Archive for the ‘Russia’ Category
“The challenge for each of us as Irish trade unionists and as Irish left political activists is to be able to step outside our theory and to listen to the voices of Ukrainian trade unionists” – Gregor Kerr at the 2023 Irish Congress of Trade Unions Conference
Gregor Kerr, is an Irish National Teachers Organisation delegate to ICTU BDC, a member of the ICTU Global Solidarity Committee and former member of the Irish National Teachers’ Organisation (INTO) Central Executive Committee. Gregor is also a member of Irish Left With Ukraine and has been an active member of several trade union and political campaigns for many years. here is a speech he was not able to deliver :
Due to time constraints I didn’t get an opportunity to deliver my prepared speech at the Irish Left With Ukraine Fringe Meeting at the ICTU Conference yesterday evening. If you get a chance to listen to the 3 fabulous Ukrainian speakers, you will realise that my speech wasn’t missed!
If I had had time, this is what I would have said –
To its credit, the Irish Congress of Trade Unions and many individual unions have been unequivocal in their support for Ukraine since the brutal Russian invasion in February 2022. As is noted in the Executive Council report to BDC, in March 2022 ICTU organised a well-attended demonstration outside the Russian embassy to mark the one-month anniversary of the invasion. ICTU and many unions have run fundraising efforts and moneys raised have gone to the Irish Red Cross and to the International Trade Union Confederation fund to support Ukrainian unions. At meetings of the ITUC General Council, ICTU supported suspension of the Russian Trade Union Federation from the ITUC, and at the ITUC Congress in Melbourne in November 2022, ICTU President Kevin Callinan attended a special session which pledged support to Ukrainian and Belarus unions. Also in November, David Joyce ICTU Global Solidarity Officer and Séamus Dooley of the NUJ spoke at a public meeting in Dublin organised by Irish Left With Ukraine.
Gregor Kerr and a few of the causes he supports :



Many individual unions have also made contact and pledged solidarity with their sister Ukrainian unions. At Easter, 2 representatives of the Trade Union of Education and Science Workers of Ukraine received a standing ovation following a very powerful speech to the annual Congress of my own union – the Irish National Teachers Organisation.
Read the rest of this entry »Written by tomasoflatharta
Jul 5, 2023 at 12:04 pm
Posted in 2018 Referendum to Repeal the 8th Amendment to the Irish Constitution, Abortion, Anarchism, Anti War Movements, Campism, Dublin Governments, European Network Solidarity with Ukraine and against war Basic consensus, European Union, Feminism, Fourth International, Gregor Kerr, International Political Analysis, Ireland, Irish Left With Ukraine, Irish National Teachers’ Organisation (INTO), Left Evasionism, Left Wing Opponents of Neoliberalism, National Union of Journalists (NUJ), Nóirín Greene, Russia, Séamus Dooley, Sotsialnyi Rukh (Social Movement), The Road to Repeal, Therese Caherty, Trade Unions, Ukraine
Ukraine Peace Appeal: Toward a More Informed Solidarity
FROM UKRAINIAN CIVIL SOCIETY ORGANISATIONS
TO PACIFIST AND PEACEBUILDING MOVEMENTS WORLDWIDE
Original Source : https://www.ukrainepeaceappeal2023.info/
We thank Jim Monaghan for drawing our attention to this important appeal, which he spotted in the North American analytical and activist journal “Against the Current” : https://againstthecurrent.org/atc225/ukraine-peace-appeal-toward-a-more-informed-solidarity/
THE FOLLOWING “APPEAL to Pacifist and Peacebuilding Movements Worldwide” has been initiated in May, 2023 by the Ukrainian Community of Mediators and Dialogue Facilitators, and Ukrainian Feminist Network for Freedom and Democracy, and supported by Ukrainian civil society organizations and individual signers.
1. We, Ukrainian civil society activists, feminists, peacebuilders, mediators, dialogue facilitators, mental health practitioners, human rights defenders and academics, recognise that a growing strategic divergence worldwide has led to certain voices, on the left and right and amongst pacifists to argue for an end to the provision of military support to Ukraine. They also call for an immediate cease-fire between Ukraine and Russia as the strategy for “ending the war.” These calls for negotiation with Putin without resistance are in reality calls to surrender our sovereignty and territorial integrity.
