was not true,” Zandee recalled.

“But he gave all the credit to Trump. And then Trump was flattered. Since then, Rutte got a very good entry ticket into the White House under Trump.”

The options discussed at the Washington summit give NATO a wide range of potential actions, stretching from the traditional European theatre to the Far East and the China Sea.

The Asia pivot strategy is mostly a US bid, while most EU member states would keep NATO’s main focus on the Eastern European flank, at most, in the southern Mediterranean, the Middle East, and the Sahel.

Extending the scope of the potential military operations of the alliance to the Pacific and the Far East could represent extra costs for both armament and logistics, as well as a dangerous progressive disengagement of the US military forces from Europe.

But could a Dutch secretary general become a broker between the European theatre powers and the let’s-turn-to-Asia advocates?

”China, of course, is a different matter. So there you see that countries like the UK and the Netherlands are following the Americans in terms of showing military presence in the Pacific, and the French are doing it, too,” Zandee said.

“But more continental countries don’t think that it is important. So, this is a potential division among European countries and a transatlantic split between Europe and the United States, it’s both an internal European and a transatlantic issue.”

China remains a fundamental trade and business partner and a huge competitor for Germany, France, Italy, Poland, and Hungary. For the EU, Beijing’s disputes are mostly of an economic nature. Very few European policymakers look at China as an existential military threat.

”If you go back to 2021, people were talking about a new NATO strategy to contain China. And then, of course, the invasion in Ukraine came, and the whole issue was dropped. Now, we put it at the top of the list, perhaps at the same level as Russia. But what does it mean? It’s a totally different degree of threat,” concluded Zandee.

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A Ukrainian woman remembers life under Russian occupation

Post By World Kherson, Occupation, Russia, Ukraine, ukraine war

Anastasiia lived in Kherson and was preparing for the birth of her second child when Russia started its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. She didn’t want to live under occupation, so she decided to take the risk and leave.

Anastasiia remembers waking up in shock and disbelief at five in the morning on the 24th of February 2022. “I woke up because our friends called us, telling us Russian tanks were rolling in from occupied Crimea”, she remembered, adding that she only really grasped the severity of the situation when her daughter’s kindergarten informed them a couple of hours later that they wouldn’t open. “They’re usually always open, even during the holidays”, she explains.

“We didn’t know if Kyiv was occupied”

Anastasiia thought the Russian forces would turn around. After a few days, Kherson, where she lived, was occupied and Anastasiia, who was pregnant, her husband and little daughter found themselves living under Russian occupation. She remembers that in the first few weeks, Ukrainian supplies couldn’t reach the city, food became scarce, and people were scared of starving.

“It was chaos. People were trying to rob supermarkets and no one could blame them”, she recalled. “It wasn’t safe to leave the house,” she says, adding that staying inside, however, wasn’t any safer. Around a month later, the Russian supplies came from occupied Crimea and the situation somewhat stabilised.

Besides limited access to food in the first month, Anastasiia remembers that their Ukrainian SIM cards didn’t work any more, implying they had no idea what was going on in the rest of the country. “We didn’t know if Kyiv was occupied,” she said.

“Kherson is Ukraine”

Residents took to the streets to protest just a few weeks into Russia’s occupation of Kherson They carried Ukrainian flags and signs such as “Kherson is in Ukraine”. Anastasiia remembers the protest with awe.

“We had two revolutions in the last two decades, when we’re unhappy with something, we protest”, says Anastasiia. In the end, the protest in March 2022 was dispersed by Russian soldiers with force, using gunfire, stun grenades and rubber bullets. Several people were reportedly injured.

Based on an allegedly leaked letter from an FSB whistleblower, there were plans to implement a ‘great terror’ to suppress protests in Kherson, stating that residents would be “taken from their homes in the middle of the night”, as reported by The Times.

