There are neo-Nazis in Ukraine’s new government. It’s not representative of the whole country – and it should accept autonomy for Crimea and pledge not to join the EU or NATO to avoid civil war or war with Russia

Summary: Putin’s talk of Ukraine’s transitional government as being entirely made up of neo-nazis who target Russians is an exaggeration, but there’s some truth in it. Ukraine’s new government includes neo-nazis of the Svoboda party and is not representative of the whole country.

EU sanctions are impossible as the EU relies on Russia for gas imports. Arming and funding western Ukrainian groups to fight Russia and its allies would only tip Ukraine into a Bosnian or Chechnyan style civil war. Russia will not back down on this issue as Ukraine was used as a base by its enemies in both World Wars and Chechnya was used as a base by terrorist groups far more recently.

Ukraine’s government should settle for granting Crimea, with its Russian majority, autonomy – and guaranteeing Ukraine will not join the EU or NATO in order to avoid such a war – and the US and EU should encourage them to make these concessions.

Most of the western media talk as though President Putin’s characterisation of the Ukrainian transitional government as neo-nazis who threaten the lives of Russians in Ukraine is purely propaganda.

There is some truth in Putin’s claims though, despite his exaggerations, and despite him being an authoritarian hard line nationalist himself, as well as a frequent propagandist.

The violent neo-Nazis in key posts in the transitional Ukrainian government

Photo: Oleh Tyahnybok, leader of the Svoboda or 'Freedom' party, gives a Nazi salute

The largest party in the transitional government , the ‘Fatherland’ party, are not neo-nazis, despite their name. However the ‘National Socialist’ Svoboda (‘Freedom’) party, notorious for its anti-semitism and hatred of Russians and other minorities in Ukraine, has four ministries in the transitional government including Defence and Deputy Prime Minister (1) – (5).  

Svoboda also has 37 seats in parliament, which approved the Interim Prime Minister and President (6). It won only 10% of the vote nationally in the last elections, but over 40% in parts of Western Ukraine, with the party with the largest share of the vote in the East being the now overthrown President Yanukovych’s Party of the Regions (7).

Svoboda’s four ministries in the transitional government are clearly representative of its support in western Ukraine and a huge over-representation relative to its support in the country as a whole.

Svoboda members and some of its MPs still publicly celebrate the Ukrainian SS unit recruited by the Nazis during World War Two and the Ukrainian nationalist Stephen Bandera who allied with the Nazis (8) – (9).

The Deputy Secretary of National Security is Dmitry Yarosh, former head of the paramilitary Ukrainian nationalist group Right Sector, whose members fought against Russian troops in Chechnya (10).

The opposition majority in the Ukrainian parliament voted after Yanukovych’s overthrow to revoke a law which allowed Ukraine’s regions to use official languages of minorities such as Russians, Hungarian, Romanian, Bulgarian and Tatar along with the Ukrainian language. Ukrainian was to become the only language which could be given official status (11).

Interim President Arseniy Yatsenyuk reversed this ruling. His party Batkivshchyna, or “Fatherland”, is the largest in the transitional government and parliament and luckily it is not as extreme as its name would suggest. Yatsenyuk is Jewish and comes from a family of mixed Romanian and Ukrainian descent (12) – (14).

Svoboda and other ultra-nationalist protesters included many armed with baseball bats, iron pipes and a few guns who still patrol Kiev. Medieval style trebuchet catapults were also used to fire rocks, bricks and petrol bombs at riot police. The last were mostly reported as being amusing, but would be quite capable of killing (15) – (18).

This violence by ultra-right militias may have led to the use of snipers by the government, if those were government snipers (various unsubstantiated rumours include that they were Russians, mercenaries hired by the opposition, or mercenaries hired by the US), though it certainly didn’t justify it.

