Links July 2015

News roundup:

Greek has dominated the news while the slaughter in Syria, Iraq, and Yemen went on unabated and yet ignored by mass media.

Reports signal that the Jordanian government is eyeing a security zone in southern Syria to give safe haven to refugees and rebel groups that are seeking to overthrow Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Turkey, too, wants to create a buffer zone on its border and is considering sending thousands of troops into Syria to prevent the Kurdish PYD/YPG, which Ankara considers a national threat, from seizing more territory. Until now the Turkish military has not been supportive and it is not clear if Turkish President Erdogan can proceed with this plan.

The USA and Turkey have agreed to create a de facto ‘safe zone’ in northwest Syria. Planned operations in the targeted area would stop short of meeting long-standing Turkish demands for a full-scale no-fly zone, but the area could eventually become a protected haven for Islamic rebels.

At least three Turkish F-16 fighters from the Diyarbakir air base bombed targets inside Syria, ostensibly targeting IS (Islamic State) fighters but more likely targeting Kurds. In Iraq, Turkey bombed PKK facilities. Turkey’s military has also shelled Kurdish positions from across the border.  The YPG reported that Turkish tanks hit its positions in Zur Maghar in Syria’s Aleppo province, wounding four fighters and several villagers. Zur Maghar lies on the border with Turkey, east of the town of Jarabulus, which is held by IS.

Turkish police in Ankara dispersed hundreds of Kurdish activists who gathered to protest the bombardments, and arrested 33. More than thousand persons have been detained by Turkish police for alleged ties to IS. Kurdish activists maintain that most of the arrestees are not IS sympathizers at all but Kurdish Turks. In other words, the AKP government is using a feigned move against IS to actually crack down on the Kurds instead.

Seized USB drives from the compound of Abu Sayyaf, who was killed in a commando operation a few months ago, reveal high-level contacts between Turkish officials and lS leaders. A senior Western official said that “direct dealings between Turkish officials and ranking IS members were now undeniable.“

Iran, despite concerns about its own sometimes restive Kurdish minority, has been strongly backing Iraqi and Syrian Kurds against IS, which regards Shiites and most Kurds as mortal enemies. Iranian military and intelligence advisers have been active in Kurdish areas in both Iraq and Syria.

The USA until now has managed to train not more than 60 individuals to fight IS in Syria and the bombing campaign is ineffective and rather a show for Western media to make it easier of further obscuring the machinations of Western agencies and the true origins of Islamic terrorism.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad admitted in an interview that the Syrian Arab Army lacks manpower and had to cede some areas to Islamic insurgents in order to hold onto other regions deemed more important.

The cold war slogan “better dead than red” has become reality for 220,000 Syrians, another four million Syrians are refugees in neighboring countries. They are for sure glad to have escaped the clutches of the secular and socialist BA’ATH regime in Damascus. 7.6 million Syrians are internally displaced, mostly crammed into government controlled areas.

US democratization efforts are not always going along smoothly.

The Ukraine is stumbling on, and despite running out of cash, the economy has not collapsed. This can only be explained by the fact, that nearly 70 percent of Ukraine’s economy is informal and based on barter, neighborhood help, and subsistence. The national Hryvnia is replaced by Euros, Dollars, and all kind of counter currencies.

A third of Ukrainians want to leave the country (similar to Latvia, another neo-liberal success story, where a tenth of the population already have left their homeland). But Ukrainians are not welcomed in Western Europe and the EU has created a “cordon sanitaire,” summarily rejecting visa applications and asylum requests. To prevent Ukrainians from “voting with their feet” is in the interest of both the EU and the Poroshenko regime, because 1) a Ukrainian nation without people would be not a good role model for further regime change projects, 2) a Ukrainian regime, even a strongly pro-Western one, bereaved of its subjects would be useless, 3) the EU has an unemployment problem which could lead to social unrest and political volatility. Moldova, Romania, and Latvia already provide more than enough cheap laborers to keep the EU labor unions quiet and enough sex workers to keep EU natives motivated.

A UN report estimates that a third of the Ukrainian population will be in poverty by the end of the year. Even the World Bank, optimistic as it tries to be, states that the economy is disappearing. Odessa’s new governor Mikhail Saakashvili (Georgia’s ex-president, sought for corruption charges in his native country) says that it will be 20 years before the economy returns to the pre-Maidan state.

Another UN report says Russia leads the world in asylum requests, the vast majority of which are from Ukraine. 172,000 Ukrainians have applied for asylum in neighboring countries, including more than 168,000 people in Russia. A further 149,000 applied for other forms of legal stay in Russia.” 

Cyberberkut hackers turned up a document from the Ukrainian Procuracy saying the so-called “volunteer battalions” are out of control and little more than criminal organizations. OSCE observers were told by the Pravy Sektor that the battalion had its own orders and did not fall under the command of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. A recent shootout in Mukachevo between a Pravy Sektor gang and local police, which left 3 people dead and 13 injured, resulted in the suspension of Mukachevo’s police chief by Interior Minister Arsen Avakov.

6,000 supporters of the Pravy Sektor were gathering on Maidan a few days later and leader Dmitry Yarosh announced plans to initiate a referendum on a vote of no-confidence in the Ukrainian authorities. Field offices will be organized in all regions of Ukraine to work on the referendum. Yarosh also announced at the rally that those Pravy Sektor centers will act as “revolutionary committees.”

The Pravy Sektor demands a return to war, but this is not happening because corruption and inefficiency in Ukraine remain, even in the war effort: Generals are accused of writing off equipment so they can sell it, Weapon repair facilities are turning out nonfunctioning pieces. Desertions and defections are increasing — more than one million men of military age are said to be hiding in Russia alone.

And yet, there are persistent news about a new wave of mobilization for the ATO and the latest expansion in forced recruitment all the way up to age 60 suggests one of two things:

1. The Ukraine is planning another offensive
2. The Ukraine believes that pro-Russian separatists are planning another offensive

OSCE observers finally confirm that Ukrainian forces are shelling civilian areas in Donetsk: “In both cases, the SMM was able to conclude the direction of fire to have been from the area of government-controlled Pisky (11km north-west of Donetsk) and Pervomaiske (17km north-west of Donetsk).”

Grexit and other venues of the ongoing global financial crisis have made clear an uncomfortable truth that the banking establishment has tried to obscure for generations: Bank deposits are not piles of money sitting in bank vaults to be drawn upon as needed, but unsecured loans being made to bankers who use that money to gamble on exotic financial instruments (CDSs, BDSs) that only further destabilize the financial system.