The acts of protests didn’t stop, though. “There is a movement called ‘Yellow Ribbon’. Some people put little yellow ribbons [or Ukrainian flags] on the street, on trees or railings, and when you see it, it was a sign of resistance, and you knew, you weren’t alone”, says Anastasiia. The movement’s founder Ivan said in an interview with the Kyiv Independent that the concept behind ‘Yellow Ribbon’ was to ensure that acts of resistance were simple, safe, and accessible for everyday people. According to the Kyiv Independent, the movement now has 12 coordinators in major occupied cities.

People caught participating in the ‘Yellow Ribbon‘-movement face severe repercussions from Russian-controlled authorities, including secretive and likely fabricated charges leading to imprisonment. This suppression is part of Russia’s broader effort to stifle Ukrainian grassroots opposition to its occupation of Ukrainian territory.

According to the organisation Human Rights in Ukraine, 35-year-old Mykola Onuk was sentenced last month to five years in prison on “secretive, and almost certainly fabricated, charges initiated several months after his detention, likely for pro-Ukrainian graffiti associated with the ‘Yellow Ribbon’ peaceful resistance movement.”

A couple of weeks later, the residents of Kherson were offered Russian SIM cards, which many accepted out of desperation. It was then that she was able to catch up with everything that had been happening so far, such as the siege of Mariupol.

Anastasiia gives birth while living under occupation

On the 9th of March 2022, Russian forces bombed a hospital serving as a children’s hospital and maternity ward in Mariupol. At least four people were killed, 16 were injured, and the attack led to at least one stillbirth. Anastasiia, who was pregnant at the time Kherson was under Russian occupation, was due to give birth soon. Seeing photos and reading what happened in Mariupol terrified her.

“I was really scared. Leaving the house during nighttime was dangerous, so my doctor and I decided to have a C-Section instead of waiting for labour”, she recalls. “It was absolutely terrifying. I felt I wasn’t only risking my own life, but also the life of my baby”, Anastasiia says.

Luckily, the birth of her second child went well and Anastasiia and her son were healthy. Due to Russian forces burning down the regional office of the State Migration Service of Ukraine, she couldn’t get her son’s documents issued.

ISW: Hospitals are threatening to take newborns from mothers if neither parent can prove Russian citizenship

In the temporary-occupied territories of Luhansk and Donetsk, possession of a Russian passport is essential for proving property ownership and retaining access to healthcare and retirement benefits. Failure to obtain the forced new passport by July 1st 2023, as mandated by a new Russian law in occupied territories, may lead to imprisonment as a ‘foreign citizen’, risking custody loss, imprisonment, or worse.

The Institute for the Study of War (ISW) reported recently that in the Russian-occupied Luhansk Oblast, hospitals are threatening to take newborns from mothers if neither parent can prove Russian citizenship, according to Artem Lysohor of the Luhansk Regional Military Administration.

Starting May 6th 2024, proof of Russian citizenship is required for parents to be discharged with their newborns. The ISW reports this action violates the Convention on Genocide, which prohibits measures to prevent births within a group.

“I was scared every day”

Whilst living under occupation in Kherson, Anastasiia remembers being terrified every day. Life was uncertain and dangerous. Even something normal, such as texting, turned into something that could endanger your life. “Phones were checked regularly. They checked messages, which Telegram channels one subscribed to and even photos”, adds Anastasiia. “We had to delete everything. Anything pro-Ukrainian was dangerous. If they found anything that connects you to the Ukrainian Armed Forces, you were brought to a filtration camp.”

Ukrainians living under Russian occupation now can face up to 20 years in prison for expressing pro-Ukrainian views, additionally, there have been reports of homes being raided and children and adults being kidnapped and deported to the Russian Federation.

In a speech at this year’s Lviv Media Forum conference, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and human rights lawyer Oleksandra Matviichuk said: “Occupation doesn’t reduce human suffering, it simply makes it invisible.”

“Culture can be a tool of resistance”

“I think they wanted to use Kherson as a ‘model’”, says Anastasiia. Compared to occupied Donetsk, occupied Luhansk and occupied Crimea, there was no active fighting and shelling in the city while she was there, she remembers.

