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Afghanistan’s Ambassador to Paris and Permanent Delegate to UNESCO & ICESCO signs Schiller Institute petition

On Thursday February 29, 2024, in Paris, HE Mr Mohammad Homayoon Azizi, Afghanistan’s Ambassador to Paris and UNESCO (on the right in the photo), added his signature to the Schiller Institute’s petition calling on the governments of the Western world to extend and strengthen cooperation in order to protect and preserve Afghanistan’s cultural heritage. H.E. Azizi added that he sincerely hopes that the 46th Session of UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee, to be held in July this year in New Delhi, India, will contribute to strengthening relations in this field with his country. On the left, Karel Vereycken, representative of the Schiller Institute, warmly thanking the ambassador for his commitment.

Read and sign the petition here.


Afghanistan: Mes Aynak Copper Mine Will Open, But Buddhist Archeological Site Will be Fully Preserved

On November 10, in Kabul, an eminent Afghan archaeologist gave us some excellent news, disavowing what we read in the mainstream press in the West.

Having been involved for a decade in the excavations at Mes Aynak, where an archaeological site on the surface is complicating the opening of a huge copper mine, this expert knows what he’s talking about and today he is pleased to be able to announce that the dossier has reached an extremely favorable conclusion.

The richness of its subsoil makes Mes Aynak (literally “little mine”), 35 km south of Kabul, the second largest copper deposit in the world. At a time when China and the other BRICS countries need this precious metal for their industrial development, exploitation of the mine could provide a substantial windfall that Afghanistan, a country devastated by 40 years of war and looting, urgently needs to finance its reconstruction.

In 2008, an initial contract was signed between the Afghan government and the Chinese state-owned company Metallurgical Corp of China (MCC). However, following security incidents, the project was suspended.

Taking advantage of the opportunity, archaeologists, who suspected the site’s archaeological wealth, were able to excavate the site and uncover a vast Buddhist complex (3rd-7th century), already considered a major Buddhist site. The site includes monasteries, stupas (temples), fortresses, administrative buildings, dwellings, sculptures and frescoes.

It’s true that the 2008 contract envisaged conserving only a small part of the site and transforming the rest into an open-pit mine.

However, according to our interlocutor, who attended the latest discussions between all the various parties involved in the project at the end of October, things have changed radically: the Chinese company MCC now agrees to mine the whole site, not just a small part, exclusively by the use of underground mining methods. As a result, not a small part but all of the historic remains on the surface will be preserved.

Whereas in 2001, the world was shocked by the destruction of the two giant Buddhas in the Bamiyan Valley, this happy agreement marks a real turning point. Both Afghanistan and China take their responsibility in the defense of the cultural heritage of mankind, while confirming their commitment to bring prosperity to all through economic and industrial development.

In Kabul, Karel Vereycken


Schiller Institute: First-Hand Report on Russia-Africa Summit

Sebastien Perimony of the Schiller Institute Africa Desk in France was the only representative from any Western organization participating in the historic Russia-Africa Summit in St. Petersburg on July 27-28, 2023. His video, now translated into English, is a fascinating and insightful 18 minute first-hand report on that conference.

This important summit was either ignored, blacked out, or lied about in most of the western world, so please listen to it and circulate it widely. 


Conference: Let us Join Hands with the Global Majority To Create a New Chapter in World History!

Invitation for the Schiller Institute Online Conference September 9, 2023

The world is presently undergoing changes, changes which occur only once in a thousand years: The age of colonialism, which began in the 16th Century, and has lasted almost 600 years, is coming to an end. The countries of the Global South, which represent by far the majority of mankind, are shedding the remnants of colonial suppression, as it still exists in the form of international control over their resources, unfair conditions of trade, and financial subjugation and looting by the City of London and Wall Street. The countries of the Global South are asserting their right to process these resources and produce value-added goods as a means of becoming middle income societies in the foreseeable future through high-technology industrialization. Lyndon LaRouche, for decades, specified the needed concepts and policies in physical economy to expedite that transition.

It can be expected that the summit of the BRICS countries, to take place August 22-24, will reflect the tectonic shift going on: Twenty-three countries have applied formally for membership in this organization and more than twenty informally. Rather than regarding this process as a threat to the West, the nations of Europe and even the U.S. should take up the offer of cooperation. If the countries of the Global North go forward with their stated intent to “decouple” or “de-risk” from China, which is the largest trading partner of many countries of the Global South, this will be especially devastating for the economies of Europe, which are already in the process of deindustrialization. Even more fundamentally, if the West sticks to a policy of geopolitical confrontation with Russia and China, and tries to maintain an unipolar world by creating a Global NATO, the present conflicts around Ukraine now and soon Taiwan, could escalate into a third, this time thermonuclear world war.

The fact that the old order has failed to solve the problems of poverty, hunger, and the underdevelopment of billions of people in the developing countries, is demonstrated by the horrendous migrant crisis, where thousands and thousands of desperate people are assembling, at national borders—be it between the U.S. and Mexico, or be it along the Mediterranean, which has already become a mass grave. Instead of resorting to cruel and inhumane methods to keep human beings out, we should join hands with China and other emerging countries to help the countries of the Global South industrialize. There is no need for rivalry; there is so much for everyone to do to meet the existential needs of people now suffering.

Which way we decide to go, will in all likelihood determine if we end up in a world war resulting in the annihilation of the human species, or if we keep our humanity and open a new, more beautiful chapter in the history of mankind.

We need a new international security and development architecture that takes into account the interests of every single country on the planet. The warring parties of the Thirty Years War were able to reach the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, because they realized that there would be no one left to enjoy the victory, if they had continued to fight. We should at least be that intelligent.

We must revive the most beautiful traditions of our cultures, especially in classical art, and celebrate the image of man as the creative species, to develop from there a vision of how to create a durable peace for all of humanity.


PRESS RELEASE: International Peace Coalition Holds Sixth Meeting

July 14—The International Peace Coalition (IPC), initiated by Helga Zepp- LaRouche, held its sixth weekly Zoom meeting today, chaired by the Schiller Institute’s Anastasia Battle, with 38 guests from 15 countries and peace organizations, in addition to members of the Schiller Institute.