Urgent advice: Take the deposed money out of the bank as soon as you are able, as long as you are able. Can one really believe after what happened in Cyprus and Greece that the money is insured and safe from being snatched in the case of a “bail-in?”

Sadly, Greece has unconditionally surrendered and has seized to exist as an independent country. The conclusion of “negotiations” with the “Troika” (EU/ECB/IMF) was reminiscent of the Munich Dictate in 1938.

Greece’s top spokesman Lefteris Kretsos said on CBC: “Austerity is bad but bankruptcy is much worse,” and named five reasons why the deal went down the way it did:

“First, we don’t have an efficient and effective public administration to deal with emergencies. Secondly, the Greek people were not informed about what a transition to a new currency means. Thirdly, we did not have enough reserves in our banks to sustain them. And finally, we did not have support from other economic blocs or countries that could sustain Greece in the midterm or in the case of going back to the country’s previous currency, the drachma.”

It has to be seen if the Left Block in Portugal and Podemos in Spain will follow Syrizas example or will finally stand up to the EU-masters. Italian comedian-turned-political activist Beppe Grillo calls for a nationalization of Italian banks and an exit from the Eurozone. His “Five Star Movement” has been rising steadily in the polls and currently enjoys the support of 26 percent of voters. Right wing anti-euro parties will also surely see increased popularity.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/11758853/Why-Greeces-ritual-humiliation-wont-kill-off-Europes-revolutionary-Left.html

Blistering heat and the statical data which tells that five month of this year were the hottest ever recorded have climate change deniers make disappear. They will come out from their caves in late fall at the earliest.

The heat wave has kept me busy, because I had to water the plants in the garden all day to keep them from drying and dying. Irrigation was time consuming and costly, because the rain barrels (containing 2,400 liter all together) were soon empty and I had to use municipal water. 9 of my (approximately) 160 blueberry bushes died because of the heat but I have already replaced them. I planted the new bushes only in shadowy areas.

I was busy for up to six hours only with irrigation. This is the explanation for the longest silence this blog has ever seen. I intend to keep posting but the garden has preference.

Climate change is real but until now nature can adapt. The vegetation gradually becomes more mediterranean. The forest is very dry and wildfires will become a danger in the coming years. At the moment forest fires are raging in not too far away Croatia and Bosnia, illustrating the frightening prospect that one day my subsistence gardening project could go up in flames.

There are a few upsides of the warming world:

Grapevines love the increased sunshine and temperatures. There are 11 plants who all carry substantial amounts of grapes and in fall I will have a whole freezer filled up alone with grapes. The biggest plant and three younger plants share a huge pergola and I’m constantly constructing new trellis out of aluminum pipes and profile bars to accommodate the fast growing branches of the grapevine plants.

Strawberry yield was extraordinary and blueberries will be the same despite the heat related losses. Tomatoes are doing very well and many pumpkin fruits the size of (European) footballs are ready to harvest. There will be about 100 pumpkins but I will have to give away most of them to friends because they rot fast and until now I have not found a method to preserve them longer than till January.

I will not deepfreeze pumpkins because all freezers will be full with berries. I bought a fourth freezer which is now completely full with strawberries and blueberries. Another freezer is slowly filing up with the remaining blueberries, gooseberries, and jostaberries. I got a load of organic apricots from a friend and have to deepfreeze most of them too. My own apricot trees were only planted last year and they have no fruits yet. The fruit trees in general are not doing well this year, but I have modest amounts of apples and plums. Even the peach trees, suffering from peach leaf curl, contribute a handful of fruits.

At the moment my diet is rich of raspberries and blackberries because freezing, canning, or making jam is not viable in their case.

Lemon balm and mint have reached the status of weeds and most plants have to be just cut and composted. Nothing to worry about, the cut herbs are valuable organic material and a good part of the herbs is spared and used to make tee with fresh green leaves plucked right from the garden.

Growing, harvesting, composting, this is the real renewable energy, using photo synthesis — the most efficient and environmental friendly variety of solar power. I’m not advocating industrial bio fuels, which are a scam, but locally and independently growing food and firewood is good.

This is not even half of the garden, I juetst went up to the balcony to make a few pictures of the garden from there.

Amazon.com (which I profoundly dislike) reported revenues of 23 billion US$ for the last quarter, up 20 percent. Its stock market value is now higher than Wal-Mart’s. Ordering goods online and let it be delivered by post is not a bad idea, it saves time and energy. Decent co-op or community owned online-retailers should be supported.
https://www.coopathome.ch/
http://www.co-operative.coop/

Would be glad about further suggestions of co-op online retailers.

Ecological news:
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jul/03/runit-dome-pacific-radioactive-waste
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/07/01/us-france-nuclear-waste-idUSKCN0PB4TM20150701
https://agenda.weforum.org/2015/04/why-ukraine-should-move-away-from-nuclear-power/
http://www.motherjones.com/tom-philpott/2015/06/africa-indigenous-vegetables-superfood
http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2015/06/climate-change-medical-emergency
http://www.environmentalhealthnews.org/ehs/news/2015/jul/chemicals-obesity-oil-deepwater-horizon-soda-obesogen-fda
http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/123-A174/
http://www.dw.com/en/global-ideas-infrastructure-africa-development-environmental-protection-poverty/a-18566109
http://www.bostonherald.com/news_opinion/local_coverage/2015/07/docs_wireless_devices_can_harm_pregnancies
http://touch.latimes.com/#section/-1/article/p2p-83876686/
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/society-will-collapse-by-2040-due-to-catastrophic-food-shortages-says-study-10336406.html
http://www.naturalnews.com/050411_Russia_GMOs_agriculture.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2015/06/24/researchers-latest-obsession-the-stress-of-urban-noise-on-your-body/
http://www.livescience.com/51494-safer-plastics-phthalates-health-problems.html
http://www.vancouversun.com/technology/Seabird+population+down+cent+around+world+researchers/11200446/story.htmlWho needs birds when the mass production of cheap drones has already started? The sky will not be empty even without birds.
http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2015/jul/09/bottled-water-shipped-halfway-round–world-madness
http://neweconomicperspectives.org/2015/07/climate-defeatism-is-as-much-a-threat-to-human-survival-as-climate-denial.html
http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2015/071615-international-report-confirms-2014-was-earths-warmest-year-on-record.html

