how WWII still triggers russian imperial reflex. ask any russian what they “liberated” in that war — and watch the aggressive imperial denial kick in. maksymeristavi.substack.com/p/russian-em...

thank you to all of you ensuring no Ukrainian feels like they resist alone. happy vyshyvanka day 💛💙

i have seen some of you posting Dmytro’s pictures, a 23-year-old victim of recent russian attack on a residential building in Kyiv, which took away 24 lives. but did you know that Dmytro was also emerging, yet already beloved, drag artist named Mistique Grimes?

May 18 is the Remembrance Day of the forced deportation of the Crimean Tatars from Crimea in 1944, a genocide known as Sürgünlik in Crimean Tatar, meaning “exile” Qırımlı history is one of great beauty and resilience. Excellent essay by @maksymeristavi.com Ukraine won’t be free until Qırım is free

show it to russian culture fan. they are missing out on its best masterpiece.

"Because expansion isn’t a policy choice for empires — it’s a life cycle, a necessity." — Maksim Eristavi 👓⬇️

"I used to think of russia as just a normal country having a bad decade. it took me years — and losing a home — to finally recognise a 500-year-old empire in it having a typical century. in my latest essay I explain what and how exactly changed my mind" maksymeristavi.substack.com/p/how-i-got-...

Add this to the mix, also being the core origin of the modern Russian mafia state, but its basics already running for a century, probably more, reaching back to the earliest Gulag times: bsky.app/profile/wilh... #1/2

on this remembrance day for the Sürgünlik genocide, resharing one of my favorite essays i ever wrote: on how what happened to Qırım-Crimea during the first half of the 20th century can tell you almost everything you need to know about russian colonialism maksymeristavi.substack.com/p/russian-co...

understanding those two things took me also a long time but after it finally clicked sometimes after you started calling it Russian _colonialism_ made understanding of our own history between the end of WWII and 1989 so much clearer. We were just another colony!

i used to think of russia as just a normal country having a bad decade. it took me years — and losing a home — to finally recognise a 500-year-old empire in it having a typical century. in my latest essay i explain what and how exactly changed my mind open.substack.com/pub/maksymer...

"This is a disruption of the russian fossil fuel industry at a scale no climate summit has ever achieved."

🔴🇺🇦 In Kyiv's Darnytsia district, rescuers worked all night. After 28h, the search in the ruins of the collapsed building was completed. Russia has killed 24 persons there, including three children. 48 people were injured. 400 sought psychological support. Today has been declared a day of mourning.

Rescue efforts at the site of the russian strike on an apartment building in Kyiv have been completed. The attack killed 24 civilians, including three children, and injured 48 others.

Ukraine is doing more to decarbonise the global economy than all climate change organisations combined.

🔴 Another war crime: Russians have beheaded the bodies of two Ukrainian soldiers following an ambush. Radio intercepts show that the commander gave order to desecrate the bodies by cutting off two heads & placing them in a visible location at the edge of a field. www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/202...

#UkrainianView This one is good. One of the reason Ukraine was not allowed to strike back was not only nuclear weapons, but also a concern about global oil prices. It is an instrument of international control in many ways.

🔴 UPD: 40 were injured, including two children, and one person was killed as a result of the Russian attack on Kyiv, the mayor said.

Important Signal from President Zelenskyy to Latvians: "I met with the President of Latvia, Edgars Rinkevics. Security cooperation was our main focus. [...] We will send our experts to Latvia to exchange experience and provide direct assistance in protecting the airspace."

After using the Venice Biennale as a platform for fascist propaganda, the russian 'culture' circus is heading to Bulgaria to celebrate russia's return to Europe. Violinist Vadim Repin, banned in Italy, Germany and the USA due to his ties with the Kremlin, has been invited to perform in Sofia.

Ukraine’s goal is not only to cripple the russian war economy. It is to strike at the core engine of the russian empire itself: petroimperialism. maksymeristavi.substack.com/p/climate-se...

different centuries. the same russia. same imperial warfare. same slavery.

Avrom Zak’s story, a Jewish-Polish writer and journalist who survived both the Holocaust and the Gulag, is a powerful reminder: russia’s imperial violence is not new, not reactive, and not accidental.

Wow. What a woman. I will try to do better with the days I have left.

