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New Chinese move for peace in Ukraine

By New Worker correspondent People’s China has launched a new initiative to end the war in Ukraine with a 12-point plan that calls for a cease-fire and the resumption of peace talks between Moscow and Kiev. The Putin government has broadly welcomed the Chinese initiative. The Germans say it needs to be seriously considered amid reports that Britain, France and Germany are proposing to send Ukraine a new tranche of weapons and economic aid as a sweetener for opening up a dialogue with the Russians. And even the Ukrainians are taking it seriously. Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky says he wants to meet China's leader Xi Jinping to discuss Beijing's proposals on ending the war in Ukraine which he said showed that China was involved in the search for peace. But the Americans have already dismissed it out of hand.      China's plan calls for peace talks and respect for national sovereignty. However, the 12-point document does not specifically say that Russia must withdraw it

Support the anti-fascist struggle!

It is good that trade unionists are meeting to debate the attacks on working-class people resulting from the war NATO has been waging in Ukraine, and the war itself. But to be effective, we need a better understanding of what is at stake.      The government has been banging a jingoistic drum, denouncing strikers as doing “Putin’s work”. They only dare try this because of censorship of the real nature of the war. But truth is leaking out. The warmongers are increasingly not trusted. Too many lies.       This is not a predatory war by Russia against ‘poor little Ukraine’ but the result of a 2014 coup by the US using Neo-Nazis as their weapon. They started a war against almost half of the population: the Russian speakers in the South and East of Ukraine. This war has been going on since then: Russia’s intervention was simply defensive against a massive escalation of those attacks in mid-February. Biden ‘predicted’ the intervention at the end of the month because the US had planned an at

Odessa Solidarity Campaign Joint Statement

An anti-imperialist position on the crisis in Ukraine The war in Ukraine is raging on with no end in sight. People are suffering, and fears are rising that the conflict could widen and even involve nuclear weapons. Many well-meaning people are calling for a ceasefire and negotiations. We all want peace, but it does no good to promote solutions that don’t take into account what led up to the war in the first place. Back in 1991, as the Soviet Union was collapsing, the U.S. government promised that NATO would not expand “one inch” eastward. But since then, all 14 new NATO members have been former Soviet states or allies. Sweden and Finland are expected to join soon. Both Georgia and Ukraine, which border Russia, have asked to join. That would complete the encirclement of Russia’s western flank. It would be as if Russia were building an anti-U.S. military alliance of all South and Central American countries and was about to admit Mexico. Obviously, the U.S. would see that as an ex

Johnson claims key role in Ukraine conflict

  by James Tweedie Boris Johnson led the charge on arming Ukraine – both before and during Moscow's military operation – and imposing sanctions and embargoes on Russian exports that prompted a Europe-wide inflationary crisis.      Now the former Prime Minister says that European leaders had hoped for a quick Russian victory in Ukraine.      In a TV interview last week with a US channel, Johnson also conceded that there were "sound economic reasons" for Germany wanting Kiev to agree swiftly to a peace deal with Moscow but that he "couldn't support" it.      It was Johnson – backed by Washington – who persuaded Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky to break off peace talks with Russia just a month into the conflict, when they were on the verge of a breakthrough, during a visit to Kiev in late March.      But a US military analyst says Johnson "miscalculated" by encouraging the clash with Russia.      "The Germans, for all sorts of sound economic

Bye-bye Kiev, hello Cote d’Azur:

Bye-bye Kiev, hello Cote d’Azur: how Ukraine’s corrupt elites are profiting from the conflict By Olga Sukharevskaya, a former Ukrainian diplomat Since the beginning of Russia's military offensive in Ukraine, the US, EU, and their allies have provided Kiev with $126 billion worth of aid, a number almost equal to the country's entire GDP. Moreover, millions of Ukrainians have found refuge in the EU, where they were given housing, food, work permits, and emotional support. The scope is huge, even by Western standards. Considering that the bloc has been funding Kiev while coping with an economic and energy crisis of its own, the assistance is perhaps especially notable.      Kiev bases its endless funding requests on the collapse of its economy, due to the war, and its need to “resist Russian aggression.” But is the aid reaching its intended destination?      While Ukraine has undergone a general mobilization affecting all men under the age of 60, many former and current high-ranki

The Fascist Threat and the Tasks of the Communists

Speech by the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the RCWP-CPSU Stepan Sergeevich Malentsov at the XXII Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties in Havana. Dear Comrades, We welcome all the participants in the meeting, and all the parties that could not come to Cuba, but stand with us in the same class formation. We express our special thanks to the hosts of the meeting, the Cuban comrades. An example of your courage and resilience inspires new generations of revolutionaries around the world. And the example of fraternal proletarian assistance to the Cuban Revolution, primarily by the Soviet Union, remains a subject of study for today’s communists. This is especially true in these October days, when exactly 60 years of the most intense days of confrontation with the Caribbean crisis, when the world stood a stone’s throw away from a possible global nuclear catastrophe, are exactly 60 years old. But thanks to the courage of the Cuban comrades and the fraternal solidarity of the

