 Hello. Hello. Hello. This is DM 25, a radical political movement for Europe by Miron Kileli. And today we have a special DMTV episode on the current conflict in Ukraine that dramatically escalated last week. As we're broadcasting now, it's the sixth day since Russian forces invaded their neighboring country of 40 million people. The UN is reporting today that 136 civilians have been killed, including 13 children and 400 injured, although in reality it's probably many more. The Russian government has announced that they will launch missile strikes in the Ukrainian capital city of Kiev. The West has responded with sanctions last weekend against Russia, airspace restrictions, military aid, as well as a dramatic increase in defense spending from Germany. But this conflict has deep roots and it certainly didn't start last week. Furthermore, it has potentially catastrophic implications for Europe and the world, triggering or it has the potential to trigger waves of crises in energy, economics, and humanitarian crises, of course, with refugees. And similarly, the debate around the Ukrainian war has become incredibly polarized. The war propaganda machine is spinning at hyperspeed and everyone's suddenly a Ukraine expert. History is being revised to fit certain narratives and progressives seem to be divided on issues like whether we should condemn U.S. imperialism while blasting Putin's actions. And as the discussion rages, more Ukrainians are tragically dying as they mount a brave fight simply for defending their home. So in today's episode, we'd like to try and sift through all this. We've got our own Yanis Varoufakis here with us, as well as Volodymyr Ishenko, a Ukrainian researcher based in Dresden. We've got a subset of our coordinating collective and several of our grassroots members. And of course, we've got you out there. So if you have anything you want to say, any questions, comments, rants, concerns, please put them in the YouTube chat and we'll put them to our panel. Now, today, if we'll do something a little bit different, we'll kick this off with some words from our grassroots members about this conflict, some short, some short words from them. We'll start off with Anna Kolesnichenko, who is Ukrainian and based in Vienna. Anna. Hi, thank you, Mehran. Well, basically, I think you all see the news and I guess we're all realizing that this is a real war. And I know that there are different views, like which were especially present before the war, that there is some play of great powers and so let them play. And so, but it all ended up in a real war and people are dying. And I would say for Ukrainians, this is not abstract, because there is no, like, not great powers war, but this is like Russian skill in Ukrainians. And so I would like everybody to think about this, like, yeah, like, in real terms, not very abstract. And also, from what I observe, I also have many Russian friends who don't support this. And so they are posting also different things. And one of the posts that struck me yesterday was that citation, like a couple of paragraphs from Eric Maria Remar about the Second World War coming and how he was amazed to see, like, Germans before the war being mesmerized by Hitler, how they were reading and discussing and how they were, like, thinking that the whole world is somehow united against them and all sorts of rhetoric like this. And this is exactly what we see in Russia. So parallels with Hitler is 100%. So it's like not some kind of geopolitical play. It's a war of good versus evil. And this is how it's seen from Ukraine. And also, I feel some compassion for Russians in a way because their country was turned into a concentration camp and they don't know about this. And now they realize it because when they go to protest, they're put in jail. And I think during this war at the price of this very high price of life, it will be not only Ukraine, but also Russia liberated. But let's hope that the price doesn't get much higher. And in terms of European position and support, there are many ways many things that can be done now. But I think SDM, as a progressive movement, we can low bay and pressurize for a halt of Germany and other European countries buying Russian gas. Because right now, this money is used to finance the war. So in this way, Europeans are financing this war. And so this is the priority number one that should be done. Also, I would say this goes very much in line with the agenda for greening, for green new deal and reducing the use of gas and oil. So I would say this is a perfect opportunity to advance this agenda. Thank you. Thank you, Anna. Let's get a view from Moscow. Now, Elisaveta Sharagina. Do you remember from Moscow? Thank you. I'm very glad that I can take part in this event. And Anna talked about some letters which were made in Russia. I also want to tell about one letter which was made by several activists who represent left-oriented and democratic-oriented activists. And they asked people not to forget that anti-war protests, which are very important, but also there should be protests social-oriented. And it's very important for left-oriented activists in Russia who still can do something because now it's time not very good for left-oriented people here. And what I try to speak about is I present cultural questions in Russia. And I still think that enlightenment and education for people in different countries can help. And I hope very much that Movement Diem can make some publishing programs to translate important books. I told already about books by Yanis, which were translated in Russian. And that was very helpful for left-oriented and democratic-oriented activists. And I should say that we see here that it was just the problem of inequality for classes, for countries. When this inequality rises, then it can be broke through. And this time and in this place, it suddenly broke through. And it was a disaster, a disaster for all the people here. But we could see this inequality. And for example, all the sanctions were made already here by our country