2. We ask for nothing less than the full respect for internationally agreed humanitarian and human rights law and the UN Charter and the practical means to defend ourselves, our popular sovereignty and our territorial integrity, to resist the Kremlin’s expansionist and imperialistic attempts to re-colonize its neighbors. Yes, we need diplomacy, and yes, we need humanitarian aid, but make no mistake, Ukraine needs to continue to be supported with modern weaponry and other military assistance and strict economic and political sanctions on the Kremlin.
Read the rest of this entry »Written by tomasoflatharta
Jul 5, 2023 at 12:01 pm
Posted in Anti War Movements, Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS), Campism, Europe Solidaire Sans Frontières (ESSF), Fourth International, International Political Analysis, Ireland, Left Evasionism, Left Wing Opponents of Neoliberalism, Left Wing Organisations, NATO, Neutrality, Russia, Sotsialnyi Rukh (Social Movement), Trade Unions, Trade Unions - International, Ukraine
500 Days Since Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine : Protest, Friday, July 7 2023, at 3:00 pm near the Russian Embassy in Dublin on Orwell Road
Ukrainian Action in Ireland Announcement :
500 days since the full invasion. Irish protesters near the Russian Embassy and Ukrainian Action invite you to remind representatives of the aggressor country that they must not escape responsibility for their military crimes and urge the world community to help Ukraine expel Russian detainees from our land.

Friday, July 7 2023, at 3:00 pm near the Russian Embassy in Dublin on Orwell Road.
Bring the posters, Ukrainian flags.
Also, on Sunday, July 9, there will be an art installation dedicated to 500 days of war in central Dublin, we will write about it later.
Written by tomasoflatharta
Jul 3, 2023 at 7:22 pm
Trade Unionists for Solidarity with Ukraine -Russian Troops Out of Ukraine Now – Irish Congress of Trade Unions Conference Official Fringe Meeting – Maginnes 3, Lyrath Hotel Kilkenny – Tuesday July 4 2023, 17:30

Trade Unionists for Solidarity with Ukraine –
Russian Troops Out of Ukraine Now
ICTU BDC Official Fringe Meeting
Maginnes 3, Lyrath Hotel, Kilkenny
Tuesday July 4 2023 17.30
Zoom Link : https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82438977972?pwd=NlR1dVVra0VoNkRXTFFjYnY4SHZKdz09
Speakers :
Gregor Kerr – Irish National Teachers Organisation delegate to ICTU BDC, member of the ICTU Global Solidarity Committee (Personal Capacity)
Nataliya Levytska , Deputy Chair, KVPU (Confederation of Free Trade Unions of Ukraine)
Sergey Movchan, member of Solidarity Collectives Ukraine
Denys Pilash, political scientist and historian representing Sotsialnyi Rukh (Social Movement Ukraine)
Chairperson : Nóirín Greene, Former ICTU Executive Member
We stand in solidarity with the people of Ukraine and their defence against the illegal and brutal invasion of February 2022. We want an immediate stop to the bombardment of civilians and the destruction of civilian infrastructure by the Russian Federation and to war crimes and human rights abuses in the occupied territories.
We are for the speediest possible end to the war, based on
- The immediate withdrawal of all Russian forces
- Self-determination for Ukraine and restoration of occupied territory
- Ukraine’s right to appeal for, and be provided with, the military equipment needed to defeat the invasion.
- Approval of any ‘peace deal’ by the people of Ukraine
We extend our solidarity to Ukrainian trade unionists and socialists who continue to promote
and defend workers’ rights. We oppose the introduction of new labour laws in Ukraine which
have undermined trade union and worker rights.
We support a socially progressive reconstruction of Ukraine, with trade unions and civil society
playing a central role. We therefore support the cancellation of Ukraine’s foreign debt and
seizure of Russian assets to help fund state and society-led reconstruction with fully state-
funded welfare state and a low carbon sustainable economy.