Why Ukraine should grant the Crimea autonomy and pledge not to join the EU or NATO – and why the US and EU should not try to persuade them to do otherwise

Photo: Ukrainian Russians in Kiev protest against war over Crimea, one sign calling for Putin to protect her by withdrawing his troops

The transitional government is overwhelmingly made up of parties which want to join the EU. Russian actions in Crimea have been sending a message that, as Russian spokespeople put it, this is a “red line” for Russia.

The Ukraine has a large Russian speaking minority, Russian military bases, is right on the border of Russia, historically a close ally of Russia – and an invasion route for the French in the 19^th century and the Germans in the First and Second World Wars.

More recently secessionist republics trying to leave the Russian federation, including Chechnya, were used as bases by terrorist groups for attacks inside Russia (though Russian military torture and massacres in wars against the secessionists contributed greatly to recruitment by these Islamist groups).

President Putin’s popularity in Russia is based on nationalism , restoring Russia’s pride after the collapse of the Soviet Union and economic collapse under Yeltsin’s experiments in an absolute free market that led to chaos. It’s also based on him being seen as a “strong” leader who will stand up to pressure from the US and its allies.

Putin is certainly no democrat, but its hard to believe that any other Russian government would have reacted any differently to a US backed revolution in one of its closest neighbours and allies which also contains strategically important naval bases. The threat to Russians in Ukraine only adds to this.

 If there had been a Russian backed revolution in Canada or Mexico, in which ultra-nationalists threatened US citizens, the US wouldn’t have responded any differently.

If the Ukrainian transitional government attempts to join the EU the likely result will be either civil war in Ukraine with the Russians and Americans each providing arms and training to their proxies there, or else a Russian invasion to install its own client government and prevent US-backed paramilitaries using it as a base, or both. This would not be good for the people of the Ukraine – not even the ones who survived it.

Nor would risking direct military intervention of the kind advocated by the right in the US be good for anyone. It is not wise to suggest potential escalation to World War Three between two nuclear armed powers.

Sanctions on Russia would have little downside for the US, which could afford to play geopolitics with Russia in this way, but western Europe gets much of its gas for heating and electricity from Russia. Germany, the largest country in the EU, gets 25% of its gas imports from Russia.

While the Ukrainian parliament is elected, the transitional government is not. Only after new elections will there be a fully legitimate government representative of all Ukrainians.

The US government has repeatedly condemned changes to the consitutions of Honduras under Zelaya and Venezuela under Chavez when carried out by democratic referenda and elected constitutional assemblies. This leaves it looking more than a bit hypocritical when condemning the Russian government’s criticism of the transitional Ukrainian government as being in breach of Ukraine’s constitution.

The Russian majority in the Crimea voting by referendum to leave Ukraine would no more be against international law than Kosovo’s Albanian majority voting to leave Yugoslavia by referendum. The US government opposes the first and backed the second purely in order to expand its own influence and reduce Russia’s. It has no democratic principle behind its positions.

Minorities in Crimea justifiably fear repression under a Russian nationalist client regime, but the fears of Russians in Crimea of being ruled over by a government including Svoboda are just as real.

Given the massively greater military power of Russia and Russia’s fear of Ukraine being used as a base for its enemies, as it was in both world wars, the best deal the Ukrainian government is likely to get is to give up the Crimea in return for staying in power itself while agreeing not the join the EU.

(That’s before even taking into account Russian fears of Ukraine being used as a base for terrorist attacks into Russia, as Chechnya was by Islamic militants).

Giving western Ukrainians the false impression that the EU will use economic sanctions on Russia (which Putin might well choose to endure to maintain his strong man image and which would hurt the EU more than Russia) to tip the balance, would be misleading them and doing them no favours.

Ditto for pretending that the US will fight World War Three for them.

Arming and funding groups that include neo-nazis and so reducing their country to a Bosnian or Chechnyan style war in the name of “freedom” would be even worse.

There is no freedom for anyone except the killers in a civil war – and no freedom even when it ends if one side are Russian ultra-nationalist extremists and the other side Ukrainian neo-nazis.

