this post was submitted on 26 Aug 2024
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Image is from this Black Agenda Report article by the Communist Party of Kenya.


In June, large anti-government protests shook Kenya. President Ruto and his parliament were attempting to pass the new Finance Bill 2024, which, among other things, would have hiked taxes on the population, with a 16% sales tax on bread and a 25% duty on cooking oil, as well as new taxes on financial transanctions and vehicle ownership. There would also have been levies on women's sanitary products and digital goods such as phones, among other measures affecting hospitals.

Hundreds of protestors stormed the parliament building and began to tear the place apart. Shortly afterwards, on June 26th, Ruto announced that he was withdrawing the bill, calling the tens of deaths and hundreds of injuries "unfortunate". A couple weeks later, Ruto then fired his entire cabinet (aside from his foreign minister) and communicated his wish to the nation to form a "broad-based government". Funnily enough, in July, it was announced that the majority of positions were to be filled by members of the old cabinet, while other positions were taken by members of the opposition. This has prompted scepticism among the population, including calls to resign, but there haven't (yet) been any major anti-government events to pressure this outcome. The Communist Party of Kenya has been working to get some of their comrades back after they were abducted by the police during the protest period, and have otherwise supported the protests against Ruto.

The measures in the bill were strongly encouraged by the IMF. Kenya's debt is currently around $80 billion, of which about 10% is owed to China for infrastructure projects (such as a railway linking the capital, Nairobi, to the port city of Mombasa, as well as 11,000 kilometers of road throughout the country). The rest is owed to a combination of the US, IMF, World Bank, and Saudi Arabia. More than half of government revenue is going towards repaying the debt - but despite these massive payments, it has only grown. The most recent round of IMF plundering (and the impetus for current events) began in 2021, when they offered a 38-month programme to "help" Kenya, which would involve the usual warfare on the poor and the dismemberment of any useful societal institutions.


The COTW (Country of the Week) label is designed to spur discussion and debate about a specific country every week in order to help the community gain greater understanding of the domestic situation of often-understudied nations. If you've wanted to talk about the country or share your experiences, but have never found a relevant place to do so, now is your chance! However, don't worry - this is still a general news megathread where you can post about ongoing events from any country.

The Country of the Week is Kenya! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.

Please check out the HexAtlas!

The bulletins site is here!
The RSS feed is here.
Last week's thread is here.

Israel-Palestine Conflict

If you have evidence of Israeli crimes and atrocities that you wish to preserve, there is a thread here in which to do so.

Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:

UNRWA daily-ish reports on Israel's destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.

English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news (and has automated posting when the person running it goes to sleep).
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.

English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.

Various sources that are covering the Ukraine conflict are also covering the one in Palestine, like Rybar.

Russia-Ukraine Conflict

Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict

Sources:

Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful. Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists' side.

Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.

Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:

Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.

https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.

Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:

Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.


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[–] Redcuban1959@hexbear.net 45 points 2 months ago (3 children)

Argentine Police Arrest Far-Right Politician Accused of Pedophilia

German Kiczka is a member of the political coalition that brought President Milei to power.

Article CW: Pedo

On Wednesday night, the police in the province of Corrientes captured German Kiczka, a former provincial legislator from Misiones who had been on the run since August 22.

This politician, who is a member of the coalition that brought President Javier Milei to power, faces charges related to the production and distribution of child pornography. His arrest took place in the town of Loreto, near the border with Misiones.

This action follows days of intense searching and the issuance of an Interpol red notice due to suspicions that Kiczka might flee to neighboring countries.

His arrest occurs in the context of “Digital Guardians for Childhood,” a police operation that began after reports were filed by the International Centre for Missing & Exploited Children (ICMEC), which revealed criminal connections between Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay.

The text reads, “A U.S. NGO was quicker than Minister Bullrich to detect German Kiczka, the libertarian pedophile legislator, who was in Casa Rosada two weeks ago. Shame!” The video shows current Security Ministry Sandra Bullrich asking citizens to vote for Kiczka.” Recently, the Misiones Chamber of Deputies approved the removal of German Kiczka’s parliamentary immunity, allowing for his arrest and prosecution on these serious charges.

