Free Republic

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the ensuing military violence and instability have mobilized far-right extremists, playing into Russian President Vladimir Putin’s propaganda about “neo-Nazis” running the country as justification for invading Ukraine. In a speech given just before Russia launched its ongoing attack on Ukraine, Putin justified what he described as a “special military operation.

The picture in Eastern Ukraine is becoming clearer as the residents begin being able to talk openly about the key battleground in Mariupol. Keep in mind, the western narrative about the battles in Eastern Ukraine are all framed around calling the Ukrainian military, spearheaded by the Azov battalions and the ultranationalists, as the good guys. Nothing could be further from the truth. According to increasingly obvious reports, coming from ordinary citizens in/around Mariupol, the Ukrainian army has been using them as human shields and keeping them from evacuating. There is a lot of war fog surrounding the conflict, however, it...

ransomnote: The Expose is over the target and taking flak, banned and censored - even Paypal turned against them in an effort to deprive them of funding. Please pray that the Expose receive the funds it needs to keep serving the public.Quoting Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann, Ukrainian Channel 24 TV presenter, Fahruddin Sharafmal, called for his countrymen to destroy the Russian nation by killing their children, and urged Ukrainians to “kill at least one Moskal” – a derogatory term for Russian – each.Eichmann was a senior SS officer who played a key role in setting up the Nazi death...

... Azov headquarters in Mariupol It is also where the Azov Battalion, which is part of the Ukrainian National Guard and thus subordinate to the Interior Ministry, has set up its headquarters. Its fighters are well trained, but the unit is controversial because it is composed of nationalists and far-right radicals. Its very existence is one of the pretexts Russia has used for its war against Ukraine. Initially, Azov was a volunteer militia that formed in the city of Berdyansk to support the Ukrainian army in its fight against pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine. Some of its fighters came from...

An official of the U.S.-led NATO alliance has told Newsweek that the coalition did not notice what appeared to be a symbol associated with Nazism on the uniform of a Ukrainian soldier featured in a since-deleted The image, posted Tuesday to commemorate International Women's Day, contained four images related to the current crisis in Ukraine, where a Russian military incursion was set to enter its third week. "All women and girls must live free and equal. This international women's day we think of the remarkable women of #Ukraine," NATO tweeted alongside a Ukrainian flag emoji. "Their strength, bravery and resilience...

Five years ago, Ukraine’s Maidan uprising ousted President Viktor Yanukovych, to the cheers and support of the West. Politicians and analysts in the United States and Europe not only celebrated the uprising as a triumph of democracy, but denied reports of Maidan’s ultranationalism, smearing those who warned about the dark side of the uprising as Moscow puppets and useful idiots. Freedom was on the march in Ukraine. Today, increasing reports of far-right violence, ultranationalism, and erosion of basic freedoms are giving the lie to the West’s initial euphoria. There are neo-Nazi pogroms against the Roma, rampant attacks on feminists and...

While Western media deploys Volodymyr Zelensky’s Jewish heritage to refute accusations of Nazi influence in Ukraine, the president has ceded to neo-Nazi forces and now depends on them as front line fighters. Back in October 2019, as the war in eastern Ukraine dragged on, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky traveled to Zolote, a town situated firmly in the “gray zone” of Donbas, where over 14,000 had been killed, mostly on the pro-Russian side. There, the president encountered the hardened veterans of extreme right paramilitary units keeping up the fight against separatists just a few miles away. Elected on a platform of...

America’s Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) has published and promoted an interview with a renowed Neo-Nazi Ukrainian mayor, without disclosing the politician’s allegiances to World War II German leader Adolf Hitler and Ukraine’s own Nazi sympathizer Stepan Bandera. The interview comes just days after PBS published an article downplaying the links between Neo-Nazi politicians and Ukraine’s current political situation. On Thursday, March 4th, PBS hosted Mayor Artem Semenikhin of Konotop in the country’s North East. Semenikhin described the Russian military as “cockroaches” before going on to thank the United States for supplying his people with weapons. “My weapon is American, and...

Russian propaganda efforts have redoubled since Putin launched its aggression against Ukraine a week ago. Suddenly, a host of stories has appeared in conservative media that try to rally support for Vladimir Putin because he is allegedly fighting Nazis and the New Word Order in Ukraine. One of the worst examples is, perhaps, the Gateway Pundit, which has been duped into publishing stories by one Larry Johnson, whose only focus is the glorification of Russia and the smearing of Ukraine as a nation of Nazis. We could respond by advising Russia and its advocates to worry about their own neo-Nazi...

In 2015-2016, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights connected Azov with war crimes, including mass looting, unlawful detention and torture. Since Yanukovych’s ouster, the US and its allies have ensured that the Ukrainian regime, particularly its far-right paramilitaries, remain a significant and threatening force. Billions of dollars have been spent supporting the government and supplying and training its armed forces. In April 2015, nearly 300 members of the US 173rd Airborne Brigade were sent to Ukraine to train Ukrainian soldiers, including members of the Azov Battalion. They were joined by British, Canadian and Polish soldiers...

With Russian forces besieging Mariupol, in which 120,000+ ethnic Greeks live, SKAI news spoke with a Mr Kiouranas who lives in the city and exposed that Ukrainian “fascists” are killing people for trying to leave the city. When asked by SKAI news if he planned to leave the city, Kiouranas responded “how can I leave? When you try to leave you run the risk of running into a patrol of the Ukrainian fascists, the Azov Battalion.” “They would kill me and are responsible for everything,” he added. Who are the Azov Battalion? Azov Special Operations Detachment (Ukrainian: Окремий загін спеціального...

Facebook is backtracking on a ban it placed on users praising the Azov Battalion, a far-right paramilitary force within the Ukrainian National Guard. The Intercept first reported the news. Praise for the group, which is the armed wing of the country's white nationalist Azov movement, was banned in 2019 under Facebook's Dangerous Individuals and Organizations policy. The platform had classified the group alongside others such as the Ku Klux Klan and Islamic State. A 2016 report by the OHCHR found that Azov soldiers had raped and tortured civilians during the 2014 Russian invasion of Ukraine. The memos seen by The...

If the BBC found a group of neo-Nazis among some student Tories, or among Trump supporters in the USA, they would surely tell us about it, hot and strong. Quite right, too. In fact, the Corporations horror and disgust is such people is one of the few things I absolute share with them. So why did they last week repeatedly broadcast an entire news item, featuring a group of undoubted, shameless neo-Nazis, actually wearing SS insignia on their clothes-and not even notice? The film starred a sweet old great-grandma, Valentina Konstaninovska, in the Ukrainian city of Mauripol...