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Gonzalo Lira’s disappearance ought to have triggered outrage and requires an investigation by the “freedom-loving” US authorities and media
My private journey into the drama-infused existence of Gonzalo Lira started in mid-February 2022, once I appeared as a part of a panel dialogue organized by Joe Lauria of Consortium Information (CN), which included the British author Alexander Mercouris.
It was simply previous to the Russian “particular navy operation” kicking off in Ukraine. Alexander and I subsequently appeared on a number of CN-hosted panels to debate the conflict in Ukraine, and in conversations following the printed he talked about a fellow he referred to as “Gonzo Lira” and requested if I adopted him. I indicated that I didn’t, and Alexander replied that I ought to, as “Gonzo” resided in Kharkov, and had some first-hand insights into the battle that I would discover fascinating. Alexander requested if he may ahead my contact data to Gonzo Lira, and I agreed.
I have to admit that I didn’t observe up on Alexander’s suggestion to observe Gonzo and had forgotten about our dialog about Mr. Lira when, someday in late March, I used to be all of the sudden contacted by the person himself, who requested if I might conform to be interviewed by him for his YouTube channel. I did a fast Google search, and skim a number of objects about Gonzalo Lira, AKA Coach Crimson Capsule, together with a very unflattering article written by Mark Hay of The Each day Beast. I shortly determined that if Gonzo was making The Each day Beast uncomfortable, then I used to be very happy to be interviewed by him.
The setup for the interview, which occurred on March 30, was informative in its personal proper. Alexander’s colleague Alex Christoforou was offering technical help, and due to connectivity points attributable to Gonzalo broadcasting from Kharkov (actually a conflict zone), the YouTube platform couldn’t be accessed, and as an alternative we shifted to Twitter Areas (a considerably ironic selection, given my later everlasting suspension).
However probably the most fascinating facet of the pre-interview technical discussions was a to-and-fro between Gonzalo and Mr. Christoforou about Mr. Lira’s security. Past the plain actuality of broadcasting from a metropolis below assault (air-raid sirens had been sounding within the background throughout this time), Gonzalo expressed a transparent concern that he was being sought out by the Ukrainian Safety Service (SBU). I opined that maybe broadcasting from Kharkov won’t be the wisest resolution below these circumstances, a priority echoed by Mr. Christoforou, however this was dismissed by Gonzalo. “I’m taking precautions,” he mentioned, with out additional elaboration.
The Twitter Areas session was gratifying, with Gonzalo asking related questions and, within the true spirit of the journalist/interviewer, allowed me to reply with none undue commentary from his finish – one thing so-called “skilled” journalists within the mainstream media ought to do extra usually. In keeping with Mr. Lira, it was “nicely obtained” by his followers.
Gonzo reached out to me once more, on April 11, for a follow-up interview on his YouTube channel. This time, Mr. Christoforou was profitable in surmounting the technical challenges surrounding Mr. Lira’s geographical realities, and the interview went off and not using a hitch. After we completed, Gonzo thanked me, and within the subsequent dialog, he relayed his considerations that the authorities in Kiev weren’t solely displeased with what he needed to say however had been actively on the lookout for him.
Gonzo’s pinned Tweet from March 26, through which he listed the names of eight Ukrainian politicians, journalists, dissidents, and human rights figures who had both been killed, arrested, or gone lacking for the reason that conflict with Russia had damaged out, jumped out at me. The thought of getting simply accomplished a live-streamed interview lasting extra some 77 minutes at a time when the Ukrainian SBU, which undoubtedly possesses appreciable cyber abilities ample to geolocate a prolonged on-line presence such because the YouTube broadcast we had simply completed, bothered me – particularly in mild of Gonzo’s personal self-expressed considerations, and I mentioned as a lot.
Gonzalo Lira was fatalistic about his future. “I do know the dangers,” he mentioned. “And I take precautions.”
Gonzo’s final tweet was posted on his account (@realGonzaloLira, 54,400 followers) at 7.07am on April 15, 2022. “New Patrick Lancaster,” he wrote, referring to a US Navy veteran-turned conflict correspondent who has been actively reporting from the frontlines within the Donbass area of japanese Ukraine. “Should watch.”
