The Week in Ukraine - 4/30/22

An American citizen, Willy Joseph Cancel, was killed fighting alongside Ukrainian forces in Ukraine this week.  The 22-year-old was working for a private military contracting company when he was killed-- the company had sent him to Ukraine, and he was being paid while he was fighting there.  Cancel, a former U.S. Marine, signed up to work for the private military contracting company on top of his full-time job as a corrections officer in Tennessee. When the war began, the company, began searching for contractors to fight in Ukraine and Cancel agreed to go. “He wanted to go over because he believed in what Ukraine was fighting for, and he wanted to be a part of it to contain it there so it didn’t come here, and that maybe our American soldiers wouldn’t have to be involved in it,” Cancel’s mother, Rebecca Cabrera said.

A Ukrainian adviser to President Volodymyr Zelensky compared Russian troops to ISIS militants after Putin's forces threatened to execute a captured soldier on video unless his mother paid a ransom.  Ukrainian soldier Novikov Alexey Antonovich, from Mariupol, said he was captured on April 23, and was part of the 109th brigade of the Donetsk territorial defense.  Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said video of the captured soldier showed Russia was a 'terrorist state'.  He said: 'The military is increasingly reminiscent of ISIS militants. Russia must be recognized as a terrorist state.'  He added the Russian soldiers threatened to send a video of his execution if they didn't receive the money. Footage showed the Ukrainian soldier being filmed as he was asked his name and how he was being treated.  The video was sent to the young soldier's mother with a demand of €5,000 if she wanted her son to remain alive. 

Two British volunteers providing humanitarian assistance in Ukraine were taken captive by the Russian military.  The non-profit Presidium Network said the men were detained at a checkpoint near the city of Zaporizhzhia in southern Ukraine on Monday.  The two aid workers are believed to have been working independently, but were in touch with the Presidium Network.  They were said to be trying to rescue a family from a village south of Zaporizhzhia at the time of their capture.  Presidium Network's founder, Dominic Byrne said he was making an appeal on behalf of the captured men "to get the support we need from the UK government and from the international community, as well as on the ground".  Two other British men, Aiden Aslin, 28, and Shaun Pinner, 48, were captured earlier this month while fighting in the south-eastern city of Mariupol and shown on Russian state TV with apparent facial bruising.

Russia declared that it had taken “all of Mariupol.” this week, but in reality, hundreds of Ukrainians have been holding out in tunnels underneath Azovstal.  Azovstal, a vast complex of factories, buildings, sheds, scrapyards was one of the Soviet Union’s largest manufacturers of steel and other alloys through World War II, the Cold War, and into the present day.  The tunnels beneath Azovstal were designed to take a near-direct hit from a nuclear weapon. For the last two months, those tunnels and shelters have served their purpose, holding out against weeks of bombardment. Azovstal was built to be a shelter under the worst imaginable circumstances. Now those circumstances are here. And unless something changes soon in Mariupol, what started as a shelter will end as a tomb.

Elsewhere in Mariupol, the BBC reports that Russia has set up “filtration camps” at which local citizens are processed before being taken away to unknown locations within Russia. Some of the few to escape from those camps call conditions there “unimaginable.”  A 49-year-old resident named Oleksandr said, "It was like a true concentration camp."  Elderly people slept in corridors without mattresses or blankets. There was only one toilet and one sink for thousands of people. Dysentery soon began to spread.  Those suspected of being “Ukrainian Nazis” or who showed any sign of protest were taken away to be tortured or killed.  The filtration camps are like ghettos," a resident named Olena said. "Russians divide people into groups. Those who were suspected of having connections with the Ukrainian army, territorial defense, journalists, workers from the government - it's very dangerous for them. They take those people to prisons to Donetsk, torture them."

Lizzo - About Damn Time

Wells Fargo Still Sucking After All These Years

 New York City has announced that it is refusing to open new accounts with the financial company after a Bloomberg News study showed that the bank rejected more than half of its Black applicants looking to refinance their homes in 2020.

City Council Member Justin Brannan, chair of the committee on finance, called the disparity "indefensible” and “outrageous” in a news release from the mayor's office. "In a world where we already expect big banks to flout the law and make their own rules, Wells Fargo really outdid themselves," he said. "Over the past two years – of all the major mortgage lenders – Wells Fargo was alone in rejecting more Black homeowners than it accepted. These brazen and illegal discriminatory actions have no place in New York City."

In a letter to Wells Fargo CEO & President Charles Scharf, Mayor Eric Adams and Comptroller Brad Lander said, "We are both gravely concerned about the recent report in Bloomberg that Wells Fargo rejected over half of Black applicants seeking to refinance their homes in 2020 while approving over 70% of white applicants.  These disparate mortgage practices, layered upon a checkered history of steering homeowners of color into subprime mortgages, rejecting mortgages in redlined neighborhoods, and numerous outstanding consent decrees pertaining to mortgage practices, require a swift response by both your bank and stakeholders."

