Memes

FYI, the debt will be paid by Russian war reparation

The EU equivalent of saying Mexico Will Pay For the Wall.

War and Theft: The Takeover of Ukraine’s Agricultural Land

Western financing to Ukraine in recent years has been tied to a drastic structural adjustment program that has required austerity and privatization measures, including the creation of a land market for the sale of agricultural land. President Zelenskyy put the land reform into law in 2020 against the will of the vast majority of the population who feared it would exacerbate corruption and reinforce control by powerful interests in the agricultural sector. Findings of the report concur with these concerns. While large landholders are securing massive financing from Western financial institutions, Ukrainian farmers — essential for ensuring domestic food supply — receive virtually no support. With the land market in place, amidst high economic stress and war, this difference of treatment will lead to more land consolidation by large agribusinesses.

Ukraine's been operating under the same Shock Doctrine that came for the rest of Eastern Europe following the collapse of the USSR (and much of Latin America and Oceania before that). The government is perpetually in a state of debt to its EU neighbors and it is constantly hemorrhaging state property at cut-throat prices to lowest-bidder private interests.

The looting of the Soviet sphere isn't new and it isn't the result of the Russian invasion. But the sudden acute need for foreign cash, combined with the mass displacement of Ukrainian citizens, has accelerated the process enormously.