Economic news:
http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/blogs/jonathan-derbyshire/interview-paul-masons-guide-to-a-post-capitalist-future One must not share Mason’s analytic conclusions and predictions, some of which are implausible, unconvincing, or wishful thinking. But a few gems here and there make this interview worth reading. Like for instance: “positive externality for Google is that it can see what we are searching for but we can’t see what each other are searching for. So it can now construct a monopolized business model on the basis of the secrets revealed by its data-mining.”
In Greece the banking closure alone was massively destructive and brought the Syriza government to its knees.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/greece-the-delphi-declaration/5458742
https://www.jacobinmag.com/2015/07/tsipras-varoufakis-kouvelakis-syriza-euro-debt/
Debt servitude is the basis of rentier capitalism. An empathetic society would help those who are in need, unconditionally providing all necessary means to overcome an emergency. If the received funds would be wasted, misappropriated, or stolen, the help would stop.

Greece was offered cheap loans by French and German banks for projects it didn’t need and was offered more money than it ever could pay back. This was similar to the sub-prime mortgage crisis in the USA which in 2008 nearly brought down the international finance system. When Greece got in trouble the concerns of the international money-masters were not about saving the Greek economy but about saving the banks and consequently 77 percent of the 207 billion Euros in the so-called “Greek bail-out” went to banks.

Greece should attempt to become more self-sufficient. This is difficult in a country which has been ecologically devastated since ancient times and cannot feed the people with the remaining agricultural land. Only a quarter of the land is cultivated because of poor soil, low precipitation, and the emigration of the rural community into urban areas or abroad. The agricultural labor force decreased from 1.4 million in 2000 to 1.2 million in 2010.

Greece is still a major EU producer of olives, cotton, tobacco, all crops which have a negative ecological impact. In 2010 38 percent of farms were specialized on olives. 37 percent of the cultivated land has to be irrigated.

Greece is demographically challenged, a fifth of Greeks are above 65. Lavish military spending is a big cause of Greece’s 360 billion Euros debt problem.
http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/greece-referendum-troika-eurozone-by-joseph-e–stiglitz-2015-06
Despite the “OXI” (No) vote of 61 percent Greece’s Parliament passed stringent austerity measures needed to secure a fresh bailout. The measures, which include spending cuts and tax increases, were approved by 229 MPs. Among a total of 149 MPs in Mr. Tsipras’s left-wing Syriza party, only 32 voted against the deal.

Imagine that members of Syriza, whose name translates as “Radical Left Coalition,” vote for hardcore neoliberal memes. This is a reflection of the success in organizing the economic and political order along neoliberal lines over the past 35 years. This deal is a total capitulation to the EU bureaucrats and a sellout of Greece’s remaining public assets to foreign corporations and equity firms.

Syriza didn’t make preparations for a return to the Drachma (which would have been a challenge, but not unachievable in a timeframe of a few month) and they didn’t stockpile essential goods (food, medicine). Syriza had no plan B and when the ECB shot down Greek banks the guys around Tsipras were helpless. The story is a bit more complicated of course and cannot be described in a few sentences, if one likes to get confused by details:
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2015/07/greeces-drachma-drama-why-planning-is-too-important-to-be-left-to-economists.html
To make things even more convoluted, despite a general agreement the bailout deal is not definitely done yet and there are many uncertainties:
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2015/07/greece-negotiations-already-starting-to-look-wobbly.html

According to recent polls only 19 percent of the Greek population favor a return to the drachma. Thats it — let democracy take its course no matter what.

Greek’s are now described as lazy and unproductive by media pundits and notorious commentators, a necessary move to prevent their hard pressed and stressed out fellow EU workers of developing any sympathy for their plight.

“The time for singing and dancing is over!”

The proverbial easygoing Greek lifestyle, once cherished by tourists from around the globe, is now declared to be a hinderance, not compatible with diligence and industriousness. Why should Greeks be spared, if Latvians, Irish, Portuguese, Spaniards, Italians, and Romanians have to endure hard times?

But: if Greeks lived beyond their means, they didn’t it to a higher extend than the populations of other Western countries. Greece’s per-capita consumption of energy and vital resources is still a fraction of what the USA consumes.

One has to admit that accordingly US citizens face the probably toughest austerity measures of all Western consumer societies. Real earnings for the US middle class has fallen for decades and both husband and wife have to work hard to continue their accustomed middle-class lifestyle. Those with prestigious jobs (analysts, managers, specialists of every kind) often put in 12-hour days while millions of their less fortunate compatriots work 2 or 3 part-time jobs to make a living. Everybody has to be reachable every moment via smartphone by her/his employer or by important customers.

Why wages stall, US public services and social spending are cut in favor of military expenditures and tax favors for big corporations.

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/jul/24/greek-debt-crisis-great-greece-fire-sale
Calling the privatization of public property an austerity measure is misleading and a prime example how the use of euphemisms and the constant repetition of profoundly false assumptions is able to dumb down the artless population and make them accept even the most obvious deceptions and lies.

There are no examples that privatization increases the efficiency of public services or results in longtime benefits for society as a whole. Privatization means a loss of state revenue, means tariff increases, a decrease in quality of services and produced goods, lower salaries and worsening working conditions for the employees, and a deteriorating infrastructure because of cost saving measures (“cost saving measures” is the new euphemistic term for neglect and carelessness).

The Greek assets will be payed partly with the Dollars which the US-FED is creating and which are inserted into the financial system via big US banks. 1.37 trillion US$ in coins and banknotes are in circulation, but including money held in money market funds, savings accounts and CDs (certified bank deposits) there are about 11 to 12 trillion US$ in existence. This is fiat money, not backed by gold reserves or other assets, and yet, the Dollar is strong still because it is the worlds reserve currency (petrodollar) and is used for most trade exchanges.

A strong Dollar means that the USA can buy commodities cheap and sell high tech gadgets, IT services, and weapons for good value.

If the amount of 11 trillion US$ is nearly unimaginable, the US government debt of 18 trillion US$ is even more so. This mountain of debt is getting bigger and the increase is accelerating. This debt can never be repaid but no creditor will dare to challenge the USA thanks to US military might.