itself. We don't have a possibility for science education here. It doesn't exist here because there is no equal position for scientists, for example, in Russia and in Europe, in other countries. By the way, one more letter was written by mathematicians who work in Russia. They also made this petition, anti-war petition, and they said that our science is still very important for us. But there is no possibility for science to live in this disaster and in this time. Thank you very much. Thank you, Elizabeth. Sorry to hurry you on there. Nina Petrov from Serbia. Hi, everyone. So first of all, I think we can all agree here that we're strongly against any military action taken at the current time from any side. And I would like to emphasize that this is not the way to resolve any conflict. And this is what we're here to talk about today. But most of all, I would like to discuss what is the power of civil society in times like this? What can we do in our own countries and how can we overturn this situation? So my heart does go to the people of Ukraine, the innocent people that are standing in someone's way. But also my support goes to all the Russian citizens that are fighting, they're trying to fight this regime that is implementing terror. And I think that we should support each and every activist in Russia at this moment. I'll keep this short. Having that said, we have launched a campaign calling for action from civil society worldwide. And you can find it on our DM25 website. It is called No More Wars. Thank you. Thank you Nina. And now let's move over to Yanis. Thank you all three of you for your important contributions. And let's move to Yanis and then we'll hear from Volodymyr Ishenko. Yanis. Good evening everyone. At the moment in history when the people is being invaded by an army of occupation, when their homes are being violated, when their neighborhoods are being bombarded, when young and old people who had never touched a gun before take up arms to defend their homeland. At that moment we have simply to bow our heads to them, to support them, to do anything in our power, to empower them, independently of whether they're Ukrainians, Palestinians, Kurds, Iraqis, Polisari rebels in Western Sahara, we, you know, DM25, we do not discriminate between victims, victims of aggression. Unlike the systemic media who treat a Palestinian woman, who picks up a rock to throw out the Israeli forces about to demolish her home and they call her a terrorist, or whether we're talking about a woman in Har Kiv who is putting together a lot of cocktails, we treat them as freedom fighters, we make no distinction between them. Now, let me be clear about Mr. Putin. He chose war, it was not imposed upon him, it wasn't the Ukrainians, it wasn't Washington, it was NATO, it wasn't some divinity, it was his choice and he is going to be condemned in the annals of history for that barbarism. The choice of war, the choice of war is a crime in itself. Whether he's actually committed war crimes, this is a formal definition, according to the Geneva Convention, is something we'll work out later on. But as far as I'm concerned, he's a war criminal anyway. And I've been saying this since the early 2000s, because of the crimes against humanity that Putin personally instigated in order to become the first president of Russia that reclaims territory back, that was Chechnya, when he completely flattened Grozny killing 250,000 people under false pretenses in order to solidify his power. This is the kind of man we're talking about. This is not something new for me, I've been saying this now, as I said since 2001. I shudder to think what he's going to do to give if the resistance continues. I want the resistance to continue. I want the resistance to win. But I shudder to think that he may try out in Kiev what he's done in Grozny. I shudder to think what he's doing as we speak to our Russian comrades in prisons across Russia for having demonstrated against his evil regime. I remember a few years ago I was on stage in Edinburgh in Glasgow, sorry, in Glasgow in Scotland with Maria Alokina from Pussy Riot listening to the Howard details of the torture that she suffered in Siberian prisons. Let me now come to what I think my contribution can be here. What is the solution at this moment? The Ukrainians have been led up the garden path by NATO, by Washington for years. They've been promised things that were never going to be delivered. As far as I'm concerned, and this is something I've been advocating over the last few days, I just float it up here because I don't want to take too much of your time. For me, there are two potential outcomes for the next few years. One is in the pursuit of an impossible and unsustainable aim of a Ukraine that becomes maybe a NATO member to have a protracted occupation and tens of thousands of deaths in the Ukraine as we speak. The only alternative, which I think is fathomable and one that is potentially a good outcome for Ukrainians, is a Finland-like neutrality agreement to be brokered between Washington and Moscow. The European Union doesn't exist. It has become absolutely obsolete and irrelevant. It has become the tale of the United States. I'm putting this forward, the Finlandization of the Ukraine. Knowing full well what Finlandization was, it was a fantastic opportunity for Finland to avoid being gobbled up by Russia after a war and the resistance by the people of Finland like the ones, the resistance now by Ukrainians. It was a process that led to 80 years of peace, prosperity, democracy and freedom and independence by Finland. If we care about Ukrainians and we do not care about the interests of NATO, of our own little ideologies here and there, I think we should be pressing our friends in the Ukraine to bargain, to fight, to resist because the only way of convincing Putin that a Finland-like solution is palatable to him is if the resistance in the Ukraine succeeds in exacting a large cost upon the Russian Army, the sanctions do the same thing at the economic sphere, then and only then an