Maria Popova 🇨🇦

🇨🇦⚜️ polisci prof @mcgillu, Director Jean Monnet Centre Montreal; Rule of law, anticorruption, democracy; Book on Ru-Ukraine War:

[Maria Popova 🇨🇦 @PopovaProf]

Our book isn't straightforwardly about "war and peace", but about the regime and identity divergence between Ru and Ukraine, which Ru refuses to accept. We'll take the "hot new releases" label, though! Thanks, Amazon. @OxanaShevel @politybooks

[Kareem Rifai 🌐 @KareemRifai]

Insane just-released CNN report on Russian military recruitment tactics alleges that bounty hunters are kidnapping Russian men on the streets and forcing them into service to get "bring a friend" cash bonuses from the Russian state.

The incidents are on the rise, and most involve vulnerable men, often in debt or with health or alcohol problems.

"In July, the person said, their uncle, an employee at a state defense company in his late 50s, was approached outside his apartment block by several men in civilian clothes and taken away in a car. They didn’t know where he was taken, but said that day 'they slipped him a document to sign, supposedly a 'notification that they were there.' It turned out to be a contract (to join the military)."

In this case, after signing the document, the uncle returned home, his relative said, but a week later he disappeared. A few days after that he called to say he was at a training ground in Luhansk, in Russian-controlled eastern Ukraine. In late September came the news he was missing in action.
https://t.co/ieDY5agB6b

[Maria Popova 🇨🇦 @PopovaProf]

@joysynk1 What a loser take. Only 3% of the American people agree with you.

[Olena Halushka @OlenaHalushka]

After a night of ballistic missile barrages, I was genuinely surprised to read that a UN commission had issued a report explicitly stating that russia is committing crimes against humanity in Ukraine.

A UN body has more guts to call a spade a spade than the US administration.

[Nik Stankovic @nikstankovic_]

Vucic won his first election on an anti-corruption platform (Styrofoam Revolution).

As did the people before him (who he rightfully accused of corruption) when they overthrew Milosevic (Bulldozer Revolution).

Milosevic also ran on an anti-corruption campaign (Anti-bureaucratic Revolution).

See a pattern? "It's different this time". If you are a 20 year old student.

[Johanna Nyman @JohannaNyman5]

Anyone with even a basic understanding of Russia knows this is true. Those blaming Ukraine’s supporters for prolonging the war have absolutely no idea what they’re talking about.

[Paul Niland @PaulNiland]

If this comes as a surprise to you, I've told you this 20 times.

The rest of Donetsk is NOT the peace deal.

It's the starting point for russian demands. Those demands (accept or we go back to war) will include demands from the EU and NATO.

Plus russian immunity for war crimes.

[Maria Popova 🇨🇦 @PopovaProf]

@AdiG15810331 wow, very profound. Now the Nazis are all in russia, though

[Maria Popova 🇨🇦 @PopovaProf]

Repeat after me: Russia has no legitimate security concerns; only its neighbours do. Russia has been the only one invading others.

[Maria Popova 🇨🇦 @PopovaProf]

@JojoNewZ Ru leaves its borders unattended to focus on conquering a neighbour; keeps prodding NATO members, unafraid of a response; NATO's afraid to help Ukr defence directly but Ru is supposedly scared it'll get invaded. How terminally Ru-propagandized does one have to be to buy this?

[Maria Popova 🇨🇦 @PopovaProf]

@BCdrainoty if you don't know where the supposed coup even happened, don't opine

[Maria Popova 🇨🇦 @PopovaProf]

@JensenVero64278 Ru leaves its borders unattended to focus on conquering a neighbour; keeps prodding NATO members, unafraid of a response; NATO's afraid to help Ukr defence directly but Ru is supposedly scared it'll get invaded. How terminally Ru-propagandized does one have to be to buy this?

[Maria Popova 🇨🇦 @PopovaProf]

@RealGPang Yeah, all the thieves get mad when neighbours get locks. Still doesn't make their anger legitimate.

[Maria Popova 🇨🇦 @PopovaProf]

@stationd5 the USSR occupied half of Europe against their will after WWII, buddy. Maybe you skipped that lesson in elementary school

[Maria Popova 🇨🇦 @PopovaProf]

@SchiavoPet21964 Skipping the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, I see. Get lost.

[Maria Popova 🇨🇦 @PopovaProf]

Ru leaves its borders unattended to focus on conquering a neighbour; keeps prodding NATO members, unafraid of a response; NATO's afraid to help Ukr defence directly but Ru is supposedly scared it'll get invaded. How terminally Ru-propagandized does one have to be to buy this?

[Maria Popova 🇨🇦 @PopovaProf]

@tkpearson Do you have a point? He will also talk about the 9th century, I'm sure. He'll tell a thousand silly lies, maybe including the one you mention that NATO is attacking Ru. So what. What's the goal of your hand waving other than to undermine the obvious facts I stated?

[Maria Popova 🇨🇦 @PopovaProf]

Any talks/negotiations about a post-war security arrangement for Europe need to start from the indisputable fact that Russia’s neighbours have an acute need of protection from Russia whereas Russia has no demonstrable need for protection (and it already has nukes for that).

[✙ Constantine ✙ @Teoyaomiquu]

If defending yourself is prolonging the war, then what is attacking you? A peace initiative?

[Maria Popova 🇨🇦 @PopovaProf]

A little story about how dehumanizing the russian state is and how passive/docile russian society is, devoid of any efficacy and agency. Putting any hope on russian society ending the war or demanding deimperialization or democracy after Putin is gone is extremely naive.

[Roman Anin @RomanAnin]

1/ After most Western journalists had to leave Russia in 2022, the country became a terra incognita. It is hard to get credible information out of it, let alone get Russians on camera speaking frankly about what they think. 🧵

[Alexander Dubowy @dubowy_alex]

Absolutely. No one should mistake Moscow’s proposal to involve Europe for a sign that Russia has suddenly come to its senses. Quite the contrary.

What Ushakov is effectively referring to is Russia’s ultimatum to NATO in December 2021, demanding, among other things, a rollback of NATO’s military deployments in Europe to their 1997 levels.

In other words, Moscow wants Europe involved not to accommodate European interests, but to impose its own demands not only on Ukraine but on Europe as well.

[Tymofiy Mylovanov @Mylovanov]

Zelenskyy: Russia already has an army of around 2M. No country in Europe has an army ready for such a fight. I'm not talking about people, I'm talking about armies.

That is why Europe needs a strong Ukraine as part of NATO, on its eastern flank — Hudson Institute. 1/

[Maria Popova 🇨🇦 @PopovaProf]

And most of the Russian soldiers aren't even conscripts but contract.

[Stanislav Aseyev @AseyevStanislav]

Russian conscripts have a choice:

1. Overthrow Putin’s regime;
2. Flee the country before conscription;
3. Go to prison;
4. Surrender as soon as they end up on the front.

Instead, they choose to invade another country and kill.

Honestly, there’s already no point in reacting to the stupidity of the current American administration and its lobbyists.

A Russian conscript is not a lonely island in an ocean of madness. He is an integral part of the Russian ecosystem of terror that once drove a mine fragment into my neck and will gladly do it again and again.