Russians looting museums, such as the Contemporary Art Museum of Kherson and destroying Ukrainian books has been well documented. Artists, such as Viacheslav Mashnytskyi, who mysteriously disappeared during the occupation of Kherson. Currently, there is no information on his whereabouts or fate.

“Culture can be a tool of resistance, a carrier of memory and self-determination, freedom and independent thinking. It can also be a tool of expansion, displacement of another culture, a tool of power. Therefore, in the occupied territories, cultural agents become priority targets for Russian soldiers”, says curator Natalia Matsenko.

“The occupiers often try to pull people from the creative sphere over to their side, forcing them to collaborate. And in case of refusal, they destroy or imprison, deprive them of their voice in any way. This is not a new tradition: in Soviet times, especially under Stalin repressions, it was precisely cultural figures who disagreed with the authorities who were exterminated as the greatest threat to the stability of the regime. Thousands of writers, artists, theatre artists, musicians were shot, imprisoned or sent into exile”, she adds.

The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe’s (PACE) Committee for Culture has recently recognised that the erasure of Ukrainian cultural identity is being used by Russia as a weapon in its war against Ukraine. This act is considered a facet of a genocidal policy aimed at annihilating the Ukrainian nation.

Taking the risk: Leaving occupied Kherson

Living under such conditions and constant fear for her and her family’s life, Anastasiia wanted to leave Kherson. “I had a two-year-old toddler and a newborn, I didn’t want them to grow up under these circumstances under occupation”, she says.

There are humanitarian corridors that should allow Ukrainians to leave the Russian-occupied territory or city, however, these aren’t safe. “These corridors are frequently bombed or soldiers just shoot the people trying to leave in their cars”, says Anastasiia. There was no guarantee of safety and survival for Ukrainians trying to reach freedom. It shows therefore how desperate people are who are trying to leave the occupied territories, such as a 98-year-old woman, who walked almost 10 kilometres to reach Ukrainian-controlled territory.

Despite the risk, Anastasiia decided to organise her family’s journey to escape occupation in the summer of 2022. Her husband was unsure in the beginning, considering the risks of being killed by Russian forces on their way. In the end, they decided to leave their home and embarked on a dangerous journey that forced them to cross around 40 Russian checkpoints. Finally making it to the last checkpoint to close to safety, they were met by a long row of hundreds of cars.

“We have two little children, please let us go”

“At the last checkpoint, nearly 700 cars were waiting to reach safety in Ukraine. They processed around 100 cars a day. We were number 690”, remembers Anastasiia. Out of desperation, she asked a soldier if they could somehow open another line since they had a toddler and a newborn with them. “I pleaded with them: We have two little children, please let us go.” Anastasiia was lucky and a second lane for people with children under one year was opened. They only had to wait one day to reach the final checkpoint.

There, their car was checked. “They took our phones, laptops and all other electronics to another guard who screened them”, she recalled. “Other soldiers checked everything in our car, every single shoe.” Terrified that they would be sent back or worse, killed, Anastasiia felt a massive weight off her shoulders when she and her family were allowed to pass.

On 23rd September 2022, Russia initiated ‘referendums’ to annex four occupied regions of Ukraine. Ukrainian officials reported that people were prevented from leaving some occupied areas during the four-day vote, armed groups entered homes, and employees were threatened with job loss if they didn’t participate.

Less than a month later, Kherson was liberated by the Ukrainian Armed Forces on the 11th of November 2022. Parts of the Kherson Oblast, namely the territory on the left bank of the Dnieper River, is still under Russian control.

“Russian terror relies on unpredictability”

Anastasiia and her family ended up moving to Kyiv. There, Anastasiia had to finally get her son’s documents issued, which took her around a month of proving with scans and other documents that she was his mother. Not living under occupation hasn’t taken away her constant fear, though.

