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Borotba

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Borotba
LeaderSerhiy Kirichuk
FoundedMay 1, 2011 (2011-05-01)
HeadquartersOdessa
IdeologyCommunism
Marxism–Leninism
Revolutionary socialism
Anti-fascism
Political positionFar-left
International affiliationLeft Front (Russia)
Website
Official website

The Association “Struggle” (Ukrainian: Об'єднання "Боротьба" Ob'yednannia “Boroťba”) calls itself a revolutionary Marxist–Leninist and anti-fascist organization operating in Odessa and Kharkiv, Ukraine. It has close ties to the Left Front in Russia. [1][2]. However, it is criticised for its cooperation with pro-Russian separatist[3][4], nationalist and neo-fascist groups[5][6].

History

The association was established in May 2011 after the merger of a part of the "Organization of Marxists" (Ukraine), the "Leninist Communist Youth Union of Ukraine" (youth wing of the Ukrainian Communist Party), "All-Ukrainian Union of Workers", the "Youth Association Che Guevara", and the "Youth against capitalism" movement, with some individual leftist activists also joining.[7] The founding congress was attended by delegates from Kiev, Donetsk, Odessa, Dnepropetrovsk, Crimea, Vinnitsa, Luhansk, Krivoy Rog and other cities of Ukraine. International guests from Sweden and Russia were also present.[7]

Activities

When the Euromaidan movement started in 2013, Borotba were critical of protesters' demands from the outset. Borotba's critical position won them a great deal of support among the anti-Maidan working-class, particularly in Kharkov.[8] Some members of Borotba, namely the Levine brothers, attempted to recruit protesters to the Confederation of Independent Trade Unions of Ukraine to fight against increased public transport costs in Kiev. However, when they were recognised as members of Borotba, they were attacked by the far-right.[9]

Borotba has condemned the "Western-backed"[10] and "fascist" February 2014 coup in Kiev and called for a socialist revolution in Ukraine against the government of "ultra-nationalists and Nazis".[11] Borotba's analysis of the composition of the so-called "revolutionary" government that took power on 22 February 2014 stated that far-right nationalists received too much power and control over important ministries and agencies including defense, anti-corruption and national security, education, agriculture and the environment, as well as the office of the prosecutor general.[12]

Borotba's members took an active role in all major political events in Kharkiv in March 2014.[13] On April 15, and May 8, 2014, Borotba's office in Kharkiv was raided by police.[14]

On March 15, Borotba, the "People’s Unity" and other groups called a public meeting in Kharkiv. At the rally, according to an eyewitness, Borotba's flags dominated the scene and Borotba's newspaper, the "Front", was widely distributed.[15] That day, Borotba joined other pro-Russian nationalist groups in storming the regional administration building[16], which at that time was occupied by pro-Maidan activists, and their members are accused by other left wing organisations for taking part in the beating of pro-Maidan activists, including anarchists and the well-known Ukrainian author Serhiy Zhadan[17]. Borotba justified their action by flatly calling the occupants members of Right Sector[18].

In Kharkiv Borotba activists printed 100,000 leaflets and 10,000 posters persuading the voters to boycott the presidential election in May 2014, since they considered it unrepresentative, radical rightist, and illegitimate.[19][20]

On May Day Borotba members staged a rally in Kovalska Street in Odessa.[21] The following day, Borotba member Andrey Brazhevsky was beaten to death by a far-right mob after jumping from the third floor of the burning Trade Union Building during the 2 May 2014 Odessa clashes.[22][23] A detailed eyewitness account of the human tragedy that occurred in and around the Trade Union Building in Odessa during the right-wing march "For unity of Ukraine" was published on Borotba's website.[24][25] Following the Odessa Trade Union building massacre and other attacks on Borotba's members and offices, Borotba was forced underground.[26][27]

The leader of the Odessian regional organisation of Borotba, Aleksey Albu, fled to Russian-annexed Crimea, where he founded a "Committee for the Liberation of Odessa" on the 24th of May 2014 together with a representative of the right wing conservative party Rodina ("Homeland"), Aleksandr Vasilyev, and a representative of the neonazi organization "Slavic Unity", Dmitry Odninov.[28][29].

Criticism

On March 3, 2014, several far-left and anarchist organizations in Ukraine, including the Autonomous Workers Union, the "Direct Action" Independent Student Union and the Left Opposition socialist organization, criticized Borotba for alleged cooperation with conservative pro-Russian groups in Ukraine and allegedly spreading "overt lies and fact manipulations, deceiving foreign leftists and antifascists".[30] In a rebuttal, Borotba rejected the accusations as "hypocritical" and "irrelevant" and stated:

We are not the part of the movement that has nothing common with left and antifascist stance. Thus, we are and have always been a leftwing and antifascist organization. We condemn ex-regime of Yanukovich and the new far-right government as well. We condemn Russian and Western interference in Ukrainian affairs as well as militarist patriotic intoxication induced by new power.

...

We firmly follow internationalist antifascist and class line as our basic stance. We are against both Russian and Ukrainian nationalisms that are being used now only for dividing working class and further plundering of the country. We do not back Russian nationalist organizations as well as Ukrainian ones. All the smear campaign of our organization led by far-right groups and caught up by some admittedly ‘left’ groups will not stop us to organize anti-fascists resistance.[31]

Borotba has regularly criticized Russian authorities and organized in solidarity with left-wing Russian organizations that met with repression from the Russian authorities.

