Protests in Bulgaria and the fall of the government
It is becoming increasingly difficult to distinguish between a popular movement and a provocation. The events in Bulgaria mixed elements of both.
23 September Movement
Tuesday 16 December 2025
Members of the 23 September movement participate in the anti-government protests with a message against the Eurozone, the EU, Nato and imperialist domination of Bulgaria.
This statement has been translated from the website of Bulgaria’s 23 September movement (Движение 23 септември).
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On 11 December 2025, the Bulgarian government announced its resignation. This followed two protests on 1 and 10 December, which were massive by Bulgarian standards and spread to every major city in the country.
The government was officially composed of three parties: GERB (which has dominated political life for the past 15 years), ITN (led by a populist showman), and the Bulgarian Socialist party (do not let the word ‘socialist’ in the party’s name deceive you, as the party has no relation to socialism). To secure a parliamentary majority, the government was supported by DPS-NN, led by Delian Peevski, who is considered one of the most influential people in Bulgaria.
The government pursued a consistent policy of subordination to the European Union, Nato and the USA (as it has nearly always done over the past 35 years), and did everything possible for the country to join the Eurozone, which is expected to happen on 1 January 2026.
Domestically, it maintained the core line of the last 35 years, serving the interests of the big comprador bourgeois and international capital at the expense of workers. Simultaneously, it continued the trend of previous governments by allocating substantial funds to the police and military, thereby ensuring its protection from future protests and unrest.
The line of confrontation with Russia and military support for Ukraine also remained unchanged. Undoubtedly, from the perspective of communist and anti-imperialist forces, the government of Rosen Zhelyazkov was a direct adversary of the working masses.
The main reason for the protests was the proposed 2026 budget, expected to be the first budget in euros. Paradoxically, initial criticism of the budget came from the right, which claimed the budget was excessively “left-wing”. It included measures such as an increase in the dividend tax and the social security contribution ceiling. The so-called ‘employers’ organisations’ (a sort of capitalists’ ‘trade union’) immediately opposed the budget and even boycotted and did not participate in the traditional Bulgarian ‘tripartite council’ (which takes place before budget approval, between representatives of workers, employers and the state).
Opposition parties, especially the most pro-European and pro-American alliance (‘We Continue the Change – Democratic Bulgaria’), launched an intensive campaign against the budget.
A mass campaign began to encourage participation in the protest against the budget scheduled for 1 December. All major television stations advertised the event. All those connected to George Soros’s institutions, the European Union and the United States actively worked to support this protest.
Meanwhile, there are various objective social problems in the country that made people quite willing to take to the streets en masse to protest against the government. In the months leading up to the expected adoption of the euro, inflation reached huge proportions. Prices are rising steeply every day.
The scale of the 1 December demonstration surprised even its organisers. In total, over 100,000 people protested in all cities, a very rare occurrence for Bulgaria (a country of 6.5 million people). Many young people participated in the protests, people to whom the message was primarily addressed.
Unfortunately, certain weaknesses in Bulgaria’s social and political life in recent years also became apparent, such as the issue of the level of political culture and political literacy. The main slogans failed to move beyond demands for the government’s resignation and personal attacks against top political figures. Only representatives of the liberal, pro-American opposition and even some fascist-leaning individuals spoke from the official protest stage. From the stage, calls were openly made to ban communist ideology (“decommunisation”, in their words), to persecute “Russian agents”, and for the Maidan-isation of Bulgaria.
Although various people participated in the protest, including opponents of imperialism, European integration and the introduction of the euro, the main tone of the protest in Sofia remained aligned with the preferences of right-wing and anticommunist forces. Paradoxically, the right-wing, pro-American and pro-European government was criticised by the right-wing, pro-American and pro-European opposition for not sufficiently supporting so-called ‘Euro-Atlanticism’ in Bulgaria and for not providing adequate support to the Ukrainian regime.
There were even provocations and scenes of violence.
Outside the capital Sofia, where reactionary forces do not have such a strong presence, the situation was slightly different. In some places, reasonable demands were heard, even some against our country joining the Eurozone. Unfortunately, in Bulgaria, political developments are excessively concentrated in the centre of the capital, and the main resonance comes from events there, where pro-imperialist forces are stronger.
