Patrick Henningsen
21st Century Wire
As the internationalist colors of change quickly fade, a winter of discontent beckons in western Ukraine.
Things are getting ugly in Kiev. Yesterday’s protests outside of the Parliament building in the capital city saw at least 122 people were hospitalized with 11 in critical condition, including one dead policeman, and at least 30 detained by security services, including one member of the US-backed fascist Svoboda Party who is said to have confessed to throwing a grenade into a crowd of riot police.
HAND GRENADE: McCain’s foot soldiers are now threatening to overthrow US puppet President Poroshenko.
Who are Svoboda? Overseas adventurist and US Senator John McCain (pictured above) and US State Department operative Victoria Nuland had established political ties with fascist right-wing Svoboda and Right Sector parties back in the winter of 2013 as they prepared for the coup d’ etat which took place shortly thereafter in February 2014. They provided the street muscle Washington needed to flip the government during the Maidan Square protests. Ironically, it’s the US and EU-backed puppet, President Petro Poroshenko, who finds himself targeted by the very same street mobs who helped put him in office. Recently assembled unruly mobs are comprised of the same militant NeoNazis that were used by the US State Department to overthrow the democratically elected government of deposed former President Viktor Yanukovych.
Trouble in east Ukraine is now coming home to roost in Kiev. Right-wing Svoboda and Right Sector protesters became violent after Parliament approved a measure on constitutional changes that could grant greater autonomy to the Russian-speaking Donbass region of Luhansk and Donetsk in eastern Ukraine – which is keeping in line of the Minsk I peace agreement that was signed in February, and later with Minsk II finalized in June. As Washington was not present at the Minsk Accords, it’s expected that Washington nation-builders like Nuland might be rather displeased with President Poroshenko’s more ‘conciliatory’ approach at try and end hostilities in the east and regain some stability throughout the country. Washington hardliners see this as making concessions to ‘Russian interests’, and could be applying additional pressure on defiant puppet Poroshenko by directing right-wing mobs against him.
With its army numbers and funds dwindling, it’s obvious that Kiev was ill-prepared to fight a protracted civil war in the east. Desperate to refresh its ranks Kiev have even tried forced conscription, or a ‘draft’. Military morale is at an all-time low in the country. All this for a war that is clearly unpopular with the people, but very popular in Washington (judging by the apparent enthusiasm at State Department press briefings) who have been keen to send any military support they can in order to help Ukraine’s armed forces “stand-up to Russia and Putin.”
From its new overseas station on the top floor of the Ukrainian Defense building in Kiev, many critics believe that the CIA is ‘managing’ leadership elements of the Right Sector movement. Right Sector’s ‘national guard’ paramilitary units were previously been used by Kiev as manageable rogue ‘free agents’ for fighting in east, and have been blamed for breaking many of the cease fire agreements between Kiev and Russian-speaking rebels in the Donbass. Right Sector militants have also been accused of repeated war crimes in the east. However, in July of 2015, Kiev began to lose control of their unofficial militia when government soldiers and police were forced to confront the ultra-nationalist militia in western Ukraine following a gun and grenade battle which left at least two dead.
Maidan 2.0?
If the Poroshenko government moves too close to peace and reconciliation with the people in the eastern Ukraine, do not be surprised if Washington unleashes more instruments of chaos, and we see another sustained Maidan Square revolt this winter in Kiev. You could argue that this is exactly what we are witnessing now.
Add to this the crippling new economic yoke being placed on the people of the Ukraine by the IMF – and you have a recipe for a genuine powder keg. Ukrainian will then be asking themselves why they didn’t accept the original Russian aid package offered in December 2013, and just how they were conned into bed with the EU and Washington in the first place.
Watch the deadly grenade being thrown at police during yesterday’s protest:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCL0iT0YYuQ
Considering its previously hawkish stance in favor of nation-building in the Ukraine, elements of the mainstream British press are gradually beginning to adopt talking points which are slightly more in line with European leaders Germany and France, while drifting away from hawks in Washington. Below is a surprisingly neutral and somewhat balanced report from the BBC…
One national guard member has been killed and over 100 injured in violent protests outside Ukraine’s parliament, the interior ministry said.
Clashes between nationalists and riot police erupted after MPs gave initial backing to reforms for more autonomy in the rebel-held east.
Some in the crowd lobbed what police said were live grenades at officers protecting parliament.
The reforms are part of a peace plan to end fighting in eastern Ukraine.
The Ukrainian President, Petro Poroshenko, said the violence was “a stab in the back”.
Protesters led by the populist Radical Party and the ultra-nationalist Svoboda (Freedom) party – who oppose any concession to the Russian-backed separatists – gathered outside parliament early on Monday.
After a rowdy debate, 265 MPs out of 450 backed the first reading of the decentralisation bill, granting more powers to areas of Donetsk and Luhansk.
Initially, there were only minor clashes but a BBC correspondent then heard small explosions followed by a much larger one – apparently from a grenade.
‘Pools of blood’: Svyatoslav Khomenko, BBC News, Kiev
The demonstrators numbered barely more than a few dozen – mainly young men, most of them masked. They started the fights with police, but others supported them.
The protesters tried to pull the policemen away from their lines. They beat them and took their shields and helmets. Soon about a dozen young men were almost as well-equipped as the police.
Several times the atmosphere near the building seemed to calm down for a while, with clashes starting up again. And then the explosions began…
READ MORE UKRAINE NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire Ukraine Files
