Антимилитаризм

This video on YouTube channel "The Right Podcast" includes an overview of Autonomous Action and an interview with Antti Rautiainen who was exiled from Russia. Antti talks about the history of Autonomous Action, the current website that arose from the movement, events in Russia leading up to his exile, Russia's invasion of Ukraine, anarchist resistance to Russia, work with political prisoners and more.

Today, September 9, 2023, Dmitry Petrov would have turned 34 years old. On the website of his memory leshy.info you can read and listen to Dima’s biography, his interviews and lectures, his articles and articles about him. There are links to books he translated or edited, to projects in which he participated. The memorial website consists of sections in Russian, English and Ukrainian.

We publish call for International Week of Solidarity with Anarchist Prisoners 2023 // 23 – 30 August:

July 28th the First Eastern Regional Court in Khabarovsk has handed down its sentence in the case of the burning of the National Guard building in Komsomolsk on the Amur. The 51-year old taxi-driver Vladimir Zolotarev was found guilty of committing an "act of terrorism", even though no-one was harmed in the fire.

Ivan Kudryashov is an anti-war activist who made a street art piece in the center of Tver with the text “Fuck the War.”​ ​In September 2022, he was detained by the Federal Security Service. FSB officers planted Molotov cocktails in Ivan’s apartment and tortured the activist in an attempt to pressurize him to confess to preparing the arson of a military enlistment office.

At the end of May, anarchist Alexey Rozhkov was illegally extradited from Kyrgyzstan to Russia. Without observing the procedures under Kyrgyz law and international norms, officers from the Kyrgyz State Committee for National Security kidnapped Alexey and took him to the Russian Federation, where he was detained by FSB officers. The former threatened Alexei with torture, and the FSB put those threats into action — the young man told us that he had been tasered.

Now, as this statement is being published, we still cannot fully predict the development of events around the “Wagner rebellion” in a relatively long-term view. But we can definitely expect two seemingly opposite trends: first, increased repression against ordinary citizens, not only by state security forces, and second, simultaneously, an increase in chaos, when the opposing sides leave people facing the problems that they themselves created.

Dear friends, welcome to our latest update!

This is long overdue. As usual, we start with (relatively) good news. Krasnoyarsk anarchists Danil Ivanov and Ilya Vinogradov were given 5 and 3.5 years probational sentences respectively. They were accused of ”robbery”, for paying a visit to a former comrade who had been seen hanging out with Nazis. Congratulations to Danil and Ilya for dodging prison!
 

On 31 May the Southern District Military Court in Rostov-on-Don sentenced Igor Paskar to eight-and-a-half years’ imprisonment on charges of “vandalism” and “terrorism”. He was found guilty of burning a Z-banner [a pro-war symbol] and the symbolic firebombing of the FSB [Federal Security Service] building in Krasnodar. The day before his sentencing, Igor gave his final statement in court. Here is a translation of his speech:

On the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the first anti-authoritarian international, international meetings are being prepared in the Swiss Jura mountains. They will take place from July 19 to 23, 2023. 

You may read the full information on the website. 

As part of the gathering, we would like to announce two events, organised by Autonomous Action and Anarchist Black Cross – Moscow.

Supporting anarchist and anti-war prisoners in Russia

On May 29, anti-war activist Alexey Rozhkov, who had fled from Russia to Kyrgyzstan, was extending his temporary registration in his host country. And the very next day, early in the morning, security forces broke into his home. On June 7, lawyer Kamil Isabekov visited Alexey Rozhkov in a temporary detention center in the suburbs of Yekaterinburg (the largest city in the Urals) to find out the circumstances of his transfer to Russia.  Anti-war human rights initiative Solidarity Zone wrote about it.

18-year-old Mikhail Lazakovich from Tver, was detained on May 9 on suspicion of setting fire to a military recruitment center in Likhoslavl, 50 km from Tver. On the advice of his appointed lawyer, the young man did not deny his involvement in the arson. However, instead of the promised mitigation of punishment, the charge was reclassified from "attempted damage to property" to "an act of terrorism". 

After being charged under the "terrorist" article (Part 1 of Article 205 of the Russian Criminal Code), Mikhail refused to testify and plead guilty of terrorism.

Sometimes you’ll hear people say that in modern Russia, it’s a waste of money to hire a lawyer for politically motivated cases. After all, they say, the person will be found guilty either way, and they’ll still get a sentence.

Solidarity Zone explain why having a lawyer is vital for political prisoners in Russia.

Kirill Butylin carried out the first known arson attack on a military enlistment office following the beginning of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine. On 28th of  February 2022 the young man threw Molotov cocktails at the enlistment office in the town of Lukhovitsa in the Moscow region.

We publish an article from Crimethinc.

On April 19, 2023, three anarchists were killed in battle near Bakhmut: an American named Cooper Andrews, an Irishman named Finbar Cafferkey, and a Russian named Dmitry Petrov, known to us until then as Ilya Leshy. People in our networks have shared undertakings with all three of these comrades over the years.

10th of April, the Central District Military Court in Yekaterinburg sentenced Roman Nasryev and Aleksey Nureyev to 19 years in prison for firebombing an administrative building, where the military registration desk is based. Roman and Aleksey must spend the first 4 years in prison, and the next — in a maximum-security penal colony.

This is the most severe sentence handed down so far for anti-war arson.

This update was provided by ABC-Moscow for German Das Antifaschistische Infoblatt issue 138. This version has some minor updates with numbers mentioned. 

On the night of October 6 in Goryachi Klyuch city of Krasnodar region unknown persons set fire to military registration and enlistment office. The next day the law enforcers detained two suspects.

The detainees turned out to be 27-year-old citizen of Minsk (Belarus) Bogdan Abdurakhmanov and 34-year-old resident of Krasnodar Boris Goncharenko.

“Solidarity Zone” is a project that helps people repressed for anti-war resistance. Altleft talked to activists of the project about solidarity in the Russian society, forms of protest and the prospects of the end of the war. Questions were answered by participants that work in Russia.

Yegor Balazeikin is sixteen years old.