The main organisers of the protest from the liberal, pro-western opposition, intoxicated by the protest’s success, escalated their demand from the withdrawal of the 2026 budget to the resignation of the government. A second protest was scheduled for 10 December 2025.
Communist, revolutionary and anti-imperialist forces were faced with the question of how to respond to these events. It was clear that a huge number of ordinary people participated in the protests who should not be left in the hands of the liberal and far-right forces leading these demonstrations.
Supporting the government was impossible due to its profoundly anti-popular character. Some, like the ‘Revival party’ (which contributed significantly to the Bulgarian people’s struggle against Eurozone accession, criticising arms shipments to Ukraine and Bulgaria’s colonial position), called on their supporters to join the anti-government protests, emphasising the government’s anti-popular character.
Others, like the 23 September Movement (Движение 23 септември), tried to use the occasion to spread the message of the need for people to fight to the end against the adoption of the euro in Bulgaria and against the country’s imperialist dependency. Before the second demonstration on 10 December, there were tensions and threats (mainly online) calling on opponents of Nato and the EU to stay away from the protest.
Ultimately, the second demonstration on 10 December attracted at least as many people as the first. The situation in Sofia was similar: the protest participants were heterogeneous, but in the foreground, various reactionary forces dominated.
Neo-fascist groups brought a huge banner with the phrase “This is not Moscow” and a Russian flag and the letter Z crossed out. Anti-imperialist forces were present with their own bloc at the protest. Again, in other cities, there were also demands to keep the national currency among other slogans.
The day after the second protests, the government decided to resign. Some declared this a “victory for the people”, while others saw various behind-the-scenes games between top political figures.
There are sufficient grounds to consider these events both as a popular uprising against the political elite and, simultaneously, as an attempt at a ‘colour revolution’ and a ‘Maidan’-style regime change, as elements of both were present in the Bulgarian squares. However, the government’s resignation at this point means that no one will take political responsibility for the massive inflation we expect in relation to the adoption of the euro on 1 January 2026.
On the other hand, this leaves room for anti-imperialist forces to make every possible effort to prevent entry into the Eurozone, which has been the most important struggle of the Bulgarian people in recent years.
In any case, confidence in the existing system has been seriously shaken, and alternative solutions are being sought. It all comes down to sufficient organisation to achieve the necessary transformations that will liberate the Bulgarian people from the capitalist system and colonial dependency on imperialist forces.
https://thecommunists.org/2025/12/16/ne ... ment-fall/
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All Key Players Have Their Reasons For Excluding Poland From The Ukrainian Peace Process
Andrew Korybko
Dec 15, 2025
Their snubbing discredits the image that Poland wants to cultivate of a former Great Power that’s finally reviving its long-lost status as a European leader.
Politico reported that “Poland fumes about being cut out of Ukraine peace talks” after it wasn’t invited to the recent meeting in London and the prior one in Geneva. The former included France, Germany, the UK (the E3), and Ukraine while the latter included them and the US. Poland’s absence was conspicuous since it’s spent the world’s largest percentage of its GDP on Ukraine (4.91%, most of which went to refugees), donated its entire stockpile to it, and plays a pivotal military logistics role in the conflict.
Poles are therefore upset that their country is still excluded from the Ukrainian peace process (the first time was the Berlin Summit in October 2024) despite all that it’s done for that neighboring country. For as difficult as it may be for them and their officials to accept, however, there are sensible reasons behind this from the perspective of all key players whose interests curiously intersect on this issue. Poland is fiercely anti-Russian, which explains why Moscow refuses to discuss the conflict’s settlement with it.
As for the US, it’s finally serious about reaching a grand compromise with Russia for ending their proxy war and heralding a world-changing “New Détente”, which is why it too doesn’t want Poland to obstruct this outcome through involvement in the peace process. At the same time, “Poland Will Play A Central Role In Advancing The US’ National Security Strategy In Europe”, but only as the US’ junior partner who’s forced to operate within the new European security architecture that Trump and Putin plan to build.
