Russian communists' front-line report

 

by New Worker correspondent

NCP members held on online meeting with five comrades from the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF) on Saturday. The main Russian communists speaker for the CPRF was Donbas communist leader Boris Litvinov, who gave the following assessment of the current situation in Donetsk and the Ukraine.
“There is martial law in the Ukrainian controlled parts of Donetsk, so all activities are currently banned. Ukraine’s forces are suffering 1,000-1,500 casualties daily. There are fewer and fewer actual Ukrainians on the front line, and more and more foreign mercenaries from around the world, many from Latin America, in addition to the people seized on the streets in Ukraine. As a result, a growing number of soldiers on the Ukrainian side prefer to surrender at the first opportunity, rather than die” Litvinov said.
“In most areas near the front line less than five per cent of the normal population remains when the Russian and Donbas forces arrive. The Ukrainian military is forcibly removing civilians, including women and children, from towns and villages near the front line they still control. For example in Avdeyivka, only 800 remained from the original population of 32,000”.
When the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic was established in 1922 – the first time Ukraine ever existed as a separate territory – the heavily industrialised Donbas, a completely Russian speaking area, was included in the new Ukrainian republic, so Russian has historically been the main language in the region for the past 104 years. But it was outlawed by the Ukrainian fascists.
Litvinov pointed out that “when the Russian forces arrived in Kurakovo there were still 30 children in the town, and their first action was to set up a school for them. Under Ukrainian rule they were brought up to speak only Ukrainian, and couldn't speak any Russian.
“Now NATO is using the territory of the Baltic States to launch attacks on industrial and energy plants in Northern Russia. These attacks are aimed at provoking Russia to strike back at those states leading to an extremely dangerous escalation of the war.
“According to the Russian Federation Ukraine is using drones made in France, Britain and Germany, or built from parts sent to Ukraine, which are being used to target industrial plants all over Russia, just as the USA and Israel are attacking plants all over Iran, and Iran has hit facilities in the Gulf countries.
Refuting Western claims that Russia deliberately targets civilians Litvinov said “the Russian military only ever strikes targets related to military production. Residential buildings or areas are never targeted, and the Russian forces issue warnings to civilians to leave areas they are planning to strike”.
It’s the Ukrainian fascists who target innocent civilians Litvinov said “On Lenin's birthday, 22nd April, from the early morning, Ukrainian forces struck the areas around monuments with missiles and drones, as they knew that local people would be laying flowers there, and several people were injured. But in spite of these attacks, members of the CPRF and trade unionists still managed to lay flowers at the monuments.
“This war would have ended long ago without the massive support Ukraine has received from Western states. We believe that if the USSR had still existed, all these problems, and the war, could have been avoided in other ways. Members of the CPRF are united in the eventual goals of ending all wars, and to defeat imperialism”.