(1) = http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All-Ukrainian_Union_Fatherland

(2) = Interfax Ukraine 27 Feb 2014 ‘Ukrainian parliament endorses new cabinet’,
http://en.interfax.com.ua/news/general/193222.html

(3) = http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yatsenyuk_Government#Composition

(4) = Channel 4 News (UK) 05 Mar 2014 ‘How the far-right took top posts in Ukraine's power vacuum’, http://www.channel4.com/news/svoboda-ministers-ukraine-new-government-far-right

(5) = http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svoboda_(political_party)

(6) = Reuters 07 Mar 2014 ‘In Ukraine, nationalists gain influence - and scrutiny’,
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/07/us-ukraine-crisis-far-right-insight-idUSBREA2618B20140307?feedType=RSS&feedName=topNews

(7) = The Nation 06 Mar 2014 ‘The Dark Side of the Ukraine Revolt’,
http://www.thenation.com/blog/178716/dark-side-ukraine-revolt#

(8) = See (7) above

(9) = BBC News 07 Mar 2014 ‘Ukraine's revolution and the far right’,
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-26468720 (see third photo down and text above and below it)

(10) = See (4)

(11) = IB Times 09 Mar 2014 ‘Watch Your Tongue: Language Controversy One Of Fundamental Conflicts In Ukraine’, http://www.ibtimes.com/watch-your-tongue-language-controversy-one-fundamental-conflicts-ukraine-1559069

(12) = See (11)

(13) = http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arseniy_Yatsenyuk

(14) = http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All-Ukrainian_Union_Fatherland

(15) = BBC Newsnight 01 Mar 2014 ‘Ukraine: Far-right armed with bats patrol Kiev’,
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-26394980

(16) = BBC News 01 Mar 2014 ‘Ukraine: The far-right groups patrolling Kiev’,
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-26398112

(17) = ABC News ‘The Kiev Protests Look Apocalyptic’,
http://abcnews.go.com/International/photos/kiev-protests-starting-apocalyptic-22316896/image-pro-european-integration-protesters-build-catapult-throw-stones-22317002

(18) = http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUvrKv0pHNY (BBC news report)

Russian and Chinese government propaganda on Libya?

There have been reports from the Voice of Russia Radio of almost half the casualties being soldiers – without specifying how many soldiers were rebels and how many Gaddafi loyalists.The Chinese Xinua news agency also reported in the early stages of the protests in Benghazi that two policemen were hung by rioters and the managing director of a hospital was tortured to death by them (1) – (2).

It’s possible that these reports are true or closer to the truth than other media, but we also have to remember that these governments have their own ulterior motives and that most of the media in China and Russia are controlled by the governments of one party states with rigged elections. If Gaddafi survives then Libyan oil and arms contracts are likely to move from American and European firms to Russian, Chinese and Indian ones. Gaddafi has already started talks with the ambassadors of these countries on this (3). So there’s even more likelihood of their reports containing propaganda than those of the western media.

Xinua news agency have not been exactly unbiased on the causes of riots in Chinese occupied Tibet and Xinjiang, or on police responses to them. There’s no reason to think they’re more unbiased on Libya.

We also have to take account of the fact that Russia Today (RT) and Voice of Russia Radio get most of their funding from the Russian government – and that Russian journalists critical of their government often end up murdered, like Libyan journalists have in the past under Qaddafi, or having their legs and skulls broken (4) – (5). If you watch RT’s coverage of Chechnya for instance you’ll get the impression that the Russian government and their client thug Kadyrov in Chechnya are very humane democrats, with all killings in the country being the actions of “western forces” or terrorist groups. In fact Kadyrov, like Russian forces under Putin, kills anyone who defies his rule in order to keep the main oil and gas pipeline from the Caspian to Moscow under Russian control. Kadyrov has said that he approves of “honour killings” and worse than this many supposed “honour killings” are actually kidnappings followed by rape and murder, then presented by police as an “honour killing” (6). Russian forces along with Kadyrov’s  have tortured, murdered and raped their way across Chechnya for the last 25 years (7) – (9). When Russian journalist Anna Politskaya wrote articles about Putin and Kadyrov’s involvement in this, she was poisoned and when she survived that, shot dead. After the murder of human rights activist Natalya Estemirova, who was investigating the killings of women in Chechnya, Kadyrov said that she was a woman who “never possessed any honour, dignity or conscience” (10).