But Wells Fargo has a history of dubious banking practices.  In 2012, the financial services company settled a $175 million lawsuit accusing the company of charging black and Latino customers higher rates on mortgages.  In 2018, the city of Sacramento accused the bank of a "long-standing pattern and practice" of illegal lending that lowered home values, upped foreclosures, and capped property tax revenue used to fund schools in minority communities.  In 2019, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported that the company is set to pay Philadelphia $10 million to settle a lawsuit alleging lending discrimination targeting minorities. 

In 2020, the same year that Wells Fargo agreed to pay $7.8 million in back wages and interest to resolve allegations of hiring discrimination, the company approved only 47% of refinancing applications launched by Black homeowners, according to the Bloomberg News report. That approval number for white homeowners was 72%.

 

The Never-ending Omichronicles

Kenya's Supreme Court Blocks Kenyatta's Bid to Stay in Power

In a huge blow to President Uhuru Kenyatta, Kenya's judges have once again blocked a government-backed plan to make fundamental changes to the constitution.  Supreme Court judges said the president had acted unlawfully when spearheading the reforms, known as the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI).  They said it should have been led by citizens - not a sitting head of state.  The defeat comes ahead of crucial elections in August.  Another element the Supreme Court deemed unconstitutional was the plan to create an extra 70 seats in parliament - which critics had viewed as a self-serving attempt to reward loyal politicians.

Kenyatta has already served two terms as president so will not stand in those polls, but had staked his legacy on passing this bill, which he argued would make politics more inclusive.  Among its key proposals was the introduction of a new post of prime minister. There had been speculation that Kenyatta could seek this role should his rival-turned-ally Raila Odinga win the presidency.

His previous bid in 2017 saw him narrowly lose to President Kenyatta, amid allegations of fraud and fears of renewed political violence.  A year later, however, the pair agreed a deal, which is the basis of the BBI reforms, while President Kenyatta and his deputy William Ruto have fallen out.  He and Odinga are expected to be the two front-runners in this year's presidential race.

"The whole of this scheme looked to me like it was choreographed to try and force me to get out of government," Ruto told reporters last month. "The so-called 'Building Bridges' built no bridge."  Odinga says he is not deterred by the Supreme Court decision and will "protect the interests" of those who backed the reforms.

While many analysts will see the ruling as a win for Ruto, the real winners are ordinary Kenyans who have fought throughout from the lower courts to the Supreme Court to defend the country's constitution from being amended by elites without public participation. 

 

The Ralph Lauren of Arabia

Jared Kushner just raked in $2 billion from Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, even after the fund’s panel of top advisers called Kushner’s new hedge fund, Affinity Partners, “unsatisfactory in all aspects.” How did the boy wonder do it? By supporting Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and turning a blind eye to the murder and dismemberment of Jamal Khashoggi.

Kushner’s fealty to Mohammed bin Salman finally paid off. The Slim Reaper has been defending MBS for years and is now cashing in. As the Saudi crown prince carried out a purge of the royal family, Jared helpfully revealed classified U.S. intelligence to MBS about which royals supported his purge and which ones did not. Torture and death followed.

And so now, the boy who said not to worry about COVID-19 and thinks he brought peace to the Middle East — all while getting Qatar to bail out his disastrous 666 Fifth Avenue building — has managed to get $2 billion because of his proximity to a murderous Saudi prince and a deranged former U.S. president.  The grift continues.

If Aliens Were Watching Us

The Week in Ukraine - 4/23/22

For the remaining civilian residents of Mariupol, the situation remained as bleak at the beginning of the week. Russia continued to block humanitarian aid to the city, and began issuing "passes" to residents that will be required for any Ukrainian leaving their own homes.

Pointless Russian cruelties continued elsewhere, with a rocket attack on a Kharkiv neighborhood killing at least five. There were no further updates on the fate of the crew of the sunken Moskva, with only a tenth or so of the ship's 510-person crew appearing in footage of the assembled survivors.

There were reports that Russia's Uralvogonzavod tank factory shut down production. It will no longer be able to assemble any of T-72 tank (main RU tank) or newer T-90 & T-14 tanks (Armata). The reason given for the shutdown is the lack of imported components-- which is the direct result of Western sanctions which should continue.

A restaurant run by celebrity chef José Andrés’ nonprofit World Central Kitchen in Kharkiv, Ukraine, was destroyed by a Russian missile strike.  One person was killed, and four others wounded.  WCK staff moved its remaining food products and undamaged equipment to a new kitchen location in Kharkiv.  "This is the reality here — cooking is a heroic act of bravery," WCK CEO Nate Mook said.