The view from the Donbas

Boris Litvinov, Theo Russell & Andy Brooks

by Theo Russell

Members of the New Communist Party and International Ukraine Anti Fascist Solidarity recently held an online meeting with Boris Litvinov, the Secretary of the Donetsk Region of theCommunist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF). The meeting was also joined by Gedrius Gebrauskas, the general secretary of the Communist Party of Lithuania, who is currently living in exile in Moscow. We publish here a summary of the main points which were discussed.
Boris Litvinov, the Donetsk communist leader,  said that though recent initiatives have led to talks on the Ukraine conflict the war continues unabated. On the US-Russian peace talks there are currently plenty of delegations meeting in various places, creating the illusion that the Americans want peace. But while Trump says he won’t send troops to Ukraine, he’s happy for the Europeans to pay for weapons to send to Ukraine to continue the war.
The leading European states dream of endlessly prolonging the conflict, with the aim of doing away with Russia. The European media spreads the idea that Russia is preparing to invade Europe, and the EU representative for foreign policy, Kaja Kallas, has made the ridiculous claim that in the past 100 years, Russia has attacked at least 19 countries, “some as many as three or four times”. 
We need to explain that Russia isn’t preparing to attack anyone. But Ukraine is our concern. It was part of the Soviet Union. It is our problem and we need to solve it. Let Europe solve their own problems with the United States!
We hope to convince the European countries to stop sending money and weapons for the war.
We still don’t understand why the European states blew up the Nord Stream pipeline and cut off Russian energy.
On Western claims of about a million Russian casualties let’s be clear. There are victims on both sides in any war. But when we return 1,000 body-bags to Ukraine, Ukraine sends us 80 in return, and this is the normal ratio in such exchanges. War is very complicated, now with modern systems such as drones, and inevitably the war will carry on. 
 Zelensky is a criminal. His latest demand is for 1.5 trillion US dollars to cover Ukraine’s budget for five years. If Europe continues to send money to ther Kiev regime, a global catastrophe, including the possibility of a nuclear conflict, becomes highly likely.
We want to see a just settlement of the Ukraine crisis. We also want conflicts elsewhere in the world to end in Palestine, Iran,  Lebanon, Yemen and Sudan. This is our main concern.
Andy Brooks, the NCP general secretary. said that the primary contradiction in the world today is between United States imperialism and the rest of the world it seeks to control and exploit. President Trump may not want world domination but he does want to divide the world into spheres on influence – with the lion’s share in American hands –  in line with the wishes of the dominant sections in the USA – manufacturing, big oil and the tech giants. As with Biden, the aim is still to control the world market in energy, and to challenge any country which tries to establish genuine economic independence.
Europe believed that Russia would lose quickly in 2022 and that the sanctions against Russia and against Russian oligarchs would create the possibility of a change of leadership in the Kremlin. This they believed would enable British and Franco-German imperialism to exploit Ukraine in partnership with the Americans. This did not happen.
Trump’s 22 point “peace plan” for Ukraine includes total American control of Ukraine’s mineral resources and the current US-Russian talks cover economic projects which completely exclude Europe. 
These talks are secret. Now we oppose secret diplomacy, which was banned by the UN after 1945, and we still don’t know what is happening in the US-Russian talks, which are by-passing the United Nations. What does seem clear is that Trump’s goal is to take 70 per cent of Ukrainia’s assets for himself leaving the 30 per cent of liberated territory for Russia and nothing for the Europeans.
For our part we hope that a future settlement will recognise the legitimate right of the people of the Donbas and southern Ukraine to join the Russian Federation and that the democratic forces in Ukraine will be given complete freedom of expression. 
Boris Litvinov said our mission is to help people to open their eyes. The capitalist part of our state wants to join the US dollar system, but there is another section which is patriotic. This section includes capitalists and left forces. We recognise that we need to protect our country’s national interests , even in alliance with capitalist forces.
Now Trump is hoping to impose a digital currency on the world. When this happens and a new international situation comes about, the European states need to choose what to do. If they decide to ally with Russia, China, India, Brazil and the other BRICS states, then there will be no space left for the Americans and the dollar will collapse.
We feel sorrow for the people of Ukraine. They are being used as cannon fodder to achieve the future aims of the United States. Many Ukrainians have fled to find a better life and there are not many people left to continue fighting. Now the Western countries are talking about sending troops to Ukraine. That means you too will have coffins returning – who will be responsible for this madness?

Donbas communists: our historic mission

by Boris Litvinov

 Boris Litvinov, is the First Secretary of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) District of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF)