At their fifth meeting, in an impassioned presentation, Dr. Chandra Muzaffar, President of the International Movement for a Just World (JUST), had described he just concluded July 4–5 conference sponsored by JUST and the Save Humanity and the Planet (SHAPE) centered in Malaysia, titled “Asia-Pacific NATO: Fanning the Flames of War.” The target was AUKUS, the Australia-U.K.-U.S. security pact whose purpose, Dr. Muzaffar said, is to “contain China.” Most Asians oppose this pact, but the political leaders want to “assure the domination of Asia by the British and the U.S.,” and undermine any peace movement. The meeting was quite successful, with speakers from Australia, China, Malaysia, the U.S China and South Korea, with several new organizations participating in the event. JUST and SHAPE will get the news on the IPC to their mailing lists. Dr. Muzaffar thanked Mrs. Zepp-LaRouche and the Schiller Institute for building the IPC, which he said he “hopes will grow and flourish, as it is key to our future.” [Read IPC#5 Press Release Here]

Helga Zepp-LaRouche, the founder and leader of the Schiller Institute, opened the sixth meeting by noting two globally important events in the week since the IPC’s fifth meeting on July 7: the two-day international conference of the Schiller Institute in Strasbourg, France on July 8-9; and the NATO Summit of July 11-12 in Vilnius (referred to as the “villainous Vilnius Summit” by one speaker at the IPC meeting). While the NATO Summit was a war cry for more escalation of the surrogate NATO war against Russia centered in Ukraine, the Schiller Institute conference provided ideas and discussion on the urgency of substituting cooperation for confrontation, preventing the current rush to an outbreak of global nuclear war, and bringing the world’s nations together in a paradigm of development.

Zepp-LaRouche pointed to the newly-announced decision by President Joe Biden to deploy cluster bombs to Ukraine—altogether 300 million bomblets—a madness that will cause thousands of deaths of innocents, as has already been demonstrated by the death and maiming of children and other civilians in Cambodia and Vietnam from the landmines and cluster bombs deployed during the Indochina war of the 1960-70s—deaths and injuries continuing even today. There is international opposition to this genocidal act, including from within the United States, but Biden is going ahead regardless.

The ugly irony of this move, Zepp-LaRouche added, is that Biden has admitted that even though he once opposed the use of cluster bombs as a war crime, now the U.S. and its NATO allies are running out of ammunition to continue the bloodletting in Ukraine, and therefore will use the cluster bombs to keep the war going. She pointed to the decision to deploy F-16s to Ukraine as yet another insane act, noting that Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that Russia will have no way to know if the nuclear-weapon capable F-16s are armed with nuclear weapons or not, and must therefore treat them as being nuclear armed.

Zepp-LaRouche also pointed to the NATO Summit’s embrace of a policy to expand the domain of NATO to the Asia-Pacific region, targeting China with the same war-policy as deployed against Russia in Europe.

As to Ukraine, she reported the intention presented at the NATO Summit to turn the country into a military production center, with the West’s major military-industrial companies setting up production facilities in Ukraine for a “forever war.” In the process, there was no discussion by any NATO participants of a peace plan, or even for negotiations for peace. At the rate of destruction of the Ukraine economy and the death of thousands of young men in the bloody cauldron of war, there will be no way for the country to rebuild even if the war can be stopped.

The lesson, Zepp-LaRouche concluded, is that the International Peace Coalition must grow and create a massive public outcry against the madness. The plan for international demonstrations on Aug. 6, the 78th anniversary of the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima by U.S. President Harry Truman, must be the basis for expanding this effort.

Ray McGovern, a former CIA analyst and a co-founder of the Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS), gave a situation report on the war in Ukraine, asserting that while Biden is declaring that Ukraine is winning, even that Putin has “already lost” the war, that simply demonstrates that Biden is living in an “alternative reality,” since it is abundantly clear that the opposite is the case. The much-heralded “counter-offensive” by the Zelenskyy government forces has been a colossal failure, with the mass destruction of tanks and other military equipment, as well as yet more thousands of lives sacrificed.

Col. Richard H. Black, a retired Marine officer and former Army Joint Advocate General (JAG) lawyer who headed the Army’s Criminal Law Division at the Pentagon before retiring from the military and serving in Virginia’s House of Delegates and Senate, reviewed the failure of Kiev’s “counteroffensive,” suggesting that the idea of a perpetual war of attrition is a losing proposition for Ukraine, and that they may not be able to sustain the current pace even through the end of August.

Regarding the cluster bombs, Col. Black remarked that the world agreed to ban mustard gas and other chemical weapons as war crimes, and for the U.S. to simply declare that cluster bombs are to be accepted because “Ukraine needs them” does not change the fact that their use is a war crime. Are we to declare later that nuclear weapons will stop being illegal if “Ukraine needs them,” he asked? We are heading for nuclear war, he warned, and there is far too little resistance to it in the U.S., so this Coalition must grow.

Joseph Boyd-Barrett, a professor (emeritus) at California State University and an expert on the uses of propaganda, gave further evidence of the falsification in the mainstream media about the war in Ukraine. Ukraine and its Western backers in NATO have already essentially lost the war, as their munitions are running out and the NATO countries are not able to sustain the supply, while Russia “can produce multiples” of the munitions produced by the combined NATO backers of Kiev. He also estimates that the supply of weapons to Ukraine will run out by the end of August.

The problem remains that the Ukraine government, and its backers in NATO, don’t care that the country and the population are being destroyed by the war policy, and refuse to negotiate. Zelenskyy was elected on a pledge to bring peace, but now it must be said that the Kiev regime’s policy is to see their own population murdered by continuing a war which cannot be won. The Democratic Party in power in Washington appears to believe that the only way to win the next general election in November 2024 is to keep the war going through next year.

Juan Carrero, a peace activist from Spain, said that the Western elites are suffering from dementia, as they repeat without any evidence that Russia will lose the war. He said that he had lived in Hiroshima for a year and a half, and saw the effects of the destruction, calling for the Aug. 6 demonstrations worldwide to be a turning point to stop the madness.

Moderator Anastasia Battle read four demands which the IPC will issue on its website https://humanityforpeace.net/
They are:

  • 1. End the supply of weapons to Ukraine.
  • 2. Begin unconditional peace talks with all parties to the war
  • 3. End the NATO alliance.
  • 4. Establish a new security architecture for all nations, ending the division of the world into warring “blocs.”

Bernie Holland, a peace activist from the U.K., asked Helga Zepp-LaRouche to discuss her concept of the “Coincidence of Opposites” which is the eighth of her Ten Principles of a NewInternational Security and Development Architecture.