“Paula Wachter, director of the NGO Red de Infancia, revealed that the legislator’s involvement in this criminal network was identified through his social media activity, where a YouTube magic channel was used to lure and seduce minors,” the newspaper InfoBaires24 recalled.

“The Kiczka case is not the first in Argentina where the complicity of officials with criminal networks has been observed. Wachter recalled the Loan case, where agents of the Federal Police were involved in a human trafficking network for sexual exploitation purposes.”

Wachter emphasized that these criminal organizations “operate with a worrying level of impunity, fueled by their ability to infiltrate key sectors.

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[–] Alaskaball@hexbear.net 45 points 2 months ago (4 children)

Nice to learn one of the Founding figures of nafo is a literal nazi from the national alliance

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[–] Redcuban1959@hexbear.net 45 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (4 children)

Elon Musk vs. Brazil Update.

In the absence of a representative for X in Brazil, the STF (Supreme Federal Court of Brazil) blocked financial resources from Elon Musk's Starlink. Supreme Court Judge, Alexandre de Moraes, considered the existence of a “de facto economic group” under Musk’s command and, on August 18, ordered the freezing of all financial assets of this group in Brazil.

The objective is to guarantee the payment of fines applied by the Brazilian Justice against the X network. All Starlink executives in Brazil have already been notified and summoned to also respond for the amounts owed to the Brazilian courts by the X network.

Businessman Elon Musk has decided to close the X office in Brazil, it was announced on the 17th. The reason for this is that the company does not agree with the fines imposed by the Supreme Court, nor with the order to remove content published by users on the social network that contravenes the Democratic Rule of Law and Brazilian legislation.

Since then, Justice Alexandre de Moraes has requested that the businessman establish a legal representative to officially answer for the platform's actions. The owner of social network X, Elon Musk, published an image produced by artificial intelligence mocking Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes. The post, which compares the minister to villains from Star Wars and Harry Potter, was made on the social network at 1:39 am Brasília time.

Earlier, the minister gave Elon Musk 24 hours to appoint a new legal representative for X in Brazil. Moraes set a deadline for compliance with this requirement and warned that if the order is not followed, the social network could face the suspension of its operations in the country.

In the publication, the billionaire used a photo produced by the artificial intelligence Grok, of which he is the owner. The artificial intelligence model is a competitor of ChatGPT. In the image, the STF minister appears in a robe holding two lightsabers - a reference to the Star Wars film franchise. He also has his eyes made up. Lord Voldemort is the main villain in J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series. The Sith are an order of warriors who follow the “dark side of the force” in the Star Wars universe.

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[–] InevitableSwing@hexbear.net 45 points 3 months ago (3 children)

The last few months I haven't been following what's happening between Israel and Hezbollah closely. On the scale of 1 to 10 - how likely do you think war is?

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[–] CDommunist@hexbear.net 45 points 3 months ago (2 children)

I know what happened to epstein

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[–] Redcuban1959@hexbear.net 44 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (8 children)

Reports of major power surges and blackouts in several areas of the country (Venezuela) earlier tonight. Social media users report that service has gradually been restored

Newly-minted Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello denounced a terrorist attack against transmission towers and pointed the finger at hardline opposition sectors

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[–] AssortedBiscuits@hexbear.net 44 points 2 months ago (3 children)

Senegalese president disgraces himself and his country by begging to his European neocolonial masters for help:
https://xcancel.com/marcus_herve/status/1829597347044868255

During Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez visit to Senegal 🇸🇳, @PR_Diomaye called on Europe to commit to the stability in the Sahel. Here are his own words:

“Our interview also covered other subjects of major interest, such as the situation in the Sahel in the face of terrorism, which requires a global mobilization of the international community, and especially of Europe alongside the countries concerned. For, it is known that the African and European continents have a linked security destiny.”