Some nations try to replace the US$ in bilateral trade (Brazil – Uruguay, China – Russia) or create Dollar free trade zones (BRICS, SCO, EEU). Some nations repatriate their gold reserves, suspecting financial shenanigans or preparing for turmoil in the global financial system (Germany, Austria, Netherlands, Belgium).
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/joseph-e-stiglitz/argentina-greece-default_b_7697838.html
http://sputniknews.com/columnists/20150629/1023985661.html
http://triplecrisis.com/the-slow-burn/ About the neoliberal experiment in Latin America.
http://journal-neo.org/2015/07/02/the-us-russia-economic-war-heats-up/
http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/06/29/putin-gobsmacks-uncle-sam-again/

Imperial news
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/07/23/us-usa-gmo-labeling-idUSKCN0PX17920150723
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2015/07/24/there-have-been-204-mass-shootings-and-204-days-in-2015-so-far Gun deaths are expected to surpass automobile deaths in the USA this year.
http://www.workers.org/articles/2015/07/23/justice-for-sandra-bland/

Imperial conquest news:
http://www.middleeasteye.net/columns/anglo-american-empire-preparing-resource-war-1170119289 Important.
https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/israel-seizes-gaza-bound-boat-act-piracy
http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/report-leaked-documents-show-israel-tried-sell-weapons-syria-oppositon-1500586222 Israel and Jabhat Al-Nusra – a perfect match (or: birds of a feather…)
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/islamic-state/11716111/Inside-Kobane-How-Islamic-State-conducted-its-terrifying-killing-rampage.html Don’t let them fool you and don’t forget: IS = US.
http://awdnews.com/top-news/turkish-president’s-daughter-heads-a-covert-medical-corps-to-help-isis-injured-members,-reveals-a-disgruntled-nurse
http://news.yahoo.com/video-shows-mass-execution-ruins-syrias-palmyra-163424222.html
http://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2015/07/02/greek-crisis-awaits-other-nato-partners.html
http://www.unz.com/ishamir/russia-tit-for-tat/ This article contains many contentious and debatable statements (especially calling “everything is better than war” a soul numbing mantra) but it is nevertheless refreshingly different from Western junk journalism.
https://consortiumnews.com/2015/07/07/ukraine-merges-nazis-and-islamists/ The most logical step.
http://gordonhahn.com/2015/07/14/ukraines-neo-fascist-right-sector-preparing-a-revolt/
http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/06/19/in-the-usa-i-cannot-write/ A powerful text about the imperial mindset.
http://www.workers.org/articles/2015/07/18/iran-nuclear-free-but-u-s-sends-a-bombs-to-italy/
http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/07/23/72279/

News from cat land

Mia has died, she had cancer. Here are a few pictures made in the last two days of her life.

I will write more about her in a separate post.

As I write down word after word

As I write down word after word, I contemplate the reality of fantasy, the abundance of stupidity, the morality of complacency, the monotony of continuity, the impossibility of integrity, the incomprehensibility of eternity, and the sweet gift of serenity and tranquility.

And I start meditating about the brutality of ideology and the ferocity of idiocy, the audacity of curiosity, the scarcity of charity or generosity, and the legacy of hubris and greed.

And as I write this words on the computer, I speculate about net neutrality, data mining, eavesdropping, deep packet inspection and the encryption of Skype. The names Mark Zuckerberg, Jack Dorsey, Larry Page and Sergey Brin come to my mind and I wonder, how I would explain the secrets of life or anything meaningful in 140 Roman characters.

I reflect about the ability of language to express the ongoing turmoil in my brain with millions of neurons sending electrical impulses back and forth. I start seeking for the questions that can never be answered and for the answers that don’t solve anything and I think about Gertrude Stein and the “Lost Generation” and I think about the International Brigades in the Spanish Civil War and about Hemingway’s cats down in Key West in Florida.

As one idea leads to another one and from there to another one and as the chain reaction in my brain continues unabated, I’m musing about the trickle down effect of corporate bailouts, which has reached now all billionaires and also most of the millionaires and I think about the necessity of cutting social welfare to make funds available for further bailouts, which in the end will benefit everybody except people who do not hold large amounts of corporate shares.

And I think about the Crusades and the Spanish Conquerors and the countless souls that were saved because the delinquents were baptized before they were burned alive, torn apart, or cut into pieces. I think about Abraham and King Solomon, Jesus and Muhammad, and the sex appeal of the Pope (god bless him, he is one of the few bright spots in the dark picture of world news).

I think about the illusion of hope, Obama and Osama and the Nobel Peace Price, I think about just wars, preemptive wars, and holy wars. I imagine the red button and reflect about the morality of obliteration and the ethics of annihilation. I agonize about the acceptance speeches of Nobel laureates Barack Obama and Menachem Begin. Benjamin Netanyahu comes to my mind and I think about the Benjamin’s and Adolf’s of the world, about the Holocaust, about the firebombing of Dresden, about Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I ponder about nuclear just wars, nuclear preemptive wars, nuclear holy wars, Erez Israel, Armageddon, and the “Second Coming”.

And as more and more synapses in my brain receive action potentials and the electrical impulses flow in the axons of my neurons at a faster and faster pace like positrons in the Hadron Collider, I start confusing a choir of agony aunts with vestal virgins, the Bilderberg Group with a charity organization, Fox News with journalism, a group of barking dogs with talk radio and a flock of carrion crows with phoenixes emerging from the nuclear ashes.

But that is as far as it goes, because fortunately I remember again the breathing exercises and mediation practices, that helped me over all the years to cope with the craziness of life. So I sit quietly for some minutes and then I hear Princess Min Ki scratching at the door and I let her in and pet her for a while and she sits beside me softly purring.

And as I calm down and the epinephrine levels diminish again and the dopamine and oxytocin levels stabilize, the storm in my mind subsides and the only thing that emerges from the debris of useless and confusing thoughts are the lyrics of the song “You’ll Never Walk Alone”. Many artists have recorded this song, but I like the version of Ray Charles best, though he is by no means one of my heroes. I prefer his rendition of the song even to the versions of Nina Simone and Patti LaBelle.

When you walk through a storm,

Hold your head up high,

And don’t be afraid of the dark,

At the end of the storm is a golden sky.

And the sweet silver song of a lark.

Walk on through the wind,

Walk on through the rain,

Tho’ your dreams be tossed and blown,

Walk on, walk on, with hope in your heart,

And you’ll never walk alone.

You’ll never walk alone

I realize now that I’m tired and that I should go to bed and sleep. I better put this text onto the blog right now because maybe tomorrow I will consider it as too edgy and trow it away and it will never be published.

