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Judge extends order blocking Trump from banning CNN, MS NOW and Politico reporters from White House

A federal judge on Tuesday extended an order blocking President Donald Trump's administration from banning reporters for three news outlets from the White House, a pivotal operational development for the organizations as the extraordinary case — pitting the president against the media that cover him — makes its way through the legal system. In a victory for media organizations at a time when tension between the White House and journalists is high, U.S. District Judge...

Is Modi stealing India’s democracy?

13 October 2026 at 15:18

“Unparalleled and unprecedented” police repression in India, where thousands of protesters demanding the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar were met with mass detentions, internet shutdowns, and a brutal crackdown across Delhi over the weekend. Dr. Nitheesh Narayanan of the Tricontinental Institute for Social Research joins Zoe Alexandra and Rania Khalek, following the deployment of 50,000 police and armed forces to suppress youth-led protests over the Special Intensive Revision’s removal of more than 130 million names from voter rolls.

Narayanan says Saturday’s action marked a turning point in India’s months-long wave of repression, uniting students, the left, and the Gen Z-led Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) in the fight for a democratic, secular India – “and the idea that it’s the people, not power, who define a country.” He breaks down how Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) stacked the committee that appointed Commissioner Kumar, why the SIR disproportionately targets minorities and the poor, and why the outrage and demands for accountability are growing despite the crackdown. And as Trump pushes a unified voter roll in the US, India’s purge could offer a preview of what’s at stake: “Is this democracy, or is it the daylight murder of democracy?”

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Finland calls for EU tourist visa ban on Russians until Moscow ends war against Ukraine as bloc weighs tougher restrictions

13 October 2026 at 19:22

Finland’s Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen, 20 September 2025. Photo: Elina Valtonen / X

Finland’s Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen has called on the European Union to stop issuing tourist visas to Russian citizens until Russia ends its war against Ukraine, urging the bloc to adopt a unified policy. Her call comes as the EU discusses broader restrictions on Russian diplomats, tourists, and former combatants.

Russia has intensified its hybrid campaign across Europe in recent months, with suspected sabotage, arson attacks, and other covert operations targeting infrastructure and undermining security. European officials have increasingly called for a coordinated response, arguing that tighter controls on Russian diplomats, travel, and former combatants could help reduce security risks and limit opportunities for Russian intelligence operations.

In a statement published on 12 October, Finland’s Ministry for Foreign Affairs said Valtonen was calling on the European Commission to introduce stricter guidelines for processing Russian visa applications and propose changes to EU legislation needed to implement a complete ban on tourist visas.

“As long as Russia continues its invasion, Russian citizens should not be issued tourist visas,” Valtonen said. “It is not right that Russians can travel to Europe to enjoy the way of life and freedoms here while their country bombs the homes of Ukrainians.”

Finland banned visas for non-essential travel by Russian citizens in 2022. Valtonen said the same restriction should now be adopted at the EU level.

The Finnish minister has invited other EU member states to join a joint letter to the European Commission. Beyond a complete ban on tourist visas, the letter proposes barring Schengen visas for people in Russian President Vladimir Putin’s inner circle, restricting visas for Russian athletes, and enforcing an EU-agreed visa ban on former Russian combatants.

We must stop issuing tourist visas for Russian citizens across the EU.

I have invited other EU Member States to join a letter addressed to the European Commission. I am calling for a complete EU ban on Russian tourist visas for as long as Russia continues its war of aggression.…

— Elina Valtonen (@elinavaltonen) October 12, 2026

EU considers wider restrictions on Russians

The proposal comes as EU foreign ministers discuss additional measures to counter Russian hybrid threats. EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said after a meeting of the bloc’s foreign ministers in Luxembourg on 12 October that the EU was considering reducing the number of tourist visas issued to Russians, restricting Russian diplomats’ movements within the bloc, and accelerating entry bans for former Russian combatants, Radio Svoboda reported.

Kallas said the EU needed a comprehensive response to Russian hybrid threats, including new sanctions, stronger enforcement of existing restrictions, action against Russia’s shadow fleet, accountability for hybrid attacks, and improved intelligence sharing.

One proposal would require Russian diplomats to obtain advance permission before traveling to other EU member states, rather than simply notifying authorities of their trips.