Read the rest of this entry »Written by tomasoflatharta
Jul 3, 2023 at 6:34 pm
Posted in Anti War Movements, Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS), Dublin Governments, European Union, FÓRSA trade union, International Political Analysis, Irish Congress of Trade Unions, Irish Left With Ukraine, Irish National Teachers’ Organisation (INTO), MANDATE, National Union of Journalists (NUJ), Russia, Séamus Dooley, SIPTU, Sotsialnyi Rukh (Social Movement), Trade Union of Education and Science Workers of Ukraine, Trade Unions, Trade Unions - International, Ukraine, Ukraine Russia War 2022, UNITE
Britain’s tankies react to Prigozhin’s mutiny
Here is another article in a series concerning Britain’s political tankies (left wing activists who identify positively with Stalinist tanks sent into countries neighbouring Russia to crush popular working class and democratic uprisings – for example Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968). A leading spokesperson of Britain’s “Stop the War” Campaign is Andrew Murray, who operates within a narrow political spectrum opposing active solidarity with the Ukrainian masses. Regrettably Murray shares practical common ground with activists from a different non-Stalinist background, the British Socialist Workers’s Party. This political poison – supporting any camp that is opposed by United States imperialism – is demolished below by the social democratic author Paul Mason. Mason might do his readers a favour by pointing to the fact that many currents with political origins on the left of Stalinism and Social Democracy – for example the Fourth International, solidarity movements such as the European Network for Solidarity with Ukraine, many anarchist organisations and activists – advocate policies on Ukraine in accord with his own thinking. The main Irish radical left organisation – People Before Profit – is strangled by political campism. It needs rapid lessons offered by Scandinavian comrades :
Nordic Green Left Parties Declare Solidarity With Ukraine “we demand a complete and immediate withdrawal of the Russian armed forces from all Ukrainian territory”
https://www.europe-solidaire.org/spip.php?article61764
Stop The War movement finds yet another reason to tell Ukraine to stop resisting…
Putin’s regime is in danger of collapse therefore Ukraine should stop fighting…That’s the message from Stop The War. Having been struck dumb by the events of Saturday 24 June, the campaign has finally come out with a line, penned by self-styled Ukraine expert Andrew Murray.
Read the rest of this entry »Written by tomasoflatharta
Jul 2, 2023 at 12:36 pm
Posted in (Left Party) Vänsterpartiet, Anti War Movements, Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS), Britain, Campism, Eastern Europe, Europe Solidaire Sans Frontières (ESSF), European Network Solidarity with Ukraine and against war Basic consensus, European Union, International Political Analysis, Ireland, Irish Left With Ukraine, Jeremy Corbyn MP, John McDonnell MP, Labour Party, Wales, Left Evasionism, Left Opposition, Mick Antoniw, Member of Senedd (Asssembly), NATO, Non-Alignment, Nordic Green Left, Norway, People Before Profit, Red Green Alliance Denmark, Red Party (Rødt), Norway, Russia, Skripals Chemical Assault in Salisbury, Socialist Left Party, (Sosialistisk venstreparti), Sotsialnyi Rukh (Social Movement), Sweden, Ukraine, UNITE, Westplaining, Yuliya Yurchenko
Britain: The Lecturers’ Union and the Betrayal of the Intellectuals – The anti-imperialism of amoral idiots
Many certainties about global politics were transformed on February 24 2022 when the Russian Federation began a genocidal imperialist invasion of Ukraine, a country in the heart of Europe with a population of 44 million people. The imperialist invaders have forced at least seven million people out of their homeland. This was a seismic shock to many parts of the existing international anti-war movement, which failed to see this catastrophe on the horizon. In itself, that is not a problem. The future cannot be foretold with perfect accuracy, we only have 20-20 vision about the past.
But, what to do?
Readers of this blog will be aware of activities sponsored by Irish Left With Ukraine (ILWU) and the heroic work of Ukrainian activist and academic Yuliya Yurchenko.
This is her take on the behaviour of the British “Stop the War Coalition”, which has parallels in Ireland and other parts of the globe :
Yuliya Yurchenko, a Ukrainian senior lecturer in Political Economy at the University of Greenwich, described the attitude of the ‘anti-war’ left, “who somehow manage to simultaneously recognise Russia’s right to ‘defend its interests’ while denying the right of Ukrainians to defend their very lives or assert their national self-determination”, summing this up memorably as “the anti-imperialism of amoral idiots”.
