(Se puede leer este artículo en español aquí.)
Ukrainian fighters are burning left-wing books in the capital Kiev, as Russian troops advance.
The chief foreign correspondent for NBC News, Richard Engel, is reporting inside Ukraine, after Russia invaded the country on February 24.
Engel does not hide his bias; he is extremely supportive of the Ukrainian government and its Western-backed forces, and has helped spread propaganda from the neo-Nazi Azov Battalion.
But even Engel has had to sometimes acknowledge the grim reality on the ground in Ukraine.
On March 7, the NBC correspondent tweeted a photo of tires full of books, on a street in Kiev. He said many of the texts were “about communism and political theory in the USSR.”
A local commander told Engel that the Ukrainian militants were planning on setting fire to the books and tires as Russian soldiers move on the capital.
The Ukrainian commander said, “We don’t need them.”
Checkpoint in kyiv stuffed with Soviet-era books. Many about communism and political theory in the USSR. A local commander said they’ll be used to light the tires on fire as Russians advance. “We don’t need them,” he said. pic.twitter.com/H1KxektzYJ
— Richard Engel (@RichardEngel) March 7, 2022
Ukraine has a systematic problem with Nazi infiltration of the government.
Far-right neo-fascist groups played a key role in a violent US-backed coup in Ukraine in 2014.
After the putsch, neo-Nazi militias like the Azov Battalion were directly incorporated into the Ukrainian National Guard.
These Ukrainian neo-Nazis have been supported by Western governments, including the United States and Canada.
In the back of this photo, you can also see a Canadian officer, alongside US military officers, meeting with Ukraine's neo-Nazi Azov Battalion, which uses Nazi-era symbols.https://t.co/8tOZ9A7YGK pic.twitter.com/dAZBeFaHdU
— Benjamin Norton (@BenjaminNorton) January 16, 2018
