In Episode 159 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg takes stock of the inspiring and terrifying situation in Peru—which is only escalating, with no resolution in sight. Since left-populist president Pedro Castillo was ousted in a "soft coup" last month, a mass movement has rapidly mobilized to demand that new president Dina Boluarte step down, that Congress be dissolved, and that a "constituent assembly" be called to draft a new constitution with the participation of popular organizations. Despite repression approaching genocidal levels, thousands of protesters from across Peru converged on the capital for a "Taking of Lima"—which only brought street-fighting to the center of national power, when the gathering was charged by the riot police. It is a case of "bad facts" for the popular movement that the crisis was sparked by Castillo's attempt to seize autocratic power in an auto-golpe in response to relentless efforts to remove him by the reactionary fujimorista bloc in Congress. But this does not alter the basic right and wrong of the struggle in Peru, which is fundamentally that of campesinos, indigenous peoples and common folk fighting for their elementary rights and even very survival, against the corrupt political class fighting to preserve its privileged position and ill-gotten gains. Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon.

The prosecutor general's office in Peru, the Fiscalía, on Jan. 10 opened a preliminary investigation into President Dina Boluarte and five of her current and former cabinet members for possible acts of "genocide" in the repression of the mass protests sparked by the ouster of president Pedro Castillo last month. Prosecutor general Patricia Benavides announced that, in addition to Boluarte, her investigation will target Prime Minister Alberto Otárola, Interior Minister Víctor Rojas, and Defense Minister Jorge Chávez. It will also target ex-prime minister Pedro Angulo and ex-interior minister César Cervantes, who lost their positions in a cabinet shake-up amid the unrest. (DW, El Comercio; TRT World)

The war in Ethiopia's northern Tigray region has cooled down since the signing of a peace deal in November. But a separate conflict is intensifying further south, in Oromia, where civilians are suffering as anti-government rebels step up attacks. Oromo Liberation Army (OLA) guerillas were previously confined to the fringes of western and southern Oromia, Ethiopia's largest region. But analysts say the Tigray war created a security vacuum that has helped the OLA expand its long-running insurgency. The security situation is now "fast deteriorating," the UN's aid coordination agency, OCHA, warned in a report last month. Hundreds of thousands of civilians have been uprooted and essential services are not functioning in some conflict-affected areas.

A human rights group in Burkina Faso on Jan. 3 reported that 28 people were found shot dead in the town of Nouna, in apparently ethnically targeted killings at the hands of a volunteer militia group. The Collective Against Impunity & Stigmatization of Communities (CISC) said the killings were perpetrated by members of the Volunteers for the Defense of the Homeland (VDP). The VDP allegedly killed 21, including children, on Dec. 30, in a part of Nouna mostly inhabited by the minority Fula community. The report stated that the VDP appears to have targeted "resourceful" or "influential" people in the community. The report further found that similar extrajudicial executions were carried out by the VDP in the same community on Dec. 15, 18 and 22.

In Episode 156 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg discusses Peter Lamborn Wilson's last book, Peacock Angel: The Esoteric Tradition of the Yezidis. One of the persecuted minorities of Iraq, the Yezidis are related to the indigenous Gnostics of the Middle East such as the Mandeans. But Wilson interprets the "esoteric" tradition of the Yezidis as an antinomian form of Adawiyya sufism with roots in pre-Islamic "paganism." Melek Taus, the Peacock Angel, the divine being revered by the Yezidis as Lord of This World, is foremost among a pantheon that ultimately traces back to the Indo-European gods. Wilson conceives this as a conscious resistance to authoritarianism, orthodoxy and monotheism—which has won the Yezidis harsh persecution over the centuries. They were targeted for genocide along with the Armenians by Ottoman authorities in World War I—and more recently at the hands of ISIS. They are still fighting for cultural survival and facing the threat of extinction today. Weinberg elaborates on the paradox of militant mysticism and what it means for the contemporary world, with examples of "heretical" Gnostic sects from the Balkan labyrinth. Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon.

In the midst of the political crisis gripping Peru, reactionary elements in the country's Congress have launched an initiative to repeal the 2006 law establishing reserves to protect isolated indigenous peoples in the Amazon rainforest. AIDESEP, Peru's trans-Amazonian indigenous alliance, is calling Law Project 3518/2022-CR the "Law of PIACI Genocide"—a reference to the Spanish acronym for Indigenous Peoples in Isolation or Initial Contact. The AIDESEP statement also charges that the congressional Commission on Decentralization & Regionalization submitted the bill on Dec. 14 without first seeking clearance from the Commission on Andean & Amazonian Peoples, which holds first authority in the matter.

The Russian State Duma on Dec. 13 passed the first reading a bill concerning the use of Russian criminal law in territories of Ukraine that Russia now occupies. The bill includes a provision stipulating that a deed considered criminal under either Russian or Ukrainian law is not to be qualified as a crime if it "aimed to protect interests of the Russian Federation." Saying that passage of the bill would constitute "impunity made law," Amnesty International warned: "Russian servicepeople should remember that even if this unprecedented bill is eventually passed, it will not override international law and will not protect war criminals from eventually facing trials abroad under universal jurisdiction."

Among the long list of ostensibly local conflicts that have broken out in South Sudan since a national peace deal was inked in 2018, analysts say the current violence involving Nuer and Shilluk militias in Upper Nile state ranks with the deadliest. Thousands of people have been uprooted since mid-November and there are concerns of an imminent attack on Kodok—a town hosting more than 10,000 displaced Shilluk. The UN's peacekeeping mission has been encouraged to step up protection duties, but Nuer forces have reportedly encircled Kodok and cut off escape routes, including to the nearby UN protection camp in Malakal. Though clashes are occurring along communal lines, they were triggered by internal tensions within a splinter group of the country's main opposition movement, the SPLA-IO. Simon Gatwech (a Lou Nuer) and Johnson Olony (a prominent Shilluk) defected from the group last year before turning on each other. President Salva Kiir has said he "cannot stop" the fighting, though observers say his regime benefits from pitting the feuding factions against each other.