agreement between Moscow and Washington could be solved by putting to his own regime, to his own people as a kind of victory for him, but at the same time, it will be the optimal outcome for Ukraine. And if we want, as a European Union, this is what I propose, if we want to support this independent but neutral Ukraine, we can do that, we can invest massively, especially in the green transition and so on, education, health, infrastructure as Europeans, we don't even need to have formally the Ukrainians inducted in the European Union, if that is the way to get the occupying armies out of the Ukraine. The very simple choice we now have is between a solution that stands a chance of ending the carnage, preventing a long-term occupation and granting Ukrainians the right to live in democracy and with freedom and without being under the thumb of the Russian bear or pursuing the kind of line that NATO and the Washington establishment has been pushing Ukrainian governments towards since 2014, a dead end that is leading to today's absolutely outrageous circumstances. I'm looking forward to the debate. Thank you, Yanis. Volodymyr Ishenko. Thank you so much for inviting me here. So I'll try to use these five minutes as useful as possible. So when this whole escalation started a few months ago, I've made a number of interviews, I've wrote several op-eds. I've been explaining to the Western media about the complexity of relations between Ukrainians and Russians since the Russian Empire in the Soviet Union. I've been explaining about the Euro-Maidan revolution, which I closely studied about all the problems of the post-Maidan regime in Ukraine with the nationalist radicalization with the far right and so on and so forth. But now we should very clearly understand that the person who pushed the button and started the war is Vladimir Putin. He is the primary responsible for the war and he must be stopped. I've been very critical to post-Maidan regime in Ukraine. I've been a target of a couple of hate campaigns. I received threats from the people who actually killed other people. But I also remember how 19 years ago I joined marching against the invasion of Iraq by the United States and this was a part of the global day of action, which is claimed to be the global protest events in the whole history. And all the left understood that Saddam Hussein was a brutal dictator, brutally repressive against the communists, against the courts, but foreign occupation would lead to horrific, horrible consequences not only for Iraq, but for the whole region. And now we need to discuss how to stop Putin. So one of the lines of actions by the EU is sanctions. I think I'm not the best person in this circle to discuss the impact of the financial sanctions and I think Yanis probably has much more to say about this. But I would only remind you that discussion of the swift cuts banning Russian banks, not allowing them to use trade in dollar and euro, they've been all since 2014. And I think the Russians were preparing for this. And also I'll remind you that China is practically openly supporting Russia and without that probably covered agreement, Putin would probably not risk to start the war. I'm in agreement with China. Another line of the European Union is sending more arms to Ukraine. Sending arms to the people who fight against the aggression is probably not a bad thing. But if it's not supplemented with any attempt to reach a political solution, that would mean that the European Union is creating a kind of like Afghanistan on the territory of Ukraine. That would lead indeed to massive destruction of Ukrainian cities, massive losses of civilian lives. And I don't think that this is what Ukraine actually needs. And we also understand that Putin bet almost everything on this invasion. If he loses in Ukraine, he loses his power. And that means that he would use whatever means possible not to lose. He already threatened the world with the nuclear weapons. So this is also a risk that we need to understand. One of the possible political compromises that is starting to discuss now in Ukrainian media, in Russian media, in some Western analysis, that it's connected to today's vote in the European Parliament for recommending to accept Ukraine to the European Union. And this can be indeed a part of a deal, a part of a quick peace solution for Ukraine that could prevent massive destruction assaults on Ukrainian cities. Ukraine could become a part of the European Union. And the other part of the deal would be in neutral status for Ukraine that Russia demands and probably some compromises on Crimea and a weird thing that Putin calls denazification. And we also need to understand what exactly it means for him now, but he left for him a big space to decide what it could be. The benefits of this deal would be that both for Ukrainian and for the Russian government it would be possible to present it as a victory. Ukrainians were fighting for the European Union since the Euro-Madan Revolution. And that would be the culmination of this fight. Putin could also be capable to present the Ukrainian neutrality compromises on Donbass and Crimea as a victory for him. And would not be pushed to the wall and offend with whatever means in his disposal. So I think if this deal is something that is realistically discussed among the European, Ukrainian and Russian elites, I think that would be the best thing that Ukraine can get now and that would prevent massive distractions and also thousands more, maybe even millions of lives in our country. Thank you, Volodymyr. A couple of questions from the chat and comments. One question on the proposal of a Finland-style neutrality for Ukraine that you and Janis both referenced. The thing is, says Abilsen, how can Ukraine do this? I mean, ideally we wanted to be at Switzerland, but how? Without leaning towards the West or towards Russia. Niels Waldorf says, one thing to defend Russia, given the historical context, the West has always been the aggressor. That's why I think Putin doesn't feel safe. We, i.e. we in the