Feminist, punk activist group Pussy Riot has released a hard-hitting anti-war song and video attacking Russian President Vladimir Putin as well as the officials, generals and propagandists propping up his invasion of Ukraine.
The Russian lyrics liken Russia’s war symbol of Z to the Nazi Swastika. The chorus – “Mom, there are no Nazis here, don’t watch TV” – is taken from the words of a captured Russian conscript in a telephone conversation with his mother.
Referring to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as “a military operation” rather than as a war, Putin has claimed he is trying to rid the country of Nazis, with other Russian propagandists suggesting on live TV that the whole of Europe is in the grip of Nazism.
The video intercuts footage showing the destructive impact of the war with images of a suitcase on a sidewalk seeping blood as well as the band members sitting on a café terrace in Paris; performing the song live and climbing through a subterranean network in their trademark brightly colored balaclavas.
“This song is our statement against the war that Putin started in Ukraine. On 24th February 2022, Russia began a wide-scale military attack on Ukraine. Russian bombs and rockets destroyed Ukrainian homes, schools, and hospitals, wrecking towns and destroying lives,” the group said in a statement released in Russian and English.
“We believe that Putin’s regime is a terrorist regime, and Putin himself, his officials, generals and propagandists are war criminals,” it continued. “Russian propaganda daily poisons the hearts of people with hatred. Those who oppose Putin are imprisoned, poisoned with military poisons and killed.”
The statement noted the cases of former intelligence officers Alexander Litvinenko and Sergei Skripal as well as political activists Vladimir Kara-Murza, Pyotr Verzilov and Alexei Navalny, who have been either poisoned or jailed or both.
The group called on the West to further clamp down on the acquisition of Russia’s oil and gas, step up sanctions against Russian officials with links to Putin and also create an international tribunal to hold Putin and those working with him to account.
In a message to Russians, the group urged their compatriots not to take part in the war and to ignore mobilization notices and propaganda.
“Every action against this war is important,” they said.
Most of the original members of the collective anti-Kremlin group are now living in exile outside of Russia.
Co-founder Maria Alyokhina (aka Masha Alekhina) fled Russia last April, escaping from house arrest disguised as a delivery man, after being threatened with a sentence in a penal colony. Other key member Nadya Tolokonnikova is also living in an undisclosed location outside of the country.
Since her escape, Alyokhina has been on a Europe-wide tour with other long-time Pussy Riot members Olga Borisova and Diana Burkot as well as new arrival Taso Pletner, the proceeds of which are going to help Ukraine.