These issues have erupted inside a British trade union, the University and College Union (UCU) which has a reported membership of about 120,000 people https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_and_College_Union . The report below makes for often ghastly reading. All the same, effective left-wing solidarity with Ukraine is essential – we urge readers to engage.
Article Source : https://www.europe-solidaire.org/spip.php?article66925



Many academics in both Ukraine and the UK are horrified by the Putin-enabling posturing of far-left factions within the UCU
Read the rest of this entry »Written by tomasoflatharta
Jul 1, 2023 at 12:08 pm
Posted in Anti War Movements, Britain, British Empire, Bureaucratically Deformed Trotskyist Parties, Campism, Double Standards, Eastern Europe, Europe Solidaire Sans Frontières (ESSF), European Network Solidarity with Ukraine and against war Basic consensus, European Union, Fall of the Berlin Wall, Fourth International, International Political Analysis, Ireland, Irish Left With Ukraine, Left Evasionism, Left Wing Opponents of Neoliberalism, Lindsey German, NATO, Poland, Razem (Poland), Russia, Socialist Workers' Party (Britain), Sotsialnyi Rukh (Social Movement), Ukraine, Ukraine : Women Raped by Russian Invaders, Ukraine Russia War 2022, University and College Union (UCU), Britain, Westplaining, Yuliya Yurchenko
The Neutrality Policy of the Irish State – A rational defence strategy is required
The left campaign to defend the current Irish foreign policy of Neutrality should be supported – (more accurately the campaign should be styled Non-Alignment, in the sense of 100 per cent opposition to membership of NATO or any other imperialist military alliance).
Opponents of the Dublin government’s attempt to move closer to NATO got lucky.
Foreign Affairs Minister Micheál Martin set up a public “consultative” forum examining Irish foreign policy – which is designed to push the Irish state closer to NATO. President Michael D Higgins launched an effective public attack
Irish President Michael D Higgins Mocked a British Empire Dame from Waterford, Louise Richardson – Is this Expert a good choice to chair an Irish Public Forum on the Neutrality Foreign Policy?
Higgins forced the issue into the mainstream media. Otherwise, the Forum would have taken place with much less publicity. Opponents of the government cannot rely on a lucky break like that every time.
The Irish State has ignored its responsibility to police our skies and our seas. It allows other states – primarily Britain – to do that job. Today, in 2023, international global tensions have risen to an alarming degree, and a very serious imperialist and genocidal war is occurring in the heart of Europe, in Ukraine. Russian imperialism is threatening the Irish state’s balancing act. Putin’s regime has openly threatened military action against the Irish state. That should not be laughed off or ignored. That is the reason the Dublin government is under pressure to get involved with a military alliance.
Read the rest of this entry »Written by tomasoflatharta
Jun 30, 2023 at 4:45 pm
Posted in 1921 Treaty Partitioning Ireland, Anti War Movements, Anti-Semitism, “A Carnival of Reaction” - James Connolly’s Warning About the Partition of Ireland, Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS), British Empire, British State (aka UK), Dublin Governments, Eastern Europe, European Network Solidarity with Ukraine and against war Basic consensus, European Union, Fianna Fáil, History of Ireland, International Political Analysis, Ireland, Irish Left With Ukraine, Louise Richardson, Dame of the British Empire, Micheál Martin TD, NATO, Neutrality, Non-Alignment, Russia, Ukraine, Ukraine : Women Raped by Russian Invaders, Ukraine Russia War 2022
Bizarre Things that American Con Artists and Clare Daly MEP Believe or Don’t Believe
Joan McKiernan, who has been a socialist activist in both the United States and Ireland, reports. Joan also writes for Against the Current https://againstthecurrent.org/joan-mckiernan/
When I was teaching college sociology, I used to do a session on the bizarre things that Americans believe or don’t believe. Like, only 60% of Americans believe in evolution. 10% believe that chocolate milk comes from brown cows, to mention a few notable examples. Long ago, Mark Twain remarked, “It is easier to trick the average person, than it is to convince them that they have been tricked.”