“I’m scared every day. Russian terror relies on unpredictability, and I know my chances of being killed are much lower than in a car accident. But it feels like I can influence my safety in a car by being cautious. Meanwhile, the source of danger now remains unpredictable and scary”, Anastasiia says.

Moving to Kyiv wasn’t the only change in her life. Russian is her mother tongue, but since the full-scale invasion, she doesn’t want to speak it any more. “Since the full-scale invasion, I’ve read up on Ukrainian history and how Ukrainian identity and culture was suppressed by the Russians throughout the centuries. I speak Ukrainian now, my children’s mother tongue is Ukrainian. I feel like I’ve finally reclaimed my Ukrainian identity”, says Anastasiia.

Freezing the war

Since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion, there have been calls for negotiations and appeasements with Russian President Vladimir Putin. In March, Pope Francis ‘advised’ Ukraine to have the courage to raise the ‘white flag’ and negotiate an end to the war with Russia.

For Ukrainians, ‘freezing the war’ means living under occupation. Living under Russian occupation means living in constant fear, facing threats of violence, and enduring profound hardships, as shown by harrowing accounts of rape and other war crimes.

Anastasiia doesn’t understand the calls to freeze the war. “Freezing the war in the occupied territories would lead to a mass exodus of those who can afford to leave. Only the elderly, the sick, and those without the means to start anew would remain, eventually obtaining Russian passports. The most alarming aspect is the Russians taking over schools and using Russian textbooks, effectively rewriting history for children”, explains Anastasiia.

On the 8th of May 2024, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree establishing the state policy on historical education, emphasising the dissemination of reliable historical knowledge and fostering patriotism. The policy aims to counteract foreign attempts to distort Russian history and includes measures such as updating educational programs, creating unified history textbooks, and promoting historical and cultural heritage. The decree also plans to develop digital platforms for educational materials, support non-state historical museums, and regulate media to “prevent historical falsifications”.

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#Ukrainian #woman #remembers #life #Russian #occupation

Russian President Vladimir Putin makes a rare visit to North Korea, an old ally

Post By World North Korea, North Korea Russia, putin north korea, putin president, Russia, Vladimir Putin, Vladimir Putin news, Vladimir Putin North Korea

President Vladimir Putin arrived in North Korea early on June 18, Russian news agencies reported, after he said the two countries want to cooperate closely to overcome U.S.-led sanctions in the face of intensifying confrontations with Washington.

Mr. Putin was met at Pyongyang’s airport by North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, according to the news agencies, RIA-Novosti and Interfax.

Mr. Putin, making his first trip to North Korea in 24 years, said in comments that appeared in its state media hours before he landed that he appreciates the country’s firm support of his military actions in Ukraine. The Kremlin launched a full-scale invasion of the neighbouring country in 2022.

He said the countries would continue to “resolutely oppose” what he described as Western ambitions “to hinder the establishment of a multipolar world order based on justice, mutual respect for sovereignty, considering each other’s interests.”

Before heading to North Korea, Putin travelled to Yakutsk, a city in eastern Russia, where he met regional Gov. Aisen Nikolayev, and received briefings on technology and defense-related projects. He also met with young professionals working in Russia’s Far East.

Mr. Putin is being accompanied by several top officials, including Deputy Prime Minister Denis Mantrurov, Defense Minister Andrei Belousov and Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, according to his foreign policy adviser, Yuri Ushakov. He said a number of documents will be signed during the visit, possibly including an agreement on a comprehensive strategic partnership.

Expanding economic relation

Mr. Putin’s visit comes amid growing concerns about an arms arrangement in which Pyongyang provides Moscow with badly needed munitions to fuel Russia’s war in Ukraine in exchange for economic assistance and technology transfers that would enhance the threat posed by Kim’s nuclear weapons and missile program.

In the North Korean capital of Pyongyang, the streets were decorated with portraits of Mr. Putin and Russian flags. A banner on a building said: “We warmly welcome the President of the Russian Federation.”

