Sure, I have no idea what the Soviet-era Armenian art film called The Colour of the Pomegranates is about, but each shot is so carefully and beautifully staged like a photograph or painting that it is hard not to find it intoxicating. Free on YouTube.

Tatyana Oranskaya, 'Chinese revolutionary woman' (1960)

The #Soviet system never commemorated the #Holocaust. One reason for this is that once you define and identify one #genocide, you can recognize other genocidal crimes. The Soviet empire didn’t want us to learn our #history. —Victoria Amelina, “Nothing Bad Has Ever Happened”1

Today in Labor History March 29, 1951: Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were convicted of conspiracy to commit espionage. They were executed at Sing Sing in 1953. The Rosenberg’s sons, Michael and Robert Meeropol were adopted by Abel Meeropol, the composer of “Strange Fruit,” (made famous by Billie Holiday). The sons maintained their parents’ innocence. However, after the fall of the Soviet Union, decoded Soviet cables showed that their father had, in fact, collaborated, but that their mother was innocent. They continued to fight for the mother’s pardon, but Obama refused to grant it. The Rosenberg’s sons were among the last students to attend the anarchist Modern School, in Lakewood, New Jersey, before it finally shut its doors in 1958.

The Modern School movement began in 1901, in Barcelona, Spain, when Francisco Ferrer opened his Escuela Moderna. It was one of the very first Spanish schools to be fully secular, co-educational, and open to all students, regardless of class. His ideas were so popular that 40 more Modern Schools opened in Barcelona in just a few years, while 80 other schools adopted his textbooks. In 1909, there were mass protests and a General Strike against Spanish intervention in Morocco. The state responded with a week of terror and repression, during which they slaughtered over 600 workers and falsely executed Ferrer as an instigator of the protests. His execution led to worldwide protests. Modern Schools started to pop up outside of Spain, inspired by his original Escuela Moderna, including 20 in the U.S.

For more on the Modern School movement, read my article: https://michaeldunnauthor.com/2022/04/30/the-modern-school-movement/

Amid some rather dull ъ reporting on the #kprf's destined-to-fail "people's referendums", there's an interesting conflict line between the old #soviet memorial legacy (putting #lenin on a square) vs nationalist-monarchist movements (putting a church there)
https://www.kommersant.ru/doc/7565833

A Soviet T34/76 tank on the outskirts of Leningrad - Winter 1944 #ww2 #worldwar2 #leningrad #soviet #t34 #tank

'The emblem of the #CIA is stamped on many bloody events around the world'

#Soviet poster, 1978. #Artist: #ViktorKoretsky

Via #Propagandopolis

Today in Labor History March 23, 1918: 101 IWW members went on trial in Chicago for opposing World War I and for violating the Espionage Act. In September, 1917, 165 IWW leaders were arrested for conspiring to subvert the draft and encourage desertion. Their trial lasted five months, the longest criminal trial in American history up to that time. The jury found them all guilty. The judge sentenced Big Bill Haywood and 14 others to 20 years in prison. 33 others were given 10 years each. They were also fined a total of $2,500,000. The trial virtually destroyed the IWW. Haywood jumped bail and fled to the USSR, where he remained until his death 10 years later.

Today in Labor History March 22, 1920: Azeri army soldiers, in collaboration with Azeri civilians, attacked Armenian civilians in Shusha (Nagorno Karabakh) and destroyed the Armenian half of the city. The pogrom continued through March 26. The true death toll may have been well over 20,000. Between 1905 and 1920, there were at least 9 pogroms in the region, against both Armenians and Azeris, with a death toll of at least 57,000, and possibly well over 100,000. At least another 10 pogroms resumed after the fall of the Soviet Union, with hundreds more people slaughtered.

Today in Labor History March 22, 1943: The Nazi-affiliated Schutzmannschaft Battalion burnt alive everyone from the village of Khatyn, Belarus, near Minsk. They did it in retaliation for an attack on German troops by Soviet partisans. Himmler created Schutzmannschaft police units in 1941. By 1942, they had over 300,000 members. They slaughtered Jews throughout the Baltics, Ukraine and Belarus. They also served as guards at forced labor camps. In total, Nazis and Nazi collaborators slaughtered over 2 million people just in Belarus during the three years of Nazi occupation. This was nearly 25% of the entire population. Of these, 800,000 were Jews, or about 90% of the Jewish population.

#Russia is the successor state to the Soviet Union in the worst possible ways.

Pjotr Sauer: Soviet-era dissident given ‘draconian’ jail sentence in Russia for anti-war views: Alexander Skobov jailed for 16 years over social media post and alleged involvement in opposition group

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#soviet #AlexanderSkobov
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/mar/21/soviet-era-dissident-alexander-skobov-draconian-jail-sentence-russia-anti-war-views

President of #Finland #Alexander_Stubb at a joint press conference with President #Zelenskyy:

I think the basis of statehood usually rests on three pillars: independence, sovereignty, and territorial integrity. #Finland, in 1944, with the peace of #Stalin, lost two of those pillars. 

We retained independence pretty much as the only #Soviet neighbouring state, but we lost our sovereignty to decide. And we also lost 10% of our territory.

Today in Labor History March 13, 1968: Student demonstrations in Warsaw led to street riots. All Polish universities went out on strike against the repressive communist regime, with students occupying the campus buildings. The strike, which came in the wake of Soviet withdrawals of diplomatic relations with Israel, in protest of the 1967 war, spread throughout the country, leading to a violent government crackdown and antisemitic purge that was branded as anti-Zionism. Thousands of Jews fled the country because of political harassment and being fired from their jobs.