I should not have been surprised then during the Trump era and the pandemic, we saw so many Americans accepting untruths, refusing masks and vaccines, refusing to believe that Covid was real, even as they went to their deaths. And during these years after Trump’s defeat, so many still refuse to accept facts, electoral counts, data. We are told there are alternative versions of facts!
So now we have the same lack of truth applied to support for Ukrainians resistance against the Russian invasion and destruction of their country. Recently, this was seen in this article, The Con Artists Who Blame Ukraine Aid for America’s Social Problems, in which independent presidential candidate and anti-vaxxer, RFK Jr., Green Party candidate Cornel West, Glenn Greenwald, and other Putin apologists are making disingenuous, pseudo-populist arguments against U.S. support for Ukraine. Rather than looking at capitalist exploitation, the Trump tax cuts, unemployment and low wages for the majority, they are blaming the Ukrainian support for all of the US social problems.
https://newrepublic.com/article/173902/ukraine-war-cost-russian-propaganda-rfk-jr-greenwald
The Con Artists Who Blame Ukraine Aid for America’s Social Problems
The reliance on untruths, twisted thinking and re-writing of history is no longer just an American characteristic. This week Irish member of the European Parliament, Clare Daly, came out with her own bizarre explanation of how to deal with the Ukraine war. She says, “The US sat down with the Taliban.” praised the role of United States in the Irish Good Friday Peace Agreement and said the international community should try and do something similar in Ukraine. She accuses the West of giving arms in order to keep the war in Ukraine going!
Read the rest of this entry »Written by tomasoflatharta
Jun 29, 2023 at 3:45 pm
Posted in Anti War Movements, Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS), Campism, Clare Daly TD, Crimea, Eastern Europe, Ecosocialism, Elected Left for Ukraine, European Network Solidarity with Ukraine and against war Basic consensus, European Union, Fall of the Berlin Wall, FFFGGG Coalition, International Political Analysis, Ireland, Irish General Election February 8 2020, Irish Left With Ukraine, Left Evasionism, LeftEast, Mick Wallace TD, NATO, Russia, Ukraine, Ukraine : Women Raped by Russian Invaders, Ukraine Russia War 2022, USA, USA Far Right, Westplaining
The Con Artists Who Blame Ukraine Aid for America’s Social Problems
We thank Joan McKiernan for drawing our attention to a very useful article. The issues it raises also affect political dialogue in other parts of the world, including Ireland. Sections of the left repeat, in many cases unwittingly, pro-Putin populist propaganda currently promoted by North American celebrities who sometimes dress in left-wing clothes. The author (Alaric DeArment) demolishes the apparently plausible claim below :
A scene of squalor unfolds as the camera moves along a city street lined with apparent drug addicts to the soundtrack of Childish Gambino’s “This Is America.” A caption reads, “While American citizens live on the streets and take drugs not to feel the pain, the United States would rather finance a proxy war against Russia,” while a bar graph says the U.S. has sent $46.6 billion in military aid to Ukraine.
Read on, to see what is fundamentally wrong with the above approach. Article Source :
https://newrepublic.com/article/173902/ukraine-war-cost-russian-propaganda-rfk-jr-greenwald
Howie Hawkins writes a very useful introduction :
The article below highlights a big problem the Ukraine solidarity movement faces. These influencers who are pitting Ukrainians against Americans have far more reach than we do. Glenn Greenwald has 300,000 substack subscribers. Jimmy Dore has 1.2 million YouTube subscribers. RFK Jr’ s celebrity status reaches millions.
Dore and these anti-Left influencers give expression to a conspiracist-minded populism that explains social problems as caused primarily by evil elite cabals rather than social structures. Their audiences are very susceptible to the conspiracist themes in Russian propaganda that these influencers amplify.
The anti-Left “populist” influencers are also proudly “anti-woke,” which is to say hostile to anti-racist, feminist, and LGBTQ movements, saying that they divide the working class, which in their mind is white male when in fact it is majority women and people of color. It is their anti-woke rants that divide workers by race, gender, and sexual orientation. For example, see this ignorant denigration of Juneteenth by Jimmy Dore and his sidekick.
I don’t have any easy recommendations for us to deal with this phenomenon other than to keep organizing, speaking up, and building our own media.