As Russian forces retreated from various regions of Ukraine, there are now reports coming in of gang rapes, assaults taking place at gunpoint, rapes committed in front of victims’ children, as well as torture and mutilation. There have been several reports of Ukrainian women who were raped and then murdered by Russian forces.

One Ukrainian woman described on camera how multiple Russian fighters raped her after they rolled into her village with tanks. Another reported that two Russian soldiers murdered her husband on their front lawn and then repeatedly raped her in her basement with her 4-year-old son sobbing in a room down the hall. A group of 15 Ukrainian soldiers, all women, had their heads shaved and were forced to undress and squat for hours while in Russian detention. A dead Ukrainian woman was found in a cellar, shot in the head and naked except for a fur coat, with a used condom and condom wrappers around her.

In one of the most abhorrent testimonies, 25 girls and women, ranging from 14 to 24 years old, were locked in a basement and gang-raped repeatedly in Bucha, a city near the capital of Kyiv. Nine of the victims are now pregnant. “Russian soldiers told them they would rape them to the point where they wouldn’t want sexual contact with any man, to prevent them from having Ukrainian children,” said Ukraine’s ombudsman for human rights Lyudmyla Denisova.

 

Red Hot Chili Peppers - These Are the Ways

Tying the Knot With Pot

Jeffrey Belmonte feasted on meatballs, Caesar salad and bread with herb dip at his wife’s cousin’s wedding in Longwood, FL--  and then felt strange, tingly and fidgety. His sister-in-law also became dizzy and found herself on her hands and knees, vomiting up her dinner.

Miranda Cady, who knew the bride through friends, ate the bread and olive oil, too. She later felt like her heart was going to stop. She went to her car and was so terrified she would die there, she sent herself a text so people would know what had happened to her.

Those stories of being stoned were later confirmed when they and many other wedding guests tested positive for marijuana.  None of the guests interviewed said they knew there would be marijuana in the food.  Now, Danya Svoboda and the wedding caterer, Joycelyn Bryant, have been charged with food tampering and the delivery of marijuana, both felonies. In Florida, medical marijuana is legal, but recreational use remains prohibited.

Douglas Postma, the groom’s uncle, told police he hadn’t used marijuana for many years until he ate the wedding food, according to an arrest affidavit. His heart started racing, and he started having “crazy thoughts,” the affidavit states.  Postma texted his nephew to ask what was happening. Andrew Svoboda replied that he didn’t know and would look into it — a statement he would echo to other guests. Postma’s wife, Nancy, later went to an emergency room and became paranoid, loud and unruly, believing that one of her family members had died.

Earlier, while still at the reception, Nancy Postma and Belmonte, her daughter, went into the kitchen, looking for water and explaining they were feeling unwell.  One of the staff members told them, “Well, there’s cannabis in the food.”

Cady remembered seeing a caterer put green herbs along with pepper in the small dishes containing olive oil.   After she ate the bread and olive oil dip, she felt stoned. She then asked Bryant whether there was marijuana in the food. Bryant “giggled and shook her head yes.”  Going out to the dance floor, Cady found the bride, Danya Svoboda, and asked whether she had put cannabis in the olive oil.  Svoboda said “yes,” smiling and acting as though she had given Cady a “gift.”

Rachel Penn, a neighbor of the newlyweds, told deputies that after she ate the olive oil, she felt “weird” and “buzzed.” Around 9 p.m., the reception ended when Seminole County Fire Rescue and sheriff’s deputies showed up.  Sitting in a hospital, Penn texted the bride and asked what she had consumed at the wedding. Svoboda  texted back: “Uggg, we have no idea, let us know if you need help with anything.” 

 

More of the Omichronicles

GOP Political Stunt in Texas Results in Produce Losses Exceeding $200M

Under pressure from the business community, GOP Texas Gov. Greg Abbott raised the white flag, reversing his stunt that forced commercial vehicles to undergo unnecessary secondary inspections at ports of entry.  The unnecessary checks were performed after U.S. border officials had already conducted their inspections.  The failed political calculation, announced in retaliation for the Biden administration’s just decision to end Stephen Miller policy, was the target of intense bipartisan blow back after causing immense traffic delays and financial losses for food producers.

“A lot of our members are absolutely flabbergasted that this was allowed to happen and that it happened for so long for the sake of border security,” Texas International Produce Association President Dante Galeazzi told The Texas Tribune on Friday. “We feel like we were used as bargaining chips.”

Abbott had tried to save face during the manufactured crisis by staging photo-ops with several Mexican state governors.. But the agreements signed provided “little relief for the overall trade logjam,” The Texas Tribune reported at the time.  Three of the four Mexican governors said they will simply continue security measures they put in place before Abbott ordered the state inspections,” The Texas Tribune now reports.

