Three groups filed suit against the Trump administration on Feb. 29 in federal court over the administration's diversion of funds allocated to the Department of Defense for border wall construction. The Trump administration has announced its plan to use $3.6 billion in military construction funds and $2.5 billion in other military funds for wall construction. The administration is attempting to use these funds despite Congress' exclusive appropriation of $1.375 billion for border wall construction under the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2019. When President Trump signed the CAA into law, he also issued Proclamation 9844, declaring a national emergency along the southern border. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Sierra Club, and Southern Border Communities Coalition sued, asking the US District Court for the Northern District of California to block the diversion of the funds. They claim that as Congress did not appropriate the funds for border wall construction, the president's actions usurp the constitutional budget allocation powers of the Legislative Branch.

Amid all the recent talk about how the war in Syria is approaching an imminent end, it suddenly looks like it is set for international escalation. With Turkish forces resisting the Assadist advance into Idlib province, the last rebel-held territory, there is the clear potential for direct combat between a NATO member and the Damascus regime or its Russian backers. Turkey's military shot down two regime warplanes over northwest Idlib on March 1, hours after Assadist forces brought down a Turkish drone over the region. The Damascus regime said the pilots parachuted to safety. At least 34 Turkish troops were killed in air-strikes in Idlib n the previous days. (Al Jazeera, Reuters) 

More than a year of US-Taliban negotiations bore formal fruit Feb. 29 with the signing in Doha of what is being called a "peace deal" by Washington's envoy Zalmay Khalilzad and Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, named as leader of the Islamist group. The pact calls for the US to withdraw its military forces from Afghanistan in 14 months if the Taliban fulfills its commitments under the agreement. Afghanistan's government must release 5,000 Taliban prisoners before March 10, after which the "intra-Afghan" talks are to start, with the aim of negotiating a permanent ceasefire. The signing of the pact follows a one-week "Reduction in Violence" by the Taliban. (Khaama Press, NPR, Al Jazeera)

Ukrainian lawmakers from the ruling party this week proposed resuming the water supply to the Russian-occupied Crimean Peninsula, leading to public outrage. After Russia's 2014 seizure and unilateral annexation of Crimea, Ukraine ceased supplying water to the arid peninsula. Before the occupation, water was supplied from the Ukrainian mainland through the North Crimean Canal. Today, a dam blocks the canal on the de facto border with Ukraine's Kherson Oblast. The shortage of water has hurt Crimean agriculture and industry, although most households rely on local wells. MPs from the ruling Servant of the People party proposed either selling the water to Crimea or using it to leverage a withdrawal of Russian military forces from the conflicted Donbas region in Ukraine's east. But Refat Chubarov, the Crimean Tatar leader who was exiled from the peninsula by Russia after the take-over, responded that any agreement to supply water to Crimea, regardless of the conditions, would be a betrayal of the 500,000 Tatars living in the peninsula. (EuroMaidan Press)

Some 1,000 activists from various civic groups marched in Taipei on Feb. 22, commemorating the 73rd anniversary of the "228 Incident"—the 1947 uprising and massacre that marked the beginning of Taiwan's "White Terror." Li Ssu-yi, chair of TW Gong Sheng, a youth group dedicated to remembrance of the Incident, said, "We refuse to forget and insist on carrying on the spirit of what they fought for during this year's march." Other participating groups included the Taiwan Association for Human Rights and the Dr. Chen Wen-chen Memorial Foundation—named for a student activist killed on probable orders of the regime in 1981. The route of the march passed various sites connected to the Incident, including Tianma Tea House and the former Tobacco Monopoly Bureau building.

At least 27 are dead in five days of communal violence in Delhi that coincided with Donald Trump's first visit to India as president. The violence began as protests against India's new citizenship law sparked a reaction by Hindu militants, who began attacking Muslims and torching Muslim-owned shops. Delhi judicial authorities have opened an investigation, and ordered police officials to view video clips of incitement by local leaders of the ruling Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). (Jurist, India Today)

Algeria's President Abdelmadjid Tebboune held an official commemoration of the "February 22 Revolution," marking the first day of the nationwide protests last year that finally ousted his long-ruling predecessor Abdelaziz Bouteflika. Tebboune, who came to power in a December special election, declared the day a special holiday to honor what is being called the "Smile Revolution" to emphasize its nonviolent ethic. But the day before the official commemoration, protesters mobilized in their thousands for the 53rd straight week of Friday marches, dismissing the December elections as controlled and saying that the old regime still remains in place. They are calling the movement by its original name of the "Hirak," or "people's mobilization."  Adopting a new slogan in response to the official commemoration, protesters vowed to "disqualify the system's agenda of self-renewal, and to lay the foundations for a new republic." A popular slogan was "We're not going to stop." (AfricaNews, France24, NYT)

In Episode 48 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg speaks with Ernie Harburg, co-author of Who Put the Rainbow in The Wizard of Oz? Yip Harburg, Lyricist, and Deena Rosenberg, author of Fascinating Rhythm: The Collaboration of George and Ira Gershwin. Ernie and Deena are, respectively, son and daughter-in-law of the legendary Yip Harburg, who penned the lyrics to the beloved songs of The Wizard of Oz movie. Born to poverty on the Lower East Side, Yip's breakthrough song was the Depression-era populist anthem "Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?" Known as the social conscience of Broadway and Hollywood, he would be "blacklisted" in the McCarthy era—despite his antipathy to all forms of totalitarianism, fascist or communist. Ernie and Deena and their family are keeping his legacy alive today through the Yip Harburg Foundation and Yip Harburg Lyrics Foundation. Listen on SoundCloud, and support our podcast via Patreon.