The German-led EU’s interests are different since Germany and Poland are in a zero-sum rivalry that was described from their perspectives here and here. Ukraine is one of the countries within which they’re competing as explained here in late 2023 so it follows that Germany wants to exclude Poland from discussions about its conflict’s endgame. This is achieved by leveraging its influence over the EU to ensure that Poland isn’t invited to E3 summits (the latest one in Berlin was meant to be more inclusive).
Regarding Ukraine itself, ties with Poland have been troubled in recent years, so Kiev doesn’t want to reward Warsaw with the prestige associated with participation in the peace process. For these reasons, each in pursuit of their self-interests, Russia, the US, the German-led EU, and Ukraine have thus far tacitly agreed to exclude Poland from these discussions. Their snubbing discredits the image that Poland wants to cultivate of a former Great Power that’s finally reviving its long-lost status as a European leader.
About that, while Poland veritably has the potential to restore its historic role in the region, it can only do so with US support since Warsaw doesn’t have the sway over patriotic-nationalist parties that Washington does for rallying them all against the EU’s federalization plans. Moreover, “Poland’s Military-Industrial Complex Is Embarrassingly Underdeveloped”, with even Politico describing its defense industry as a “dwarf” in a recent article. Poland therefore simply doesn’t have the same influence as the E3 does.
Seeing as how Poland isn’t (yet?) a Great Power (again) and would be a hollow one if it ever (re)attains this status, it shouldn’t act too big for its britches by expecting a seat at the table alongside Great Powers like France, Germany, and the UK. The E3 isn’t even able to exert influence over this process despite their best efforts so there’s no way that much less influential Poland could succeed where they failed. The US and Ukraine also have their reasons for excluding it too, which altogether bruises Poland’s national ego.
https://korybko.substack.com/p/all-key- ... ir-reasons
Great Power? (laughs up sleeve...)
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Eighty Years After Yalta: Europe’s Return to Irrelevance
December 17, 2025
By Kautilya The Contemplator, Substack, 12/9/25
The recent photograph taken in London of British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was intended to project unity and resolve. Instead, it has become a quiet indictment and a visual symbol of Europe’s geopolitical exhaustion, moral confusion and strategic irrelevance. Framed as a modern display of allied coordination, the image instead exposes a continent that has lost the power to shape events and must now cling to hollow performances of influence.
The photo stands in stark contrast to another image, separated by eighty years but now inseparable in symbolism – the iconic photograph from the Yalta Conference of February 1945, where Franklin Roosevelt, Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin, leaders of the victorious wartime coalition, met to determine the contours of the postwar order. Yalta remains one of the most symbolically potent diplomatic images of the twentieth century with three titans of history seated in Crimea, calmly dividing spheres of influence in Europe and shaping the architecture of global politics.
The juxtaposition with the London photo is devastating. Where Yalta showcased the architects of victory determining the fate of continents, London presents four embattled leaders presiding over a failing geopolitical project, excluded from real decision-making, divorced from battlefield realities and increasingly alienated even from their own citizens.
Yalta: The Moment When Power Shaped the World
Yalta is remembered not just for its decisions, but for what it represented – authority grounded in victory. The United States, Britain and most of all, the Soviet Union, had paid in blood, industry and sacrifice to defeat Nazi Germany. Their leaders possessed legitimacy not only from electoral mandates or political structure but from their command of armies, economies and societies mobilized for an existential struggle.
At Yalta, the great powers negotiated Europe’s postwar borders. Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin carved out zones of influence and the future of Germany, Eastern Europe and global security institutions was shaped. This was diplomacy anchored in actual power. The Yalta image radiates the confidence of leaders who had earned the right to design the postwar order because they were the ones who had won the war.
Winston Churchill, Franklin Roosevelt and Joseph Stalin at the Yalta Conference in February 1945 (Source: The Atlantic Council)
The symbolism is even deeper because Yalta took place in Crimea, the very peninsula that, in today’s conflict, symbolizes the West’s strategic denial. In 1945, Crimea was the serene setting in which the great powers calmly divided Europe. In 2025, Western leaders cannot even accept the reality of Crimea’s status, despite Russia’s irreversible consolidation there. The historical irony is almost poetic. The site where world order was once crafted is now a geographic focal point of Western delusion.