The director of the Texas Department of Public Safety was forced to admit that the redundant checks “did not turn up any human or drug trafficking during the inspections,” the Associated Press reported.  Fresh Produce Association of the Americas President Lance Jungmeyer told CNN that the losses to vegetable and fruit producers alone were estimated at over $240 million. There are also the losses to the workers transporting this food, and the losses to consumers now facing higher food prices. 

“There’s only person that this helped, and that was Greg Abbott,” Democratic challenger Beto O’Rourke said, adding: “For everyone else, this has been terrible. It’s sending prices through the roof, spiking inflation even higher in the state of Texas.”

 

Protesting War in all the Small Places

A homegrown group of Russian feminist anti-war group has created a list of phony grocery store price tags that it is encouraging its supporters to post under products in grocery stores in a "guerilla style" anti-war campaign. 

The price tag on a jar of coffee reads, "The Russian army has bombed an Art school in Mariupol. Around 400 people were hiding in it from shooting."

A candy bar price tag reads: "Russian soldiers did not let in 14 trucks with humanitarian cargo into the Kherson oblast.  Peaceful residents there need food and medicine."

Other price tags appearing in stores contain the messages: "The Russian army has destroyed over 20 medical establishments in Ukraine."  "People I know are hiding from Russian bombings in the Metro.  None of them are Nazis.  Stop the war."  "Stop the War!  In the first three days, 4300 Russian soldiers died.  Why is this not being talked about on TV?" "Russian war forces have destroyed 80% of the city of Mariupol.  What for?"  "I haven't been in touch with my sister from Ukraine for 8 days.  I don't know what's happened to her.  Stop the War."

On social media, the anti-war group says, "By replacing something very routine with something alien and unusual, we show that there is not a single place in our country that would not be affected by the war, and we do not let people simply close their eyes to what is happening."

Last week, a Petersburg man was arrested for replacing price tags in a supermarket with price tags containing the above anti-war labels.  He is facing 10 years in prison.  Also, an artist was sent to pre-trial detention for doing a similar thing-- using fake price tags at a store to distribute anti-war slogans.  Alexandra Skochilenko was placed in remand pending felony prosecution for spreading “false information” about Russia’s military after a customer reported her to the police.   She is facing 10-15 years in prison.  

We Need More Shame

Many media observers were shocked by an utterly moronic opinion piece from the New York Times' editorial board last month ("America Has a Free Speech Problem") where they lamented, "Americans are losing hold of a fundamental right as citizens of a free country:  the right to speak their minds and voice their opinions without fear of being shamed or shunned."  The board thought that it was a grave social problem that 55% of survey respondents said that they had held their tongue over the past year because they were concerned about retaliation or harsh criticism."

If anything, I would think that number should be much higher.  I would hope that all of us would have second thoughts about our opinions before we go shooting off our mouth. It may have been too many years since I was in college, but I thought freedom of speech meant that you have the right to speak your mind without fear of retaliation, censorship or legal sanction by the government.  It doesn't mean that you are shielded from the consequences of your words by law-abiding citizens.

And of course, there is no constitutional right to "feeling good" as a result of your speech-- and thank god, we finally have an opinion writer at the NYT who comes out and says that.  In "What's Shame Got to Do With It", University of North Carolina professor Tressie McMillon Cottom writes, "[shame] can be functionally good, like when it keeps your pants on in public.  Despite the bad rap that shame gets in our overly psychoanalyzed culture, it is merely a feedback loop that tells you something about your behavior as well as the expectations of others . . . it is bizarre to think that we should legislate, regulate or condition away an emotion."

What's even more important is the distinction Cottom makes between shame and stigma, pointing out, "When we elevate shame from psychological state to social problem, we value systems of oppression that stigmatize those with the least power." Read the piece here.

The Real Easter Island

This Week in Ukraine - 4/16/22

The week began with reports that Russian forces that unsuccessfully tried to take Kyiv were so confident they would win they brought along outfits to hold a parade in the capital, a Ukrainian military official said Thursday. But they wound up dumping their parade attire when they were forced to retreat, according to Oleksandr Gruzevich, deputy chief of staff of Ukraine’s ground forces. At a briefing early Thursday, Gruzevich said Russian troops had left behind formal military attire in the Kyiv region.  He went on to warn, however, that the capital city still isn’t in the clear, as “it is likely the enemy has not given up the goal of a second attack on Kyiv—there is such a threat.”

Russian soldiers that ransacked the Chernobyl nuclear site after Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine took “souvenirs” with them from laboratories that were highly radioactive and deadly, Ukraine’s state nuclear company said.  But if they were hoping to bring these souvenirs back home to impress their friends, they’re in for a surprise, as “carrying such a souvenir with you for two weeks will inevitably lead to radiation burns, radiation sickness and irreversible processes in the body,” according to Energoatom.