We express our solidarity today comrades of the Left Front, who are now pursuing the mobilization of workers, youth, public sector and self-employed in the struggle for their rights, for human dignity and for socialism.[32]

Serjei Kirichuk, a founding member and coordinator for Borotba, responded to many of the accusations levelled against the organisation, especially with regard to their support for what are incorrectly termed 'pro-Russian' separatist's in the South and East of Ukraine, in an interview with Andrej Hunko Germany's Die Linke.[33]

See also

References

  1. ^ Volodymyr Ishchenko (NaUKMA, Department of Sociology). Ukrainian New Left and Grassroots Social Protests: A Thorny Way to Hegemony, presented at the "Making the World Working Class" Tenth Annual Historical Materialism (journal) conference, London, 7–10 November 2013.
  2. ^ Ukraine's Borotba association ready to help Left Front in case of persecution and arrest of its activists in Russia, Interfax-UKRAINE, 13 September 2012.
  3. ^ Borotba during the protests in the SoutheastBorotba.org: Kommunique Nr.6, accessed 4 July 2014 (Russian)
  4. ^ Statement of Left and Anarchist Organisations about 'Borotba' Organziation
  5. ^ On Crimea, a committee for the liberation of Odessa was founded Website of Borot'ba (Russian), accessed 11 July 2014
  6. ^ Representatives on the run founded a "Committee for the Liberation of Odessa" on Crimea. Quote: "The Organisation was created by a member of the city council of the party "Rodina" (homeland), Aleksandr Vasilev, a member of the regional council, leader of the regional organisation of Bor'ba (Russian name for Borot'ba) Aleksey Albu and the leader of the "Odessian Squad" Dmitry Odinov, who at the same time is member of the extreme right wing 'Slavic Union'." ipress.ua (Russian) 22 May 2014, accessed 11 July 2014
  7. ^ a b History of the organization, Official site of the "Borotba" Association, accessed on 15 May 2014.
  8. ^ http://www.antiimperialista.org/interview_kirichuk Ukraine: Interview with a leader of Borotba (struggle)
  9. ^ http://www.liva.com.ua/not-my-war.html Not My War, by Svetlana Tsiberganova
  10. ^ The International Socialist Organization and the Ukraine crisis - World Socialist Web Site
  11. ^ The government of ultraliberals and Nazis, Official site of the Borotba Association, accessed on 15 May 2014.
  12. ^ Roger Annis. Popular Rebellion Deepens in Eastern and Southern Ukraine as NATO and the Kiev Government Step Up Attacks, TRUTH-OUT.ORG, 29 May 2014.
  13. ^ Template:Ru icon Григорий Пырлик. «Боротьба» за Юго-Восток. Кто, сколько, зачем, Mediaport, 22 March 2014.
  14. ^ Template:Ru icon Маски-шоу в офисе партии «Боротьба» в центре Харькова, Dozor.kharkov.ua, 21 June 2014
  15. ^ Franz Ickstatt (Gruppe Arbeitermacht, German section of the League for a Fifth International). The mass movement in Eastern Ukraine: an eyewitness report, Workers Power, June 21, 2014.
  16. ^ Borotba during the protests in the SoutheastBorotba.org: Kommunique Nr.6, accessed 4 July 2014 (Russian). Russian text: Координатор харьквоской «Боротьбы» Денис Зайцев: «Сегодня, ударная группа харьковской «Боротьбы», вместе с другими антинационалистическими силами взяли штурмом областную госадминистрацию. Translated: Coordinator of Kharkiw group of Borot'ba, Denis Zajcev: "Today the hit group of the Kharkiw Borot'ba took over the regional administration together with anti-nationalist groups"
  17. ^ Statement of Left and Anarchist Organisations about 'Borotba' Organziation
  18. ^ Borotba during the protests in the SoutheastBorotba.org: Kommunique Nr.6, accessed 4 July 2014 (Russian)
  19. ^ Ukraine: 'Socialist prospects in south-eastern Ukraine', Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal, May 25, 2014.
  20. ^ Rally in Ukraine's Kharkov calls for boycotting presidential elections, promises referendum
  21. ^ May Day rally of 'Borotba' union in Odessa, GuardianWitness.
  22. ^ GUILTY: Washington, Kiev responsible for Odessa massacre, Workers World, May 6, 2014, accessed on 15 May 2014.
  23. ^ Salute to Martyr Andrew Brazhevsky, Murdered By Fascists
  24. ^ Neo-Nazi terror in Odessa: more than 40 killed, hundreds injured
  25. ^ Odessa, Ukraine: Right sector and Maidan activists murder at least 43 persons, Ukraine Human Rights website, 3 May 2014.
  26. ^ Terror in Ukraine forces left wing organisation Borotba underground – interview with Sergei Kirichuk, In Defence of Marxism, 21 May 2014.
  27. ^ Junta launches repressions against Borotba activists: Statement of the union ‘Borotba’ (Struggle), Official site of the Borotba Association, accessed on 15 May 2014.
  28. ^ On Crimea, a committee for the liberation of Odessa was founded Website of Borot'ba (Russian), accessed 11 July 2014
  29. ^ Representatives on the run founded a "Committee for the Liberation of Odessa" on Crimea. Quote: "The Organisation was created by a member of the city council of the party "Rodina" (homeland), Aleksandr Vasilev, a member of the regional council, leader of the regional organisation of Bor'ba (Russian name for Borot'ba) Aleksey Albu and the leader of the "Odessian Squad" Dmitry Odinov, who at the same time is member of the extreme right wing 'Slavic Union'." ipress.ua (Russian) 22 May 2014, accessed 11 July 2014
  30. ^ Statement of left and anarchist organizations about Borotba organization, Official site of Autonomous Workers' Union, March 3, 2014, accessed on 20 May 2014.
  31. ^ Statement of the union ‘Borotba’ over recent smear campaign against anti-fascists in Ukraine
  32. ^ Borotba Solidarity With the Protests in Russia
  33. ^ "They hate us because we are communists" - Andrej Hunko, MdB
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