SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
alaska
Alaskans With Ukrainian Flags Protest 'Fascist' Trump Meeting 'War Criminal' Putin
Alaskans are coming together "to protest against an international war criminal hanging out here," the advocacy group Stand UP Alaska said on social media, ahead of the action. "We're here to tell Trump and Putin: Alaska opposes tyranny!"
Some protesters shared their signs on Stand UP Alaska's Facebook page:
(Photo by Timothy Kane)
(Photo by Cynthia Crawford McGinty)
(Photo by Karen Rode)
(Photo by Linda Scates)
Some signs tied Alaskans' solidarity with Ukraine to the Russian sale of Alaska to the United States in 1867.
The Alaska-based nonprofit Native Movement said in a Friday statement that it "stands with Alaskans and those across the country who condemn any attempt to legitimize Russia's war crimes on Alaskan lands."
"Alaska knows the cost of Russian imperialism," the movement continued. "For over a century, Russian colonizers stole and exploited land, decimated Alaska Native populations through violence, disease, and enslavement, and erased cultures with religious supremacy. Today, we see the same imperial playbook in Ukraine: annexation of territory, targeting of civilians, and the forcible deportation of over 20,000 Ukrainian children—a war crime under international law."
"The decision to host Putin, a war criminal, on Alaskan soil is a betrayal of our history and the moral clarity demanded by the suffering of Ukraine and other occupied peoples," the group added. "Native Movement voices opposition to any deals that force Ukraine to cede territory, reward aggression, or silence the voices of those whose lives are at stake. We stand against the rise of fascism and violent occupation everywhere—whether in Ukraine, Palestine, or here in Alaska. None of us are free until all of us are free."
The Friday demonstration followed a protest on Thursday that drew hundreds of people to an intersection in Anchorage.
Amid calls for including a representative from Ukraine in any peace talks, Trump suggested Thursday that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky may join him and Putin in Alaska at a later date. He said, "I don't know where we're going to have the second meeting, but we have an idea of three different locations, and we'll be including the possibility, because it would be by far the easiest of staying in Alaska."
The Associated Press reported that "Friday's summit will be at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Anchorage. The base was crucial to countering the Soviet Union during the Cold War, and it still hosts key aircraft squadrons that intercept Russian aircraft when they fly into U.S. airspace."
According to the Russian state-owned news agency TASS, a one-on-one meeting between the two leaders is set to start at 11:30 am local time. The outlet also noted Trump's comments about Putin to reporters on Air Force One: "He's a smart guy, been doing [politics] for a long time but so have I... We get along, there's a good respect level on both sides, and I think, you know, something's going to come of it."
Meanwhile, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt notably called the summit a "listening exercise," and Dmitry Peskov, a spokesperson for Putin, said that the two governments don't intend to produce any formal document based on the talks. "However, given that there will be a joint news conference, the president will outline the range of agreements and understandings that can be achieved," Peskov added.
Amnesty International Eastern Europe and Central Asia director Marie Struthers said in a Friday statement that "we urge President Trump, as the meeting's host, to put human rights and matters of justice at its forefront. He has repeatedly expressed his desire to end the war in Ukraine and his regret for people dying; this is President Trump's real chance to do something for the victims and survivors. Upholding human rights and ensuring accountability for crimes under international law committed in Ukraine since the beginning of the Russian intervention in 2014 is the only way to bring a just and lasting end to the war."
The human rights group has documented numerous crimes during the war, including direct attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructure, indiscriminate attacks, extrajudicial executions, forcible deportations, abuse of prisoners of war, and more. Struthers said:
President Trump must as well take concrete steps to bring the suspected perpetrators of these violations to justice. Vladimir Putin and several other top Russian officials are fugitives from international justice after their indictment by the International Criminal Court. When it comes to the US government's own obligations under international law, the Geneva Conventions in particular, it must search for and try or extradite persons accused of responsibility for grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions. There must be no 'safe haven' for individuals alleged to have committed war crimes and crimes against humanity.
President Trump must also raise the issue of torture and other ill treatment, enforced disappearances, and unlawful prosecution and trials of Ukrainian prisoners of war in Russia. More steps need to be taken urgently to ensure that all gravely wounded or sick prisoners of war are repatriated or transferred to third countries. Likewise, all Ukrainian civilians detained and sentenced under fabricated criminal charges in Russia or in Russian-occupied territories must be immediately released. So must be all persons in Russia jailed for opposing the war.
"Amnesty International continues to call for a peace framework to address the urgent needs of those most affected by the conflict—from providing sustained aid to vulnerable groups, including children and older people, and robust support for refugees and displaced people, to ensuring the safe return of communities through large-scale clearance of landmines and other explosive remnants of war," she added. "For his peace efforts to be successful in the long run, President Trump should follow up on this meeting by working with the US Congress and international partners to address these critical needs, including through the provision of adequate funding."
Most Popular