Mid-week, the United States and NATO began pointedly dropping the distinctions between "defensive" and "offensive" weaponry that sharply limited what sorts of equipment NATO countries were willing to send to Ukrainian forces. Body armor, ammunition, and anti-armor drones and missiles had been readily handed over; armored vehicles and especially military aircraft were out.  The distinction was made in an effort to not be seen as providing anything that could be used to attack Russian territory directly, out of fear that Russian autocrat Vladimir Putin would insist that NATO was now attempting to attack Russia itself.   However, it is now Russia's exposed war crimes that have provided the justification for the U.S. now dropping its previous objections to offensive weapons delivery.

Within a week of Putin appointing Aleksandr Dvornikov as the new commander of Russian forces in Ukraine, there came reports that chemical weapons were being deployed by Russian soldiers.   On April 11, Canadians volunteering in Mariupol reported that Russian troops used used Sarin deployed via a unmanned aerial vehicle.  There were no deaths reported, but three were injured. 

But easily the most significant development this week was the news that Ukraine sunk the flagship of the Russian Black Sea Fleet, the guided missile cruiser Moskva— the very ship Ukrainians told to go fuck themselves on the first day of the war.  This is likely the largest mass-casualty event for the Russian invaders the entire war, while losing a ship likely costing in the hundreds of millions of dollars. (An American guided missile cruiser costs around $1 billion.)

 

Pink Floyd feat. Andriy Khlyvnyuk - Hey Hey Rise Up

Border Patrol Agents Allowed to Use Messaging Apps That Hide Racist Communications

The former Border Patrol agent who in August 2019 pleaded guilty after intentionally hitting a Guatemalan man with his truck and then lying about it to investigators used text messages to call migrants “disgusting subhuman shit unworthy of being kindling for a fire” and “mindless murdering savages.” Not only did Matthew Bowen’s attorney seek to block these sort of messages from court, he defended his client’s racism by claiming “use of such words is commonplace in the Tucson, Arizona sector.”

So what does Customs and Border Protection (CBP) do as a result?  It is allowing agents to use encrypted apps that have capability to automatically erase messages-- which shouldn't come as a surprise, as CBP has an established history of protecting agents from accountability over their abuses.

CBP is facing at least two inquiries into the agency’s use of the Amazon-owned Wickr app, which has a feature to automatically delete messages. Last October, the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) issued a letter to CBP’s Senior Agency Official for Records Management expressing concern “about the use of this messaging application as it has the capability to auto-delete messages after a specified period of time has passed.”

Then this week, watchdog organization CREW filed a lawsuit after CBP failed to respond to a records request into the app.  “CBP has a notorious record of human rights abuses and exposed texts from CBP agents show an environment of racism and cruelty within the agency,” the organization said. “It is alarming, then, that CBP has issued a $900,000 contract with an encrypted messaging platform where agents could easily destroy all traces of problematic behavior or messages that corroborate reports of abuse with just the swipe of a finger. And from a legal standpoint, any use of the auto-burn function may also violate record-keeping laws.”

“CBP, like ICE and other agencies DHS oversees, has an abysmal track record when it comes to complying with record-keeping laws,” CREW senior counsel Nikhel Sus said. “This has had real consequences for accountability by impeding investigations and oversight of the agency’s activities. The agency’s use of Wickr, a messaging app with ‘auto-delete’ features, certainly raises red flags.”

 

More of the Omichronicles

You Know It's True

We Are at a Tipping Point on Women's Rights in this Country

A Texas district attorney has reversed course and moved to dismiss a murder charge against a woman who authorities allege performed a “self-induced abortion.”  Starr County District Attorney Gocha Allen Ramirez released a statement saying that 26-year-old Lizelle Herrera “cannot and should not be prosecuted for the allegation against her.”

The unexpected development came on the heels of shocking news that the unfortunate woman had previously been arrested and charged with murder-- even being forced to post $500K in bail after spending two nights in jail.  The arrest represented a further chilling crackdown on women in Texas and a disturbing challenge to the inviolability of an individual’s own body.  It was initially unclear how the arrest even passed muster with the judge.  While it's true that the law (signed by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott) prohibits abortions once medical professionals can detect cardiac activity (which is usually around six weeks and before many women know they’re pregnant)-- it specifically prohibits state officials from enforcing the ban. Instead, the law lays out an enforcement mechanism via the civil court process (as opposed to the criminal system).  Instead, the law allows private citizens to sue abortion providers and anyone else who helps someone get an abortion. Whether this disconnect led to the dropping of the charges is still unknown.  

