Ukrainian Anarchists invoke the spirit of Makhno!

 

Ukranian Anarchist - Nestor Makhno

Anarchists in the Ukraine have joined the war effort to oppose Vladimir Putin's invasion of the country. They say that Putin's regime is an ultraconservative rightwing dictatorship that represses anarchists in Russia, the free press, LGBT networks, and animal rights activists.

For the Ukrainian anarchists, the war between Russia and the Ukraine is a conflict between "a more or less democratic state and a totalitarian one." They accuse Putin of having appropriated the term anti-fascism to justify his war and say that the Russian-speaking parts of southern and eastern Ukraine, which Putin supposedly came to liberate, have been the areas that have been hardest hit by the war. They say that Russian ultra-rightists have carried out extrajudicial killings in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions.

Historically, parts of southern and eastern Ukraine were once under the control of the 'Makhnovist' Army', led by the Ukrainian anarchist, Nestor Makhno. During 1917-21, self governing communes existed across most of southern and eastern Ukraine under the protection of Makhno's army. Makhno's base was in Huliaipole, a town in Ukraine's Zaporizhzia region.