Zepp-LaRouche replied with an in-depth discussion of the concept, developed by the 15th-century genius Nicholas of Cusa, who discovered the idea as a method of thought based on the truth that the “One” is superior to the “Many,” that only by recognizing that there is a common principle which unites all human beings, whatever their faith or ethnicity or nationality. This method of thinking made it possible for Cusa to bring about the unity of the Roman and Orthodox Christian religions at the ecumenical Council of Florence between 1431 and 1449, and later was the basis of the Peace of Westphalia in 1648 ending the Thirty Years’ War in Europe. In the current age of nuclear weapons, that principle of creative thought, based on love rather than hate, is the only basis for world peace. Other speakers reported on their organizing efforts for peace in Argentina, Chile, England, France, Germany, Holland, India, Italy, Nicaragua, Scotland, and across the U.S. All agreed to build an even larger attendance, including representatives from the Global South, for the next meeting on Friday, July 21.

Rally and Concert:
Humanity for Peace is hosting a “Global Rally for World Peace and an End to All Wars!” On Sunday, Aug. 6 from 1-4 pm at the Dag Hammerskjöld Plaza (United Nations Plaza) in New York City, 47th Street between 1st and 2nd Avenue, followed by an evening concert from 6-8 pm at the Unitarian Church of All Souls, 1157 Lexington Ave. at East 80th Street, of Mozart’s Requiem, performed by a combined chorus and orchestra which will include the Schiller Institute NYC Chorus and musicians. It will be free and open to the public.

A full report on the fifth meeting of the International Peace Coalition, held on July 7, is here: https://schillerinstitute.com/blog/2023/07/13/press-release-fifth-international-peace-coalition-event-reveals-growth-and-extensive-organizing/

In Attendance:

  • Helga Zepp-LaRouche (Germany), founder and leader, Schiller Institute
  • Colonel Richard Black (U.S., ret), former head of the Pentagon Criminal Law Division, former Virginia State Senator
  • Oliver Boyd-Barrett (U.S.), Professor Emeritus, Bowling Green State University, Ohio
    Alessia Ruggeri (Italy) Trade Unionist
  • Anton Winter, (Austria) Nouvelle Alliance, UZG – Initiative Zivilgesellschaft
  • Dr. Balkrishna Kurvey (India) President of the Indian Institute for Peace, Disarmament and Environmental Protection
  • Barbara Spahn (Germany)
  • Beatriz Solórzano León (Guatemala), Lawyer, Parliamentary Technician
  • Bernie Holland (UK) No2NATO
  • Fr. Robert Cushing (U.S.), Association of US Catholic Priests (AUSCP), Pax Christi GA, former priest
  • Bolívar Téllez Castellón (Nicaragua), Lawyer and university professor
  • Boubacar Sidy (USA/Guinea)
  • Christer Lundgren, (Sweden)
  • Ruben Dario Guzzetti (Argentina), Argentine Institute of Geopolitical Studies (IADEG)
  • Christine Bierre (France), Solidarity and Progress
  • Fr. Harry Bury (U.S.), Archdiocese of Saint Paul in Minneapolis, MN
  • Ingo Scharpff (Germany)
  • Jacques Cheminade (France), head of Solidarity and Progress
  • Jimmy Gerum (Germany), Lighthouse Media
  • Juan Carrero (Spain), President, S’Olivar Foundation
  • Juan Gómez (Chile)
  • Karen Ball (U.S.) Pax Christi – Texas
  • Liliana Gorini (Italy), Movisol
  • Mike Billington, (U.S.) Executive Intelligence Review Magazine
  • Muhammad Selim Akhtar (U.S.) Muslim Alliance
  • Ray McGovern (U.S.) former senior analyst, U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA); founding member, Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS)
  • Rev. Dr. Terri L. Strong (U.S.), AME minister from Memphis, TN Chair of the Actions and Global Concern Committee of the Church Women United
  • Ulf Sandmark (Sweden), President Schiller Institute, Sweden
  • Wolfgang Lieberknecht (Germany)
  • David Andersson, (U.S.) Coordinator of NYC bureau for Pressenza Press Agency and hosts a talk-show, Face 2 Face, broadcast on Youtube and Facebook
  • Jurgen Wolf (Scotland), No2NATO UK, Workers Party BG
  • Jack Gilroy (U.S.), Organizer, Pax Christi, NY State/Pax Christi International; Board Member, New York Veterans for Peace
  • Sonja Van den Ende, (Netherlands/Russia) Independent Journalist, covers Russia/Ukraine conflict, for Katehon 
  • Chris Fogarty (U.S./Ireland), Irish American Leader
  • Fredrick Weiss (U.S.) Classical musician
  • Dennis Small (U.S.), Schiller Institute, Virginia
  • Dennis Speed (U.S.), Schiller Institute, New Jersey
  • Diane Sare, (U.S.) U.S. Senate Candidate, New York
  • Jose Vega, (U.S.) Interventionist, Organizer Schiller Institute
  • Anastasia Battle (U.S.) Organizer, Interventionist and Editor-in-Chief, Leonore Magazine

**Affiliations for identification purposes only


On Demonization of Russian Culture

Tatjana Zdanoka – Ms. Zdanoka is a Member of the European Parliament, Latvia

We used to say, “Don’t bring me, My God, to live during an era of big changes.” But we are living during an era of big changes now.

The methods of management focused on unifying the population of Europe and the world according to values of “homo economicus”—the self-sufficient rational consumer—are enduring a systemic crisis. “The economic person” is not even an abstraction, it is a reduction, a flat projection of one of a set of measurements of any human being. The reality is that all people—West Europeans, East Europeans, the Chinese, Indians or Russians—cannot be reduced to the sum of their economic requirements and to functioning as consumers of goods and the benefits.

Each person exists only in the interrelations and the relations with other people, and these communications are irreducible to mutually advantageous or mutually acceptable economic exchange. These are social and political communications—belonging to language, culture, national or subnational community or to religious community. Both these communications and interests are unrealizable out of community, out of political space.

The following phenomenon is evident: with the growth of integration on the contrary, awareness of the originality increases. There is the known mathematical rule: the process of integration must be accompanied by the process of differentiation. I’m often used to quoting the words of Yehudi Menuhin: “Either Europe will become the Europe of cultures, or Europe will die.”