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[–] AssortedBiscuits@hexbear.net 44 points 2 months ago (2 children)
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[–] PointAndClique@hexbear.net 44 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Hey this is a good place to post news

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[–] GaveUp@hexbear.net 44 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Wait did some yemenis blow up an oil tanker last week? Was it transporting Russian oil? Did I somehow miss all this?

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[–] Awoo@hexbear.net 44 points 3 months ago (1 children)
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[–] nat_turner_overdrive@hexbear.net 44 points 3 months ago (10 children)

Ukkkraine is claiming their F-16s intercepted Russian missiles

It was apparent early on that the Ukrainian air force would assign the F-16s to air-defense duty. They’ve been seen flying with pairs of AIM-9 infrared-guided air-to-air missiles and AIM-120 radar-guided air-to-air missiles. They haven’t been seen with air-to-ground ordnance, even though they are widely compatible with Ukraine’s best Western-made anti-radar missiles and GPS-guided glide bombs.

I thought they didn't have fully trained pilots yet?

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[–] Redcuban1959@hexbear.net 44 points 2 months ago

Argentina’s Milei to veto pension reform to push through austerity measures - Al Jazeraa

The Senate defied the president by approving a pension increase to match the country’s triple-digit inflation rate.

Article

Argentina’s President Javier Milei is set to veto a pension reform passed by the Senate in a move that is likely to widen the rift between the libertarian leader and the opposition-controlled Congress.

The Senate defied Milei to push through an increase to pension spending in line with the country’s triple-digit inflation, dealing a blow to his tough austerity programme.

The bill, which swept through the lower house in June, was passed by a 61-8 vote in the Senate on Thursday. All but one of the lawmakers who voted against the measure were from Milei’s party, a sign that the president’s allies had failed to negotiate with centrist parties.

Lawmakers could override his veto by passing the law with a two-thirds majority again. “[The bill’s] only objective was to destroy the government’s economic programme,” Milei’s office said in a statement on X, as it would have required spending an extra 1.2 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP).

“The president promised Argentines that he would maintain a fiscal surplus at all costs, and he will,” his office said. Milei took office in December with strict austerity measures as part of a bid to tackle rampant inflation in the face of rising poverty now hitting half of the population.

He has promised to strike down legislation that undermines his “zero deficit” plan. “Anything that goes against public accounts will be vetoed,” presidential spokesman Manuel Adorni said on Thursday. The bruising defeat for the president once again highlighted his weakness in Congress, where leftist and centrist lawmakers hold sway.

Because Milei’s party controls less than 15 percent of Congress – and just seven of the Senate’s 72 seats – he has largely relied on sweeping executive decrees to slash public spending and deregulate the economy.

Last week, Congress struck down a presidential decree that would have multiplied the intelligence budget, arguing those funds could be used for more urgent social needs.

After six months in office, Milei managed to secure his first legislative victory in June, when his economic reform bill narrowly passed the Senate as thousands of protesters clashed with police.

But the pension law, which sets more than an 8 percent increase in retirement benefits this year, threatened to revive investors’ fears about the ability of the self-described “anarcho-capitalist” to implement his radical agenda.

In the first six months of the year, Milei has managed to achieve an extremely rare fiscal surplus by slashing state spending, halting public works projects and cutting revenue transfers to provinces.

“The pension reform passed today is particularly sensitive because it partially impacts the core of Milei’s fiscal programme,” said Marcelo J Garcia, director for the Americas at Horizon Engage, a New York-based political risk consulting firm.

“What most concerns investors is that this negative streak is the result of the hardline, more confrontational side of Milei’s inner circle taking the lead.”

Executive measures imposed so far have deepened a recession, increased poverty to 55 percent and sent annual inflation surging to 260 percent.

[–] Redcuban1959@hexbear.net 43 points 2 months ago

Far-right activist Maria Corina Machado failed in her call for mobilization this Wednesday in Caracas. Venezuela | The president of the National Assembly, Jorge Rodriguez, celebrates and defends the victory of Venezuela's president, Nicolas Maduro, with the people on the streets.