Polish Deputy Foreign Minister Marcin Bosacki said tighter rules were necessary because some acts of sabotage and subversion were coordinated, at least in part, through Russian diplomatic missions.

Kallas said the European External Action Service and European Commission would also prepare proposals for further isolating Russia in international sport. She argued that sport and culture should not be used to whitewash Russian aggression.

EU divided over tourist visa restrictions

Several EU countries have pushed to reduce tourist visas for Russian citizens. In June, a group of member states jointly called for fewer visas, according to DW. The Finnish ministry said Schengen countries issued nearly 500,000 tourist visas to Russian citizens in 2025.

Estonia has also proposed measures to bar former Russian military personnel who fought against Ukraine from entering the EU. Estonian Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna warned that large numbers of Russian veterans could try to enter Europe after the war, potentially with support from Russian intelligence services. 

The European Commission has supported including a mechanism targeting former combatants in the EU’s 21st sanctions package, and officials are working on how to implement it.

However, EU countries remain divided over the scope of visa restrictions. France and Italy have previously opposed a blanket isolation of Russian tourists. Member states are also debating how to prevent former Russian combatants from entering the bloc without restricting entry for military deserters or opponents of the war.

No timeline has been announced for the proposed restrictions on Russian tourists and diplomats. The measures remain under discussion and have not been adopted as a bloc-wide ban.

Observador distinguido com dois prémios Meios&Publicidade

13 October 2026 at 18:38
A campanha de promoção do podcast plus “Os Segredos da Seita do Yoga” e a série de artigos sobre as árvores genealógicas dos candidatos presidenciais foram distinguidos pelo júri.

Opinion: Why news organizations should boycott Israel

After Trump banned CNN, MSNow and Politico from press access to the presidency, even Fox boycotted the White House. The press needs to show the same backbone when it comes to Gaza. Major news organizations need to boycott Israel until it opens up Gaza to international coverage

Antarctica Once Had Wildfires: Tiny Charcoal Fragments Reveal a Burning Forest Near the South Pole

Forest fires and Antarctica are hard to picture together. Today the continent lies under a thick sheet of ice, and the cold preserves almost everything that falls on it. Around 90 million years ago, in the Cretaceous (the last period of the age of dinosaurs), the scene was very different. The planet was going through […]

Why Was Sadiq Khan Given a United Nations Award?

13 October 2026 at 07:00

Parts of London look like a dump. But that hasn't stopped the UN from giving Mayor Sadiq Khan an award for "improving urban life". It's all very incestuous, says Charlotte Gill: the UN is just rewarding its cronies.

The post Why Was Sadiq Khan Given a United Nations Award? appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

France mutilates its children to stifle social protest

12 October 2026 at 14:59
Caught between the methodical repression of its own youth and the shock of a global geopolitical shift that marginalizes it, Emmanuel Macron’s France sees the republican myth collapse under the combined effect of its internal cynicism and a historic strategic defeat abroad. In reality, May 1968 revealed the vulnerability of technocratic certainties in France. However, […]

Is Modi facing his own Bangladesh moment?

12 October 2026 at 05:48

Demanding the resignation of a minister is one thing. It is uncomfortable for a government, occasionally embarrassing for a prime minister, but ultimately manageable. Ministers can be sacrificed and their departures can be presented as accountability, and governments can move on. Demanding the resignation of the chief election commissioner is quite another matter and for […]

The post Is Modi facing his own Bangladesh moment? appeared first on Asia Times.

EU Commission Prepares New Visa Restrictions for Russians as Security Concerns Mount

11 October 2026 at 10:45

The European Commission is preparing proposals to impose tighter visa restrictions on Russian citizens entering the Schengen area, with new measures expected to be presented in January 2027 following pressure from several member states concerned about Russia’s expanding hybrid operations across Europe.

Poland, Sweden and Estonia are among the countries demanding a tougher approach to Russian visitors, particularly former military personnel who fought in Ukraine. The proposals could affect hundreds of thousands of Russian nationals who continue to receive visas for travel to the European Union despite restrictions introduced following Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

According to a report published on Sunday, EU officials are finalising plans to address vulnerabilities in the Schengen visa system, which governments increasingly regard as a potential entry point for individuals involved in intelligence operations, organised crime and acts of sabotage.