You will struggle to find out any of this from Russia Today or Voice of Russia coverage, which includes nothing but Kadyrov and Russian government officials condemning the killings, mixed with fawning interviews of Kadyrov telling them that all human rights activists are after is money and that all murders in Chechnya are caused by agents of the US, years after the US ended all support for Chechen rebels to get Russian support for UN resolution 1441 on Iraq (11) – (12). RT and Voice of Russia are the propaganda arms of the Russian government.

(1) = Voice of Russia 23 Feb 2011 ‘Libya riots kill 111 troops, 189 civilians’,http://english.ruvr.ru/2011/02/23/45700481.html

(2) = Xinua news 19 Feb 2011 ‘Two policemen hanged in Libya protests’,http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/world/2011-02/19/c_13739109.htm

(3) = Xinua news 14 Mar 2011 ‘Gaddafi urges Russia, China, India to invest in Libya's oil sector’,http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/china/2011-03/14/c_13778113.htm

(4) = guardian.co.uk 08 Nov 2010 ‘Russian journalist beaten unconscious outside office’,http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/nov/08/russian-journalist-beaten-unconscious-office

(5) = guardian.co.uk 10 Dec 2010 ‘Russian journalist cleared of slander in road controversy’,http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/dec/10/russia-beketov-cleared-slander-journalist

(6) = St. Petersburg Times 03 Mar 2009 ‘Chechen President Kadyrov Defends Honor Killings’,http://www.sptimes.ru/index.php?story_id=28409&action_id=2

(7) = Human Rights Watch 13 Nov 2006 ‘Widespread Torture in the Chechen Republic’,http://www.hrw.org/en/reports/2006/11/13/widespread-torture-chechen-republic

(8) = Human Rights Watch 13 Aug 2009 ‘Killing with impunity in Chechnya’,http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2009/08/13/killing-impunity-chechnya

(9) = Human Rights Watch 09 Mar 2000 ‘Rape Allegations Surface in Chechnya’,http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2000/01/19/rape-allegations-surface-chechnya

(10) = See (6) above

(11) = Russia Today 27 Jan 2011 ‘The US should leave the Caucasus alone – Chechen leader’,http://rt.com/news/kadyrov-chechen-negative-image/

(12) = Guardian 24 Sep 2002, 'Russia lifts objections after Chechen 'deal'', http://www.guardian.co.uk/chechnya/Story/0,,797846,00.html

The big threat of nuclear war is not from Iran but from US missile shields and anti-missile lasers

The real nuclear threat of nuclear war is not from Iran but from missile shields and laser systems that could allow a nuclear armed state to make a nuclear attack without fear of a nuclear counter-strike just as happened at Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945

A US anti-missile laser test in February

While a ridiculous amount of attention is being paid to whether Iran might develop one nuclear weapon and so possess the same nuclear deterrent that the UK, France, the US ,Russia, China and Israel have had for decades there is  no discussion in the media of the much bigger risk of nuclear war posed by the advances in anti-missile technology being made by the US (such as the first successful test of plane mounted lasers which took down a ballistic missile in February). The assumption seems to be that projects like this and the ‘missile shield’ network across Europe are ‘purely defensive’, when in fact they could return the world to the situation at the time of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings, when the US felt free to use nuclear weapons on Japan’s civilian population because it could do so without any fear of a nuclear counter-strike (1).