Mr. Putin also said in his published remarks that Russia and North Korea will develop trade and payment systems “that are not controlled by the West” and jointly oppose sanctions against the countries, which he described as “illegal, unilateral restrictions.”

North Korea is under heavy U.N. Security Council economic sanctions over its nuclear weapons and missile programmes, while Russia is also grappling with sanctions by the United States and its Western partners over its aggression in Ukraine.

Mr. Putin said the countries will also expand cooperation in tourism, culture and education.

U.S. and South Korean officials say military, economic and other exchanges between North Korea and Russia have sharply increased since Kim met Putin in September in the Russian Far East, their first since 2019.

U.S. and South Korean officials accuse the North of providing Russia with artillery, missiles and other military equipment for use in Ukraine, possibly in return for key military technologies and aid. Both Pyongyang and Moscow deny accusations about North Korean weapons transfers, which would violate multiple U.N. Security Council sanctions that Russia previously endorsed.

Along with China, Russia has provided political cover for Mr. Kim’s continuing efforts to advance his nuclear arsenal, repeatedly blocking U.S.-led efforts to impose fresh U.N. sanctions on the North over its weapons tests.

In March, a Russian veto at the United Nations ended monitoring of U.N. sanctions against North Korea over its nuclear programme, prompting Western accusations that Moscow is seeking to avoid scrutiny as it buys weapons from Pyongyang for use in Ukraine. U.S. and South Korean officials have said they are discussing options for a new mechanism for monitoring the North.

Earlier this year, Mr. Putin sent Mr. Kim a high-end Aurus Senat limousine, which he had shown to the North Korean leader when they met in September. Observers said the shipment violated a U.N. resolution banning the supply of luxury items to North Korea.

Russia, North Korea’s relationship ‘is concerning’ says U.S.

John Kirby, spokesperson of the U.S. National Security Council, said the deepening relationship between Moscow and Pyongyang is concerning, “not just because of the impacts it’s going to have on the Ukrainian people, because we know North Korean ballistic missiles are still being used to hit Ukrainian targets, but because there could be some reciprocity here that could affect security on the Korean Peninsula.”

“We haven’t seen the parameters of all of that right now, certainly haven’t seen it come to fruition. But we’re certainly going to be watching that very, very closely,” he said.

Lim Soosuk, spokesperson of South Korea’s Foreign Ministry, said Seoul has been stressing to Moscow that any cooperation between Russia and North Korea must not “proceed in a direction that violates U.N. Security Council resolutions or undermines peace and stability in the region.”

Rising tensions on the Korean Peninsula

Tensions on the Korean Peninsulas are at their highest point in years, with the pace of both Mr. Kim’s weapons tests and combined military exercises involving the United States, South Korea and Japan intensifying in a tit-for-tat cycle. The Koreas also have engaged in Cold War-style psychological warfare that involved North Korea dropping tons of trash on the South with balloons, and the South broadcasting anti-North Korean propaganda with its loudspeakers.

South Korea’s military said soldiers fired warning shots to repel North Korean soldiers who temporarily crossed the land border on Tuesday, apparently in error, for the second time this month.

Mr. Putin has continuously sought to rebuild ties with Pyongyang as part of efforts to restore his country’s clout and its Soviet-era alliances. Moscow’s ties with North Korea weakened after the 1991 Soviet collapse. Kim Jong Un first met with Mr. Putin in 2019 in Russia’s eastern port of Vladivostok.

After North Korea, the Kremlin said Putin will also visit Vietnam for talks that are expected to be focused on trade. The United States, which has spent years strengthening ties and accelerating trade with Vietnam, criticized Putin’s planned visit.

“As Russia continues to seek international support to sustain its illegal and brutal war against Ukraine, we reiterate that no country should give Putin a platform to promote his war of aggression and otherwise allow him to normalize his atrocities,” a U.S. Embassy spokesperson in Vietnam said in a statement.

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