Fake news from the American lie machine

 The US propaganda machine is playing dirtier than ever in its information war against Russia By Vitaly Sovin After the publication of a recent story in the New York Times based on allegedly ‘declassified materials’ from US intelligence agencies about Russia’s ‘purchase’ of millions of artillery shells and missiles from North Korea for use in Ukraine, something went awry.      Against the backdrop of statements from representatives of the State Department and the Department of Defense, who did not provide any factual information, John Kirby, the US National Security Council’s coordinator for strategic communications, walked it back. He conceded that there were no indications that the arms purchase had actually occurred yet, or that any North Korean munitions had made it onto the battlefield in Ukraine. The narrative, however, serves a number of purposes: Highlighting the “serious logistical problems” for Russia and its local allies in the context of the military operation in Ukraine;

Only NATO Could De-Militarise Itself!

by James Tweedie In a scene from the 1974 film The Four Musketeers the vain Porthos (Frank Finlay) shows the pious Aramis (Richard Chamberlain) his new trick: He draws his rapier and throws it into the bullseye of a target.      Aramis tells Porthos to try that again, but with himself as a live target. The musketeer easily parries Porthos’ hurled sword to one side. “Only Porthos could invent a new way of disarming himself!” Aramis scoffs, before chasing his friend around the gymnasium.      NATO leaders obviously don’t watch enough classic swashbucklers. In their rush to arm the Ukraine since before the start of Russia’s ‘demilitarisation’ operation there, several eastern member-states have managed to demilitarise themselves without Moscow having to lift a finger.      Poland has sent 232 T-72 main battle tanks, almost half its entire tank fleet, over the border into the Ukraine. The Donbas militias have already captured some examples with almost no miles on the clock. Warsaw has orde

What are Russia's war aims?

  Six months into the conflict, what exactly does Russia hope to achieve in Ukraine? by Dmitry Trenin  Putin’s latest comments reveal that Moscow’s thinking has shifted and compromise is no longer on the agenda.      Last week, Russian President Vladimir Putin referred to Ukraine as an “anti-Russian enclave” which has to be removed. He also said that the Russian soldiers taking part in the military operation there were fighting for their “own country.” These statements carry important implications.      Over the last six-plus months, the mantra of the Russian officialdom has been that all aims of the offensive will be reached. On purpose, however, the specific objectives, such as how far Moscow’s forces plan move into Ukraine, have never been spelled out. This cannot but raise speculation about what the Kremlin is actually hoping to achieve.      The only person who can authoritatively answer that question, however, is the President, and second-guessing him makes no sense. Yet, two thi

Support for Ukraine slumps at UN

Only one in three UN members back new anti-Russia resolution International support for Ukraine has dropped dramatically since March. Only one in three UN members back new anti-Russia resolution.Only one in three UN members back a new anti-Russia resolution US and EU ambassadors backed Ukrainian envoy to the UN Sergey Kislitsa after a Security Council meeting on 24August 24, 2022. But Ukraine’s latest proposal to condemn Russia has attracted the backing of just 58 out of 193 UN member states, a far cry from the number that symbolically supported Kiev in the General Assembly in March.      Kiev’s envoy to the UN Sergey Kislitsa heralded the proposed resolution on Wednesday, following the Security Council meeting convened on Ukraine’s independence day. The session featured a video address by President Vladimir Zelensky, for which the council had to override protocol requiring in-person appearances, and a series of statements by Western governments denouncing Russia.      Moscow’s envoy Va

Ukrainians Behind Murder of Daria Dugina

by Ilya Tsukanov The 29-year-old journalist and daughter of famed Russian political political philosopher Alexander Dugin was killed instantly Saturday night on a highway outside Moscow after a powerful car bomb attached to the SUV she was driving detonated.      Ukraine's special services are behind the murder of Daria Dugina, and the perpetrator of the crime is Natalya Vovk, a Ukrainian national, the Federal Security Service (FSB) has concluded.      "It has been established that the crime was prepared and committed by the Ukrainian special services. The perpetrator is Natalya Pavlovna Vovk, a citizen of Ukraine born in 1979, who arrived in Russia on July 23, 2022 together with her daughter...," the domestic security agency said in a statement on Monday.      Vovk was said to have rented an apartment in the same building where Dugina lived to obtain information about her lifestyle. The perpetrator was said to have driven a Mini Cooper, with the vehicle entering Russia w

The selective amnesia of the Western media

The West will brush Ukraine biolab allegations under the carpet just like those of Kosovo organ trafficking by Aleksandar Pavic In crisis after crisis, Western narrative control kicks into overdrive to shift blame, whitewash culprits, or make sure inconvenient lines of questioning are never pursued      Soon after US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s recent descent on Taiwan, the Russian Foreign Ministry’s spokeswoman, Maria Zakharova, called out Nicholas Burns, America’s ambassador to China, for “keeping an embarrassed silence” regarding the “insolent stunt.”      The silence was quite a change from how vocal Burns had been a mere month prior at the World Peace Forum in Beijing, where he demanded that China stop relaying “Russian propaganda” by “accusing NATO of starting” the conflict in Ukraine. He used the opportunity to accuse the Chinese Foreign Ministry’s spokesperson of “telling lies about American bioweapons labs, which do not exist in Ukraine.”      But that was then and this is no