The title of my intervention is “On Demonization of Russian Culture.” There is no need to argue that the EU is infected with Russophobia. Here is just one single example out of thousands.

You see in this slide the invitation to the discussion “Pushing Pushkin: the imperialism and decolonization of Russian culture” co-hosted by Rasa Juknevičienė, Member of the European Parliament (MEP) from Lithuania, and Raphaël Gluksmann, MEP from France. The main idea promoted by the organizers and guests of that discussion is that Russia has always used and continues to use any work of culture as a “weapon of colonization.” The burning hatred in Baltic states, in particular in my country, Latvia, towards everything Russian is irrational and caused by a state inferiority-complex of national elites.

At this moment, the Russian minority of Latvia is on the verge of a catastrophe under the blows of the decisions taken by the ruling politicians, who represent exclusively the national majority. Since last spring, the situation has deteriorated significantly. The war in Ukraine served as a signal for new persecution of the Russian-speakers of Latvia.

Four years ago, my colleague Inese Vaidere, a member of the European Parliament from Latvia, denounced me to the State Security Service for publicly stating that Russians in Latvia felt like Jews on the eve of World War II (saying that we cannot compare [the two], the situation of Jews in Germany was worse). Now another colleague, Sandra Kalniete, calmly tweets that “we should take advantage of the “window of opportunity” that has opened to solve issues important to “our people,” first of all, the elimination of education in Russian and the demolition of the Monuments to the Liberators of Latvia from the Nazi invaders.

Ethnic Russians make up 25% of the population of Latvia, the Russian-speaking linguistic minority makes up 37% of the country’s population. This part of the country’s population is of mixed origin—some represent the descendants of the citizens of the Republic of Latvia from the period 1918-1940, and some represent the labor migrants of the Soviet era. There are approximately 25% of Russian-speaking citizens among the voters of the country, since 12% of Russian-speaking permanent residents remain in a status close to the status of a stateless person and cannot vote.

When speaking about a “window of opportunity,” the Latvian colleague supposed, “[W]e can now achieve our goals without much international attention.” What are those goals? [They encompass] a full-scale campaign by the Latvian authorities to dehumanize, suppress and marginalize the country’s Russian-speaking population. Latvian society is sinking in the wave of hate speech in the mainstream media and social networks. Columnists and commentators openly compare Russian-speaking compatriots with “animals,” a “fifth column” and “aggressive occupiers.” One of the members of National Parliament (Saeima) of the ruling coalition party openly called for ethnic cleansing, aimed at increasing the proportion of ethnic Latvians in the country’s population. The signatures are collected on a petition for the expulsion of “disloyal citizens” from the country and deprivation of their Latvian citizenship, as well as on a petition for a ban on my party, the Latvian Russian Union, standing for the protection of the rights of Russian-speaking minority.

The European Union nominally has an instrument to combat this kind of manifestation. This is the Council Framework Decision 2008/913/JHA of 28 November 2008 on combating certain forms and expressions of racism. This document does not have direct effect—it obligates the states to criminalize the respective acts in their legislation. And the Latvian Criminal Code has an article punishing incitement to national, ethnic and racial hatred. The crux of the matter is that this article is only selectively applied in my country.

Appeals to the police and state security bodies regarding the use of hate speech and calls for violence against Russian-speaking residents of Latvia are fruitless. Consistent refusals to initiate criminal proceedings are coming in. At the same time, charges of allegedly inciting hatred against the titular population have been brought against several journalists writing in Russian, the most prominent of them being Yuri Alekseev and Vladimir Linderman.

The Government has prepared a package of initiatives to destroy memorials dedicated to the soldiers of the Soviet army who liberated Latvia from Nazi occupation during World War II. About 150 thousand Soviet soldiers died in the battles for the liberation of Latvia. In almost every family of Russian-speaking Latvians and in many Latvian families, the memory of the victims of the war and the ancestors who fought on the side of the anti-Hitler coalition is preserved. Through this initiative, people are deprived of the opportunity to preserve the memory of their families.

Thanks to the efforts of our party, complaints were submitted to the UN Human Rights Committee and a temporary settlement was requested, i.e., a ban on the demolition of eight monuments until the complaints were finalized. All these requests were granted. However, the government ignored the UN HRC’s decision, stating that it was advisory in nature. During last summer and autumn, more than 70 monuments to the liberators of Latvia from German fascist occupiers were dismantled, despite the decisions of the UN Human Rights Committee obliging Latvia to refrain from demolition.

I was among those who addressed the Committee. Fate so decreed that the land on which one of the monuments stood belonged to my ancestors, victims of the Holocaust. It is the monument to Alosha in the city of Rezekne, the capital of Latgale.

In addition to the demolition of the World War II monuments, the authorities have recently taken on other sites. You see in this slide the sculpture of Pushkin in one of the parks in Riga which was recently demolished.

The fight against monuments of the past continues with repressions against people living in Latvia today. Some of the elderly people are at risk of becoming illegals. The new retroactive norm provides annulment, in the case of bad knowledge of the Latvian language, of the permanent residence permission for those who acquired the citizenship of Russia. But most grave consequences of the use of “window of opportunity” affect the young generation. The ongoing destruction of minority education started in 1995 (higher education), continued in 2004 (secondary education) and 2018 (primary education). The latest amendments to the Education Laws in the Republic of Latvia are deemed to abolish the education in Russian language in total. It will apply both for public and private schools.

I will conclude my intervention with the fragment of the video clip produced by our team in 2003 when the mass protests of Russian-speakers against education reform started. With the kind permission of Roger Waters, the fragments of the famous Pink Floyd clip were used.

School education in native languages of traditional ethnic and linguistic minorities is one of the most important values of the EU. The Russian-speaking community of Latvia is one of such traditional linguistic minorities of the European Union like many others, and its rights should be respected.


Culture Is the Key for Peace

Maurizio Abbate – Mr. Abbate is Chairman of ENAC, National Institute for Cultural Activities, Italy

Dear friends and colleagues from around the world,

We are gathered here today to seek, with all our strength, useful ideas and solutions to resolve the terrible armed conflict that has been raging in the old continent for almost a year-and-a-half. A fratricidal war capable of bringing death and destruction among the civilians in the territories directly involved and a very serious economic and financial crisis in the rest of the world, due to a system of speculation implemented with unprecedented wickedness by the food and energy multinationals. Corporations often controlled by the same masters.