Our troops have advanced some 35 to 40 kilometres from Donetsk, which means the capital of the Donetsk People’s Republic is now beyond the reach of Ukrainian artillery and tanks, Now the administrative border of the Donetsk Republic with the Dnepropetrovsk region is just 10 kilometres away from the front. But there are still many problems due to the supply of Western weapons such as missiles and modern drones. So the attacks on Donetsk are still ongoing with weapons supplied to Ukraine from the United States, Britain, France, Germany and other NATO countries. But whatever weapons are used against us the decisive factor is the fighting soldier – the infantry. 
Of course, many people are now discussing the forms in which negotiations on ending the war will take place, but the question is, who will participate? And what will the negotiations be about?
At the moment, the DPR is not a participant in the negotiation process, as it was in 2014-2020. Today we are a legitimate region of the Russian Federation, according to the Constitution. Any negotiations on war and peace should be conducted by Russian President Vladimir Putin and the Government of our common country. But, in our deep conviction, negotiations with Zelensky should not take place. Zelensky's legitimacy as President of Ukraine ended last May, when new elections were due to take place. He, Zelensky, is nothing to us right now. He can't decide anything. In fact, Zelensky is totally dependent on the United States and he is completely unable to make any independent decisions, so negotiations are possible only between the United States and Russia. But Ukraine will not even be the main subject of these negotiations.
Negotiations can be about areas of interest in the world; about global political and economic reconstruction like after the Second World War. And in such a new configuration of the world, Ukraine will become only part of a global issue.
Well, the main issue should concern all possible guarantees for the establishment of peace between states with different ideas about their future. No one should impose their will on others. Every state should develop independently of the wishes of others. And the peoples living in a particular region of the Earth must decide for themselves who to unite with, which state to be a part of, and which peoples to build their future with. We, the residents of Donetsk, Lugansk, and then Zaporizhia and Kherson, made our choice in a referendum – we will build our future with Russia. And this is the will of the overwhelming majority of the population of our republics and regions.
Now we see that Trump has already identified his areas of interest in Canada, Mexico, Greenland and Panama. And Russia also has its own post-Soviet areas of interest.
Russia stopped cooperating under the Warsaw Pact in 1991 in the forlorn hope that NATO would end its hostility to Russia. And one of the fundamental problems for Russia and its allies is that the NATO military bloc is moving step by step closer to Russia's borders. 
Nevertheless the time will come when none of the military blocs will threaten the other and there will be no military bases near the borders of Russia or the historical and traditional territories that were under Russian influence. We think that Trump probably understands this, and that the expansion of NATO to the East was a mistake.
European politicians – Macron, Starmer, Scholz and others think that they have a chance to end Russia, and that they should not miss this chance. In fact, European countries have been trying to do this for several centuries. Over the past 200 years, Russia has defeated Napoleon and the Ottomans; Germany, Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire during the First World War. Fourteen of the Entente countries including the United States, Britain, France, Italy and Japan who intervened against Soviet Russia in1918 during the civil war that ended in their defeat in 1922. And the Soviet Union defeated the German Nazis and their allies during the Second World War. 
The Western countries tried to unleash a new world war against the USSR in the 60s of the 20th century. And the Cold War, declared by the West against the Soviet Union in 1946, has not stopped to this day, having turned into a hybrid war. 
The Russian people were able to withstand all these difficulties, thinking not so much about their personal well-being, but about preserving their historically formed land, preserving the covenant of their ancestors, strengthening the unity of the Orthodox faith and respect for the faith of the peoples inhabiting Russia, thinking and realizing the dream of humanity about a just society.
The people of Russia demonstrate solidarity in defending their interests, dedication, heroism and confidence in achieving victory over any invaders. It has always been so, and it will be so in the future.  And today, in the struggle for our true sovereignty, in the struggle against neo-fascism, in the new struggle against the West, we see that history repeats itself.
The 19th century Prussian Chancellor, Otto von Bismarck, said "Make alliances with anyone, start any wars, but never touch the Russians...the Russians cannot be defeated, we have seen this for hundreds of years. Russians, even if they are dismembered by international treaties, will reconnect with each other as quickly as particles of a cut piece of mercury”. 
We are doing everything necessary to ensure that these warnings reach the minds of those who once again dream of ending Russia.
The Ukrainian state has turned out to be untenable. It can only exist together with Russia, and it has always existed as part of Russia. After the abdication of Czar Nicholas II from the throne in February 1917, the bourgeois rulers in Kiev proclaimed the independence of Ukraine. They held out on bayonets and money from foreign invaders for less than three years. But when they united with Russia and the other Soviet republics into a single socialist state – the USSR, Ukraine turned into a world-class advanced republic with a population of 52 million.
After the temporary cessation of the existence of the USSR, Ukraine again tried to build its independent country – again relying on money, weapons, and an alien Western ideology. And the result: the economy is in decline, the population is impoverished, Ukraine is being robbed by everyone, a war has been waged with its historically fraternal Russian people, and the population has shrunk to less than 30 million. This is the result of independence. Today, wars for the interests of the West are destroying the gene pool of Ukraine. More and more new generations of Ukrainians are being thrown into the fire of war.
We, the residents of Donbas, Zaporizhia, Kherson, and the whole of Russia, understand our historical mission – to live in peace with all peoples, freely manage our own destiny, and build on our land a just society that many peoples of Europe, Asia, America, and the whole Earth have dreamed of for centuries. 
And we, in our desire, will surely come to the victory of reason over the forces of evil. This is what our predecessors did, and we will continue to do so.