Swedish Justice Minister Gunnar Strömmer said the Commission was working towards a January announcement, although Stockholm would prefer an earlier decision. He told Politico that vulnerabilities in the existing arrangements could be exploited by hostile actors.

The initiative is expected to feature in discussions surrounding the Foreign Affairs Council meeting on 12 October, when ministers will examine Russia’s intensifying hybrid campaign against EU member states.

Schengen visas remain a security concern

Despite the deterioration in relations between Brussels and Moscow, Russian citizens continue to receive substantial numbers of Schengen visas. Approximately 478,000 tourist visas were reportedly issued to Russian nationals in 2025, including a significant proportion allowing multiple entries.

The figures have renewed questions about whether existing screening arrangements adequately reflect the security environment created by Russia’s war against Ukraine.

In September 2022, the EU suspended its visa facilitation agreement with Russia, ending preferential treatment and introducing stricter application procedures, additional documentation requirements and more restrictive conditions for multiple-entry visas.

However, the decision did not amount to a general prohibition on Russian tourism. National authorities retained considerable discretion over applications, producing differences in how individual Schengen countries handle Russian visitors.

The Commission’s existing visa guidelines also preserve access for certain categories of travellers, including journalists, political dissidents, civil society representatives and people travelling for essential family reasons.

The new initiative would therefore concern not only the number of visas issued but also the extent to which national screening decisions can affect the security of other Schengen countries. Under the Schengen system, a visa issued by one participating state generally permits its holder to travel throughout the area.

Estonia calls for restrictions on former Russian soldiers

Estonia has taken a particularly forceful position, proposing an EU-wide entry ban targeting former members of the Russian armed forces who participated in the invasion of Ukraine. Estonian Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna estimates that approximately 650,000 former Russian combatants could fall within the category of individuals requiring closer scrutiny.

Tallinn has advocated individual entry restrictions rather than relying exclusively on broader measures covering Russian nationals generally. Tsahkna warned that former soldiers, particularly those with combat experience and connections to Russian intelligence services, could present a serious security challenge if they entered European countries.

He suggested that Moscow could exploit former combatants to penetrate organised criminal networks or facilitate violent operations against European targets. These assessments remain security warnings rather than evidence that Russian veterans as a group are involved in such activities.

A coordinated European policy would also seek to prevent individuals refused entry by one member state from exploiting differences in national visa procedures elsewhere.

Restrictions on Russian diplomats also under consideration

The visa proposals form part of a wider effort to restrict the activities of Russian nationals whose presence in Europe may present security risks. EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas has previously indicated that member states are considering tighter controls on the movement of Russian diplomats within Schengen, alongside restrictions on visas for former combatants and a reduction in Russian tourism.

One proposal would prevent Russian diplomatic personnel from travelling beyond the member state in which they are accredited. Such restrictions would complicate cross-border activities by diplomatic officials suspected of conducting intelligence operations under official cover.

The issue has acquired greater urgency as European governments report an expanding pattern of Russian-linked sabotage, including suspected arson attacks, cyber operations and attempts to disrupt critical infrastructure.

Migration Commissioner Magnus Brunner acknowledged that the initial decline in visa issuance to Russian nationals had levelled off. He urged member states to reduce the number of visas granted and to strengthen scrutiny of applicants.

January proposals will test EU consensus

The immediate question is whether member states can agree on common restrictions that go beyond the existing visa framework. An outright prohibition on Russian tourism would represent a significant departure from the current approach, under which national governments retain responsibility for individual visa decisions.

More narrowly targeted measures against former combatants could prove easier to justify on security grounds, although identifying eligible individuals would require reliable information and cooperation between national authorities. The Commission has yet to publish its proposals, and the precise legal instruments under consideration remain unclear.

Foreign ministers meeting on Monday will discuss Russia’s hybrid campaign and possible European responses. The Council’s published agenda places the issue in the context of Moscow’s continuing aggression against Ukraine.

Whether the Commission ultimately proposes new binding restrictions or stronger common guidelines, the central difficulty remains the same: a Schengen system built around common freedom of movement must accommodate increasingly different national assessments of the security risks associated with travel from Russia.