West, are savage beasts with no values. Raytheon Lockheed Boeing chose war and Kostas asks, what do you think about NATO's position between what's happening right now with Russia bombing Ukraine and NATO bombing Belgrade back in the 90s? And we have a good person to answer that. There's someone who lived through that NATO bombing campaign in the 90s, Ivana Nenadovich from Belgrade, Ivana. Good evening and it's very nice to have this variety of voices. And this is why I decided to stay in this panel, although I wanted to pull out because of the level of emotions that it brings back. And I would like to mention another part of the war that is always brutal and never a solution. And more arms and guns are not going to bring peace. That's one thing that I can say for sure. Is the cultural war or the war of words that is happening at the same time and mainly on the left spectrum. And when I look at the people that are pretty much on the same page regarding condemning any kind of aggression, brutality and denial of sovereign countries. At the left, I can see this need to be on the right side at this point of history. This high moral ground that we will take and then we will condemn Putin, which is in order. And of course, we should do that. However, what I would like to emphasize from my experience is that when we say Russia or when we say Putin, it also spills over to the people of Russia. And as Elizaveta told us, there are progressive Russian people who are trying to fight this oppression for a very long time. Same as we in Serbia tried to fight and we did fight Milosevic and we did fight his oppression and his dictatorship. And then we ended up being bombed. This is one big injustice that I can tell you about. It's not something that will help you much. But it is something that is perceived as injustice, especially because this whole region of Eastern Europe, SSSR, Yugoslavia is very difficult for our Western friends to understand and comprehend. And all of a sudden, we have this big interest and so to say, quote-unquote geopolitical knowledge about this region, which doesn't really exist because of various reasons. Each side will have their own point of view. Of course, there is a history of oppression, repression and antagonism. And what we should do as internationalist movement is to bring people closer together to understand that war doesn't end, even if I hope that it will end soon for Ukrainian people. I doubt it will happen. And even if the peace agreement would be signed tomorrow, war lingers on and has its aftermath. And in ex-Jugoslavia or in Serbia, because Serbia bears the legacy of Yugoslavia and everything that was bad and connected to Yugoslavia is something that Russian people will suffer for a very long time. And when Putin is gone and has his place in history books. But we must be careful about more divisions, especially on the left, on the side where people are thinking progressive or humanitarian at least. And try not to make, create more divisions that we already unfortunately have. Thank you. Thank you very much, Ivana Khabant. Yuliana Zita. Thank you, Mehran. Good evening, everyone. First of all, of course, also my empathy and solidarity to the Ukrainian people. It's just devastating. And I think just after six days, I can still not wrap my mind around what's happening here. And especially from the German perspective, developments within the last days are really scary, to be honest. And it's not comparable with being in Kiev right now in Ukraine. But if you look into the future and you see the narrative that the European Union is building up for itself, being great and giving, spending more money on military is just mind blowing to me. And even more so because now you can read headlines like, it's so great that Germany is taking the lead. And I couldn't have ever imagined that the world would be cheering Germany for spending enormous amounts of money on military. And this is quite confusing for people of my generation for sure. Because I don't, and to be honest, I don't see anyone here in Germany ever taking their guns and defending themselves like the Ukrainian people do now bravely. I don't think that we could pull that off here to be honest. This is an illusion that people have in Germany now, where I live, that we can defend ourselves against people like Putin who sit on a button with nuclear weapons. And I think it's the wrong direction, extremely the wrong direction. I agree with Ivana. If you prepare for war, war will probably come. And this narrative over strong Europe is just hot air for me because before the invasion began, you could see that Janusz is completely right that the EU was completely irrelevant in negotiating. I mean, it's not news that Putin is evil for me. I was protesting something. I don't even remember what it was 15 years ago with friends of mine who are Russians. This is not the news to me, but the news to me is that, for example, now we cheer up a politician like Scholz for building up military, a politician that was one of the most corrupt on the ballot last year. He is involved in the XCOM file scandal. He beat up plenty of us leftist people at the G20 assembly in Hamburg that happened. He has so many disasters and scandals on his side that anyone who believes that this man will secure Germany or Europe in the next years is just delusional. I'm sorry. So please people in Europe, do your homework when it comes to this government in Germany, when it comes to the people who are promising you a secure Europe, because it's just not true. I don't believe in that. And I think that the left really quickly must unite anti-war, anti-nuclear weapons, anti everything that can really just blow us off this earth. And yeah, this is for now my statement. Thank you for that, Juliana, and you from Germany. Dushan Payevich, based in Montenegro. Thank you, Mehran. Yeah, I will start narrowly, then I will expand towards the wider context. First of all, let me say that I come from a country that suffered from both NATO aggression and denial of our identity and