They are most likely dead

Tatzhit Liveleak Channel

Reporter Marina Akhmedova interviewed DPR (Donetsk People’s Republic) Committee for POWs (Prisoners of War) official Lilia Rodionova. Marina Akhmedova presented a list of names — Ukrainian soldiers who went missing back in August 2014. “We don’t have them” was the answer given in the Cossack unit in Sverdlovsk, where their mothers thought they might have been. Responses from the Donetsk Ministry of State Security and other directorates of the DPR and the LPR (Lugansk People’s Republic) were identical. The mothers of the missing soldiers claim that their children have been taken to Russia by FSB operatives. Every day they are told that yet another inquiry has been fruitless, but they keep asking: “Why can’t we find our children?”

Lilia Rodionova reads the surnames on the list: “Remeniuk was killed in action. His mum already knows about it. They just have not come to terms with it, even though there is a DNA match. The parents still refuse to believe it.”

The interview:

Lilia Rodionova: For instance, I talk to one father every day — for fifteen years, his son worked in Moscow, then came home for a vacation, stayed a day, and literally the next morning the military commissars came and conscripted him. He had some kind of special ankle boots. The father was asked to identify the body by the boots, but he refused. He was told: “If you don’t want the one in the boots, just take that other one.”

I also had a case where they got a DNA match three times, but the mother refused to agree with the results. After all, a mother knows her son. If a grown man was missing a tooth, he is not going to grow it back. They were giving her a body with an extra tooth:

– I’m sorry… but a tooth won’t grow just like that… I won’t take him.
– What do you mean? He’s a DNA match. Take him.

Marina Akhmedova: So, are you saying that these DNA test results were forged?

Lilia Rodionova: I don’t know. It’s hard for me to judge what goes on there. But I am often confronted with the fact that people refuse to believe that their children are dead, even if there is a DNA match. Swindlers have already cheated Remeniuk’s mother out of about 50,000 — 60,000 hryvna. They promised her to bring him back.

How did it start? It began with rumors that Russian soldiers took them prisoner. I had a list of 40 people. Remeniuk was on there, Karpov too, Oleg Chizh. The mothers claimed they were supposedly held in Lefortovo, (St. Petersburg, Russia). Wait a minute… (She recounts a dialogue with the mothers):

– What does your son do?
– A mechanic.
– Yours?
– A plumber.
– Yours?
– A teacher.

Who needs them in Lefortovo? They are common soldiers — would anyone be interested in them? No one! They aren’t there, of course.

There were isolated cases when the wounded Ukrainian soldiers from the Ilovaisk cauldron were taken to Russia. To take them here, to Donetsk, was 80 — 90 kilometers, and the roads were being shelled. It was closer to take them to Russia, to a hospital in Rostov. We also had cases when we would bring a POWs family here, and then take them to Russia, so that he wouldn’t be forced back into the fighting. Because he didn’t want to go back. But being kept in Russia against their will — that’s nonsense.

Then there were rumors that they were sold into slavery to Chechens. It’s as if all the so-called psychos conspired; they started telling the mothers that they could see their children working in harsh conditions in brick factories. Then other theories started appearing, that they are working in bootleg pits, in coal mines. What mines? Here, the mines all lie in disrepair. The miners themselves have nowhere to work. Rubbish!

So, now, there is yet another version from the psychos, that they are breaking polar ice somewhere in the Arctic Ocean, I have no idea what for. And another: that they are working at grape plantations in Crimea. And then there is the POW list kept by the notorious Ruban [Ukrainian colonel-general Vladimir Ruban is known for his work as an intermediary in POW exchanges — ed.] He lists the missing in action as POWs.

Marina Akhmedova: Why does he do that?

Lilia Rodionova: I don’t know.

Marina Akhmedova: Those missing in action — are they as good as dead?

Lilia Rodionova: In 90 percent of cases they are. There are still places where there are undiscovered burial sites. We are still continuing our search. Just yesterday we found human remains. In Lugansk, a medical examiner told me: he lives in Khryashevatoye, and just as all this fighting was happening there, UAF (Ukrainian Armed Forces) representatives came to him and asked for gasoline. He asked them why — they told him they needed to burn the bodies:

– Wait a minute! What are you thinking? You mustn’t burn them. If you do, you won’t be able to take DNA probes.
– But what about the corpse poison?

And so they told him these myths that people would get infected by poison seeping from the corpses and die. “Then bury them! You mustn’t burn them! In the earth they will be good for DNA analysis even seventy years from now. If you burn the bodies, all chance of identifying them is lost.”

Lilia Rodionova: It’s hard for the people on the other side, away from the war, to understand that, when the ammunition load explodes, there’s nothing left of the tank. The metal gets red-hot and melts, flowing like tar. What body is there to talk about? Everything is sintered to a piece this big (Lilia shows her fist), there’s no DNA in that. We can identify the crew only by the unit number on the tank. There is no other way. I had this one woman come to me, and she kept demanding and demanding that we give her back her son: “Where he is? He is not among the captured; he is not among the dead.” And where is he? Where, indeed?

In the Starobeshevo area there were body fragments hanging from power lines and trees. Bodies were torn to pieces. Yesterday we were in Uglegorsk. We dug up fragments. Guys from the Ukrainian side took them, but they could not go back because of the shelling. So they spent the night here, and this morning we finally sent them back. No doubt they were shocked by the shelling yesterday… Also, foxes and dogs drag pieces of bodies all over the ravines. We also have to deal with the Ukrainian side only taking what they want and throwing away the rest.

Marina Akhmedova: What don’t they want to take remains?

Lilia Rodionova: In Novogrigorievka, bodies were collected and then placed in trenches and covered up with dirt. A representative of the [Ukrainian] officer corps came; her call sign is Changar. She took only the identifiable remains, but the burnt fragments of bodies, arms, legs — they just left them there. Who needs a burned body? Who could identify it?

Marina Akhmedova: So why is it that you took them?

Lilia Rodionova: To send them to Ukraine.

Marina Akhmedova: So you take rotten body fragments, load them up in a car and send them back?

Lilia Rodionova: That’s right. In Chernukhino, when people started coming back to the smashed houses, they would find bits, simply bits of skull. We would gather what we could, put it in a plastic bag and send it.