Donbas communists speak

Boris Litvinov with RT's  Steve Sweeney in Moscow

by New Worker correspondent

Boris Litvinov, secretary of the Donetsk district of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, joined a Zoom meeting with members of International Ukraine Anti Fascist Solidarity (IUAFS) while on a visit to Moscow in February. This was our first contact with comrade Litvinov for some time as residents in the Donbas are still unable to access many applications including virtual meeting platforms.

It came at a time when the NATO-backed Ukrainian forces have massively stepped up deliberate attacks on places where large numbers of civilians gather with long range weapons. There have been two recent horrific attacks in Donetsk city and the town of Lisichansk in Lugansk in which almost 50 civilians died.

“Every day the situation in Ukraine is becoming more and more unpredictable. Now our forces, those of the Russian Federation and the local militias, are step by step gaining more positions in the fighting,” Litvinov said.

“After all the talk about the Ukrainian counter offensive it is now obvious that it has failed. Now both sides are preparing for offensives in the spring and summer.

“But there is a big difference between the conduct of the war on both sides. French, British and American long-range missiles and shells are being used indiscriminately against Donetsk and other cities in the Donbas. Civilians are being killed every day, and 50 percent of Donetsk city is without power. This has become a big problem.

“The Russian Federation and Ukraine are waiting for the other side’s ammunition to be exhausted, or for the other side to weaken.

“If we look back to the attacks on our country throughout history, in 1918 14 countries of the Entente Powers attacked Russia, and in the Second World War all [the Nazis led] the forces of Western Europe were brought together to fight our country.

“At the moment, you wouldn't believe it, 50 countries are participating in this military operation against Donetsk.

“What Western people can't understand about the Russians is our collective mentality and our internationalism. This is especially difficult for many Anglo-Saxons, for people in Britain and the United States, to understand.

“Yes, sometimes we take time and we don't take action, we are absolutely different from people in Western European countries, but when it comes to a huge threat, sooner or later we ull together, shoulder to shoulder, to resist.

“What is happening now, we are together, we are brothers, we are comrades. This is our country, this is our motherland. Maybe not everyone realises this, but in spite of this the majority of our people realise that when there is a huge threat we can come together to defend ourselves.

“Actually, this is a disaster which is threatening our country, and it is not just Russians by the way, it is also 130 different nationalities living in our country.

“For us this is very emotional for all of us. We can't understand why Europe doesn't resist. There are millions of people in different countries, we do understand that most of the people are brainwashed, but still ordinary people should understand that it is high time to stop sending money to kill people, instead of sending money on healthcare, education and housing.

“But people in the West have very short memories, they should understand never to mess with Russia, never to attack Russia. These people don't learn from history that we know how to fight, and sooner or later this will bring terrible results for many European countries.

“This time we will achieve victory, but at a terrible price. How many lives of young people, how many Russian people, how many Ukrainian people, do we need to lose?

“It's high time to stop it. We don't want to fight, please stop sending money to kill people. What can we do? We have to defend our people.

“Please remind your people, please read the history of Russia. Whenever Russia is attacked it has been rebuffed, and it has been our victory.

“The Ukrainians are Slavonic people, they are our brothers, so please make efforts to pressure your governments to stop sending money to kill people in Ukraine.

“Putin is not Russia, and Russia is not Putin. There are many people in Russia, including ourselves, who are against him. To a very large extent what is happening now is his fault. If he had taken the decision to recognise the Donetsk and Lugansk republics he should have done it in 2014.

“He waited eight years, and it is his fault that people are dying today. We in the Communist Party have called on Putin to do this for eight years, and during that time Ukraine acquired huge amounts of armaments and soldiers from abroad. So it is his fault that our guys are dying now in Ukraine, his fault personally and the government which he heads.