The London Quartet: A Photo of Defeat and Denial
Against this backdrop, the London photo looks painfully small. Starmer, Macron, Merz and Zelensky do not represent victory, legitimacy or stability. Instead, they embody a continent in decline, leaders who cannot influence Washington, cannot deter Moscow and cannot deliver results at home.
Left to Right: German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and French President Emmanuel Macron in London, December 8, 2025 (Source: BBC)
The absence of both the United States and Russia, the only two countries that actually determine the trajectory of the conflict, strips the image of any strategic meaning. Europe is not shaping the conflict. It is reacting to it in an increasingly incoherent manner. The symbolism is unmistakable. At Yalta, the world’s three dominant powers shaped global order. In London, four unpopular leaders pretend to shape a war they are losing. Public relations replaces strategy, performance substitutes for power and denial takes the place of diplomatic realism.
Even more revealing is the timing. As the photo circulates, battlefield reports, including those from The Telegraph, one of the most anti-Russia newspapers in Britain, confirm that Russian forces are accelerating territorial gains in Ukraine.1 Europe’s leaders stand before cameras as though dictating terms, yet on the ground, they have lost the initiative entirely.
A Lineup of Unpopular and Discredited Leaders
If the contrast in power is glaring, the contrast in legitimacy is even more humiliating. Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin each stood atop national mobilization efforts whose populations accepted enormous sacrifice. Their word reflected the will and power of states united behind them.
The four leaders in the London photo, by contrast, represent profound domestic weakness. Starmer already faces collapsing approval ratings (now at 15%)2 mere months into office, with Labour disillusionment spreading rapidly. Macron is one of the most unpopular leaders in the history of the Fifth Republic with a 13% approval rating, presiding over a fragmented country and years of unrest.3 Merz is highly unpopular with a 23% approval rating, unable to command national confidence or offer a coherent alternative vision.4 Zelensky is an illegitimate head of state, ruling under martial law, postponing elections indefinitely, outlawing opposition parties, censoring media and presiding over deepening corruption.
Europe’s Increasing Strategic Isolation from Both Washington and Moscow
The London photo highlights isolation, not unity. The United States, Europe’s strategic patron, is now openly repositioning itself away from the continent’s conflicts. The newly released US National Security Strategy underscores this shift with striking clarity. While cloaked in the neutral vocabulary of “prioritization,” the document effectively demotes Europe as a strategic theater, placing it behind the Indo-Pacific and America’s competition with China. It signals that Washington will no longer underwrite Europe’s security architecture indefinitely, nor will it finance or sustain Europe’s maximalist ambitions in Ukraine.
Far from guaranteeing long-term support, the NSS demands that Europe assume far more responsibility for its own defense, despite lacking the political cohesion, military capacity or economic strength to do so. In practice, the document foreshadows a United States increasingly unwilling to bankroll Europe’s geopolitical illusions, leaving European leaders stranded with commitments they cannot fulfill.
This shift further isolates a Europe that has alienated Russia entirely and now finds itself subtly but unmistakably deprioritized by Washington. The continent’s leaders cling to maximalist war aims that Washington no longer supports, even as the United States now appears to pursue some semblance of a pragmatic peace plan that tacitly acknowledges Russian territorial gains. The London photo therefore becomes an even more powerful symbol of a Europe acting out the motions of great-power politics at the very moment its patron is quietly stepping away.
Europe Doubles Down: The €210 Billion Loan and the Commission’s Abuse of Emergency Powers
The greatest symbol of Europe’s internal decay, however, comes not from the photo itself but from the European Union’s proposal for a €210 billion ($225 billion) loan to Ukraine.
Not only is this financially reckless, especially for economies already crippled by energy shocks and inflation, it is being pushed through in a profoundly undemocratic way. The European Commission has invoked emergency powers to backstop the loan without the explicit consent of member states, making all EU member states liable for a massive debt they did not approve.
If the plan is implemented, this will represent a constitutional rupture as it overrides national sovereignty, violates the spirit (and arguably the letter) of EU treaties and imposes collective liability for Ukraine’s survival on European citizens who were never asked for their consent.
The Commission’s maneuver reveals a deeper truth in that Europe’s institutions, no longer able to generate unity through consent, have turned to coercion. This is how unions disintegrate, not through external pressure alone, but through internal overreach that delegitimizes the center. When citizens realize they are being forced into underwriting an unwinnable war, led by unpopular leaders in support of an illegitimate government in Kiev, resistance will not be ideological but existential. As such, this €210 billion debt scheme may one day be seen as the moment the EU stepped onto the path toward its own disintegration.