While women's rights faces a heightened threat in Texas, there was a sliver of good news from Maryland.  Republican Gov. Larry Hogan’s veto of a measure to expand access to abortion in Maryland was overridden by the General Assembly.  As a result of the override, the state will finally end a restriction that only physicians can provide abortions. The new law will enable nurse practitioners, nurse midwives and physician assistants to provide them with training. It creates an abortion care training program and requires $3.5 million in state funding annually. It also requires most insurance plans to cover abortions without cost.  The measure comes at a time when the conservative majority on the U.S. Supreme Court is weighing whether to overturn Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 ruling that banned states from outlawing abortion.

 

The new Maryland measure is modernizing the choice the state’s voters made in 1992, when they approved the right to abortion in a statewide vote with 62% of voters supporting it.  According to the bill's sponsor, House Speaker Adrienne Jones, “It is making sure that people have access to care, particularly people of color, particularly low-income people, particularly rural people.  We know that physician-only restrictions exacerbate health inequalities, and we are trying to reduce health inequalities in the state of Maryland with this bill.” 

 

American-Trained Militaries Are Ousting Civilian Governments in Coups

A flurry of military coups across Africa has disrupted the U.S. strategy of enlisting local armies to counter Islamist extremists and other security threats.

The U.S. has trained thousands of African soldiers, from infantrymen rehearsing counter-terrorism raids on the edge of the Sahara to senior commanders attending the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. The programs are a linchpin of U.S. policy on the continent, intended to help African allies professionalize their armed forces to fight armed opponents both foreign and domestic.

But U.S. commanders have watched with dismay over the past year as military leaders in several African allies—including officers with extensive American schooling—have overthrown civilian governments and seized power for themselves, triggering laws that forbid the U.S. government from providing them with weapons or training.

“There’s no one more surprised or disappointed when partners that we’re working with—or have been working with for a while in some cases—decide to overthrow their government,” Rear Adm. Jamie Sands, commander of U.S. special-operations forces in Africa, said this week. “We have not found ourselves able to prevent it, and we certainly don’t assess that we’re causing it.”

The strategic setback was apparent in recent weeks here at Fort Benning, where the U.S. Army hosted its annual gathering of top ground-force commanders from around Africa. Senior soldiers from three dozen African countries watched American recruits tackle boot-camp obstacle courses, witnessed parachute training and saw live-ammo tank and mortar demonstrations.

The Army withheld invitations from coup leaders in Mali and Burkina Faso, West African countries engaged in existential struggles with al Qaeda and Islamic State. Guinean soldiers, who in Septembertoppled the West African nation’s civilian government, were left out of the Fort Benning events and are no longer included in U.S.-led special-operations exercises. 

 

This week in Ukraine - 4/9/22

Victim of Kramatorsk train station attack

Following the reports of bodies strewn in the streets of Bucha, there were reports that night ambushes carried out by a team of Ukrainian special forces and drone operators on quad bikes helped turn the tide of the Russian invasion, The Guardian reported.  Aerorozvidka is a specialist air-reconnaissance unit within the Ukrainian army, which has claimed to have destroyed dozens of Russian "priority targets," including tanks and command trucks.  Aerorozvidka was first set up by tech-savvy, university-educated Ukrainians.  The elite unit, which flies up to 300 missions a day, is crucial to the Ukrainian campaign.

Equipped with night-vision goggles, sniper rifles, and remotely detonated mines and drones, the team of about 30 Ukrainian soldiers approached Russian forces by riding on quad bikes through forests under cover of night.  Some of the drones used by the unit were equipped with thermal imaging cameras, and others were capable of dropping small 1.5kg bombs.  "This one little unit in the night destroyed two or three vehicles at the head of this convoy, and after that, it was stuck. They stayed there two more nights and [destroyed] many vehicles," Honchar said.

Next, we were given a  grim reminder of the price of war: Two Russian soldiers died and 28 are in the hospital after being poisoned by pastries offered to them by civilians near besieged Kharkiv, according to the Ukraine Ministry of Defense.  Two troops from the 3rd motor rifle division died after being given stuffed buns laced with poison, and Another 28 soldiers are in intensive care after civilians in Izium gave the poisoned gifts to the invaders  It comes after more than 500 Russian troops were hospitalized after drinking poisoned alcohol. The Defense ministry said that, "Ukrainians resist the occupiers by all available means."

In the middle of the week came reports that Russian soldiers are forcibly taking people from Mariupol to Russia after interrogating them in so-called filtration camps.  A woman told The Guardian she was among a group of roughly 200 to 300 people who were taken to Novoazovsk, Ukraine, via bus.  That’s when they recognized they had arrived at a “filtration camp,” a series of military tents run by the Russian military where those arriving faced interrogation and confiscation of personal items before they were eventually moved to Russia.  The woman said she had her photo and fingerprints taken, and was questioned about potential ties to the Ukrainian military and her opinion on the war before being sent to the Russian town of Rostov. Others have reported they had to hand in their phones and passwords, which officers then used to access their phone contacts and register them into a database, according to The Washington Post. 