Find out more about Howie Hawkins here : https://tomasoflatharta.com/2020/03/05/every-state-is-a-battleground-howie-hawkins-green-party-usa-presidential-candidate-in-2020-standing-on-the-ecosocialist-left-against-the-democrats-and-republicans/
The Con Artists Who Blame Ukraine Aid for America’s Social Problems
RFK Jr., Glenn Greenwald, and other Putin apologists are making disingenuous, pseudo-populist arguments against U.S. support for Ukraine.
A scene of squalor unfolds as the camera moves along a city street lined with apparent drug addicts to the soundtrack of Childish Gambino’s “This Is America.” A caption reads, “While American citizens live on the streets and take drugs not to feel the pain, the United States would rather finance a proxy war against Russia,” while a bar graph says the U.S. has sent $46.6 billion in military aid to Ukraine.
The video , on TikTok, is but one of the countless posts across social media that convey the same underlying message: By helping Ukraine defend itself from bloody subjugation by Russia, the U.S. is depriving its own citizens of critical aid. This pernicious narrative has spread in part thanks to fringe yet popular media and political figures who already had a history of littering the discourse with Kremlinesque talking points, and who now have weaponized and monetized the perception that the U.S. has been too generous to Ukraine and too stingy to its own people.
Read the rest of this entry »Written by tomasoflatharta
Jun 29, 2023 at 3:05 pm
Posted in Anti War Movements, Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS), Campism, Eastern Europe, Ecosocialism, Europe Solidaire Sans Frontières (ESSF), European Network Solidarity with Ukraine and against war Basic consensus, European Union, Fall of the Berlin Wall, Howie Hawkins Ecosocialist Candidate, USA Presidential Election 2020, International Political Analysis, Ireland, Joan McKiernan, Left Evasionism, LeftEast, NATO, Neutrality, Russia, Ukraine, Ukraine Russia War 2022, USA, USA Far Right
The war unleashed by Putin’s regime threatens its stability. Why? Because of Ukrainian Resistance
Andrew Murray, a leading spokesperson of the British Stop the War Campaign, has attempted to write an explanation of the Prigozhin Coup.
A Ceasefire is more important than ever
A schoolchild can demolish this writer’s approach :
My comments are in bold italics and red.
John Meehan (JM)
I deploy a technique well known to effective teachers. One of those teachers explained that, even when you are dealing with the brightest pupils, you need to repeatedly state necessary concrete practical action and analysis so it gets through to the listeners and readers.
Andrew Murray (AM) :
“The case for a ceasefire in the Ukraine conflict is made all the more compelling by the events in Russia.”
John Meehan (JM)
The “events in Russia” have been caused by Ukrainian resistance. There is a “compelling” case to continue and deepen this resistance.
AM :
“The mercenary Wagner group launched an armed insurrection to depose the leadership of the Russian military. Had it been successful, Russia’s military, including its vast nuclear arsenal, could have fallen into the hands of an enraged oligarch.”
JM:
Russia’s “vast nuclear arsenal” is already in the hands of an enraged oligarch – Vladimir Putin.
“The adventure is a product of the failure of Russia’s war to achieve its objectives in Ukraine. Indeed, Wagner boss Prigozhin has belatedly declared that the whole invasion last year was unnecessary and predicated on lies.”
JM:
Precisely. The co-leader of the invasion has declared – unlike Stop The War (Britain) – that there was no threat to Russia from NATO, and no plans by Ukraine to invade Russia.
Read the rest of this entry »Written by tomasoflatharta
Jun 27, 2023 at 12:43 am
Posted in Anarchism, Anti War Movements, Autonomous Action (Russia), Britain, Campism, Crimea, Eastern Europe, Elected Left for Ukraine, Europe Solidaire Sans Frontières (ESSF), European Network Solidarity with Ukraine and against war Basic consensus, Fall of the Berlin Wall, Fourth International, International Political Analysis, International Viewpoint, Irish Left With Ukraine, Left Evasionism, Media Sources - Reliable Versus Unreliable, Migration in Europe, NATO, Posle Magazine, Russia, Russian Revolution 1917, Sotsialnyi Rukh (Social Movement), Ukraine, Ukraine : Women Raped by Russian Invaders, Ukraine Russia War 2022, Westplaining