We are well aware that giants such as Vanguard and BlackRock share a majority of the shares of agribusiness multinationals through Monsanto, Cargill and Dupont. The same hold today in Ukraine about 19 million hectares of land devoted to intensive agriculture, which corresponds to 60 percent of Ukrainian agricultural land. Similarly, 100 percent of Ukrainian mines are now owned by multinationals. To ask why war broke out in this part of Europe, starting from those simple figures, therefore seems superfluous.

The important thing, therefore, is not to analyze the causes of the conflict, but rather to try to understand how was it possible that the American public, as well as the European public, always attentive to the problem of peace, thanks to their peace movements, are today almost numbed by what is happening.

War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength. These were the slogans engraved on the facade of the Ministry of Truth described in George Orwell’s famous novel. This year, the European Union, in an almost grotesque way, has created a Peace Instrument to allocate nearly €8 billion for the purchase of weapons. Buying weapons to prevent conflict and build peace—this is stated, prominently, on the European council’s website. Almost a parallel to the Orwellian Ministry of Truth.

If an institution such as the European Union can alter the foundations of freedoms, that is, the truth, by characterizing the supply of weapons, tools for killing, as useful tools for building peace, then the cultural and moral degradation of the institutions, as well as that of the media that should be exposing such lies, has become self-evident.

Unfortunately, what I have previously stated about the concentration of food and energy production in the hands of a few powerholders is also true for political institutions, the media, as well as those in charge of education. Culture, which, emulating the teachings of Socrates and Plato, should be concerned with developing thoughts and indicating the models of society to be built in order to achieve nobler goals, such as general welfare and solidarity among peoples, is constantly downgraded to a kind of unimportant fashion. Such principles, at the same time, are subordinated to the interests of a few economic powers who have made contemporary society a huge market of precariousness in which everything can be sold or bought. Even the right to life.

A society in which social cohesion is being progressively demolished and upon which continuous alleged emergencies are being imposed, such as climate, health and finance, capable of altering national choices in agriculture, crafts, industry and society.

Therefore, the time has come to stop this neo-barbaric drift caused by the globalization of economy and culture.

A new social and cultural Renaissance must be initiated. To do so, a new paradigm is urgently needed for our Western communities, which must definitively abandon the principle of business as the centerpiece of society and put man with his material and spiritual complexity back at its center. Politics must redefine a harmonious system in which every man and woman has his or her own role in a synergistic and organic way. A society in which human beings must be judged and valued for who they are, for the values they express and succeed in embodying, rather than for what they possess. Only in this way can individual nations, free, independent, self-determined and with their own specificities, become communities again and contribute to the global growth of all humanity.

The differences and peculiarities of peoples, generated by centuries of history and different cultures, must become the driving force to build a constructive dialogue for peaceful coexistence. A dialogue that leads to an equitable distribution of the resources of the planet on which we all live and which are often the cause of armed clashes and unprecedented violence due to the criminal desire to concentrate them in the hands of a few.

As we develop this thesis and try to involve all those who share its aims, however, strong and persuasive signals must be sent out. It is imperative to make it clear to the world that so many free people, not only have no intention of bowing to the deliberate decisions autocratically made by globalist elites, but are ready for a global change of the paradigm imposed until now by those who believe themselves to be the absolute masters.

Confronted with the holders of the major global media in a now imminent head-on clash, networking is needed. It is necessary to organize as many events as possible and use every single television, computer or radio channel to spread the news. Inviting foreign guests to local events must also become a habit capable of disrupting the mantra that only globalization can guarantee freedom, pluralism and democracy.

ENAC, the National Institute for Cultural Activities in Italy, which I am proud to represent, is organizing a conference in Italy with the aim of re-establishing relations between Syria and Italy. Economic and cultural relations that were interrupted for mere political interests and have not been reopened even in the aftermath of the dramatic earthquake that caused thousands of civilian casualties in Turkey and Syria.

At this conference, in which we would be happy to welcome any of those present today, who would like to participate, we intend to send a clear and unequivocal message: While liberalism talks about peace and democracy causing wars and building walls, we respond with the strength of culture, the only one capable of guaranteeing and respecting individual differences while working on building a bridge made of friendship, solidarity and cooperation among peoples.


What Would Erasmus Say About Peace in Ukraine?

Luc Reychler – Prof. Reychler is Professor Emeritus of International Relations, University of Louvain; former Director, Center for Peace Research and Strategic Studies (CPRS), Beglium.

In my presentation I will share an analysis of the current war in Europe and reflect on how Desiderius Erasmus would deal with it.

As one of the greatest scholars of the Renaissance, Erasmus highlighted the folly of religious wars (folly is the pursuit of a policy contrary to the welfare of the people of the states involved), and took on the establishment of his time, whether princes or popes. Their excuses for going to war, were criticized and satirized in writings, as “In Praise of Folly” and “The Complaint of Peace.” He gave peace a voice. His comments, of nearly 500 years ago, are still relevant today, because, although wars are unique, and historically and culturally different, they are universally similar. Wars and counterwars purposefully commit atrocities. (Counterwars are fought against the country that started a war). People, above all the soldiers, are still slaughtered, pierced, burned, shredded, suffocated, tortured, pillaged, etc. And, violence committed during war, is applauded, called righteous and patriotic; the soldiers, dead or alive, get praised with medals. Erasmus warned that wars are attractive for people who have no experience or knowledge about war. His disgust with war is well expressed in the citation “Dulce bellum inexpertis,” or “War is sweet for the inexperienced.”

Before zooming in to the war in Ukraine through Erasmus’s glasses, let me focus on some facets of the war, which are not part of the official discourse in the West. They however invite us to a more balanced, comprehensive and impartial picture.

1. The war was anticipated. Several diplomats and scholars, including myself, expected a war. For example, in 2008, during the George Bush Presidency, William Burns, Ambassador to Russia, who later served as director of the CIA, cautioned that the expansion of NATO to Georgia and Ukraine would have deadly consequences. It would be the brightest of all red lines and create fertile soil for Russian meddling in Crimea and Eastern Ukraine.

2. The war could have been prevented. The West, especially America, made war prevention difficult by (a) her expansionist foreign policy, (b) reducing the art of diplomacy to coercive diplomacy and regime change, and (c) underestimating the risks and costs of an escalating proxy war. Hans Morgenthau’s political realism was replaced by neoconservatism that urged democratic states to establish a new international order through military power, sanctions and regime change.

