Tomás Ó Flatharta

On the political side, socialists in Nordic countries are streets ahead of us in the UK, perhaps because they are geographically closer to Russia.
Bjarke Friborg of the Red-Green Alliance in Denmark underlined in a recent interview the “very real” threat posed by Putin’s regime, “not necessarily in terms of ‘tanks rolling into Paris’, but certainly as a threat to democracy, sovereignty and the principle that borders can not be changed by brute force”. He continued:
We oppose Russian imperialism just as we have opposed American and NATO imperialism: not by supporting one bloc against another, but by defending the right of peoples to self-determination and supporting democratic and progressive forces in Russia and its client state, Belarus.

Simon Pirani, People and Nature Blog

We support building schools and employing health workers; we oppose building new airport runways. Why can’t we support the provision of air defence systems to Ukraine, while opposing sinking billions into Trident and aircraft carriers? Why can’t we call on the government to refuse to purchase Israeli-made weapons systems?
In order to develop a socialist approach along these lines, we need, for a start, an honest assessment of the extent and nature of the Russian military threat (i) to Ukraine, (ii) to other eastern and central European states, and (iii) to western Europe (likely in the form of cyber and other sabotage, covert support for right-wing parties etc).
Furthermore, we need an honest assessment of the limits of European “democracy” that claims to be defending Ukraine – the same “democracy” that reinforces the power of corporations against working people, that supported Israel’s genocide to the hilt and that maintains a “fortress” against defenceless refugees.

Simon Pirani, People and Nature Blog