sovereignty. I hear each day that my country is a communist lie and that we as a nation don't exist. So I deeply identify with Ukrainians, even though this is on a much larger scale, of course. And we need to be explicit as a movement against the all imperialistic tendencies. Russia and USA are playing their games through Montenegro. First, Green Party of Montenegro broke the ruling coalition with extreme right-wing Serbian Party Democratic Front, because USA officials said that they are not considered partners. So basically Green Party didn't mind being in the coalition with literal fascists until West said that it is a problem. Then DEF was meeting with the Russian intelligence before they block every road in Montenegro, which they did on the day that Russia invaded Ukraine, actually. Also, Green Party leader and Vice Prime Minister was having a dinner with Russian paramilitary organization, and now DEF, Democratic Front, is opposing to organize an assembly where new minority government needs to be formed. To have a side note, they were accused of trying to stage a coup with the Russian group back in 2016 to prevent Montenegro from joining NATO. Now they are organizing pro-invasion protests, and I just want to say that I am deeply ashamed of those people that are at this protest now as we speak. It is very, very important to note what Pivana said, and that is the fact that not all Serbs support Democratic Front, nor all Russians support the war. So I stand with peace and I stand with Ukraine and all the progressives around Europe, and I think those phrases are actually synonyms. Wars and imperialistic tendencies only benefit one percent of people, and they are definitely not a majority, and this is a war of Putin and Russian oligarchs, and it's disgusting. On the other hand, no, NATO is not a solution. Neither is the colonial view towards Slavs, and we need a different alternative as soon as possible in order to stop Ukrainians from suffering. This may sound a bit utopic, but in difficult times like these allow me to dream, at least. I call and I think we need the demilitarization of the world and the erection of those funds to be redirected towards the Green transition. If you mind that your country is dependent on the Russian gas, then you should also mind that it is dependent to any gas, basically. Gas and all companies are lobbying already to build more infrastructure in the European Union, and we need renewables and not these things they try to pass as green. While the world is looking at the direction of war, they have this sneaky taxonomy which labels nuclear and gas as sustainable, and DM-25 is going to stand up to that. We won't let a backdoor slip on this. Nuclear energy is a starting point for nuclear weapons that is dangerous and expensive, and gas is destructive fossil fuel. Don't let them paint it green. We've seen that 100 billions from Germany has went to military budget, and that is a pure example that we have the means to do this transition now, not to fund military which pollutes dirt further. The US military, for example, produces more CO2 than many states, including Sweden, Norway, and Hungary. Also, let me not start about the land pollution, because one of my great friends got leukemia because of the NATO bombing, because he was swimming in the area near where NATO dropped their depleted uranium bombs, so I cannot forget that, basically. Once again, glory to Ukraine and brave people and fighters from there. Russia needs to stop this brutal invasion, and unfortunately, I have to stress that NATO won't save you. They are criminal organization that works for profit and not for peace. As Janis said, independent and neutral Ukraine is needed. No wars between nations and no peace between classes. Slava Ukraine. Thank you very much for that, Dushan, and a reference there to our Don't Paint It Green campaign, and if you'd like to be involved in that, and of course, actions to try and stop the war in Ukraine. I mean, everybody in DM has been protesting all weekend, but we will be designing and coming forward with specific campaigns on this. Please join us. It's dm25.org slash join. Don't just sit on the sidelines. Let's do something together on this. A couple of quick comments from the chat here. The EU hates opposing views, banning Sputnik and RT, the Russian media, means you are not allowed to listen to wrong think. This is totalitarianism. Another comment Matthew says, where is the sadness for the people of Ukraine after the US coup in 2014? This commonly held view that the Euromaidan revolution was backed by the US. Let us now hear again from Elisaveta Sharginov from Moscow. Elisaveta. Thank you very much for all of you, and Dushan said very important words that it's very difficult to say just in a few minutes, but you know that both Russia and Ukraine had long history and in 90s, when this, as you told some personalities, but there was Yeltsin, Putin, they came and they brought these ideals of free market just from capitalistic world. And people were just, they tried to find their way, but it was very difficult and now this militarization goes together with the finishing of internalistic ideas of ideas that people are equal. It came to us and I think that's a long, long way to come back to their ideas. And we have now in our country also, and both in Russia and Ukraine, decommunization, you know that's our main process. But communism gave also the ideas of that people are equal. So we have to return to these ideas through culture and through education. I see no other way. Thank you. Thank you very much for that, Elisaveta. Let's bring Yanis Barofakis back in. Yanis. I'd like to take the opportunity to answer some of the things that the questions put on the YouTube chat and on Twitter. The first question is, well, wasn't Finlandization a terrible thing for Finland imposed upon it? Well, it was imposed upon it as it is not of a war with Russia. But was it terrible? Finland was a fully fledged democratic country. Yes, they had to keep a little bit quiet regarding their