The Petrogradsky District Court of St. Petersburg in Russia has sentenced 19-year-old activist Daria Kozyreva to two years and eight months in prison for "discrediting the armed forces" by publicly posting a verse of 19th-century Ukrainian poetry in protest of Russia's war in Ukraine, according to local media sources.

In Episode 273 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg happily notes how the entire political spectrum in Greenland has united against Trump's design to annex the country—and breaks down how the MAGA agenda for the Arctic interlocks with Putin's agenda for Europe, and the world. Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon.

The UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine concluded March 19 that widespread enforced disappearances and torture committed by Russia during its full-scale invasion of Ukraine constitute "crimes against humanity." The announcement marks a significant development, as crimes against humanity constitute one of the most serious classifications of international crimes.

The New York Times reported March 17 that the United States is withdrawing from the International Center for the Prosecution of the Crime of Aggression (ICPA), created to hold Russia accountable for its invasion and seizure of territory in Ukraine. "The US authorities have informed me that they will conclude their involvement in the ICPA by the end of March," Michael Schmid, president of the European Union Agency for Criminal Justice Cooperation (EuroJust) told the Times.

The Helsinki District Court in Finland on March 14 sentenced a 38-year-old man to life for committing war crimes in Ukraine. Voislav Torden, 38, a Russian-Norwegian better known as Yan Petrovskiy, was deputy commander of a neo-Nazi paramilitary unit called Rusich, which participated in Russia's first incursions into Ukraine in 2014. According to prosecutors, Petrovskyi was responsible for leading an attack on Ukraine's eastern frontier, which left approximately 20 Ukrainian troops dead. Petrovskyi was accused of ordering his men to carve Rusich's emblem into the chest of a wounded Ukrainian soldier. He was also charged for posing with a dead soldier's body for photos, which were later uploaded to social media.

The revised deal for US access to Ukraine's mineral wealth (with no security guarantees for Kyiv) collapsed in the unseemly Oval Office donnybrook, and European leaders now convene their own summit—faced with the prospect of supporting Ukraine without the US. But Hungary and Slovakia represent an authoritarian bloc that supports Ukraine's betrayal—and Romania could be next to defect to this Russia-aligned bloc. In Europe and America alike, elements of the "tankie" pseudo-left no longer even bother to hide their convergence with MAGA. In Episode 267 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg calls for a clean break at both the international and grassroots levels. Europe must realize that the Atlantic alliance is effectively dead, and there are no prospects of reviving it while Trump is in the White House; whether or not the rumors are true that he was recruited as a KGB agent in the '80s, he is on Putin's side. And progressives must repudiate pseudo-left misleaders who shill for Trump and spread lies for Putin, but seek a new leadership that mobilizes to oppose them.

UN General Assembly members approved a resolution supporting Ukraine's territorial integrity on Feb. 24, the day marking the third anniversary of Russia's massive invasion of the country. The resolution won 93 votes in favor, with 18 votes against, with 65 abstentions. Washington sided with Russia, as well as Belarus, North Korea and Sudan, to vote against the measure. Hungary, Israel, Eritrea, Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso and Nicaragua also voted against. China and Iran were among the abstentions. The US had declined to co-sponsor the resolution, instead pushing its own language that failed to blame Russia for the war or mention Ukraine's borders.

In Episode 265 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg examines Trump's ultimatum to Ukraine to hand over a large share of its wealth in strategic minerals such as lithium in exchange for continued US military aid—and whether a race with China for control of the lithium and rare earth elements needed for Elon Musk's industrial interests might also be the agenda behind the Trump regime's annexationist designs on Greenland. Trump is meanwhile opening Native American lands in Nevada to lithium exploitation, while Musk's Tesla has sought to grab a share of Bolivia's lithium reserves—now also coveted by China.