Cuba Sounds Alarm Over UN Suspension Clause

DONETSK, DONETSK PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC—The Russian “special military operation” in Ukraine reached its 90th day and the Western press continues to be inundated with unverified claims of war crimes Russian forces allegedly have committed. Accusations have been lodged against the Russian military for mass graves in Bucha, a narrative which has been widely accepted in North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) countries. Despite requests from the Russian government and India, no independent inquiry has yet to take place.

Just four days ago, Newsweek published claims of Russian soldiers “targeting kids’ bedrooms” with explosives. Nestled far beneath the fiery headline is a soft disclaimer: “However, Newsweek has not independently verified any of the claims regarding children and explosives, which come from Ukrainian sources.” Such is the state of affairs in the U.S./EU/NATO aggression against Russia.

Perhaps these deluges of outrage would appear more sincere, if the well-documented plight of the civilians of the eastern Ukrainian breakaway region of Donbass had received passing mention in any mainstream Western outlets. In the Donbass region, two oblasts (provinces) known as Donetsk and Lugansk proclaimed their independence from Ukraine in 2015, shortly after the neo-Nazi-infected Ukrainian military began attacking their mostly Russian populations.

For eight years, war has raged in Donbass, and it has included an endless campaign involving shelling civilian areas, in violation of the Minsk Agreements between the Donbass republics, Ukraine and Russia. As of May 13, the Office of the Ombudsman in the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR), put the total civilian death toll in DPR at 7,321, including 105 children. More than 14,000 people have been killed in the Donbass region since 2014, according to the International Crisis Group. The Ukrainian military did not respond to Toward Freedom’s multiple attempts to ask about attacks on civilians in Donetsk.

‘We Used to Hide in the Basement… Now, We Don’t Bother’

Toward Freedom sent this reporter to Donbass for nearly a month, and it took less than one day in Donetsk to witness the effects of Ukrainian forces purposely shelling civilians. That first afternoon, April 28, a local Telegram channel devoted to “online information about the current shelling situations by Ukrainian Armed Forces” reported the Sokol Market in the western Kirovsky District had been shelled. At 11:40 a.m., among the market’s busiest hours, Ukrainian forces—just miles away in Krasnogor—fired 10 BM-21 Grad rockets, or Soviet rockets. Initial reports on the scene were two dead, including a local high school teacher, but this has since been updated to five. This reporter arrived at 1 p.m., at which point the wreckage was apparent and two bodies remained on the ground.

No military presence was seen in this neighborhood—no base, no embedded soldiers, no checkpoints. Gennady Andreevich, an employee of the neighborhood safety commission and administrator of the Sokol Market, called it a “sleepy” district, where there is only this market, a strip of shops, a  park, and a number of Soviet-era residential buildings. The area, per Andreevich and numerous local residents, had sustained relentless strikes since 2014. Those hits have only intensified since February. One of the neighboring residential buildings had been hit as recently as two weeks prior.

These sorts of markets are the central point of social gathering, commerce, and employment for working-class people, who cannot afford to frolic in more luxurious, capitalist-developed urban centers. The eyes of bourgeois mass media are never fixed on the poor. As such, the regular targeting of Donbass civilians goes unmentioned.

Even as cleanup efforts went on, artillery fire remained constant in the background.

The following day, April 29, the Donetsk News Agency reported the Petrovsky District, also in the west end of the city of Donetsk, had just been hit with nearly 80 Ukrainian shells, resulting in casualties.

Upon arrival at 8 p.m., this reporter first found a small grocery store, smoking from the roof, completely destroyed. A small clean-up crew was inside, and one elderly woman—the shopkeeper—stood alone and bewildered, and appeared not ready to speak to anyone. Behind the store was a large residential building, also apparently damaged by the shelling.

At the entrance to the building, a husband and wife were slowly cleaning up pieces of glass and wreckage at the main entrance. They were initially spooked seeing journalists, thinking anyone could have been Ukrainian operatives in plain clothes. But when they understood members of the press had arrived, they were eager to share their story of not just what had happened that night, but of the previous eight years. The woman, Elena, identified herself by first name only.

Elena, whose apartment balcony had been completely destroyed, said that this kind of attack was a daily occurrence for the residents of Donbass, many of whom—herself included—considered themselves Ukrainians. She said that U.S./EU arms shipments were the primary cause of the continued death and destruction, and wished to personally address the citizens of those countries, to ask that they might pressure their governments to cease the deliveries of weapons.