Chizh, Oleg… I spent a lot of time in phone calls with his sister. This girl only had her brother, no one else. She was one of the first to start calling us: “Oleg Chizh! Oleg Chizh, he is missing!” So we started asking around, “Has anyone seen Oleg?” One of the POWs claimed to be him, but, once he was exchanged, it turned out to be a lie. When they asked him why he did this, he said: “I heard that everyone’s been looking for him, and so I thought that if I say that I’m him, I’d get home quicker.” This POW turned out to be a liar, and we all thought that Oleg was alive. We’ve looked for Oleg everywhere, even in Lefortovo and in Chechnya. And this despite the fact that we already had a hundred percent DNA match.

Marina Akhmedova: Taken from the remains?

Lilia Rodionova: Yes. He perished somewhere either on Saur-Mogila or in Stepanovka. They found his identity disks, as well as his personalized cross. But, on the other side, for a long time, they kept telling his sister that he is alive, that he is a prisoner here or there. I think that most likely this is how they try to conceal their losses. We also had this other prisoner, Nikolai Surmenko, from Kherson, I spent a lot of time communicating with his mum. He is a Chernobyl kid, ailing and week, with diabetes and about a meter and a half tall.

Marina Akhmedova: Why did he go fight, with problems like that?

Lilia Rodionova: Over there, no one cares — they don’t ask for their opinion. We’ve seen Ukrainian conscripts with missing fingers. Some even with a history of heart attack.

“Yes, Yaroslav,” Lilia answers her cell phone. “I’m busy right now, let’s do it in half an hour…” She explains: “This is a call from the other side, the ‘People’s Memory’ foundation. We collaborate with them on the POWs.”

…Back to Nikolai: his mother was worried sick that her son was here, but she was also afraid that if she got him back, he would be conscripted again. The whole village was laughing at her; they didn’t believe her son was fighting in the war. They said, “You’re probably hiding him from conscription somewhere.” But when he was released and returned home, they all chipped in and collected 5,000 hryvna to cover his medical expenses…

I had another case — a woman from some backwoods village in western Ukraine, who had never seen a cell phone, found Ruban’s list of POWs somewhere, and her son was number two-hundred and something on the list. She was using Ruban’s list to count off how many had been released, how much longer she would have to wait. Somebody gave her a cell phone, punched in my number, and she asked me:

– Please, could you let my son go home?
– Why should we release your son, specifically?
– His birthday is tomorrow. He is turning 19.
– We don’t have him, and never did.
– How could that be? He is on Ruban’s list.

And she couldn’t understand that her son is not with us. Not anywhere, and not anymore. Do you understand? I always tell them: go talk to your local draft board, to the military commissars. They are the ones who came and took your son away. They are responsible for him. They should be the ones making enquiries. But you know how they treat mothers there, in Ukraine…

There was one officer from the Ilovaisk cauldron who called me every day: “How are my guys doing? What about this one? And that one?” He didn’t demand that we release them immediately, he simply asked about each and every one of them, and eventually I learned every one of their names along with him. He was the only officer who cared for his soldiers. The only one!

Marina Akhmedova: Do you still have POWs at the moment?

Lilia Rodionova: Yes. Not many, but we do have them. They’ll be exchanged soon. I visit them quite often. They have phones and they talk to their relatives. They’ve got a nursing station in there, and they get all the medical aid they need. But the wounded ones we try to hand over as soon as possible. We had a guy from Debaltsevo. He was in this truck with a small cargo bed, and they were taking out the wounded. It was cold back then, you know. Their truck was shelled on the Artyomovsk–Debaltsevo highway. Those still able to walk, they left the wounded behind. And one guy, they took his boots and his wristwatch — ”They won’t be of any use to you any more.”

You could still hear the wounded moaning for a few hours, but by the evening it grew quiet. He was sitting in the cab with a lieutenant. The lieutenant was twenty-two years old. Also wounded. The lieutenant told him: “Press against me, so we don’t freeze.” Then the lieutenant died, and he tried warming himself with the body until the body grew cold too. For three days he would crawl out of the cab to lick snow, but by the end he grew too weak to crawl back inside. When the militiamen came and picked him up, he thought they were angels from Heaven.

Marina Akhmedova: How did they realize he was alive?

Lilia Rodionova: He was moaning. They brought him in with severe frostbite. I forgot to tell you: he was a surgeon himself, a military medic. His blood pressure was almost imperceptible, and his entire body had frozen stiff. We contacted the other side right away: “Ready your best doctors!” We wanted to save both his hands, but he lost the right one.

Marina Akhmedova: Do you have information about the treatment of the captured Militiamen?

Lilia Rodionova: They are treated badly, but we don’t take revenge. We just want them, over there, to finally hear us and understand that we are human beings, and we treat them as human beings and want to be treated humanly as well. Those with brains will get the message.

Marina Akhmedova: You don’t take revenge because you’re against violence, or just because you want to get your message across?

Lilia Rodionova: So as not to avoid violence altogether! They need to understand us — nobody should act like they do! Even beasts don’t act like that!

It’s true that some civilians take up arms after being imprisoned. We had one mafia boss here, he lorded over a huge penal colony before the war. He is from Debaltsevo. One day, after a shelling, he stepped out into the street to check whether his house was still standing, and he was immediately arrested as a separatist suspect. They later tricked us into taking him in a POW exchange. Afterwards, he immediately volunteered for the Militia, notwithstanding that they had a rule in the joint — criminals don’t fight for the Reds or the Whites, organized crime is beyond politics.

Even though that’s no longer true — these days even prisons have become politicized. When our comrades are accused of separatism and sent to penal colonies, the other inmates do horrific things to them.

Marina Akhmedova: Why do they care about their political affiliation?

Lilia Rodionova: Well, I guess they are inmates from the other side. I don’t really know why they care about politics, but that’s the way it is. Let me tell you about a different story. Several civilians were captured near Snezhnoye. At first, they were kept at the Kramatorsk airfield in the pits with corpses, and later one of these boys was sent to a penal colony in Poltava and housed with criminals. That’s their method of re-education — throwing people in with hardened criminals. This kid was severely beaten, and when the second prisoner, Alexei Zhukov, was thrown in there, the first one already had all of his teeth knocked out. Even worse, he has diabetes. So his blood sugar spiked, and he started having seizures, he was falling into a coma. At that point the local mafia boss found out about these two who were convicted of separatism, and the abuse instantly stopped. The inmates would even chew the food for him. So there are lots of different circumstances.