criticism of the Soviet Union during the Cold War. They have no doubt that if they had a choice between Finlandization and Novinlandization, they would have chosen the latter, all other things being equal. In other words, not being gobbled up by Russia. Let me tell you that, you know, I'm getting on a bit in life. I'm old enough to remember living in a NATO country that also had the fascist right wing dictatorship here in Greece. And I can tell you that back then we were dreaming of being Finland. We were thinking of either Finland or Austria, countries that were not in NATO, not in the European Union, as dreams come true for their people. And we were right because Austria, Finland, in a state of Finlandization of neutrality, achieved remarkable attainments, remarkable outcomes politically, technologically, educationally, health wise in terms of a social democracy. That would not be bad for Ukraine today. Somebody else asked me, well, who will guarantee the neutrality of Ukraine? You know, even if Putin agrees for five minutes, then he can change his mind tomorrow. Well, that's not my proposal. It's not our proposal. Our proposal is that this should be the result of a summit between the United States of America and Russia, the result of an agreement, a binding agreement, including demilitarization of the border areas of Donbas, one that was guaranteed by both sides. And Putin would actually appreciate that because he would be able to show to his own people, to his regime, to his party, to whatever machinery keeps him going, that he's being taken seriously by Washington DC. Another question is, well, shouldn't the Ukrainians decide if that's what they want? Absolutely. We are Democrats. But for the Ukrainians to decide, there are two prerequisites. The first one is that they are told the truth, by the West, by the European Union, not to be led up the garden path. Because this is what the European Union is doing. It's promising them things that it is not prepared to deliver. This thing about, you know, the entry of Ukraine into the European Union, they can promise it to their blue in the face. They don't mean it. There's no way that Berlin is going to accept Ukraine as a member of the European Union, even if they say that they will. Not for a very long time, and certainly not while Donbas is occupied, not while the, you know, the economy is in tatters. So first you need to rebuild Ukraine before there's any chance of entering the European Union. And finally, allow me to say this, over the last 48 hours in Twitter space and Facebook, we've all been engaged in debates. We've all been attacked by trolls for things we've said. One of the most interesting attacks I've received, where I was from the former prime minister, the ultra-right wing Alexander Stubbs of Finland, who was back in 2015, the finance minister of Finland. He would be demoted from prime minister to finance minister. And he was in the Eurogroup doing the bidding of Wolfgang Scheuble against Greece, right? And he was giving me and us Greeks lectures about, you know, that we were the grasshoppers of the Mediterranean and we had to take the pain of the Troika and austerity and so on. We need to cut tiny little pensions by the most impoverished of pensioners by 50%. And he was actually doing all that when we were in the Eurogroup. And interestingly, why am I saying that? Because now that I'm talking about Finland, he says, oh, what right do you have to talk about my country? Our history is for us to judge, not for you. Interesting, isn't it? These people think that they have the right to steamroll like, you know, like a tank going over your country. But the moment you start having opinions about theirs, suddenly you are Greek-splaining or West-splaining. Now, comrades, this is why we have DiEM25. We do not believe in national boundaries when it comes to debates. I have every right to have a view about every part of Europe, including Russia. Like you have, everybody has a right to have an opinion about the tiniest village anywhere in Greece. In DiEM25, we do not respect borders. We do not respect different jurisdictions where, you know, you are an expert in your country and I'm an expert now here. We vote together about everything. We have debates about every part of Europe, indeed every part of the world. And this is why DiEM25 is important and allow me to end by saying that as DiEM25 has established and shown in the last 76 years of our existence, Ukraine, Russia, Turkey, Greece, Lebanon, Israel, Palestine, we are one. And we are going to have this debate along the lines of humanist principles that apply to all of us. Thank you again. It's Nina Petrov from Serbia and then we'll bring Volodymyr Shinkov back in. Nina. Thank you. From the beginning of this conflict, ever since it got as violent as it did, I keep hearing people talking about the war in Bosnia and how this reminds them of the war in Bosnia and the NATO aggression over Serbia. But this is not the only resemblance that I feel as a citizen of Serbia with the situation nowadays. I also feel compassionate with the people in Russia and Belarus and why is this? Because the regimes that they have is so similar to ours. We had a referendum in Belarus on Sunday. And if anyone is crazy enough to believe that the people of Belarus had any right, had any vote, you are pretty delusional. In Serbia, we don't really have any rights to vote and every election, every referendum is already being decided for us. Before the referendum ended on Sunday, I could see a lot of campaigns coming from the Ukrainian side about how we should implement sanctions towards the Belarus citizens and everyone who's even, you know, who happened to be born in Belarus, just as the people who happened to be born in Russia no matter what they stand for. And the only thing I can say is that in these situations, the citizens under oppressive regime are even more driven to support their leaders because they feel personally attacked. And this is me coming from a genocidal nation, right? They will be labeled, they