“In the beginning of the war, in 2014, all of us in the building used to hide out in the basement when the shells flew; now, we don’t bother,” said her husband. “We just have to go on with our lives.”

Their children had moved east to Russia, away from the front lines. But for them—like many others—old age, a lifetime of attachment to one community and lack of economic flexibility made relocation impossible.

This particular building, in its entirety, was made up of 60 units, and was attached to a school.

As we parted, the couple saw our delegation of foreign journalists off warmly, entreated us to share their stories with the West in any way possible, and wished us peace.

‘God Will Sort Them Out’

In the frontline city of Kirovsk, a mining town in the Lugansk People’s Republic, this reporter visited the home of a man whose home was hit April 26 by a “Hurricane” rocket—another Soviet-era weapon—capable of destroying entire floors of large apartment buildings. But it failed to detonate as it plugged into an outer wall, next to his garden. The home was situated on a long dirt road, with only a handful of similar homestead cottages within range. The man explained that he believed the attack had been targeted from what he called “Ukro-Nazi” positions in the nearby town of Pervomaisk. Victoria Ivanovna, the mayor of Kirovsk, described such shelling as “constant,” and often targeted at schools, or other non-military locations important to the community.

Back in Donetsk, on May 10, a now-notorious U.S. expat-turned-DPR-combat-veteran named Russell “Texas” Bentley gave this reporter a tour of the districts on the edge of no-man’s land. The Petrovsky district was clearly hit the hardest; in places, block after  block contained not a single home untouched. In the center of the district, where a once-active market had since been abandoned, a monument stood for the civilian lives lost from 2014 to 2016. It listed more than 200 names.

Russell was no stranger to this kind of shelling. “They hit us out here, every (expletive) day. They always target schools, markets and grocery stores, never military. We never targeted any civilian areas; even aside from the ethical questions, it would just be (expletive) stupid. These are our people here. This is a fight for liberation. The last thing the DPR or [Russian President Vladimir] Putin want is to piss off the residents of places, which we believe will become liberated parts of the Republics.”

Russell, 62, who served in the explicitly Marxist “Sut Vremeni (Essence of Time)” unit of the DPR army—as well as in the DPR special forces until 2017—lives with his wife, Lyudmila, in the Petrovsky district. Their home has not been hit to date, but a family of six just a few doors down had not been so lucky. The mother of the family showed this reporter the impact point of a shelling from the week before; it had destroyed their front wall, killing their dogs and barely missing the family room behind.

Katya ladnova, 25, a member of Donetsk-based Marxist feminist collective Aurora, said shelling is no longer news.

“We walk right past it,” she said. “Our complaint to Putin is not that he sent Russian troops into Ukraine, but that he sent them eight years too late.”

In spite of 8 years of attacks, and now endless constraints from isolation and sanctions, including a limit on running water to a few hours in the evening, the city of Donetsk, like all of Donbass around it, continues to move on with life; shops remain open, public transport runs, children go to school every day.

“There is absolutely no military reason to strike places like this. They do this to strike fear in our hearts,” said Andreevich, the Sokol Market administrator. “But it does not work.”

Andreevich’s own administrative office had been hit this past March. Two of his co-workers were killed in that attack. At the end of our exchange, he looked sternly and said, “Sooner or later, God will sort them out, the people who are doing this.”

Fergie Chambers is a freelance writer and socialist organizer from New York, reporting from eastern Europe for Toward Freedom. He can be found on Twitter, Instagram and Substack.

Carlos Lazo and a small band of Cubans are on a 1,300-mile pilgrimage from Miami to Washington, D.C., to end the U.S. blockade of Cuba. Despite the blistering summer heat and occasional death threats (including a trucker who tried to run them off the road), the marchers persist. Lazo’s group is called Puentes de Amor, Bridges of Love, and this grueling walkathon is certainly a labor of love. 

While right-wing Cubans in Miami call him “comunista,” Lazo has no time for ideology. He is neither for or against the Cuban government; he is for the Cuban people, the Cuban families. And he is disgusted by the cruelty of the U.S. blockade and by politicians who use the Cuban people as a political football—especially during this pandemic.

