Ukraine

UKRAINE: Is it Russia that was the aggressor in Ukraine, while the West supported Ukraine's struggle for freedom? Or is it the West that was the aggressor, while Russia supported Ukraine's elected government?

MODERN TIMES CONVERSATION: We hear from Pål Steigan about his political background, upbringing and thinking. Also about the establishment of the newspaper Klassekampen, and his time in the AKP (ML) and Rødt parties. He is contrarian and censored in Norway when it comes to many issues. We have chosen to let him speak with his own arguments, where we meet him in Italy at the Franciscan monastery he has furnished as a writing room and seminar venue.

VIOLENCE: Is man fundamentally violent? History does not show exactly that. We have several examples of large societies in prehistory showing few traces of war and authoritarian rule. For example, the Stone Age can be essential for anyone who wants to say something about human evolution and nature.

NUCLEAR WEAPONS: For Moscow, the Ukraine war is about defense, not conquest. But for the West, the war is about Russia's attempt to conquer Ukraine and about Ukraine's right to choose an alliance. Like the Western doctrine, the Russian one now allows for the first use of nuclear weapons.

USA: The European political-media elite portrays Trump as the new Hitler, but is nevertheless in a great hurry to subordinate itself to the USA economically, militarily and politically. Glenn Diesen analyzes the US situation now.

POLITICAL ANALYSIS: Most have assumed that it was Russians who had shot the civilians found in the street in Butsja. But here in MODERN TIMES, peace researcher Ola Tunander criticizes this perception by documenting several facts that point in a different direction. For example: If Russian forces were responsible for the killings in Butsha, why didn't they try to cover them up? They have buried others.

PALESTINE/ISRAEL:What is it like to be the UN's special rapporteur for the occupied Palestinian territories? After the launch of the Italian book J'accuse, we spoke to Francesca Albanese – about Israel's war against Gaza, genocide, anti-Semitism and impunity, based on her specialization in international law. She talks about political, legal, psychological and epistemic violence resulting from how Israel, with the consent of the West, has oppressed the Palestinians for decades. (And what about the Oslo agreement, see the sub-section.)

NORWAY: In this essay, we take a closer look at the oil fund's financial capitalism. But capitalism is dirty – characterized by environmental destruction, exploitation, child labour, tax havens and, not least: cynical people who do everything to keep the wars going so that the weapons forges continue to produce their cunning deadly products. Oljefondet is today the largest European investor in companies operating on the occupied West Bank. The oil fund is also among the largest European financial institutions that invest in international arms manufacturers that sell arms to Israel.

FUTURE: For the first time in its long history, humanity is – possibly inevitably – facing an increasing and real risk of extinction due to the reckless activities of Homo sapiens. The effects of greed, violence, ignorance, fanaticism, political short-sightedness, overpopulation and over-exploitation of all available resources are the prerequisites for an expected disaster.

BRIEFING: Here we present a unique role model in Norwegian press history.

RUSSIA: Mikhail Shishkin has long pointed out that Russia, unlike Germany, has never come to terms with its totalitarian past.

Ukraine: In the past year, probably 140 have died too early. What are we waiting for now?

COMMENT: What should we say to the children, in the minutes before the nuclear explosions, when they cry and ask: "couldn't you do something... couldn't you talk to each other?"

INTELLECTUAL: Belarusian and Ukrainian intellectuals have applied postcolonial theory to Russia since the 1990s – but have been largely ignored in the West. MODERN TIMES presents here the voices from the "border countries".

UKRAINE: Everyone is affected by the war in Ukraine: both family finances and official budgets, aid cuts, military rearmament, global energy policy, nuclear policy and, not least, bloc politics, and it also creates increased tension around the globe. So where is the overview, or a deeper understanding? Researcher Cecilie Hellestveit has her new book Bad news from the Eastern Front unfortunately carried out a serious 'cherry-picking' of sources and arguments where she conveniently develops backwards what confirms the generally acceptable.

NEO-FASCISM: Do many still have fascist longings today, or can one always blame seductive leaders? A closer dive into the 100-year-old Italian fascism and its descendants says something about the dangers we are now likely to face.