There’s a Reason Ulez is So Hated

11 October 2026 at 07:00

As Kevin Rees is jailed for 15 years for blowing up a Ulez camera with a homemade bomb, Dr Tilak Doshi looks at why London's anti-motorist money-making 'clean air' scheme is so widely hated.

The post There’s a Reason Ulez is So Hated appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

Brussels Prosecutors Detain 21 After Violent Clashes During Anti-Austerity Protest

10 October 2026 at 10:50

Seventeen minors are among those detained following riots in the Belgian capital that left buses damaged, vehicles burnt and public infrastructure vandalised. Prosecutors have promised criminal proceedings as the government faces mounting opposition to its budget reforms.

Belgian prosecutors have confirmed that 21 people, including 17 minors, have been placed under judicial arrest following violent disturbances in Brussels on Friday, 9 October, when a national trade union demonstration against the federal government’s economic policies was overshadowed by clashes between groups of youths and police.

The Brussels Public Prosecutor’s Office announced the updated figures on Saturday morning, reducing the number of judicial arrests previously reported by police while confirming that minors accounted for the substantial majority of those detained. Four adults are also in custody, with questioning scheduled throughout Saturday to determine which cases should proceed to further judicial action.

The disturbances caused extensive damage around Brussels-Central and Brussels-Midi railway stations, where masked youths attacked public transport vehicles, set fires and threw projectiles at officers. The violence occurred separately from the main trade union procession, which police described as peaceful.

Prosecutors promise criminal action

The prosecutor’s office has assigned three additional magistrates to handle cases arising from Friday’s disturbances. Investigations concern suspected arson, vandalism, possession of weapons, threats, armed resistance to police and acts of violence.

In a statement released on Saturday, prosecutors reaffirmed that freedom of expression and peaceful assembly are fundamental rights, while warning that criminal conduct during demonstrations would be prosecuted. The authorities said they would respond strictly and systematically to offences committed during the unrest. Investigators have not yet established the total financial cost of the damage.

Friday evening’s preliminary police figures recorded 80 administrative detentions and approximately 30 judicial arrests. The prosecutor’s subsequent announcement identifies 21 people being held judicially; the two figures reflect different reporting stages and categories of detention.

Police reported that groups comprising more than 1,000 people were involved in serious incidents, although this figure does not establish how many individuals personally committed offences. Officers were attacked with glass bottles, cobblestones, bricks, sticks and pyrotechnic devices. Police also reported seizing potentially dangerous materials, including Molotov cocktails and other objects that could have been used as weapons.

Water cannon, tear gas and batons were deployed as officers attempted to disperse groups involved in the disturbances.

Buses attacked and vehicles set alight

Public transport services suffered considerable damage, particularly near Brussels-Midi station, where three STIB-MIVB buses and a De Lijn bus were attacked. The Brussels transport operator said police helped drivers and passengers leave the affected vehicles. No injuries were reported in those incidents.

The De Lijn bus sustained extensive damage while parked at a terminus. Its windows were smashed, its fuel cap was removed and security barriers were thrown inside. The vehicle had to be recovered because it could no longer operate.

A separate STIB-MIVB bus was destroyed during the unrest. Several Poppy car-sharing vehicles, electric scooters and bicycles were also damaged or set alight. Police and fire service vehicles sustained damage, while bus shelters and other street infrastructure were vandalised.

Brussels-Central station was temporarily closed, and access to Brussels-Midi was restricted as police attempted to regain control. Both stations subsequently reopened, although tram services around Brussels-Midi remained disrupted into Friday evening.

Political dispute over responsibility

The disorder has prompted a dispute over who should bear the financial consequences of violence committed during demonstrations. Belgian Interior Minister Bernard Quintin, of the liberal Mouvement Réformateur (MR), condemned the attacks on police and said the state would not be intimidated by those responsible for destruction.

MR chairman Georges-Louis Bouchez went further, proposing legislation that would make trade unions financially liable for damage associated with demonstrations, drawing a comparison with the responsibility imposed on football clubs for the behaviour of supporters.

The proposal raises questions about how responsibility could be established when violence is committed by individuals operating separately from an authorised demonstration. Police have explicitly distinguished Friday’s disturbances from the trade union march, which proceeded without serious incidents.