3. Russia started the war and is the main culprit, but the West and Kyiv are co-responsible. There are several indicators of co-responsibility. In 1990 Ukraine defined itself as a neutral country; the country would not become a member of an alliance. NATO would not expand to Ukraine. During the first 24 years of the independence, Ukraine did not experience war. The American interference in the domestic politics of Ukraine, in the name of regime change, was well underway before the Maidan revolution. This meddling in domestic affairs and NATO’s stealthy expansion threatened Russia’s objective and subjective security. Russia spoke of its existential security. The US and NATO ignored the security issue, arguing that the alliance is peaceful and defensive. This public confession is painfully dissonant with the many wars that America, her allies and NATO waged in the 21st Century in the Middle East and Europe (in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, and in Serbia to support in 1999 Kosovo separatist movement). The increasing political and geographical expansion of NATO to the Russian borders presented Russia with a crisis and a dilemma: to allow this to happen or to stop the expansion in time and thus avoid a ‘fait accomplis.’

4. There is not enough space for an open discussion in Russia, Ukraine and in the West. An impartial, open and critical discussion about prevention and co-responsibility would have contributed to a sound analysis and forecast, and a rational and realistic policy. It would significantly increase the chances of serious peace negotiations. In Russia, a critical conversation about the war and the eight years of civil war in Ukraine that preceded it, is impossible. That is also the case in Ukraine. In the public spaces of the free and democratic West, all the noses are expected to point in the same direction. An open and critical discussion is discouraged by ‘groupthink.’ This is a political-psychological phenomenon that prioritizes agreement and discourages critical commentary and alternatives. Characteristics are: the illusion of infallibility, the conviction that one’s own morality prevails, the rationalization of one’s own decisions; the stereotyping or diabolizing the opponent, and pressure and sanctions to enforce conformity. This undermines the chances of successful and cost-effective decision-making and forms a one-sided and narrowly informed public opinion. In wars, pacifists and peace researchers tend to be sidelined, sanctioned and stigmatized as traitors, dreamers or psychological deviants.

5. The war in Ukraine is a vicious entanglement of an internal-war and a proxy-war with escalatory potential. It’s an escalation of an eight-year-long civil war in a pluri-national country. Fortunately, so far, it has remained a limited war, taking place within the borders of Ukraine. The war and counter-war has created a lot of suffering and destruction. It’s a mega media event. Diplomacy is down. President Zelinski turned out to be a stand-up diplomat and appears almost daily at conferences or in the living room. It is a cynical war, for which the population and the front soldiers are paying . The Donets Basin in the East has been, for nine years, the most blood-soaked area.

6. The costs are high. During a war it is always difficult to find good statistics; they are usually rude and not reliable. The numbers are part of the psychological warfare. For example, not much attention is given to the casualties and destruction during the preceding (internationalized) civil and secession war in the Donbas. On April 9, 2018, the Washington Post reported that the Donbas was one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world. After five years of fighting, more than 10,000 people were killed, 2,800 of them civilians. The war destroyed the infrastructure and a third of the hospitals and schools, homes and election facilities. The number of refugees and displaced citizens was very high. For the current war, Pentagon documents published in April 2023 estimated that Ukraine suffered approximately 125,000 casualties, with up to 17,500 killed in action, while Russians had nearly 200,000 casualties, including up to 43,000 killed in action. The problem with wars, is not only the huge costs (physical, material, economic, social, political, psychological, spiritual and ecological) but also the real and expected benefits and profits. Wars last as long as they are considered profitable by the main protagonists.

7. The war logic prevails. No serious efforts have been undertaken to boost the chances of de-escalation and the building of sustainable peace. Humanitarians and hawks continue to ask for more guns and more war. NATO Secretary General Stoltenberg’s one-liner, “Weapons are the way to peace,” is a fitting title for a surrealist painting of Magritte. The war looks like a huge cage fight, in which the outsider-supporters are safe spectators who empower the fighters and encourage them to win.

8. The war will probably end as a lose-lose operation. Violence may continue for a long time, intensify and even lead to a regional and a third world or nuclear war. The loss is not only for the Ukrainians and fighters on both sides of the battlefield (mostly young men, 40 to 50 percent of whom have no military experience), but also for the whole of Europe. For some spectators in the rest of the world, the war is a European tragicomedy.

How would Erasmus respond to the wars in the 21st Century, and especially the war in Ukraine?

I think he would criticize and satirize the excuses for ongoing war; for example, the misrepresentation of the war as the defense of democracy and of the democratic world. He would also tackle the propaganda on both sides. Above all, he would point at the stupidity of the war and the hubris and mediocracy of the warmongers. Only wise people build sustainable peace. Modern and smart weapons have not reduced the actual and potential atrocities of the war; and the weapons of mass destruction are waiting around the corner. Erasmus would also be a whistleblower and name the princes and kings, and the war profiteers who are responsible for the war. He believes, that what cannot be refuted by argument and fact, can be parred by laughter.

As a constructive pacifist, he would add peace-work to his critical analysis. This implies demanding a cessation of the war, because he considers peace to be more precious than the pursuit of triumph, and a frozen conflict less destructive, less costly and less dangerous than a protracted war. The cessation of the war would go hand in hand with the re-establishment of communication and peace negotiations, but also with development. South Korea is a good example of a country that negotiated a cease-fire with North Korea in 1953 and decided (with the help of the US) to use its talents to become a prosperous country. South Korea reminds us that it is not who wins a war, but who wins the peace that determines their future. A cease-fire in Ukraine, combined with efforts to win the peace, could be a formula to end the war.

Erasmus stresses the relation between education and peace. He would recommend that the Erasmian program for education, training, youth and sports, also give attention to the education of sustainable peace building and the prevention of wars.

Finally, he would encourage people to take part in the building of sustainable peace. This may sound like a dream. But as he said 500 years ago, he would remind us that “there are some people who live in a dream world, and there are some who face reality; and then there are those who turn one into the other.


Make the U.S. a Force for the Good

Diane Sare – Mrs. Sare is a candidate for the U.S. Senate in New York, USA.

Thank you! I am very happy to be with you here, because we must quickly improve ourselves and our approach to everything in a coordinated fashion. I would like to thank Jacques Cheminade for his important leadership of France and his recent statement, and Helga Zepp-LaRouche for her brilliant initiative to pull together all of the international peace movements onto the same page. There is hope.