Yesterday, Donetsk regional police said at least 50 people were killed and 100 injured in a Russian missile strike on a railway station in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk, where civilians were waiting for evacuation trains to safer regions of the country.  "Russia hit the railway station in Kramatorsk today," police said in a statement.  "The rocket hit the temporary waiting room, where hundreds of people were waiting for the evacuation train.  This is another proof that Russia is brutally, barbarically killing the civilian Ukrainians, with one goal only -- to kill."  Kramatorsk railway station has been a crucial hub for evacuation of civilians from the Donbas region.

 

Harry Styles - As It Was

Hindu Nationalists in Dehli Forcing Their Beliefs on Christians and Muslims

Meat shops in the Indian capital, Delhi, have been closed for three days after civic officials asked them to remain shut for Navratri - a Hindu festival observed over nine days.  Mayors of south and east districts claimed that people had complained that they did not like seeing meat being cut in the open.  But the move has riled many who have taken to social media to express outrage-- since Hinduism is only one of five of the major religions practiced in India, and critics say the closing of meat shops is illegal, as it violates India's pluralism.

During the nine-day festival, devout Hindus usually fast or abstain from eating meat, and even avoid using garlic, onions and certain spices in their food.  The Indian capital is governed by Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal's Aam Aadmi Party which has not issued any official orders asking meat shops to shut.  However, the mayors who instituted the closures belong to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).  Their move has drawn sharp criticism online with some pointing out that someone's choice to abstain from meat should not infringe on another's freedom to eat meat or earn a livelihood.

Former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Omar Abdullah reacted to the announcement asking if it was okay to ban every non-Muslim resident or tourist in Muslim-majority areas from eating in public during Ramadan, the Muslim month of fasting.  Others asked why the sale and purchase of onions and garlic were not banned during this period, saying "Why stop at just meat?"

One Twitter user said: "Meat will continue to be served in hotels. Online vendors will continue to deliver meat. But the Hindu sentiment will be hurt by the meat shops run by poor Muslim vendors."

 

More of the Omichronicles

As If We Didn't Know That Trump is an Asshole

“I went in yesterday and there was a television screen, and I said, ‘This is genius.’ Putin declares a big portion of the Ukraine — of Ukraine — Putin declares it as independent. Oh, that’s wonderful,” Trump said in a radio interview.

This is what Trump thinks is "genius":

 

 

This is what Trump thinks is "wonderful":

 

 

 

I still can't believe how people voted for such a pathetic, cruel and heartless jerk.

 

Putin is Now the "Butcher of Bucha"

Bucha, a commuter town outside Kyiv, has been retaken by the Ukrainian army. The town suffered vast destruction and high civilian death tolls-- but the whole world has been shocked by horrific images of bodies strewn across the empty streets.  Some lie face down on the pavement while others are collapsed on their backs, mouths open, seemingly crying out in tragic testament to the horrors of the Russian occupation.

British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss expressed her outrage at the scenes, saying "[I'm] appalled by atrocities in Bucha and other towns in Ukraine. Reports of Russian forces targeting innocent civilians are abhorrent. The UK is working with others to collect evidence and support [the International Criminal Court] war crimes investigation. Those responsible will be held to account."

One image showed a man’s body with his hands tied behind his back, and an open Ukrainian passport lay on the ground beside him. Another had a gaping head wound.

Two lay near bicycles and a third was next to an abandoned car. Some lay face up, with their limbs askew, while others were lying face down. 

The causes of death were not apparent, but the appearance of the corpses suggested they had been dead for several days.  The first shocking images of the carnage were captured by Agence France-Presse on the day Ukraine declared the town liberated from Russian troops. Accounts of alleged Russian atrocities emerged as its forces retreat from areas near Kyiv following a failed bid to encircle the capital.  The town of Bucha endured five weeks of near-constant firefights.

Bucha's mayor said 280 people had been buried in a mass grave on the grounds of the Church of St. Andrew and commented on the corpses that littered the streets.  "All these people were shot, killed, in the back of the head," he said.  He added that many of the bodies had white bandages on them 'to show that they were unarmed' and that a 14-year-old boy was among the dead. Some of the victims had tried to cross the Buchanka river to Ukrainian-controlled territory and that entire families had perished, including 'children, women, grandmothers. These are the consequences of Russian occupation,' he added. 

Bucha residents said that bodies were first buried in the grave in the first few days of the war.  Ukrainian presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovych said Sunday that reports emerging from towns in the Kyiv region revealed a "post-apocalyptic picture" of life under Russian occupation. "Victims of these war crimes have already been found, including raped women who they tried to burn, local government officials killed, children killed, elderly people killed, men killed, many of them with tied hands, traces of torture and shot in the back of the head. Robberies, attempts to take gold, valuables, carpets, washing machines. It, of course, will be taken into account by the Prosecutor's Office of Ukraine and law enforcement agencies and international criminal courts."