Wider protests against government reforms

Friday’s demonstration was organised by Belgium’s socialist ABVV-FGTB and Christian ACV-CSC trade unions as opposition intensifies to the economic programme of Prime Minister Bart De Wever’s federal coalition.

The unions oppose proposed spending reductions and changes affecting pensions, unemployment benefits, taxation and purchasing power. Students and teachers also participated, expressing concerns about education funding, deteriorating school infrastructure and the affordability of higher education.

The dispute follows earlier confrontations over the government’s fiscal programme. As EU Today’s coverage of the previous national strike wave detailed, the coalition’s budget agreement in November 2025 failed to prevent widespread industrial action over proposed reductions in public expenditure.

The government argues that reforms are necessary to address Belgium’s persistent budget deficit and growing debt burden. Trade unions maintain that the proposed measures place disproportionate pressure on workers, pensioners and lower-income households.

Further disruption expected on Monday

Public services face another round of industrial action on Monday, 12 October, when socialist trade unions are planning strikes across several sectors.

Flemish public transport operator De Lijn expects to operate approximately 61 per cent of its normal bus and tram services, with substantial regional differences. In Antwerp city, only 45 per cent of services are expected to run, compared with 57 per cent across Antwerp province.

Belgian rail services will also be affected from 10pm on Sunday until the end of Monday. Disruption is anticipated in schools, postal services and public broadcasting.

The City of Brussels has warned of disruption to municipal administrative services on both 9 and 12 October as a consequence of the national trade union actions.

Meanwhile, Brussels prosecutors will continue questioning those arrested on Friday, with decisions on possible charges and referrals to the appropriate courts expected to depend on the evidence gathered.

New Yorkers demand ‘ICE Out’ after Bronx father shot in front of his five-year-old

10 October 2026 at 05:55

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents shot seven rounds into the vehicle of a New York father while his five-year-old son was in the car on the afternoon of Thursday, October 8. Oscar Belgal, a Dominican man, who had just picked up his son from school, was hit in the neck but survived the shooting.

He is currently being detained by ICE in the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn after being discharged from the hospital Thursday night. His lawyers have reported that he still has a bullet lodged in his body more than 24 hours after being shot. 

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said that they were conducting a “targeted enforcement operation,” calling Belgal a “criminal illegal alien.”

Local officials describe the incident differently. In a press conference, held by immigrant rights groups and officials a couple hours after the shooting, speakers described that disguised agents approached Belgal’s vehicle with their guns drawn. When Belgal started to move his vehicle forward at least one agent opened fire. Video emerged online of one of the agents carrying a large gun that reports say was a modified AR-15.

“They wore construction vests and masks that concealed their faces,” said New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani to press later that night.

“There was no reasonable way to identify them as ICE agents.”

The mayor claimed that he attempted to negotiate with President Trump directly for the release of Belgal, but “those negotiations were unsuccessful.” He then described ICE as “vicious” and “cruel,” saying that ICE undermines public safety.

“This is an agency that must be abolished.”

New York politicians face calls to act against ICE

New York City Public Advocate Jumaane D. Williams said that federal officials would certainly try to justify the shooting by painting a narrative that makes Bengal seem like “the worst human being you ever heard of.” But he emphasized that what actually happened is that a father picking up his child was shot by a federal agency after school dismissal in a residential area.

Later that night, in a separate press conference with the mayor, New York City Police Department (NYPD) Commissioner Jessica Tisch announced that Oscar Belgal had been arrested in 2023. Hecklers and protesters then began disrupting the mayor and the police commissioner, accusing them of demonizing the victim and justifying ICE violence.

“Tisch and the NYPD are effectively running cover for the Trump administration” over the federal shooting of a Dominican father, said Andre Easton, candidate for New York’s 15th Congressional District, in a statement on Friday, October 9.

Easton called on the mayor to back up his call to abolish ICE with action. “He must fully enforce his own Executive Order 13 and kick every ICE agent out of our city.”

He also slammed Ritchie Torres, the current representative of NY-15, for only demanding an investigation into the shooting. Torres’ demands represent a “betrayal of the Bronx.”

