Natalia Vitrenko: “De-Nazification Is a Priority for Ukraine”

A featured speaker at the Feb. 19 Schiller Institute conference was Natalia Vitrenko, chairwoman of the Progressive Socialist Party of Ukraine and a long-time associate of the SI. She gave a gripping description from the inside of what has happened since the coup d’état in 2014 by extremist and fascist forces in Kiev, supported by the West, and of how the country has been used by western forces to push for confrontation and war with Russia, while the national economy was looted, including by the IMF, which her party has systematically denounced.

Over the past few months, however, a “special kind of militaristic psychosis” has taken hold of Ukraine, she said. The “extremely hard psychological attack on the state of mind of our public” has become “unbearable”. Weapons began pouring into the country, not only from the U.S. and the U.K., but also from Poland and the Baltic countries – not “gifts”, but against billions of dollars of loans that Kiev is supposed to repay. Concerning the economy, just since January, “Ukraine has lost $14 billion… $12.5 billion from capital flight, and $1.5 billion spent by the Ukrainian central bank to support the currency.” The value of Ukrainian state debt and the national currency has collapsed, while international capital markets are closed to Ukraine. Even President Zelensky was alarmed by the disastrous effects of the war propaganda.

For the population generally, she explained, they “lack resources even for the basic necessities. Today it was announced that the price of bread will soon be raised by 20-30%. And that’s when we already, because of brutal pension and wage policies, have the most impoverished population in Europe, with the shortest lifespan.”

Meanwhile, the war propaganda inside the country has been promoted “by the Nazis first and foremost”, by the parties and movements defending the ideology called Ukrainian integral nationalism. They have consistently presented Russia as the mortal enemy which must be destroyed.

Natalia Vitrenko concluded by what needs to be done to “change the situation radically and not allow a war”. Internally, the “top priority” is to carry out de-Nazification – to “ban all parties, movements, and organizations with a Nazi orientation”. Then, Ukraine should restore its status of neutrality, and implement a union state with Russia and Belarus.

Internationally, she hopes that Russia and China will be able to convince the West to work out a new world architecture, providing for peaceful coexistence of different countries, with respect for their national interests and distinctive characters. “And of course, we need to change the world economic model. We remember how Lyndon LaRouche explained to us that without a radical change in the economic model there will be no sustained development, and it will be impossible to defend the national interests of different countries.”