I, myself, was a prisoner on the other side, too. In July 2014. I started going to Slavyansk, to evacuate the wounded and the sick civilians who suffered from heart attacks and strokes. I took everybody I could fit in the ambulance. Then I started going to Snezhoye. That time I was going to Marinovka to pick up a wounded Ukrainian soldier and to bring him here, to Donetsk.

Marina Akhmedova: Why did you decide to risk your life for a wounded Ukrainian soldier?

Lilia Rodionova: What does it matter to me? We spent the entire day transporting the wounded, and in the end, he was the last one left. He needed to be transported to a hospital. It was already dark, and we drove into an Ukrainian checkpoint. I don’t know why it was setup on that road. They riddled the ambulance with bullets. I have no idea how we survived. We hid in such small spaces… I don’t even know how we were able to fit in there.

Marina Akhmedova: Who was manning the checkpoint?

Lilia Rodionova: Border guards, I assume.

Marina Akhmedova: But the Ukrainian border guards supposedly don’t beat or abuse prisoners?

Lilia Rodionova: They didn’t beat us. In fact, they were unsure of what to do. They even pondered letting us go. When I got out of the ambulance, dressed in medical garb, they asked, astounded:

– Medics?!
– Yes, medics. Whom did you expect to see come out of an ambulance?

We had our flashers on so we could be seen from afar. They shot at us because they were scared; they thought that we were a saboteur group. Finally, after much hesitation, they decided to send us to prison. We were sent to Uspenka, from there to Solntsevo, in the Starobeshevo district. That’s where the physical abuse started. From there we were taken to the Kramatorsk airfield by helicopter.

Marina Akhmedova: What do you mean by physical abuse?

Lilia Rodionova: They beat us with rifle butts. I still have pains in my shoulder from that time. They would strip us naked, though I am not sure why. They forced us to crawl from the helicopter to the shooting wall, staged simulated executions.

Marina Akhmedova: Did you crawl?

Lilia Rodionova: I did not crawl, but the rest had to crawl with sacks on their head. We all were beaten with rifle butts.

Marina Akhmedova: What did you feel when you were stripped naked? Shame?

Lilia Rodionova: Nothing. I had a bag over my head. I felt utterly devastated, empty. I’ve been asked since: “Did you pray?” Yes, I prayed: “Lord help me.” That was all I could think of. They liked doing it for some reason. It was hard for me to strip, of course. But then I thought to myself: “If you like it, if you want it, I don’t care, enjoy yourselves.” Later they allowed me to get dressed. But the bag on my head stayed on.

Marina Akhmedova: So, you didn’t see them?

Lilia Rodionova: No. I didn’t. I only saw the sneakers of one of them, in Solntsevo, and that’s it. Only heard their voices. Later, they took us to Izyum. There were police officers there, and just like the border guards, they were astonished: “You are medics, why did they even take you?” They brought us water, then some bread and tea, and locked us up in a jail cell. From there we were sent to the SBU (Ukrainian State Security) bureau in Kharkov. We waited in the car for a long time, and a conversation with the guards started — even though that was forbidden. But one of them said:

– I was born in Russia. I was there, on the Maidan, with the Berkut.
– You were in the Berkut? What are you doing here then?
– I kept my oath of service.
– To whom did you swear your oath?
– To the people.
– Well, I’m “the people,” and I’m sitting right here, in front of you, in handcuffs, with a bag on my head.
– But you’re a separatist.
– You know why I’m a separatist? Because when people gathered on Maidan, I worked during the day, every day. And in the evening, I ran home from work and switched on the TV to find out what was happening. And then, when they started beating you guys with chains, when they threw Molotov cocktails at you, I went to the rallies and I shouted: “Glory to the Berkut! The police are the real heroes!” We didn’t know how else to help you. We just came to the rallies and shouted so that you would know that we are with you, that you have our support. Now that you know this, live with it if you can!

And when they were taking us away, he took my arm and he stroked it, and then found my hand in handcuffs and shook it twice. That’s it.

Marina Akhmedova: Is that handshake a dear memory for you?

Lilia Rodionova: Let that be a dear memory for him! If he is still alive, let him dwell on that!

The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs even asked the Kharkov SBU directorate about us. They were told that we were not there. Because we were there illegally and without paperwork. They fabricated allegations that my fingerprints — even though they didn’t even take my fingerprints — were found on four grenade launchers. It was only later that we started hearing in conversations: “People are looking for them already.” That was pure joy — that somebody is looking for us. Then they stopped beating us so badly. Solntsevo is where my mum lives. It’s only about ten kilometers from the place we were being held to the house where I was born.

Back then, I also gifted an amulet to one Ukrainian officer. I don’t know if he survived the Starobeshevo fighting, it was simply brutal later on there.

Marina Akhmedova: Why did you give him the amulet?

Lilia Rodionova: Because if it were not for him, we would have been killed. There was some other battalion stationed around there. They all talked in Ukrainian. And when that officer went to lunch, they came up to us and started talking in a west Ukrainian dialect. The started kicking us:

– You, fascist, you came to my land.
– My mother lives here! How far away is your house?

The officer came back, saw what was going on, yelled everybody away and posted his own guards to protect us. He stopped anyone from coming up to talk to us. Had it not been for him, God only knows what would have happened. I could have easily ended up raped or crippled, and it seemed like that was about to happen. They were vicious. This was the 23rd or 24th of July, and from the 21st through to the 22nd they had lots of friendly fire.

This is how it happened — they had a large unit in Kashty. This village is so small that it’s not even marked on the map, but many of the parents call me now to talk about it because that’s where their children went missing. See –(Lilia draws a diagram on a piece of paper) there are a few residential buildings here, then there is a river, and then that village. For some reason, they started shelling that unit from there, and these guys started shooting back. It escalated so much, that the whole place was burnt to cinders. I know this because we were thrown into a shell crater, and I touched the ground around. That’s where the strawberries used to grow —  I’m local, I know. Now — only cinder!

Marina Akhmedova: Why did they shoot at their own?

Lilia Rodionova: Well, this happens quite a lot with them, actually. Back then, it was mostly accidental, because everybody was scared. Somebody would fire, and the mayhem would begin. At that same time, the 95th Brigade was hit by friendly fire near Kramatorsk. They would scare us, saying, “We will send you over to the 95th. They are furious now — they will do you in.” That is what they said to me, word for word. You asked me if I knew what they looked like. Yes, one of them I could recognize. He was tall, with a nose like this (Lilia shows a hooked line.)