Lazo portrays Cuba and the U.S. as his parents—Cuba is his mother, the United States his father. He sees his job as trying to stop them from fighting and instead to embrace each other. “We try to unite people, whatever their ideology, religion, race or nationality,” Lazo told me. “The important thing is to take down walls that separate us and build bridges between our people.” 

Lazo and the marchers set off from Miami on June 27 and will arrive in Washington, D.C., on July 25. All along the journey, they have been meeting with community groups—black farmers, veterans, students—explaining their purpose and their demands. They are calling for a lifting of all restrictions on sending remittances to their families back home; the resumption of flights from the U.S., not only to Havana but to all major Cuban cities (right now U.S. planes can only land in Havana); the reopening of a fully staffed U.S. Embassy and Consulate in Havana instead of the skeletal staff that exists now; a restart to the program of family reunification that Trump suspended in 2017; the granting to U.S. citizens of the right to travel freely to Cuba; and robust economic relations, as well as scientific and cultural exchanges. Despite candidate Biden’s campaign promises to revert to Obama’s openings, the Biden administration insists that its Cuba policy is still “under review.” In practice, it has continued the brutal Trump agenda.

You couldn’t invent a better person than Carlos Lazo—a gregarious high school teacher/veteran who also plays guitar, sings and dances like a Cuban rock star—to lead a movement to change U.S.-Cuba policy. His trajectory reads like a movie script. The son of a cigar maker and a housewife, Lazo grew up in the small fishing village of Jaimanitas, west of Havana, and spent the first 28 years of his life there. After his mother emigrated to the United States, Lazo dreamed of following her. He first tried to leave in 1988 when he and his friend rigged up a makeshift raft. After two days adrift in the ocean, they were picked up by the Cuban Coast Guard. Lazo was thrown in jail, where he spent an entire year for illegally trying to leave the island. 

Undeterred, in 1991 he tried again. After four precarious days on a rickety raft with six others, this time they were rescued by the U.S. Coast Guard and allowed to enter the United States.

Lazo spent a few years in Miami working in restaurants, delivering pizzas and driving trucks, but moved to Seattle in 1998 to seek more economic opportunities. There he joined the Washington National Guard and studied nursing. When the United States invaded Iraq, he was sent as a combat medic. He participated in the battle of Fallujah and was awarded a bronze star for helping to save lives.

But in 2005, when this decorated veteran was on leave and tried to visit his two sons living in Cuba, he discovered that the Bush administration wouldn’t allow him to go. This was a turning point in his life, when Lazo realized that the U.S. blockade, which has existed in one form or another since the 1960s, was hurting both the Cuban people and Cubans in the United States who wanted to visit and help their families back home. 

So Lazo began speaking out. In 2007, he testified before the U.S. Senate and met with more than 100 members of Congress. He was featured on CNN and MSNBC and in national newspapers. 

When Obama became president and started normalizing relations with Cuba, Lazo thought his political work was over. He got a teaching degree, became a high school Spanish teacher, and threw himself into building a unique cultural exchange program that took his students to Cuba. The “profe,” as he is known, taught his students to sing Cuban love songs and dance salsa, winning the hearts of their Cuban hosts. He called this project the Factory of Dreams.  

These glorious exchanges, six in total, came to a crashing halt when Trump entered the White House. Trump tried to please right-wing Cubans in Miami by reversing Obama’s openings and adding 242 additional coercive measures designed to torpedo the Cuban economy. 

While the pandemic left a trail of pain and death around the world, Trump insisted on restricting family remittances to Cuba, stopping fuel shipments that supplied electricity to Cuban homes and hospitals, and sabotaging Cuban medical brigades that were helping to save lives around the world. “The planet cried out for solidarity and cooperation,” Lazo fumed, “but Trump responded by trying to suffocate the Cuban people.”

Lazo decided to take action. Despite the raging pandemic in the summer of 2020, he and four family members got on their bikes and rode more than 3,000 miles from Seattle to Washington, D.C., to urge Donald Trump and Congress to lift the blockade. Lazo livestreamed their voyage on Facebook, gaining an enormous following along the way.