"The Communist Party is alive and our comrades now have a faction in the Donetsk parliament, the People's Council, with six people out of 90. They are working hard and actively, and actually more than any other faction in the parliament. There are four communists in Kherson, three communists in Zaporizhia and four communists in the Lugansk parliament”.

Donbas communists speak out!

Boris Litvinov with Theo Russell

By Theo Russell

“The immediate aim is the demilitarisation of Ukraine, and the removal of the current leadership of Ukraine by any means” - Boris Litvinov

On 28th  May 2023 I met with Boris Litvinov, secretary of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) District of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF), in Moscow. His comments are reported below.
“We have spent eight years fighting for the Donetsk People's Republic with volunteer detachments against the Ukraine Armed Forces (UAF).
        “The Minsk and Normandy negotiations were cynically used by the Western Powers to buy time for Ukraine to build up its armed forces, and in 2021 Zelensky declared his intention to reoccupy the Donbas.
“After 17 February 2022 shelling of the Donbas by the UAF greatly increased, and on 18 February the mass evacuation of children from the war zone to the RussianFederation began.
“The UAF launched an attack with 60,000 troops, and the Donetsk and Lugansk people’s militias had to defend along a border of 476 kilometres with a force of 27,000.
“We realised that we had to defend our self-determination and independence with our lives. Faced with this situation, the Donbas republics appealed to the vice president of the Russian Federation for military assistance.
“The Kiev regime still controlled 35% of the DPR. We forget that for the UAF reoccupying all of the DPR was symbolic, as this is where the ‘Antimaidan’ movement began in 2014.
“The DPR is 96 per cent urbanised, it has a strong community spirit, and strong ties with Russia. We feel that it is a part of Russia.
“Before 1860 there was no industry in Donetsk. The Welsh engineer John Hughes was invited by the Czarist government and founded the city of Donetsk in 1870. Some of the factories he built there are still operating today.
“There is no history of conflict between the Christian, Russian Orthodox, Jewish or Buddhist communities in Donetsk, and there has always been a strong sense of unity among the population.
“During 20 years of Nazification Russophobia has spread to the whole of Ukrainian
society, from primary school education onwards, while Russophobia
“Only this month (May 2023), Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, at a meeting with Zelensky in Kiev, publicly praised the death of Russians in the current conflict, saying US support for the war in Ukraine was ‘the best money we’ve ever spent...and the Russians are dying’.
“It will take at least fifteen years for this anti-Russian mentality in Ukraine to change, requiring a complete transformation of education and the media.
        “In our view the immediate aim in the current war is the demilitarisation of Ukraine, and the removal of the current leadership of Ukraine, by any means.
“On May Day this year an exhibition was held in a park in Donetsk City on international solidarity with the Donbas republics, with photos from the UK, US, Ireland, Italy, Germany and other countries.
“At the Havana Conference of Communist and Workers’ Parties in November 2022, general secretary of the Communist Party of Ukraine Pyotr Simonenko stated that the current war is not a Ukrainian war, but a world war about the shape of the global order, and said that our noble task is to preserve the Russian nation.
“The plan for Western imperialism is to solve the so-called ‘Russian problem’. If Russia is eliminated, the imperialists plan to replace it with multiple states governed by fascist regimes. This is the only way in which imperialism would be able to control such a vast country.
“Today many socialists and communists around the world are together with Russia, but in future they may move in different directions, so there is a necessity for a left turn in Russia. We believe that only socialism can provide the opportunity to restructure and rebuild such a large country.
“For several years the CPRF has upheld the slogan ‘save the Russian world’ - ‘the Russian Mir’.
“At the CPRF central committee on 27th May 2023, it was decided that it was necessary to fight for a Soviet world in Russia, as well as for all other national groups of the former Soviet Union. This was the first time such a goal was stated at a CPRF CC meeting”.