will be labeled for good. And I'm convinced that there is no decent human being across these countries that is supportive of what's going on at the moment. And I really think that as Dushan said, this is oligarchy playing games and Ukraine is their playground and we are all their pawns in this game. And this is why we, all of us, have to stand up and take power back into our own hands and say what we really want and make them listen. Thank you. Thank you very much for that, Nina. A couple of quick comments from the chat. NATO should have been dismantled, along with the Warsaw Pact. In World War II, says Vorsich Tich, Belgium, Denmark and the Netherlands declared their neutrality before the Nazis invaded them and doesn't do anything, the Nazis invaded them anyway. And CH says, I do think the West is held to a higher standard by the left than the regimes in China and Russia. That's how it feels as an England. Volodymya. Thank you. I just took comments to what Yanis said about EU that could promise, promise, promise, but never accept. I think what's more realistic to get from them now is a kind of like a membership plan, of course, not expedited acceptance to the EU, but a clear membership plan, maybe for many years, but with milestones, with everything, but with a very clear goal that Ukraine becomes a member of the European Union. And that may work because for Ukraine, it's also that those guarantees that they actually call for before accepting the neutral status. There is indeed a very understandable need in the guarantees after being attacked by the neighboring country. And being a part of the European Union, and the European Union, which is starting to spend so much money on the weapons, is a guarantee. But of course, that's not exactly the progressive vision of the world, certainly. It's simply something that looks like a realistic solution for the horror which goes on in Ukraine right now. But a more long term, more forward vision would be, of course, the complete restructuring of the security in Europe, because we also need to understand that whoever would replace Putin as the president of Russia, even if he would be a democratic socialist, even if he would be a Navalny, the main oppositionist. So far as NATO remains exclusive, though Russia would continue to see NATO as a threat. And without the fundamental solution of this common security problem, a common structure for the European countries, for Ukraine, for Russia, that problem won't go away. And of course, it's just completely impossible even to imagine that Ukraine and Russia would ever be in any common structure after this invasion. But we also need to recall that Germany, France and Poland are now in the European Union together. Even after the incomprehensible horrors of the Second World War that Germany put on Europe. But after the regime change and some years, it has become possible. And so we need also to have this perspective on our agenda and in our vision. Thank you, Volodymyr. Yuliana Zeta, Germany. Yes, thank you. I just wanted quickly to add that I'm building on what Yuliana said about that we must think without borders. And I think the point is that money, for example, and the most powerful, they don't think within borders. And this is where they are ahead of most of us progressives is that we act like there's just one single interest from one single country being like Putin in Russia. But but of course, I think that if you heard the oligarchs who are with him, you can change much more than talking in military strategic senses. And I think for us on this planet, so to say, to at some point have no wars anymore, we must what I mean, Dushan, you said that it is kind of Ethiopian. But I don't see any way out. We have to kind of make a quit to history, you know, we have to stop looking back, because we will never get each other's perception 100%. I can never know exactly how it is to live in Poland or to live in even North Macedonia, where I come from, I live in Germany. I don't even have a full clue how the country I'm coming from is functioning. So so it cannot be that we all have to understand each other first to have peace. That will never happen. So we must just leave things as they are sometimes and not go. But what is with this war and this war? I mean, we condemn all wars. And the question for me is how we gain peace. And I want to quote something that the Dalai Lama wrote a few days ago. He said, 20th century was the century of bloodshed. The 21st century must be a century of dialogue. And I agree with that strongly. And I think this is something that we have to change in our human perception of how we solve conflicts and not go back to the old playbooks and try to resolve every conflict with the same same historical approach, which leads to the same outcome. So yeah, I think for the future, it's just we have to go freedom for the many and J for the few. And then we can talk about freedom and peace. Thank you, Juliana. Amir Kiayi, our policy coordinator. Hi, good evening. And thanks, Mehran. It's important and very critical to point out that we, and as Dushan has mentioned, Ivana, Nina, et cetera, and everybody else, that here we have the power of the people has been mostly taken away from us. And there's very little. But at the same time, it's about taking the power back. And part of that is actually getting ourselves as the people as the public and also civil society to proactively organize towards peace. And that's very critical because the annual military spending of $2 trillion a year is only set to increase given the moves by Germany. And of course, France will follow suit, and so will the other countries as well, because they all have to start matching each other of the inherent fear of the neighbor attacking. So we know that this spending will also rapidly increase, even though we know that even if we disagree about sustainable development goals, it will only cost $3 trillion a year to implement all the SDG goals that's out there. So it's really easy about political priority, about diverting the