Lazo’s cross-country trip inspired a group of Cubans in Miami to begin their own caravan of bicycles and cars on the last Sunday of every month. Starting with just 11 bicycles last July, the Miami caravan has grown to more than a hundred vehicles and bicycles going down Calle Ocho in Little Havana. Carlos teamed up with Miami YouTube personality Jorge Medina (El Proteston) to galvanize hundreds of Cubans in the United States. For the older generation of Miami Cubans who, at great personal risk, have been proposing normal relations and opposing the right-wing “haters” of the Cuban government since the 1959 revolution, this infusion of energy is a thrilling development.

Inspired by the success in Miami, there are now monthly caravans taking place in some 30 cities in the United States and scores more throughout the world, including in Cuba itself. Clearly, Lazo’s rejection of hatred and his commitment to building “bridges of love” reflect the sentiments of a growing number of U.S.-based Cubans and their allies.

When the marchers arrive in the nation’s capital, they will be greeted by hundreds of supporters, including U.S.-based Cubans flying all the way from Miami. Lazo plans to stay in Washington to meet with members of Congress and present the Biden administration with a petition signed by more than 25,000 people calling on him to build “bridges of love” between the two countries—just as President Obama started to do when he was in the White House.

Lazo’s pilgrimage shows his understanding that opponents of the blockade in the Cuban community need allies among broader layers of people–the farmers, students, church people, truck drivers, etc.—that he is meeting on the way. He believes the bridges of love go both ways because many groups, besides Cubans, have an interest in ending the blockade. These include farmers who want to sell their crops; tourists eager to enjoy Cuba’s nearby beauty, culture, and history; and scientists and public health officials seeking to collaborate with the island’s advanced medical system and biotech industries. In his pilgrimage, he wants to give a voice to these allies as well. 

The mushrooming of caravans across the country, the increasing number of city council resolutions against the blockade, the recent vote of the Longshore Union to condemn it, the $400,000 raised by groups sound the country to send syringes for Cuba’s COVID vaccinations—all show a growing feeling that it’s past time for the Biden administration to re-examine its cynical, electoral calculations in continuing Trump’s restrictions on Cuba. 

Lazo is not naive. He is under no illusions that his trek to Washington, D.C., will be enough to change Biden’s policies. But his philosophy is both simple and profound: “Everything you do to make the world better helps to make the world better,” he says. And whether it’s a cross-country bike trip or a 1,300-mile trek in the summer heat, Lazo takes these bold actions with so much joy, love and enthusiasm that others can’t help but follow his lead. 

Medea Benjamin, cofounder of CODEPINK, is author of several books on Cuba, including No Free Lunch: Food and Revolution in Cuba Today. 

While the Russian “special military operation” in Ukraine turns three weeks old today, energy-rich Azerbaijan is trying to preserve good ties with both Moscow and Kyiv.

Although the situation worries the Caucasus nation snuggled along the western shores of the Caspian Sea, the Azerbaijani government—based in the capital of Baku—tends toward preserving its neutrality and it potentially benefits from exporting additional gas to Europe.

Immediate Impact of War

Two days before the invasion, Azerbaijan signed an alliance agreement with Russia. The two countries are now de facto allies, although their parliaments still have not ratified the deal. According to the document, Moscow and Baku intend to deepen cooperation in the energy sector and strengthen military ties. It is worth noting Russia is already an ally of Azerbaijan’s arch-enemy, Armenia, and the agreement Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Azeri counterpart, Ilham Aliyev, signed in Moscow on February 22 is expected to reinforce Moscow’s positions in the South Caucasus.

Still, Russia’s isolation in the international arena could have an impact on its relations with Azerbaijan. Baku already has suspended all flights to the Russian Federation, and fears have emerged that remittances the approximately 650,000 Azeris working in Russia send home will significantly decline. Moreover, Russia is Azerbaijan’s top import partner. If Moscow eventually limits exports of various goods, including food, Baku likely will have to strengthen economic and political ties with another ally, Turkey.

Double-Edged Sword

It is not a secret Ankara supplied Baku with sophisticated Bayraktar drones prior to the 44-day war between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the Nagorno-Karabakh region. This landlocked mountainous terrain is internationally recognized as part of Azerbaijan, although it was under the control of Armenian forces for more than two decades. It is believed the Turkish-made weapons were a game changer in the war. As a result of the conflict, Baku restored its sovereignty over large portions of the mountainous territory, as well as surrounding areas, and some 2,000 Russian peacekeepers were deployed to the region. More importantly, Azerbaijan and Turkey became official allies, after Aliyev and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan signed in June the Shusha Declaration.