“Solely the responsible concern judgement,” Gonzo had written in his Twitter bio. “Solely liars want stifle the reality.”
Gonzo posted Mr. Lancaster’s report on his Telegram account (over 89,000 subscribers) at 7.16am. The publish has greater than 130,000 views on the time of writing.
“Right here I discuss no matter’s on my thoughts,” Gonzalo famous in his Telegram introduction. “Unvaxed – and if that makes you offended and makes you hope that I die quickly, I need you to know that I’ve no such want for you.”
No soldier believes that she or he will probably be shot till the bullet strikes house. And no political dissident or free speech advocate believes she or he will probably be silenced till the knock comes at their door.
I obtained a phone name on Sunday, April 17 from a producer for George Galloway’s The Mom of all Discuss Reveals (MOAT). Gonzalo Lira was scheduled to look as a visitor, and he had gone lacking. George needed to know if I had heard from Gonzalo. Sadly, I had not.
On the identical day, Max Blumenthal and Esha Krishnaswamy, writing for The Grayzone, printed an article titled “‘One much less traitor’: Zelensky oversees marketing campaign of assassination, kidnapping and torture of political opposition” which, in mild of Gonzalo’s disappearance, was not solely well timed however deeply disturbing.
Citing war-time necessity, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has declared martial legislation and banned all actual opposition events (the neo-Nazi events and organizations, nonetheless, remained untouched.) “The actions of these politicians aimed toward division or collusion won’t succeed, however will obtain a harsh response,” Zelensky said.
“As he worn out his opposition,” Blumenthal and Krishnaswamy wrote, “Zelensky ordered an unprecedented home propaganda initiative to nationalize all tv information broadcasting and mix all channels right into a single 24-hour channel referred to as ‘United Information’ to ‘inform the reality about conflict.’”
The order directing this motion was signed on March 18, 2022.
Zelensky, The Greyzone authors famous, had ominously warned that “there could be penalties for collaborators.”
And now Gonzo Lira had gone lacking.
On April 19-20, Twitter person @Anabel_Villeroy posted a series of tweets compiling proof that “Azov SU @botsmanua (i.e., Sergei ‘Boatswain’ Korotkikh) recognized Serhiy Velychko, name signal ‘Chilli’, as Gonzalo Lira’s kidnapper.”
Korotkikh is a infamous member of the Azov Battalion who not too long ago posted a video displaying his males committing atrocities in Bucha on April 1, 2022.
In keeping with the @Anabel_Villeroy Twitter account, Velychko was the commander of the “Azov Reconnaissance and Sabotage Battalion (a.okay.a. KRAKEN unit) in Kharkov.” The tweet contained various screenshots from the @botsmanua account (which has since been faraway from Twitter) bragging in regards to the seize, presumably even demise, of Gonzalo Lira.
Recognizing that this data didn’t represent something remotely resembling verified reality however enraged on the audacity of individuals proclaiming to be affiliated with the Azov group gloating in regards to the demise of Mr. Lira, I took to Fb to present voice to my outrage.
“When Belarusian authorities,” I wrote, “pulled Roman Protasevich, a blogger who had served a fight tour within the neo-Nazi Azov Battalion earlier than working for Radio Free Europe’s Belarus channel out of Prague, off an airplane in Might 2021 on costs of inciting political opposition (roughly the equal of sedition), the world went loopy, accusing Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko of trampling on free speech. Protasevich is alive and nicely, dwelling below home arrest whereas awaiting trial.”
Nevertheless, when experiences emerged that Gonzo Lira, a California-born social media “influencer” who resided in Kharkov, Ukraine, and who printed on-line content material important of the Ukrainian authorities, was kidnapped, tortured, and murdered by the Kraken Unit, a part of the Azov Battalion affiliated with the Ukrainian Safety Service (SBU), the West saved silent.