The Image of a Continent’s Exhaustion and Decline
In the end, the most striking difference between Yalta and London is not merely the imbalance of power, but the collapse of political imagination. Yalta’s leaders, despite their flaws, believed they were designing a world that would endure. The leaders in London cannot even shape the world already unfolding around them.
The London photo will be remembered as an image of a continent adrift, led by unpopular leaders, trapped in strategic denial, isolated from global decision-making and crippled by institutions willing to trample democratic norms to sustain an unraveling project. The tragedy is not that Europe has declined, but that its leaders cannot accept the fact. History is seldom kind to those who mistake performance for power.
https://natyliesbaldwin.com/2025/12/eig ... relevance/
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UK and EU in race to destroy all last traces of freedom of speech
Martin Jay
December 18, 2025
Britain, a country which practically invented the tenets of free speech, is now the most repressive, backward country of the West.
Britain, a country which practically invented the tenets of free speech, is now the most repressive, backward country of the West which is ridiculed on a daily basis by the very same countries that it regaled for its human rights record. There are just too many cases to rattle off which have at least made the news – social media, at least – but the mother who had police officers come into her house while she was in the bath to arrest her for calling an ex-boyfriend a ‘faggot’ has shocked many, given that the boyfriend in question beat her up and the message was not even sent to him. Elizabeth Kinney escaped jail but received a sentence involving community service and a considerable fine. Kinney was just one of around 12,000 people each year in the UK who are arrested and charged for giving their views about a given subject which the state deems could hurt someone, or in the case of politics, if it simply challenges a narrative. This farce would appear to have gotten out of hand when the long arm of the law even arrested and questioned right-wing hack Katie Holmes, who, during a stand-up comedy routine called herself a “spazza” and was subsequently detained for hours by UK police for the “offence”.
Yet while Britain sinks to an all-time low with the state strangling its citizens right to express thoughts, or even think in the case of an anti-abortion activist who was arrested for having a quiet prayer in her head what is remarkable is the lack of hue and cry by the masses who are very well versed on history and what they believe their ancestors were fighting for in two world wars. Often older people, who are very lucid in their ideas about why the British don’t carry identity cards, unlike Europeans, will not really have a strong reaction to the wave of absurd and worrying arrests for those who wish to practice free speech, around 30 a day.
Perhaps what is more remarkable though is how the world is watching this every day and commenting on how Britain is literally crumbling. A recent interview by Tucker Carlson on Piers Morgan involved the American polemicist goading the British commentator to say a rude word during the interview, claiming that Morgan would probably be arrested at a later point for merely uttering the vulgar word.
More strikingly is the extraordinary hypocrisy as, given the UK now more or less a third world country and carries out its repression of human rights much as some might expect the regime in North Korea might, you would think the government would lie low on the international stage. For the comedy to be cranked up even one more level, the British government continues to deliver its incongruent moral tutelage to the old favourites it likes to chastise on human rights. Remarkably, Yvette Cooper, a British minister released a statement on the 15th of December calling for the Chinese government in Hong Kong to release Jimmy Lai for him to continue to express his views.
Britain, renowned for its zealous use of irony, is a country which has an impressive track record for locking up people for having a point of view which clashes with the elite’s narrative. Tommy Robinson, a right-wing activist, has regularly been sent to prison for his views just to give one example. But more recently, it was particularly disturbing to witness on social media, the detainment of George Galloway at Gatwick airport when he returned from a trip to Russia with his wife, whereby security officers questioned him and his wife about their views on Russia and China, when in reality all the wanted was to use the arrest as a pretext to gaining access to communication devices. This is Britain. A country which created the Magna Carta and was once hailed as the beacon free speech and liberty stooping to such a disgusting level to intimidate ordinary law-abiding citizens who, in the case of Galloway, have a successful talk show on the internet which has a robust loathing for western hegemony and shows millions of people what tawdry gains it seeks with its policies around the world.