(Obama also offered last year to drop the European ‘Missile Defence Shield’ plan if the Russian government would help the US put pressure on Iran (2))

The US-Russian strategic warheads reduction deal has been part of Obama’s attempt to paint a rosy picture of a future without nuclear weapons, as an attempt to persuade the world to back sanctions and war on Iran to prevent it getting nuclear weapons, with the BBC reporting that it would allow Obama and Putin to take the “moral high ground” in taking action against Iran. Yet the treaty merely reduces the number of deployed nuclear warheads by about 30%, leaving the US and Russia with 1,550 deployed warheads each (and presumably an unspecified number of warheads which won’t be deployed – or else the word would be redundant) (3).

Yet they simultaneously claim Iran can’t be trusted with a single one – and make no mention of Israel’s arsenal – estimated at 80 deployed warheads. The risk of an accidental launch of one of the thousands of warheads which Russia and the US will still possess is greater than the risk of Iran starting a nuclear war. Despite the fear mongering Iran’s Ayatollahs and the commanders of the Revolutionary Guard have never shown much enthusiasm for national suicide – most of the current senior Ayatollahs and veteran Guard officers having been responsible for persuading Khomeini to negotiate an ignominious peace with Iraq in 1988 rather than risk direct US involvement and certain defeat (4) - (6).

Plans for ‘stronger’ sanctions on Iran are also being presented by the Obama admistration as if they were a ‘peaceful’ measure which would kill no-one. In fact, if they’re anything like the UN sanctions imposed on Iraq from 1991 till 2003 at the demand of the US government they’re likely to result in deaths in the millions. Two heads of the UN sanctions programme on Iraq - Dennis Halliday and Hans Von Sponeck – resigned in disgust at the number of children who died as a result of sanctions over 12 years – at least 5,000 a month or over 700,000 over 12 years). In practice sanctions which aren’t targeted specifically on a small number of products or individuals kill people on a scale comparable to war (7) – (9).

Some supporters of the Iraq war continually claim the war was necessary in order to end the sanctions, which is not true ; the sanctions could have been lifted without any risk of Saddam ‘invading his neighbours’ or ‘gassing his own people’ (things he could only do when the entire world was arming and funding him against Iran) or using WMD on us or our allies (he had the chance in the 1991Gulf war and didn’t, because he knew the response would have been nuclear) , still less ‘giving them to Al Qa’ida or other terrorist groups’ (which would have been national suicide by proxy for Iraq even if Saddam and Al Qa’ida hadn’t been bitter enemies) (10).

What’s more the invasion has not led to an increase in food supplies for Iraqis but a reduction to a quarter of the food rations provided under sanctions and Saddam (and that’s the ones who aren’t refugees within their own country and so unable to get anything but aid from charities and the UN as they aren’t at the address they were at on the ration list) (11).

Sadly facts never get in the way of those hyping non-existent ‘threats’ for their own reasons – at the Iraq Inquiry Tony Blair spent half his time calling for ‘action’ against Iran, as oblivious to the risks of action being far greater than the risks of inaction in this situation, probably because he never has to suffer the effects of the actions he calls for.

 

(1) = guardian.co.uk 12 Feb 2010 ‘US 'Star Wars' lasers bring down ballistic missile’, http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2010/feb/12/star-wars-laser-ballistic-missile

(2) = guardian.co.uk 03 Mar 2009 ‘Obama offers to drop missile project if Russian helps deal with Iran’, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/mar/03/obama-russia-iran-nuclear

(3) = BBC News 26 Mar 2010 ‘US and Russia announce deal to cut nuclear weapons’, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/8589385.stm

(4) = BBC News 04 Apr 2010 ‘Global map of nuclear arsenals’, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/7979757.stm

(5) = Takeyh, Ray (2006), ‘Hidden Iran - Paradox and Power in the Islamic Republic, Times Books, New York, 2006 - pages 170-174

(6)  = Pollack, Kenneth M.(2004), ‘The Persian Puzzle', Random House, New York, 2005 paperback edition - pages 231-233