The same politicians that built the deportation machine won’t dismantle it, he argued.

“We need a mass movement powerful enough to dismantle it and win full, equal, and permanent rights for all immigrants.”

Sparks of that very movement may already be breaking out in New York.

Movement for ICE out of NY re-emerges

Hours after the shooting, hundreds of New Yorkers took to the streets and marched to the hospital where Belgal was being treated. They carried banners and placards reading “Abolish ICE” and “Full Rights for All Immigrants” and “Justice for Lorenzo, Joan, and All Victims of ICE Terror.”

The protests were met with force by the New York City Police Department, who attacked protesters with barricades, pushing and shoving several, including congressional candidate Darializa Avila Chevalier, and making a handful of arrests.

However, New Yorkers have continued pushing for ICE to leave the city, organizing protests on Friday and Saturday.

ICE strikes again

The shooting in New York is yet another in a series of ICE shootings across the United States, including the killings of Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Houston, and Joan Sebastián Durán Guerrero in Maine. Each of these cases has left families and communities traumatized and provoked eruptions in the movement against ICE violence.

Now in New York, demonstrators are elevating the pressure on their elected officials and making a distinction between mere demands for investigation and concrete action that ends ICE operations and takes steps toward abolition.

Como A Caça ao Estripador se transformou numa peça de teatro

10 October 2026 at 01:25
Se adorou ouvir o podcast plus, não vai querer perder a hipótese de mergulhar n'A Caça ao Estripador de Lisboa: a primeira peça de teatro imersivo que nasce de uma investigação do Observador.

Europe’s mounting social chaos… chickens coming home to roost for proxy war against Russia

By: A A
9 October 2026 at 21:57

A day of reckoning is imminent. Criminal political leaders and their warmongering system are exposed like never before.

Join us on Telegram, X, and VK.

Contact us: info@strategic-culture.su

The European Union is witnessing a full-blown social revolt. Governing political parties and their economic policies are held in open contempt as public protests and strikes escalate across multiple countries.

Protests, mass marches, and industrial strikes are spreading across the EU in France, Belgium, Spain, Italy, Germany, Ireland, Portugal, and other countries. The grievances are various, from students and teachers over woeful education services, to healthcare professionals and transportation workers denouncing crumby wages and pension cuts.

But at the core is a warmongering, dehumanizing system of capitalist inequality.

Unbearable living costs for basic needs, from food to housing, are driving millions onto the streets in desperation and anger at the lack of adequate political response to their concerns. As one French student said: “Too young to be listened to, old enough to be tear-gassed.”

The entire political system is being brought into disrepute for its dysfunction and indifference towards meeting rudimentary human needs. Then, infuriating all the more, are lies from the elite rulers and their propaganda media about “national defense and threat of war from Russia.”

In Spain this week, an 87-year-old frail woman known as Maricarmen died in hospital after she was evicted from her Madrid home because she could not pay the extortionate rent increase. Her plight has come to galvanize a nationwide protest against Spain’s housing crisis, a crisis that is repeated across every European country. Protesters shouted furiously that the pitiful old woman was “murdered by the state and corporations.”

In France, the brutality of police against student protests has shocked the nation and the world. Nearly 7,000 young people have been arrested, as riot police tear gas and shoot at largely peaceful rallies. Students gathering at the Place de la Bastille in Paris and other cities vow that they will not back down. One student had his hand blown off by a police stun grenade while another teenager lost an eye from a rubber bullet fired at close range.

The Place de la Bastille is where the French Revolution manifested in 1798 against a hated aristocracy amid abject misery. Today, the tensions are boiling towards another momentous rebellion, this time inspiring again similar movements across Europe.

These protests and the inhumane suffering that underlie them are channeling uprisings all over the EU.

There is a palpable sense that populations en masse have had enough of decades of inequality and chronic deprivation inflicted by capitalist policies that enrich a few and are enforced by governments slavishly serving the interests of capital over the needs of the citizen majority.

Western media reports talk about “cash-strapped” governments under pressure from bond markets to reduce record debt levels while workers, students and pensioners demand more public investment and relief from economic hardship.