[–] Redcuban1959@hexbear.net 43 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

Several media outlets report an increase in migrants on the border between Brazil and Venezuela, in Pacaraima. The Brazilian and Colombian governments have decided to tighten immigration regulations to prevent abuses in the flow of immigrants.

Many migrants who will leave Venezuela are expected to head to Latin American countries, as the United States has ended the program that allowed temporary visas for Venezuelan immigrants. Brazil, Paraguay, Colombia and Peru are expected to be the main destinations for migrants.

These immigrants have been used politically under Bolsonaro and Ivan Duque's goverments. They would gain the same treatment Cuban gusanos received in the US, while the two goverments would treat Haitians, Bolivians, Paraguayans and African immigrants poorly and even expel Arab refugees.

[–] thelastaxolotl@hexbear.net 43 points 3 months ago

Skiatook HS pulls assignment on Christianity after Osage family protests - Osage News Hexbear Post amerikkka

Olivia Gray says she doesn’t want Oklahoma public schools to force Christianity on her daughter, who is a sophomore at SHS

Skiatook High School sophomore, Nettie Gray, received an assignment this week that left her and her family confused and upset. On Thursday evening, her mother Olivia Gray posted about the assignment on Facebook and hundreds of comments began to roll in.

The problem with the assignment, said Gray, is it has leading questions centering on Christianity. The issue also corresponds with State Superintendent Ryan Walters’ mandate that public schools must teach the Bible.

On Cape Cod, the Wampanoag Assert Their Legal Right to Harvest the Waters Hexbear Post amerikkka

Not everyone respects that right. But the Wampanoag are determined to continue, saying their work is an essential expression of 12,000 years of heritage, sovereignty, and lifeways.

Low-lying Mashpee is carved from water: from mosquito-bogged marshes, pine-shrouded ponds, and rivers that wind in brackish ropes past condos and golf courses. Since the 1970s, much of the town’s waterfront has been privatized and developed by nonmembers of the Wampanoag tribe.

The manicured and serene landscape above the waterline belies tremendous damage below, where shellfish and finfish have thinned—and in some cases disappeared—due to nitrogen pollution emitted from multi-million–dollar developments and their septic tanks. Stripped of land and resources, a dwindling group of Mashpee’s Wampanoag is committed now more than ever to asserting their rights to hunting and fishing.

Indigenous communities sidelined for Suriname’s new carbon credit program, critics say Hexbear Post eu-cool

  • The government in Suriname announced an offering of the world’s first sovereign carbon credits through the UNFCCC Paris Agreement framework, allowing the country to issue and trade carbon credits with other countries and the private sector.
  • But communities living in the forests that made the credits possible say the government rushed the process and didn’t take them into account, leaving many of them in the dark about how the program works and what the benefits are.
  • Indigenous and Tribal peoples would receive just 10% of carbon credit revenue from the program, according to government documents reviewed by Mongabay. But the communities don’t understand how it will be distributed.
[–] Evilphd666@hexbear.net 43 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

Russia launches barrage of drones and missiles at Kyiv

The barrage comes a day after Russia’s military reported intercepting and destroying 158 Ukrainian drones targeting multiple Russian regions in one of the biggest Ukrainian attacks of the war that has raged for more than two years.

Cause and effect zelensky-pain

Video showing ukkkraine "vampire drones" hitting civillians on the highway, civillian infrastructure in Russia.

France 24 reporting that people on the ground saying soilders took over certian buildings (schools, shopping malls) and refuse to show their IDs. (then they dismiss it as probable "Russian propaganda")

My own - then when Russia strikes them it's propagandized as evil Putler hit innocent [building] how mean! I think the residents know that soilders placing their shit in civillian areas deliberately makes the area a target.

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[–] What_Religion_R_They@hexbear.net 42 points 2 months ago (6 children)
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