I have this book and I highly recommend it for any home library. You can just open it to a random page and learn a whole atrocious history that repeats somewhere else on the next page. Awesome, impressive, and useful project by @maksymeristavi.com

Raqymjan Qoshqarbaev. learning this name and the story of this Qazaq soldier would be the most badass way to spend the day that Russia claims as its empire‑making myth. the best after donating to the Ukrainian army. learn more: open.substack.com/pub/maksymer...

🎯 📌

How the Gulag slave camps helped to dramatically expand russian colonisation of North Asia.

a high-ranking Ukrainian diplomat by 21, a professor by 24, a prominent European feminist and journalist by 26, and a forced labor prisoner in a russian slave camp by 31. in my new newsletter i share a remarkable story of resistance and survival by Nadiia Surovtseva

in my latest Russian Colonialism 101 edition, a story about how russia ran the largest slavery camp disguised as 'modernisation' — and about the people who resisted and survived it. open.substack.com/pub/maksymer...

in my latest Russian Colonialism 101 dispatch, i am featuring Ukrainian reads i picked up at the Leipzeger Buchmesse to help you navigate the war reality that is rapidly closing in on us in Europe maksymeristavi.substack.com/p/rc101-disp...

as we remember 40 years since the worst nuclear catastrophe in history and honour the Ukrainian heroes who prevented the worst, there's a larger story behind Chornobyl, directly linked to today's war. no one's talking about it in foreign media creators.spotify.com/pod/profile/...

from the russian colonialism 101 archives: there's hardly a single military battle, cherished by russian colonial mythology, that was achieved by russians on their own. maksymeristavi.substack.com/p/myth-russi...

compulsory reading

ending russia: why betting on the russian empire collapsing on its own never works, historically speaking. my latest russian colonialism 101 essay. learn more: maksymeristavi.substack.com/p/never-bet-...

Excellent article.

one oscar, and the western cognitive weakness russia has been exploiting for generations. learn more. open.substack.com/pub/maksymer...

worth reminding over and over again. open.substack.com/pub/maksymer...

there’s definitely a gap between how Ukrainians understand their responsibilities of living in a democracy and the rest of the Free World. i increasingly believe that those democratic societies attempting to narrow this gap will also be the ones surviving in the coming decade.

"behind every drone stands a human. an hour before the war, they were neighbours, siblings, friends." Ukrainians take what the empire sends against them and rebuild it into something that guards. not a poetic metaphor. operational logic of Ukrainian anti-colonial resistance.

don't sleep on our new @ukrainianspaces.bsky.social season. it is has been our finest yet. empowering unfiltered Ukrainian voices and decolonising Ukraine conversations since 2022. maksymeristavi.substack.com/p/ukrainian-...

lots of you outside of Ukraine complain that you can't rely on your mainstream national news for good Ukraine coverage. but where do you usually get your Ukraine news/perspective? name the names/places please 🫡

“flying is another manifestation of freedom while you’re defending it” the phrase that made me Bohdan’s forever stan. one of my favorite people is celebrating his 33rd birthday and i want you to join me empowering him. here’s why.

no one can do everything but everyone can do something. if we all survive this, in 20-30 years every European will be judged by not who they are but by what they did today. By @maksymeristavi.com #donateToUkraine #NAFO #UKRAINE

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Keep living, resisting and building amid war — a skill that most in Europe and elswhere in the democratic world will have to learn in the years to come. Ukrainians are already living their future. @boochelnikova.bsky.social for our season finale: creators.spotify.com/pod/profile/...

This Sunday @ricktheukrainian.bsky.social will have a great guest combo of @maksymeristavi.com and Savage Sage. #NAFO #boostUA #UkrainianView www.youtube.com/live/sbE44Zf...

@heidicuda.bsky.social @jim-stewartson.bsky.social Radicalized Truth Survives podcast interview with @maksymeristavi.com Russian Colonialism youtu.be/XSKZPojlZJg?

“flying is another manifestation of freedom while you’re defending it” the phrase that made me Bohdan’s forever stan. one of my favorite people is celebrating his 33rd birthday and i want you to join me empowering him. here’s why.

Since the start of the full-scale russian invasion, most Ukrainians lived through all imaginable burnout stages - and then invented some more. Yet it hasn't derailed their resistance. Why? We asked @boochelnikova.bsky.social creators.spotify.com/pod/profile/...