(7) = CNN 30 Mar 2010 ‘Obama, Sarkozy discuss Iran sanctions, global economy’,  http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/03/30/obama.sarkozy/index.html

(8) = BBC News 30 Sep 1998 ‘'UN official blasts Iraq sanctions', http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/183499.stm

(9) = Guardian 29 Nov 2001 ‘The hostage nation’, by Hans Von Sponeck & Dennis Halliday’, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2001/nov/29/iraq.comment

(10) = Nye , Joseph S. & Smith , Robert K. (1992), ‘After the Storm' , Madison Books , London , 1992 , - pages 211-216 (Nye is a former CIA officer)

(11) = See sources 82 to 90 on this link

I should have said we should favour the weaker side as their civilians are likely to make up most of the victims of any conflict

I've made a mistake in saying the EU should stay entirely neutral in the conflict between Georgia and Russia.

I still suspect President Saakashvili of Georgia wanted this conflict, thinking it might bring enough pressure on Russia from the EU and US to get Russian troops to leave South Ossetia and Abkhazia and allow him to fulfill his election pledge to re-unify Georgia, despite the majority of the populations of South Ossetia and Abkhazia never having wanted to be part of Georgia - and fearing a repeat of the ethnic cleansing carried out by both sides in the 1992 civil war.

I still suspect the Bush administration has fuelled the conflict by encouraging Saakashvili not to compromise with the Russians or separatists and vague but tough sounding promises of support.

However the Russian government and the South Ossetian and Abkhazian militias all have a record of ethnic cleansing and human rights abuses as bad and probably even worse than that of the Georgian government - and South Ossetian forces bombardment of Georgian villages on August 1st may have been co-ordinated with Russian forces which built up rapidly in the area in the months before war broke out. What's more Russia's military is so much larger and better equipped than Georgia's was that it should have been obvious that Russian forces would win and so the biggest threat was of Russian and South Ossetian forces killing Georgian civilians rather than Georgian forces killing South Ossetians.

Western journalists and UN observers have reported that Russian forces are standing by while South Ossetian militia-men steal from, rape and murder Georgian civilians (e.g watch the first video on this page from Channel 4 News, UK).
HRW Report the militias have burned Georgian villages in South Ossetia.

Nor do Russian forces have any right to still be in the main part of Georgia - where the majority of the population want to be part of Georgia, or to have continued airstrikes even after the Georgian military was defeated. Human Rights Watch observers say Russian planes have killed civilians by using cluster bombs on Georgian towns. This is a war crime - just like the same practice by NATO forces in Kosovo in 1999 - and one war crime does not cancel out another. Both sides have also used rocket launchers in town centres, killing civilians - the Russians in Gori in Georgia and (before Georgian forces' defeat) by both sides in Tkhsinvali in South Ossetia.
Russia's government and military are responsible for this and for the actions of the Ossetian militia-men they arm, train and fight alongside.

Russian troops have also aided Ossetian civilians in south Ossetia to escape from the war zone to North Ossetia - but this may be as much for propaganda value as for humanitarian motives.

This all seems like another set of moves in the international chess game among governments for power and influence. None of the players can be entirely absolved of responsibility for treating their own and other countries' people as pawns whose lives can be sacrificed to achieve 'strategic aims, but when, as with Georgia and Russia, the two sides are so unequal in power, we should favour the weaker side to try and prevent the stronger one allowing its proxies to run riot killing Georgian civilians.

That probably requires a new UN peacekeeping force in a zone on either side of the border between central Georgia and South Ossetia. This would help humanitarian aid and observers to get to civilians and internally displaced refugees of all ethnic groups. A UN General Assembly resolution calling for this and for Russian forces to withdraw back to their positions of July 31st this year and prevent Ossetian militias targeting Georgian civilians in Ossetia could also be put forward, since Russia could veto any Security Council resolution.