Humanity is undergoing a transition, and it is a very dangerous one, because you have some shriveled-up old, evil people running some evil institutions, who don’t want to give up the power that they used to have—and I say “used to,” because they’ve already lost that power, and the danger comes from their failure to realize that important fact.

Lyndon LaRouche provided a pathway for the new order with his 1976 [1975—ed.] proposal for an “International Development Bank,” in which every nation would have the opportunity to achieve its full independence in the way the American President Franklin Roosevelt envisioned should occur after World War II.

Unfortunately, or by design, FDR had died just before the end of the war, and his vision for the post war world was unfulfilled.

In 1976, when Mr. LaRouche put forward his program, and launched his first US Presidential campaign, the financial and intelligence community interests tied to the British Imperial system still had too much power, and were able to prevent him from becoming President of the United States. They later assassinated Indira Gandhi and others, including two important German figures, Alfred Herrhausen and Detlev Rowedder, when we had another chance in 1989.

Now, these rotten institutions are totally and thoroughly bankrupt—and I mean, the World Bank, the IMF, NATO, the U.S. Federal Reserve, the ECB, the Bank of England, JP Morgan Chase, all of them! So everything they try to do, not only backfires, but it produces the opposite effect.

They intended to destroy Russia—in fact, President Biden announced that himself last year when he visited Poland. It is not “Russian propaganda’ (which I’ve been accused of spreading).

Has Russia been destroyed? No. The Russian economy is stronger than ever, and Putin is now even more popular since the Prigozhin/Wagner attempted insurrection was so quickly and efficiently put down. Contrary to idiot western propaganda, Putin is stronger, and his nation more unified. However, the arrogant, and perhaps also drug-induced, blindness of the so-called western leaders seems to prevent them from seeing this.

But it’s not only Russia. There is a powerful dynamic among many large nations, and they are joining into various groups, such as the BRICS, the SCO, the Eurasian Economic Union, and now there are signs of unity coming in Ibero-America, and in Africa as well. The African Union has become a powerful player in world politics. Trade between Russia and China is now 85% in yuan and rubles, not dollars.

The grave danger is that the delusional west thinks that they can blackmail and threaten six billion people to change course, and go back to being slaves. If anyone has paid attention to recent speeches of South African President Ramaphosa, you know that this will never happen. So, we face nuclear war.

Please don’t think I am exaggerating, or Helga is exaggerating when she keeps saying this. Let me remind you that President Biden has already crossed several of his own boundaries in escalating this proxy war in Ukraine. He said, “no tanks”; we are sending tanks. He said, “No F 16’s”; we are sending F-16’s. He said, “No long range missiles;” we are now sending those as well. He also said, “NordStream will be ended…. I promise you.” And he delivered. Would he, would [British Prime Minister] Rishi Sunak, would [NATO Secretary General Jens] Stoltenberg approve a strike on the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant?

Now, those of us here, are here because we want to stop this. We want to move mankind into a new direction, but we face some obstacles. Perhaps most frustrating is that our governments don’t listen to us. Not only that, but our governments persecute truth-tellers. Because our societies have been so culturally degraded, it is easy to respond with violence. Before Helen Keller had access to language, if she needed or wanted something, all she could do was throw a tantrum. She caused harm in hope of getting a response.

The violence can be expressed outwardly as in the riots and looting just seen in France, and as happened in the USA a few years ago, or mass shootings—now we have one every few hours; or it is expressed inwardly, with drug addiction, alcohol addiction, and suicide. The rate of suicides among children in the United States, aged 10-19 years old, has tripled.

Everyone seems to believe that brute force, rather than poetry, is the way to “send a message.” What is the message? This is our challenge, because God has created each of us with an innate sense of Truth and Justice, but due to the willful degradation of our culture, like the young Helen Keller, we feel powerless to express these principles and to “be heard.”

The first thing we must remind ourselves is that the universe is created according to the same principles that exist in our souls, and this is why, if we temper ourselves—or tune ourselves to universal principles—we can defeat all evil. But this is hard work!

Let me give an example of the wrong idea about “justice.” You may not have this so badly in Europe, or maybe you do, but in the United States we are obsessed with punishment. It is a popular sentiment, that if a person does something harmful or illegal, they should be made to “suffer the consequences,” which is supposed to ensure that they don’t repeat the action. We even have a culture which blames people for being refugees—we call them “illegals.” There is no concern for whatever monstrous acts, even by our own governments, may have driven them to flee their country, but merely rage that they get a hotel room, limited medical treatment, maybe, and a cell phone!

This self-righteous indignation is fueled by the anxiety and frustration felt by millions of Americans, who themselves can’t afford medical care, or rent, or are hopelessly indebted, and I think it is designed to try to induce us to start killing each other—but that can be taken up later.

I have been reading a book by Dr. Homer Venters, who was the chief medical officer for NYC Jails. It’s called, “Life and Death in Rikers Island.” To give you a sense of the results of this attitude, of the need to punish, let me tell you the story of one 25- year-old inmate at Rikers Island, who died there in 2012. His name is Jason Echevarria.

On the evening before his death, Mr. Echevarria was being held in a unit for people with mental illness who failed to obey orders. It was then decided that he was “fit enough” to be subjected to solitary confinement as a form of punishment. According to Dr. Venters, “in order to escape the stress of solitary confinement, Mr. Echevarria swallowed a packet of industrial soap and then told correctional officers that he needed medical attention. Passing medical staff confirmed that he was vomiting and required medical attention, but the response of Department of Correction staff and their supervisor was to keep Mr. Echevarria in his cell overnight, intermittently taunting and ignoring him as he vomited blood, bile, and lye, screamed for help, and ultimately died with an eroded esophagus.”

Now, suppose they had allowed the medical staff to treat him before he died a horrible painful death, and they had saved his life, but he’d gotten to suffer a bit. Would that be an appropriate means to “teach him a lesson?”

“Well, everybody doesn’t think that way—it’s not how things are done most of the time,” many even here might say. But I am telling you that this is the institutional policy of our governments.

Take sanctions, for example. What’s the idea of sanctions? “Just starve the people, let them watch their babies die in their arms, and they’ll shape up. They’ll overthrow their leader, or their leader will finally start obeying us.” This is the exact same attitude as expressed by the corrections officers, but now made policy and imposed upon millions of innocent people.