And with this new world order which the British public have had thrust upon them, western elites have gained a new confidence just how far this treatment can be taken. And here we really are getting into an irony-free zone when it comes to how we treat dictators who are useful to us and the journalists who try to expose their embezzlement, theft and general graft.
It might have caught your attention recently that the caretaker president of Ukraine is in a spot of hot water as most of his close aides are being investigated for corruption, or, in some cases, have fled the country with suitcases of cash, leaving behind, in one example 14M USD and a number of passports of various nationalities in the name of Zelensky himself. When the whole world suddenly, it would seem wakes up to the scope and extent of the corruption in Ukraine with Zelensky at the heart of it all, it would seem that someone in these western capitals might start to consider taking action against the very many who is the obvious culprit.
Not a bit of it.
The EU had a better idea. Rather than arrest or sanction Zelensky, in true despotic style that Joe Stalin himself would have been proud of, they sanction a Ukrainian journalist who exposed the whole racket. Diana Panchenko, often referred to as an “opposition journalist” and who is defamed by western journalist watchdogs like RSF who call her a “Russian propagandist”, found herself sanctioned by the EU for her work and was quite shocked to learn of her predicament. And yet, the fact that the EU did this, would seem like an own goal. Surely if all Panchenko did was Kremlin propaganda, and therefore her video reports from Dubai where she lives are false, then why issue this sanction? Surely there must be EU rules about journalists who go against the bloc’s narrative. A sanction seems barely a slap on the wrist and, in fact, will probably boost her credibility no end. Who came up with the idea in Brussels? The buffoon Kaja Kallas – which cruel readers might pronounce ‘kaa-kaa’ – otherwise known as the EU’s chief diplomat and who is so sensationally stupid that she is generating scores of YouTube clips about her idiotic statements, might be the culprit. Recently good ‘ol KK said in a speech that Russia had never been attacked by other countries. Yes, you read correctly.
https://strategic-culture.su/news/2025/ ... of-speech/
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13 Farmers Arrested After Protests in Brussels
Farmers protest in Brussels, Belgium, Dec. 17, 2025. X/ @France24_en
December 19, 2025 Hour: 10:26 am
The European producers reject the EU-Mercosur free trade agreement.
On Friday, the Brussels-Capital/Ixelles police said 13 people were arrested during farmer protests that took place in the European Quarter, mainly in Luxembourg Square in front of the European Parliament.
On Thursday, over 7,300 people and some 400 tractors gathered at the North Station to protest against the free trade agreement between the European Union (EU) and the Southern Common Market (Mercosur) as well as against proposed cuts to the funding of the Common Agricultural Policy in the initial draft of the next European Union budget.
Police authorities separated the official demonstration carried out at the North Station from the unrest that broke out in the European Quarter and stressed that those responsible for the violent incidents gathered there spontaneously.
In total, six administrative arrests and seven judicial arrests were made after the demonstration. Four police officers were also injured in incidents that occurred outside the framework of the official protest.
In addition, during clashes between police and protesters, a man required medical treatment for a serious head injury, although it is unknown whether he was a demonstrator or a journalist.
Authorities counted 950 tractors in the European Quarter, where potatoes, beets, cobblestones and chains were thrown at several buildings, while fireworks were also set off.
As the disturbances, which began around 2 p.m. local time, escalated, police intervened repeatedly against protesters — including the use of water cannons and tear gas — to disperse the crowd and prevent tractors from breaking through barriers and entering the security perimeter established for the European summit held throughout Thursday.
Security forces reported extensive property damage, including a dozen destroyed gas masks, dozens of damaged uniforms, shields and helmets, a police vehicle damaged after being struck by a tractor, and several “Frisian horses” — mobile barriers used to secure the area around the European Parliament — destroyed after being run over by tractors.
Regarding damage to public spaces, police reported several traffic signs damaged or knocked down, broken windows — especially near Parliament — and road surfaces damaged by fires, including the burning of dozens of tires in Luxembourg Square.
Cleanup crews from the regional sanitation agency Bruxelles-Proprete, who worked until 11 p.m. to remove debris, estimated that 50 metric tons of waste were left behind after the farmers’ protest. Some residents were also reported collecting potatoes left on the ground in bags to take them home.
https://www.telesurenglish.net/13-arres ... -brussels/