Marina Akhmedova: You are drawing the image of a Mephistopholes.

Lilia Rodionova: He was very cruel. Very! He spoke in a pure west Ukrainian dialect. But when we were sitting in the car, someone came up, his voice sounded like he was a very young lad. He started shoving a piece of chocolate into my hand: “Eat… eat…” (in Ukrainian). He was whispering, afraid that someone would hear him. “Eat… eat…”

Marina Akhmedova: Did you think of yourself as a victim?

Lilia Rodionova: Yes.

Marina Akhmedova: Did you feel violated?

Lilia Rodionova: Yes — I felt completely powerless. I felt like a being without any rights, without anything.

Marina Akhmedova: Did you regret your work?

Lilia Rodionova: No. Of course not. I used to go to Seversk, evacuating the wounded from the local hospital. I got there and there was no electricity — we had to find the hospital in the dark. The nurse called us from that hospital and asked that we pick up the wounded. After we had already left, she called us again and said that half an hour after our departure, the Nazis [fighters of the Ukrainian National Guard — ed.] came to look for the wounded. When we were taking the wounded to Donetsk, they couldn’t believe that someone was able to come for them.

And two months later, the father of one of them called me and said:

– Remember the guy named so-and-so?
– Yes, I do.
– He was killed.

How can I regret anything? Although, yes, before all of this happened I had a good job, a cat and dogs.

Marina Akhmedova: Where are they now?

Lilia Rodionova: For a long time my house was in the occupied territory. On the August 7, at night — there was still no electricity — I visited home. I was there for seven minutes exactly. Met my mom. Patted the dogs, the cat too, and left. The dogs refused to eat after this. The cat followed suit. They all died. Now I don’t have any pets anymore… Before, our family always served dinner at seven, on a pretty tablecloth, with flowers on the table. I did not know then that I would be able to sleep in tents, eat whatever we can find, in any condition. Live without money. Live without makeup. Without all the things that seemed essential before.

Marina Akhmedova: In the past year, people here have seen unimaginable horrors. Atrocities that don’t have a place even in the most terrifying films. Why did it all happen?

Lilia Rodionova: We, the people of the Donbass, are no more important in the scheme of things than microbes, fleas! Who cares about us? There are other forces at work here, enormous forces. Everything happens when it has to happen. I think, after all is said and done, that the Soviet Union was something good. People here don’t want Novorussia; they don’t want the Russian Federation. They want to return to the Soviet Union.

Marina Akhmedova: So as to at least recapture the ideas of equality and fairness, if not actually implement them?

Lilia Rodionova: I am an obstetric nurse. I’ve been delivering babies since 1985. I remember that a lot of the bad things about the Soviet Union we only found out after the USSR’s breakup. I delivered lots and lots of babies. Time passed, and I was delivering the babies of those whom I once delivered.

Marina Akhmedova: And what do you feel now, when you pick up the pieces of those whom you, possibly, once brought into this world?

Lilia Rodionova: I’ve seen a lot of dead people. Even when I see strangers, it weighs on me heavily… We had a case recently. The mother of one Haritonuk called. Her son went missing. Three days later, I went to Logvinovo, there are these hills under the power lines. A smashed tank stands there. This young lad from the Militia showed me a gravesite. He buried a Ukrainian soldier there, in a shell crater. I looked at it, and there, on the sign, it said, “Haritonuk.” We talked:

– Oh… his mum was looking for him…
– How old was he?
– I don’t remember. How old are you?
– I am twenty-one. I buried him.

So, while battle was still raging, he buried him in the shell crater. He made a mound, found some sticks, tied them to make a cross, and even made a board with the name and put a helmet on top.

– He is your enemy. But you did this. Why?
– Nope, he is not an enemy to me anymore. Will you tell me sometime how old he was?
– I will.

His mum called again. He was nineteen years old, this tank operator.

Marina Akhmedova: So people don’t want to kill each other?

Lilia Rodionova: Of course not.

We brought prisoners for an exchange recently (Lilia starts a new story) and brought the bodies of the dead to give them back too. There are these narrow trenches at the Ukrainian checkpoint. I stepped out of the car. It was dark. I almost stepped on the head of one of the soldiers. They explained: “We weren’t told about the exchange.” I said, “hold on, I’ll get someone on the line.”

So I tried to make a phone call, but there was no service. Meanwhile, twenty of them already got out of the trenches, and were milling about around me — they were curious. One lad comes up to me:

– Tell me, is it true that you have wounded children over there?
– Of course. Wounded, some lost their little feet, little hands, little eyes.
– You are not lying? Is that true?
– Yes, it’s the truth.

Then a car comes with our guys. I brought four of theirs, and they had eight of ours. So they said: “No, then we will only give four back.” You know, when I was lined up against a wall in front of a firing squad, my hands weren’t shaking as much as they were then. It’s good that it was dark and they couldn’t see it. I couldn’t accept this… They were right there in front of me, standing with hands tied behind their backs, with bags on their heads. If I could only take four, what about the rest? I started bluffing as much as I could.

Marina Akhmedova: How?

Lilia Rodionova: I joked with one, hugged another. I said, “I promised you three, and brought you the fourth one as a sign of good faith. And you give me something in return!” So when they gave us all of them back, I wanted to leave as soon as possible, before they changed their minds. I took the body bags myself, and was moving them to the other car. Then I went to give back a flashlight I had borrowed from them, and I heard the same kid, who spoke to me earlier, whisper in the darkness:

– Tell me, what do I do now?
– Run! Run, while you are still alive. Run, run away from here!

This kid — him I will remember, this is a memory dear to me… What will happen to the people from our side and theirs after the war? They are like dogs that have tasted blood. Such dogs are very hard to deal with later. With people it is even harder. Especially with women. Once a woman takes up arms and starts to kill, she becomes very cruel and dangerous. War becomes an addiction for her. I’ve seen women like this.

People ask me, “What if you had a gun back then?” I don’t know what I would have done, but I feel like I wouldn’t have been able to kill. I just wouldn’t be able to do it. They also tell me: “You have to hate them.” Wait a minute… Why do I have to hate someone? I always try to understand a person and understand why they do what they do. People always make choices for a reason. Maybe they don’t understand something, and maybe I don’t understand something… But I don’t feel hatred.