Chinese press coverage on the neo-Nazis in Ukraine seems to have shifted into high gear after the May 14 Buffalo shootings by Payton Gendron. CGTN published two major opinion pieces on the topic by Keith Lamb and another by William Jones on the ties of the neo-fascist attacks in Buffalo, New York, and in Christchurch, New Zealand, and the Azov Battalion in Ukraine. Jones in particular points to the U.S. manipulation of right-wing Ukrainian groups after Maidan, as well as the maintenance by U.S. intelligence since the end of the Second World War of a “stable” of extremists for use against the Soviet Union, and now against Russia. https://news.cgtn.com/news/2022-05-17/Buffalo-killings-serves-as-wake-up-call-on-roots-of-violence-in-U-S—1a6waSeGgCY/index.html
Also significant was a total blast of these neo-fascist networks in an editorial also on May 17, in the Global Times, entitled “Neo-Nazism Poisons Ukraine, Europe, Under West’s Connivance.” (https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202205/1265888.shtml) Authors Fan Lingzhi and Huang Lanlan write, “Several experts pointed out that the U.S. is the culprit of the current chaos in Ukraine. The U.S. has deliberately pushed `neo-Nazi’ power, but is creating a backlash.”
The co-authors continue how there is not much difference between Nazis and neo-Nazis, although they have been given the label “far-right extremists” to make them more “palatable” to the body politic. “Some Western observers believe that many right-wing militias, including Azov and Right Sector, started to have a foothold in Ukraine after the Crimea crisis in 2014, and some Ukrainians even regard these militias with gratitude and admiration,” the writers continue. “Reports showed that against the background of rising anti-Russia sentiment in Ukraine, the far-right forces in Ukraine began to advocate glorifying the crimes of ultra-nationalists and suppressing the status of the Russian language.”
They explain that there has been a growth of neo-fascist elements in Poland and other parts of Eastern Europe, partially due to their fear and hatred of Russia, but also due to the destruction of the East European economy after Poland and others joined the EU. As was the case with East Germany earlier, Western countries went in and bought up East European companies cheaply and subjected them to their wishes. They report that many professionals from Poland and other countries emigrated to the West looking for higher-paying jobs, depriving their home countries of their human resource potential, thereby leading to more economic troubles and resentment, and feeding into the neo-Nazi currents.
The article also points out how the West had also been encouraging and financing Hitler, prior to the World War II, as a bulwark against the Soviet Union. And now under the rubric of “democracy” and “human rights,” they are allowing the neo-fascists a new existence in Europe.
Global Times quotes from an interview with the late Stephen Cohen in 2018, in which he explains the rise of the neo-fascists in Ukraine, which he underlines as “particularly dangerous.” “A large, growing, well-armed fascist movement has reappeared in a large European country that is the political epicenter of the new Cold War between the United States and Russia,” he pointed out. And worse still, “Kyiv is losing control over radical groups.”
Towards the end, the article addresses the shooting in Buffalo and the rise of neo-fascism in America, and falsely attributing it to the election of Donald Trump. If the process continues, says Zhang Yifei, an associate research fellow at CASS, “the most pessimistic outcome for the U.S. may be a complete transformation from Tocqueville’s America to Mein Kampf's Germany.”
RT also ran coverage of the Buffalo links to the Azov Battalion in an op-ed article by Ian Miles Cheong, a blogger whose tweets and articles are reportedly widely read by right-wing circles. Cheong inveighs against all these liberals who are applauding the billions of dollars that are going to aid these Azov fighters. He reports that the Buffalo shooter’s philosophy and worldview are shared by the Azov Battalion. In fact, the first page of his manifesto boldly features the “sonnenrad,” or black sun, symbol that features prominently on Azov’s own official insignia. (https://www.rt.com/news/555612-buffalo-shooting-symbol-azov-battalion/)
Much of this emphasis on Azov in the Chinese and Russian media may also have been triggered by President Putin’s statements at the CSTO summit on May 16, where he underlined for the five treaty countries the fact that they were facing a confrontation in which the neo-fascist elements are now playing a role unseen since the Second World War.