Do you think that a society which tolerates and promulgates such barbarism will be capable of preventing nuclear war?

So, we must temper ourselves. We must remember certain fundamental universal principles, so that we can act in accordance—what a great word, with “chord” in the middle—with the universe, which will greatly amplify our voices.

[Video of a musical performance is shown.]

I apologize that that may not have been as beautiful as I’d like, but I think you get the idea. We have to sound a certain trumpet—or trombone—but not in an arbitrary way, but based on truthful principles. If I hadn’t bothered to find out that the note F is in first position, it would have been a very frustrating and ugly experience.

Similarly, if you have a mass movement for change, and you ask for the wrong thing —that is, your demand is not in coherence, as Confucius might say, with the laws of heaven, you might regret getting what you asked for in a way you never intended.

The fundamental principle of our universe, and of our relationship to it, is growth. That is—and we are learning this more and more with the Webb telescope—that contrary to foolish opinion, the universe is moving from lower order, lower energy-density to higher, and more complex order and higher energy-density.

Life on this planet used to be little single-cell organisms which went extinct easily, until photosynthesis occurred. Suddenly, more advanced life was possible, until we came to fish and amphibians which could propel themselves—no longer dependent on the ebb and flow of the tide. Then came mammals, which not only could regulate motion, but also body temperature, requiring a great increase in caloric intake per kilogram of body mass.

What is the link between a mammal and a salamander? I think you’d be hard pressed to find it—these are some of the great mysteries—like the link between life and non-life. There is not a linear connection—if you squeeze a rock hard enough, it will turn into a mushroom, for example. We don’t know how it works.

Then humans emerged, and suddenly, not only could they regulate their own activity and temperature, but they could change the environment around themselves! They could cook their food! They could plan into the future—sowing crops for later consumption. They could build houses to enable survival in extreme temperatures. People are able to improve their environment to make it possible for more people to live more happily. People can even improve the environment to make it possible for more animals to live more happily—some good and some bad, but I wouldn’t call increasing the rat population exponentially an improvement.

This means that the natural creative love of discovery in the human mind is resonant with the way the universe itself is unfolding. This means, that if we wish to survive as a species, we must create the conditions for each individual person to develop their innate potential as much as possible. Do you believe there is such a thing as “too many geniuses?” We need billions of geniuses! We are so very arrogant to imagine that we’ve mastered the secrets of the universe, and that now we should all just stop eating and using electricity and reduce our carbon footprint because we are complete.

It is precisely trying to halt growth which will kill us all, because it goes completely contrary to the laws of the universe. So far, the most efficient means we’ve discovered to foster the development of the individual, is the principle of the nation state. So, the sovereignty of nations must be respected, and the need for each nation to have ever increasing available energy and energy-density. We don’t all need to have the same language, religion, or appearance, but we do need to respect the principle that the measure of our success is the development of mankind.

This is why the one standard which gives any government legitimacy is the principle of the General Welfare. Any policy which seeks to degrade the humanity of any individual person, or any group of people, is wrong.

Mankind is now at a crossroads, as the United States was when Abraham Lincoln was elected in 1860. The United States had reached a breaking point where it was unavoidably obvious that slavery was creating a harsh dissonance with the principles of our republic. The United States could not survive if that evil institution were allowed to continue. Similarly, the world has reached the point where humanity will no longer submit to a system which arbitrarily determines that one group is superior to another, and has the power to make its own rules, as if natural law and the created universe did not exist. The majority of mankind is no longer willing to pretend that snow is black.

If we wish to be heard, and have the power to change our own sorry governments, we will have to tune our trombones to that chorus.

[Transcript of video clip:]

So let’s talk a little bit about resonance, and I’m going to use a trombone as an example of how, if we are truthful, the universe can amplify our truthfulness, and it is a matter of principle. Now, to make a sound on a trombone, we have this, which is not an amplifier…. That not very beautiful, it is kind of labored and the sound doesn’t really carry…. When I put my mouthpiece into the trombone, then we get a great sound which carries, but you have to be precise in your tuning, because the trombone has a certain length … and if you adjust the length the resonance changes, for example, or the pitch changes. There you can hear, the longer the length, the lower gets  the sound…. So, what happens if I decide I want to play, but instead of picking the right position in my trombone, I choose something arbitrary. I can get a note but it is not beautiful, and that won’t carry.


Schiller Rep Tells RIA Novosti: Attack on Russian Fine Arts Is an Attack on Truth Itself

March 4, 2023 (EIRNS)–The renowned Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York has gone to hell and apparently intends to stay there. It has become a soldier in Global NATO’s black propaganda machine. RIA Novosti and other Russian media are reporting the story that the identity of many leading Russian painters of the 19th century—Ivan Aivazovsky, Ilya Repin and Arkhip Kuindzhi—whose excellent paintings hang on the museum walls, have had their Russian nationality erased from their paintings’ name plates. Their identities have been changed to “Ukrainian” or to other nationalities. Notices attacking Russia appear next to some of the paintings.

This Nazi-inspired policy of cultural ethnic cleansing is part and parcel of the West’s current forbidding of its scientists from participating in international conferences in Russia, the canceling of the concerts of Russia’s top Classical musicians and singers, and the false arrests and the destruction of the scientific careers of Chinese researchers working in America’s labs.

Quoted in RIA Novosti news service on March 3, the Schiller Institute’s Richard A. Black responded: “The beauty of mankind lies in the fact that it has developed a variety of different civilizations which differ in their language, their means of communication, and in fundamental ideas. Islamic, Western European, Chinese, Vietnamese—all civilizations have evolved for thousands of years, and have made unique contributions to the understanding of fundamental principles, fundamental truths—which, in essence, is the role of art. So, the imposition of lies by the U.S. authorities on an institution—such as the Metropolitan Museum—about leading examples of Russian civilization—this is a mockery of all culture, of all art and all science.” Black called the museum’s actions an attack on truth, “on an idea, on civilization, on the role that art and science play in civilization. This is an attack on American citizens, in order to continue to keep them uninformed, and to portray Russia as an enemy.” RIA Novosti concluded its article by reporting, “According to President Vladimir Putin, Western Russophobia is nothing but racism.” The article, in Russian, may be found here.

The article was also published by Sputnik Mundo, Sputnik’s Spanish-language site today, in full, changing it only to report that Black had made his statement to Sputnik


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