spending that we have now away from militarization and into the areas that we want, whether it's shifting into free public transport, free and universal healthcare, localization of renewable energy, and so on and so forth. And those are some of the demands we can make from our elected representatives. But more importantly, we know that civil society needs to get really activated about this and organize for peace. And that's why we've launched the call, a petition that people can sign at dm25.org forward slash peace, where we're calling for end to overseas military bases, extortion of foreign troops from all regions, divestment of public and private funds in the arms industry, striking at arms manufacturing companies, no pass a run to transportation of weapons, making the arms industry in lobbyists and support is visible to the public, and so on and so forth. NATO, CSTO, CSTP, all these acronyms will not bring security for us, militarization will never be able to do that. Thank you. Thank you, Amir. Some last comments from the chat here. How many of us here from Western media were the as of fascists did in Donbass? Someone else is shouting out to Matt Tebe's article on how the U.S. fostered the rise of Putin, despite his corruption. Yes, it's a good piece. Tebe.substack.com. And from Eric Sapp, criticize people, sorry, criticize Putin, if you like, but if you're a North American or a European, NATO is your responsibility. So you need to criticize it. It is your moral duty. Yannis? A very brief comment regarding the as of Nazis. Look, I come from a country where we had Nazis in Parliament, the third largest part that doesn't make the Greeks Nazis. So yes, there are Ukrainian Nazis. So what? This doesn't take away from the liberation struggle taking place today in Kharkiv, in Kiev, and so on. So let's, you know, every country has its Nazis. You know, even the best countries have them. So let's, yeah, there is no such thing as a homogeneous country. That was just a brief aside. Look, I want to address Volodymyr's point about the European Union and whether it helps for their roadmap towards membership of Ukraine. I don't think it does, Volodymyr. Let me be clear. I'd like to have Ukraine in the EU, right? I'd like to have Turkey in the EU. Today, it would be good for a comrades in Turkey, good for a comrades in Ukraine. But the number one question now is how do we stop the bombing of Kiev? How do we get the Russian troops out? That's the number one priority, right? So the question is whether it's, you know, whatever we are assessing as a possible help or hinder. Imagine that there is this announcement now by Brussels that, yes, a roadmap is out, even, you know, provisional membership of the EU by the Ukraine. Is this going to make it easier to strike a deal between Washington DC, the American government and Moscow and Putin, so that the Russian troops ceasefire and withdraw from Ukraine? I don't think so. It will have the opposite effect. And in any case, Volodymyr, let me put it this way. The process that for accession to the EU is a process, a very awful process, exacted by Brussels. They are going to be putting you through different tests for years until you tick all the boxes. I don't think that this is the right way now. I think that it's the opposite. Ukrainians should be judging the European Union, not the European Union judging the Ukrainians. So the way I see it is this. If the European Union wants to help Ukraine at the moment, right? Firstly, the European Union doesn't really exist as a serious geopolitical force. So we cannot, as a European Union, grant you the liberty from the Russian army that you need. The Americans can. So this is why I'm supporting an American-Russian agreement that guarantees your independence and that the European Union can come in with aid. Huge financial investment and technological investment in bringing up and building up Ukraine without any box-ticking by the bureaucrats in Brussels that pass judgment on you. No, the European Union wants to help. Okay, it can come in with the money and the infrastructure and the know-how to help rebuild the Ukraine after Moscow and Washington agree on the way towards a kind of compromise between them that will allow your country freedom from conflict. Okay, and then later on, once you've been rebuilt, yes, by all means, you know, hopefully by that time Russia will be free of Putin and Putin-esque kind of regimes. But this is not for now. EU accession now is besides the point, it's unhelpful. Put the honest on the European Union to provide massive financial support to a Ukraine that gets rid of the Russians, the Russian troops as a result of a global summit between the United States and Russia, maybe China, serious powers, not the European Union, which is a joke. Thank you, Yanis, and we'll need to stop it there because we've gone past our hour. There's so much more to discuss on this, guys. It's been a really valuable discussion. Thank you so much to all of you for doing this. We've only scratched the surface. And there will be other discussions on this because I am certain this issue will be with us for quite some time, unfortunately. The chat has been raging. Apologies also to any of you out there that put comments or questions here. I haven't been able to keep up. And while there's two of us doing this and neither of us have been able to keep up, but I hope you can continue the discussion in the comments of the video as well. Thank you again, especially to those of you here for your very personal takes. I mean, Volodymyr and Anna and any of you with friends and family in danger right now in Ukraine. Really appreciate you giving us your take. And please, if you'd like to join DM25 and not just be part of the debate, but be part of the solution, the web address is dm25.org slash join. We have a petition, which is a small first step that you could do very easily in a couple of seconds. You can sign on. It's dm25.org slash peace. We'll be back next week, same time, same place with another discussion. Thank you very much for