Azerbaijan is now an ally of both Russia and Turkey, which could be a double-edged sword for Baku. Although the Caucasus nation supports Ukraine’s territorial integrity, it has avoided condemning Russia’s actions or imposing sanctions on the Russian Federation.

“We have never taken decisions on imposing sanctions on any country,” Azerbaijani Deputy Foreign Minister Elnur Mammadov told Toward Freedom in an interview. He pointed out he does not expect any pressure from the West for Azerbaijan to impose sanctions on Moscow.

Fueling Demand

The European Union expects Azerbaijan to increase gas supplies to the continent, especially if Moscow eventually decides to turn off the taps. Indeed, the EU will need Azerbaijan’s energy resources to cope with possible Russian gas disruptions. But the problem is the country now does not have much more gas to export.

“In 2021, we exported 8.2 billion cubic meters of natural gas to Europe,” said Orkhan Zeynalov, the head of the International Cooperation Department of Azerbaijan’s Ministry of Energy, in an interview with Toward Freedom. “This year, we’re planning to increase the export up to 9.1 billion cubic meters.”

Such a small amount will not meet European needs for energy. In the long term, however, Azerbaijan will be able to provide more gas to Europe if it manages to increase the share of renewable energy sources for electricity production. Baku aims to turn Nagorno-Karabakh into a “green energy zone,” where foreign corporations, such as United Kingdom-based BP and United Arab Emirates-based Masdar, plan to build solar power plants. In addition, Saudi Arabian utility company Acwa Power is expected to build a 240-megawatt wind turbine farm in Azerbaijan, which should reduce the amount of gas the country currently uses.

Nakhchivan Corridor

In 2021, Azerbaijan increased its gas exports by nearly 40 percent, but the country is unlikely to ever replace Russia as Europe’s major energy supplier. Still, the growing demand for Azerbaijan’s gas will almost certainly have a positive impact on the country’s budget. Baku is expected to invest money in the construction of the Nakhchivan corridor, also known as Zangezur corridor, which seems to be a top priority for the Caucasus nation.

“We are already building 110 kilometers (68 miles) of the railway, and 124 kilometers (77 miles) of the highway in the region,” Mammadov said. “Our plan is to finish the construction by the end of 2023.”

Why is this transportation network so important for Azerbaijan? The Nakhchivan corridor will allow the energy-rich nation a land connection with its exclave, the Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic. At the same time, it will connect Azerbaijan with its ally, Turkey. The challenge, however, is 45 kilometers (28 miles) of the road will have to go through Armenian territory. Yerevan, unlike Baku, does not seem to be in a hurry to finish construction of the corridor, even though the railroad portion will connect Armenia with its ally, Russia, through Azerbaijan’s mainland. Yerevan, however, seems to be more interested in the construction of the North-South road corridor that will connect Armenia with Russia, through Georgia.

Georgia did not impose sanctions on Russia, even though the two nations fought a brief war in 2008. That is why the Kremlin does not see the former Soviet republic as an “enemy country,” which leaves room for normalization of relations between Moscow and Tbilisi. In the long-term, such a development would be beneficial for Armenia, given it would secure a land connection with Russia.

Although Moscow reportedly supports the project, and is actively dealing with issues on unblocking transport links in the region, it is not very probable Yerevan will complete the construction of its section of the corridor any time soon, if it all. Quite aware of that, Azerbaijan reportedly decided to bypass Armenia and connect its main territory with Nakhchivan via Iran. On March 11, Baku and Tehran signed a Memorandum of Understanding on establishing communication links in the region. Indeed, such a move could create a new geopolitical reality in the Caucasus.

But as long as the Russia-Ukraine conflict goes on, the final implementation of all the deals in the region will likely remain on hold. For the time being, both Azerbaijan and Armenia are expected to preserve good relations with Moscow, hoping the war in Ukraine will not spill over into the South Caucasus, an area the Kremlin sees at its “near abroad.”

Nikola Mikovic is a Serbia-based contributor to CGTN, Global Comment, Byline Times, Informed Comment, and World Geostrategic Insights, among other publications. He is a geopolitical analyst for KJ Reports and Enquire.