Funding Ukraine ‘War Machine’ Against Russia Means Austerity in Europe
Protestors hold placards during a demonstration as part of a national day of strikes and protests, a week after the French government pushed a pensions reform through parliament without a vote, using the article 49.3 of the constitution, in Nantes, western France, on March 23, 2023
InternationalIndiaAfricaJames TweedieWestern sanctions on Russia over its de-Nazification operation in Ukraine have ricocheted with disastrous results for European economies. Dr Linwood Tauheed, associate professor of Economics at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, linked them to civil unrest now wracking the continent. The wave of strikes and protests sweeping Europe are in response to austerity policies prompted by sanctions on Russia, an academic has said.Linwood Tauheed told Sputnik that Europeans are “not willing to be stoic about this any longer.”The unrest was “an indication that some of the issues caused out there directly by the sanctions, which, of course, was caused by the war, are affecting them greatly,” he said.The sanctions have been centrally co-ordinated by the European Commission, the unelected executive of the European Union (EU), which has also diverted billions of euros from the ironically-named European Peace Facility fund to buy arms for the Kiev regime.”All of the EU countries are subject to round and round, and have been, of austerity that is a particular element of having this European Economic Union,” where countries have “given up their own sovereign currency and therefore their ability to solve their individual problems,” Tauheed noted.EU nations must ask economic giant Germany’s approval before taking any measures to support their own people — as Greece and Italy have discovered. That has formed “a particular view of Germany and Brussels in terms of how those entities affect their individual economies,” Tauheed argued.He said sanctions on Russia, reduced energy imports, de-industrialisation and falling living standards were “unifying” the public against austerity.”Their leaders are willing to take limited euro resources and put them into a war machine and send them to Ukraine,” Tauheed stressed. “Austerity is looming and citizens are wondering ‘how we have money to send to Ukraine when we don’t have money to extend our pensions in France?’ Austerity is at the core of this. And it is European-wide, it’s not just country to country.”
WorldMass Strike to Stymie Transport Services Throughout Germany27 March, 06:13 GMTThe crisis is not limited to public spending and strikes over wages. German financial giant Deutsche Bank is now facing collapse after losing 11 per cent of its share value on Friday, and 29 per cent since the start of the month.”Large banks in large countries in Europe” are facing “some crisis or another” but the US option of a central bank bail-out was not available to them, the academic said.”So they’re going to be less able to quell bankruptcies and solvency among European banks than the US has been,” Tauheed said. “More dominoes” will likely fall in Europe, “but that’s also going to be contagious back to the US.”Check out The Critical Hour for more in-depth analysis