Donbas: The people have made their choice

 by Boris Litvinov

Chair of the Communist Party of the Donetsk People’s Republic

In February 2014, a coup d'etat took place in Ukraine. The capitalists of Ukraine, with the support of international capital, brought to power Ukrainian nationalists with their fascist ideology and methods of governing the country.
     Incitement of hatred towards the Russians and Russia, towards Soviet history and the socialist country, towards communist ideology and the supporters of the union of fraternal peoples became the basis of the state policy of Ukraine. With the money of Ukrainian oligarchs, the United States and a number of Western countries, armed detachments of neo-fascists were created, which forced the citizens of Ukraine to submit to the will of the organisers of the coup by force and threats.
     Crimea, thanks to the unity of the goals and actions of the people and local authorities, held a referendum on its self-determination in March 2014 and returned to Russia, where it had been historically located until 1954.
     Resistance to the invaders came from the eastern and southern regions of Ukraine. But in most areas, protests have been suppressed by force of arms and repression of dissent.
    The local authorities of Donbas chose the way of opportunism, submitting to the Kiev junta. And only the people of the proletarian, multinational Donbas (the Donetsk and Lugansk regions) rebelled against nationalism and fascist methods of imposing the will of those who had seized power on the inhabitants of Ukraine.
     Guided by the Constitution of Ukraine, which states that the source of power is the people who exercise their power, first of all, directly, using the UN principle of the right of peoples to self-determination, guided by the UN Charter and the practice of creating many states of the world, the rebellious people proclaimed the creation of the Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics (DPR and LPR). At a national referendum, with a turnout of 75 per cent, by a majority of votes – 90 per cent – the people of Donbas approved of the creation of the DPR and LPR.
     The Kiev authorities have been trying, for more than seven years, to strangle the Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics. Hopes for a peaceful solution to the issue within the framework of the Minsk process have practically melted away. Kiev does not want to peacefully resolve the contradictions between us, does not agree to conduct negotiations with the representatives of the DPR and LPR.
     The military situation is extremely tense. From the shelling of Ukrainian troops, people in the DPR and LPR, including children, die every day. The position of the communists of the DPR and the position of the Republic's leadership coincide in matters of war and peace. We have been calling on Ukraine for peaceful coexistence for seven years already. The lives of people on both sides of the confrontation should be the main value for any politician and government.
    We, the inhabitants of Donbas, defend our land, our cities and villages, our civilisational choice, our chosen path of life. And the Kiev junta is driving people to our land from all areas of its nationalist state – to die for the interests of Ukrainian big capital, for the geopolitical interests of the United States and some European satellites of America.
     Their goal is to destroy the people's republics, draw our brothers and sisters from the friendly Russian Federation into the internal Ukrainian conflict, weaken it and stop the barely outlined movement towards the unification of the peoples and states that previously made up Russia – the Soviet Union. Ukraine is counting on the help of the USA and other NATO countries. But drawing NATO countries into our internal conflict is drawing Europe, and indeed the entire Western world, into a war with us and Russia. We do not want this. We are against such a scenario.
     The people of Donbas made their choice to be with Russia in 2014. This is what our ancestors did back in 1654, when they were reunited with Russia into a single state. The inhabitants of the Ukrainian lands, together with the peoples of Russia, built and defended our united motherland for centuries. Our grandfathers and fathers built a great country – the USSR. Together they made the decisive contribution to the victory over fascism, liberated the peoples of the world from Hitler's bondage. Together they revived the country after the war devastation. They created a powerful industry, first-class science and education, sent the first man into space, created a reliable military shield to defend the country, built socialism and fought for peace on Earth.
     Yes, in the struggle against capitalism, the Soviet Union suffered a temporary defeat in 1991. For 30 years, we – the inhabitants of the Donetsk land – have experienced all the vices of the capitalist system, realized the futility of dragging behind Western civilisation. Like our ancestors, we decided to live in unity with Russia, Belarus and other peace-loving countries that respect our choice.
     Now we have to recreate and defend the civilisation called the "Russian world". And no pro-fascist Ukraine with its overseas masters will stop us on the path of uniting fraternal peoples together with Russia.
     Time will pass, and the people of Ukraine will realise that Donbas, fulfilling the behest of its ancestors “Together with Russia forever”, made the right choice this time too. They, the inhabitants of Ukraine, will go our way. So it was, and so it will be. For together we are strong. Only together with Russia and other fraternal peoples do we have a future.