A-Infos (en) Russia, AIT: Protests and solidarity on both sides of the front line (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

Recent weeks have seen an escalation of hostilities in the 
Russian-Ukrainian military conflict. Both sides are exchanging brutal 
blows not only on the front lines but also in each other's rear areas. 
Against this backdrop, public self-organization and grassroots 
resistance remain a symbol of hope.
A mass protest against mobilization in Lviv came as a real shock to 
Ukraine. On the evening of July 8, after the "people-catchers" from the 
TCC (Travel Center for Social Development) overpowered and took away a 
man, public outrage erupted. Around 200 spontaneously assembled 
protesters (mostly young people) blocked TCC vehicles, chanting "Shame!" 
One of the vehicles was smashed and overturned, and the 
"people-catchers" barely escaped. The standoff continued for several 
hours. ( https://www.bbc.com/russian/articles/cy4ezj5985jo ).

The panicked authorities urgently deployed repressive reinforcements to 
the city; a headhunt began. Those caught were forced to publicly 
apologize. Although, contrary to the authorities' fears, the protests 
did not spread to other cities, this "wake-up call" clearly demonstrated 
to Ukraine's rulers what awaited them in the near future.

It is possible that, precisely to divert attention from the maturing 
threat and to raise nationalist spirit in Kyiv and other cities, a 
"cardboard Maidan" was urgently organized as part of a showdown between 
various groups within the ruling clique.

Describing the current situation, the Kharkiv libertarian website 
"Assembly" lists examples of resistance in its own region: "It's no 
secret that the Kharkiv region leads the country in 'attacks' on 
shopping malls (whatever that means), but mass riots like those on June 
14 in Kyiv's Troyeshchyna or on July 8 in Lviv's Sykhiv have never 
occurred here. The trend toward uniting to defend lives and streets, as 
in 1918-1919 against Petliura's pogromists, is only just beginning 
here." The website provides the following chronicle of the confrontation:

"On May 26, in the village of Sakhnovshchina in the Berestinsky district 
(...), a group of local residents used tear gas and smashed a TCC cart 
with a telescopic baton, also inflicting injuries of varying severity on 
the uninvited guests (...)"

"On June 25, in the Saltovsky district of Kharkov, at around 4:00 p.m., 
a man wanted for evading conscription stabbed two police officers during 
a document check and was soon captured (...)"

"The following day, the Kharkiv Regional Central Communications Center 
reported the murder of a member of the "alert group" (...); the man 
stopped on the street allegedly also used a knife and fled (...)"

"On July 12, the village of Orelka in the Lozovsky district turned hot 
(...). A soldier from the security platoon was hospitalized with an open 
head injury, a brain contusion, and multiple skull and facial fractures. 
The suspect was sent to the Kharkiv pretrial detention center (...). 
According to local lore, when a crowd of locals clashed with the TCC, he 
was performing repair work at a substation on Selyanska Street, where he 
picked up a half-meter-long rebar, which (...) he threw at the gas van 
carrying the abducted passerby as it was leaving the scene."

On July 13, in the Slobodskoy district, "people catchers initially 
stopped two conscripts, after which three soldiers-two from the army and 
one from the National Guard-came to their aid." Those resisting arrest 
used a gas canister and damaged a TCC vehicle, injuring one employee. 
All five were eventually apprehended by police.

On July 21, during a document check at the Kharkiv bus station, a man 
fought off TCC employees with a knife, wounding three... ( 
https://assembly.org.ua/ot-odinochnoy-zashhity-k-gruppovoj-busifikacziya-i-bron-posle-otstavki-fedorova-i-syrskogo/)

While the forced abduction of people and their dispatch to slaughter 
remains the primary cause of growing outrage, it's not the only factor 
driving the protests. In Kyiv, residents protested the deforestation of 
a park in Teremki. "People began protesting the large-scale tree felling 
carried out by utility workers, ostensibly for the construction of a new 
heating main. However, according to locals, the actual plan is to build 
an office center and a parking lot on the site of the park," reported 
one Telegram channel. Authorities deployed riot police to disperse the 
protesters, claiming, "Unlike the 'cardboard Maidan,' this protest was 
not coordinated with the authorities. The problem is that this park 
doesn't actually belong to the people: it's run by corrupt officials" ( 
https://t.me/gnapinfo/4638 ).

In Odessa, according to a local Telegram channel on August 11, residents 
blocked traffic due to a prolonged power outage during the height of the 
heat (at the corner of Myasoedovskaya and Bolgarskaya streets) ( 
https://t.me/xydessa_live/79507 ).

Power outages are caused both by Russian shelling and by the 
authorities' continued sale of electricity to Romania. After all, 
business comes first, right?

Meanwhile, in Russian-controlled territories, people are also 
dissatisfied with the situation. After all, ordinary people, with their 
daily concerns, don't care who rules them. They want to live peacefully 
and with dignity, and they have less and less faith in their rulers' 
ability to provide such a life.

In Crimea, which the Ukrainian authorities subject to relentless 
shelling and bombing (even though they continue to claim that the local 
population and the territory they inhabit on the peninsula belong to 
them, so, by their logic, they are exterminating their own citizens!), 
residents, unable to receive sufficient aid from the Russian authorities 
or faced with impenetrable bureaucracy, are organizing themselves to 
help. Amid days of power outages, residents of Yalta are lighting fires 
in their yards and cooking soup, distributing it to children. Volunteers 
are delivering bottled drinking water, cereals, canned goods, wet wipes, 
generators, and fuel to remote small villages in northern Crimea (where 
there are no large stores). To keep the dolphinarium in western Crimea 
open, people, following a call from its director on social media, raised 
money for three to four months of operation... ( 
https://www.bbc.com/russian/articles/c5yek2851xzo )

In the village of Balki in the Zaporizhia region, residents took to the 
streets on August 3rd with placards, protesting the two-month-long water 
and electricity blackout. These have been out since May 21st. Residents 
are forced to buy their own water and live with generators. Authorities 
have not organized water delivery. Almost the entire 
Kamensko-Dniprovskyi district remains without power, including the 
villages of Novodneprovka, Blagoveshchenka, Podovoye, Novovodanoye, 
Ivanovka, Gurtovoye, Tsvetkov, Dneprovka, and Vodyanoye. Those who 
demonstrated under the slogan "We want to live like human beings" 
recorded a video appeal to higher authorities and distributed it. 
Afterward, law enforcement officials began visiting the protesters and 
forcing them to write explanatory statements. One of the participants is 
accused of holding an "unauthorized rally." However, the head of the 
Russian regional administration promised to take the issue of restoring 
the power grid "under special control" and instructed municipal leaders 
to "intensify" their efforts to deliver water.

https://aitrus.info/node/6377
_________________________________________
A - I N F O S  N E W S  S E R V I C E
By, For, and About Anarchists
Send news reports to A-infos-en mailing list
A-infos-en@ainfos.ca
Subscribe/Unsubscribe https://ainfos.ca/mailman/listinfo/a-infos-en
Archive: http://ainfos.ca/en