Free speech isn’t a one-way avenue. To stay silent within the homicide of Gonzo Lira is to be complicit in his attainable demise, and the deaths of all journalists who pursue the reality, even when it runs counter to the mainstream narrative. Essential considering shouldn’t be a demise sentence. Sadly for Gonzo Lira, it appears it was.
The web being the web, my publish was instantly cited as my “affirmation” that Gonzalo Lira had, the truth is, been kidnapped and murdered by the SBU. I shortly despatched out a follow-on publish to right the file.
“Some extent of clarification,” I wrote, “I’ve no direct proof that Gonzalo has been killed. I used to be clear I used to be referring to ‘experiences rising’ about his demise. However Gonzo mentioned any disappearance of greater than 12 hours ought to be handled as if one thing unhealthy had occurred to him. It’s been 5 days. If this had been a New York Instances reporter disappearing in Russian-controlled territory, it might be headline information – particularly if a Chechen ‘hunter killer’ crew had taken credit score for his demise. However with Gonzo – silence. Which was the entire goal of the publish: To boost consciousness about his disappearance.”
There may be an rising outcry from unbiased media about Mr. Lira’s disappearance, and the Chilean authorities (Lira was a twin citizen of the US and Chile) has said that it has been in contact with the “related entities” in Ukraine about Gonzalo’s disappearance.
However there’s a stunning silence within the mainstream media. One solely want recall the justified outcry in 2018 over the disappearance and homicide of Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi journalist important of his authorities who labored for the Washington Publish, to see the double requirements. As Mark Crispen Miller, a New York-based educational and media critic, famous in his Substack, “No matter they suppose, these of us who nonetheless have democratic rules, together with a perception that journalists (and meaning not simply “credentialed” members of the press, however anybody who seeks out, and experiences, the information) shouldn’t be snatched and killed for what they inform us, should see Gonzalo Lira’s disappearance… as a foul signal for all of us.”
That the US authorities has not demanded that President Zelensky launch a direct investigation into the destiny of Gonzalo Lira is a travesty. That the mayor of Kharkov, Igor Terekhov, whose approval could be required for any SBU operation concentrating on Mr. Lira, hasn’t been referred to as out by title by the collective of journalists, American and international alike, to account for the actions of Sergey Velichko and the Kraken Unit, is hypocrisy in its highest kind – particularly given the insistence by these similar entities for comparable investigations into allegations of the suppression of journalistic free speech in Russia.
“What would issues have been like if each safety operative,” Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn wrote in his epic work, The Gulag Archipelago, “when he went out at night time to make an arrest, had been unsure whether or not he would return alive and needed to say goodbye to his household? Or if, during times of mass arrests, as for instance in Leningrad, once they arrested 1 / 4 of the whole metropolis, folks had not merely sat there of their lairs, paling with terror at each bang of the downstairs door and at each step on the staircase, however had understood they’d nothing left to lose and had boldly arrange within the downstairs corridor an ambush of half a dozen folks with axes, hammers, pokers, or no matter else was at hand?”
What Solzhenitsyn referred to as “the cursed machine” would have “floor to a halt,” he believed, “if…if…”
However there was no resistance. “We didn’t love freedom sufficient,” Solzhenitsyn lamented. “And much more – we had no consciousness of the actual scenario. We purely and easily deserved the whole lot that occurred afterward.”
We will’t ambush those that took Gonzalo Lira within the staircase of his Kharkov residence. However we are able to name out Zelensky’s “cursed machine” for the crimes it’s committing on daily basis in protection of a perverted imaginative and prescient of Ukrainian nationalism that has mainstreamed the odious ideology of Nazi Germany, giving voice to its hate-filled logic, and empowering its minions to silence the voices of those that, like Gonzalo Lira, dared converse reality to energy.
Don’t stay silent within the face of the continued collective effort to silence dissent. Turn into the “ambush within the stairwell.” In any other case, free speech and the concepts manifested in that idea will die, and there will probably be nobody left with the ethical capability to mourn its loss.
And we can have deserved the whole lot that subsequently transpires.
The statements, views and opinions expressed on this column are solely these of the creator and don’t essentially signify these of RT.
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