 

The "Freedom Convey" Has Faded Away

This Week in Ukraine: 4/2/22

The week started out with reports that Russia was withdrawing some forces from Kyiv and Chernikhiv.  Russia’s military claimed it was “fundamentally cutting back" operations near Kyiv, Chernihiv "to increase trust" in talks. But nobody believed that-- Russian was more likely to be repositioning troops or resupplying them, or simply trying to buy some more time before their next military action.  U.S. intelligence later tied the move directly to Russia’s failure to capture Kyiv and meet other strategic objectives in northern Ukraine. Expectations are that these forces will be redeployed in the Donbas region.  

Russia continued to suffer setbacks as Ukrainian defense forces began to find their footing.  Ukrainian forces began to successfully conduct local counterattacks around Kyiv, towards Sumy, and in Kherson Oblast and will likely take further territory—particularly northwest and east of Kyiv—in the days afterward. Russia withdrew elements of its damaged forces around Kyiv, Chernihiv, and Sumy for redeployment to eastern Ukraine-- but these units are unlikely to provide a decisive shift in Russian combat power.  Ukrainian forces continued to repel Russian assaults throughout Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts, and Russian forces failed to take territory in the later stages of the week.  Russian forces continued to steadily advance in Mariupol, but still failed to gain full control of the city.

Later in the week, it became clear that what Putin wanted was to ultimately cleave off the south eastern portion of Ukraine, creating a coherent, contiguous block that could be absorbed directly into Russia. This would secure Russia’s control over Crimea, give it complete ownership of the Sea of Azov, and set it up for the next round of funding unrest in what remains of Ukraine. That’s the kind of result that would allow Putin to exult over his victory—even though the value of the area gained wouldn’t come close to the losses generated. It also became clear that Russia originally intended to create additional “republics” in Mykolaiv and Odesa, except for the messy fact that it failed to capture them. 

Russia continued to attack towns and villages in the southeaster area, deliberately blocking previously agreed on humanitarian corridors, depopulating the region by shipping thousands to prison camps in Russia, and launching missiles into government buildings in Mykolaiv as Ukrainian forces tried to close on Kherson.

Mid-week, @bellingcat reported that the Russian intelligence service paid money to ensure that a shadowy political class in Ukraine supported this war & created an internal coup d'état immediately after the invasion. But Ukrainian agents who took the money ditched them.

Negotiations began taking place in Istanbul, but most people were not expecting much progress to be made. 

According to a story from CyberNews yesterday, Ukraine’s Main Directorate of Intelligence of the Ministry of Defense ( GUR MOU) posted on their website a list of over 600 names the intelligence agency suspected of being Russian intelligence (FSB) officers.

The New York Times began reporting that Putin was misinformed about Russia's military’s struggles in Ukraine. One American official said there was “now persistent tension” between the Russian president and his Defense Ministry. Strikes were reported around the Ukrainian cities of Kyiv and Chernihiv, and Russian officials offered contradictory assessments of the progress in peace talks.

Russian forces began to pull out of the defunct Chernobyl nuclear power site on the heels of reports that seven buses packed with Russian soldiers suffering from Acute Radiation Syndrome arrived in Belarus from the Chernobyl exclusion zone. Russian soldiers who seized the site of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster drove their armored vehicles without radiation protection through a highly toxic zone called the "Red Forest", kicking up clouds of radioactive dust, workers at the site said. The two sources said soldiers in the convoy did not use any anti-radiation gear.

From Jeremy Fleming, the head of the U.K. Government Communication HQ;  “We’ve seen Russian soldiers, short of weapons and morale, refusing to carry out orders, sabotaging their own equipment, and even accidentally shooting down their own aircraft,” said Fleming. “And even though we believe Putin’s advisers are afraid to tell him the truth, what’s going on, and the extent of these misjudgments, must be crystal-clear to the regime.”

At the end of the week, Ukrainian defense officials claimed that Ukraine was not behind an attack on the oil depot at Belgorod (25 miles inside the Ukrainian border).  However, there are early reports that a pair of Ukrainian Mi-24 Hind attach helicopters crossed low over the border into Russia and struck the oil storage facility.  Hard to know what the facts are at this point-- but the only thing better than having Russia worry about whether Ukrainian pilots slipped across the border to attack a site in the middle of a Russian city, may be having Russia worry that two of their own pilots might have done it.

German Foreign Minister Baerbock said, "Putin is saying every other day that he’s having, as he calls it, peace negotiations but... he’s bombing Mariupol... you can’t say on the one hand that you are having... peace negotiations and on the other hand, you are bombing hospitals.”

 

Claudia Valentina - Extra Agenda