That is a misleading partial portrayal of the problem. Omitted is the crucial backdrop that European governments are directing vast economic resources towards militarism and the proxy war in Ukraine against Russia. That is what is causing the “cash-strapped governments.” In other words, their declared fiscal straits are a policy choice, not some mysterious dilemma.

The social crisis sweeping across Europe is also seen in the United States and other Western-aligned nations. The background is a failed economic system that no longer provides a modicum of acceptable living conditions. The problem has been decades in the making from growing inequality and diminishing political representation. Today it is even questionable if Western states are democracies, controlled as they are by corporate oligarchies.

Nevertheless, the social crisis that is unfolding across Europe has been intensified and amplified by European political rulers operating in a relentless war mode against Russia.

The European Union has pumped hundreds of billions of euros into Ukraine over the past four years to prop up a NeoNazi regime run by a corrupt dictatorship – all for the objective of defeating Russia. The EU leaders – many of them unelected, like Ursula von der Leyen, Kaja Kallas and António Costa – are driven by an obsessive Russophobia. But that is only part of the explanation.

Other elected leaders and parties like France’s Macron and Germany’s Merz are also despised for their elitism and delusions of grandeur. Merz declares that he wants to make Germany the strongest military in Europe, in total tin-ear deafness to his nation’s economic and social problems and the sinister historical connotations of resurrecting Nazi Germany. Meanwhile, as his government suffers electoral defeat after defeat, European elites deprecate German voters as being blind because they dare to choose parties that are opposed to war with Russia.

There are many grounds for the Europe-wide contempt of ruling parties. Inequality, poverty, unemployment, soaring living costs, declining wages, deteriorating public services. Uncontrolled immigration amid the pressure on inadequate public resources is another cause for grievance. Europe’s complicity in the Israeli genocidal war on Palestinians, and Europe’s complicity in Trump’s aggression towards Iran, Yemen, Cuba, and so on, are other factors.

However, the bogus narrative that governments are “cash-strapped” is a cause for immense public disgust. There are plenty of economic resources to meet public needs. It’s a question of those resources not being permitted to create just and humane societies under the prevailing capitalist system with its priority of enriching a tiny elite class.

The conditions of “tight budgets” and “austerity for the masses” are created by deliberate policies of militarism and fuelling a proxy war in Ukraine.

European “leaders” and their NATO lobbyists like Mark Rutte demand hundreds of billions of euros to boost military industries while at the same time calling for draconian cuts in public spending and social welfare in order to pay for this reckless militarism. The EU is “lending” an additional €90 billion over the next two years alone just to prop up the corrupt regime in Kiev so that it can keep fighting a futile war with Russia. The perverse priority is driven by the military-industrial complex and its corporate investors. It is also driven by an ideological, propagandized mindset that demonizes Russia as an enemy. President Putin and other Russian voices have repeatedly stated that they do not want war with Europe. They say the conflict in Ukraine has root causes that can be resolved through diplomatic engagement. Why are European politicians implacably opposed to peace?

A major factor is covering for internal political and economic failure of the European system. The EU’s economies, as with those in the U.S. and other Western states, are bankrupt dystopias in terms of delivering on social and democratic needs. The failure has been compounded by the costs of war in Ukraine.

That failure is criminal and fatal for the politicians and governments who have overseen the policies. Thus, the political class, including the propaganda news media, cannot admit their criminal policies.

In the face of their own internal contradictions, the European political elites are seeking a solution by externalizing Russia as an enemy. This is the same modus operandi that European rulers have used for the past century and more, unleashing two world wars as a result.

These criminal politicians and their dysfunctional economic system are again pushing war as their escape plan for survival at the expense of millions of lives and at the risk of starting a third world war, one that this time around could involve catastrophic nuclear nemesis.

It is damning of virtually every European government, including primarily the British, that there are no calls for diplomacy and political settlement with Russia. They are committed to waging war on Russia to absolve themselves from the social devastation they are responsible for.

One positive thing, though, is that increasing numbers of people can see through the chicanery and lies. A German student placard summed it up: “We won’t fight your wars… Education not bombs!”

A day of reckoning is imminent. Criminal political leaders and their warmongering system are exposed like never before and in a way that demands total revolt as a proper solution. The consequences are not to be externalized this time. Chickens are coming home to roost, as Malcom X once said.

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