Bay Area Activists Protest against War on Ukraine
By Phil Pasquini
Novato/San Francisco: Bay Area activists and supporters rallied across the region on March 25 and 27 to show support for Ukraine by calling for an immediate end to Russia’s war on the sovereign country.
On Friday, motorists entering the small north Marin County town of Novato from busy Highway 101 were greeted by a group of activists from Peace Novato who held signs along with a Ukrainian flag made of blue and yellow origami cranes. The group called for support of “Ukrainian soldiers, fleeing citizens, murdered innocents and democracy” by ending Putin’s war on Ukraine. Peace Novato has for the past twenty years held weekly vigils promoting social justice, peace and environmental issues eliciting both support and condemnation from motorists passing by. With calling for peace in Ukraine by ending the war, however, the response along the busy traffic corridor by motorists has been overwhelming positive with many motorists honking their car horns in solidarity.
The group is famously remembered for a demonstration in 2004 at the City Hall building when they burned almanacs that then Attorney General John Ashcroft along with the FBI had warned Americans could be used by terrorists to launch an attack against the country because of the statistical information that they contained. By purging such dangerous information from the city limits, the demonstrators announced that Novato was “terrorist free.”
On March 27, with the Golden Gate Bridge as a dramatic backdrop, activists in San Francisco during the National Day of Action protested against Russia’s war in Ukraine.
On the large lawn that replaced the former Crissy Airfield in a swords to plowshares conversion of the military base into a National Park, several hundred supporters gathered in the late afternoon to call for a stop to Putin’s genocide of the Ukrainian people and to end his war machine that has devastated the country. Specifically, the speakers called upon Biden and NATO to provide stronger military support along with more weapons for air defense and to establish a no-fly zone they referred to as “Shelter the Sky” over the country. “Never Again” was a concurrent theme regarding the invasion by Russia as a defiant summation that Ukraine will not fail in its quest to win the war and to firmly commit ending the injustice.
Ukraine Consul General in San Francisco Dmytro Kushneruk spoke of the resolve people of Ukraine and the military are utilizing in their battle to force the Russian military out. The Consul General also pleaded for monetary support for those displaced and others in need by naming a few organizations including that of Chef José Andrés’ World Central Kitchen. The Consul General also asked that no one make monetary donations to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) whose head Peter Maurer met recently with Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. He accused Mauer of siding with the Russian government due to their amicable meeting and smiles and handshakes during a photo op.
Georgian Consul General Levan Beridze spoke, reminding everyone that his country knows only too well what Ukraine is facing after the Russian invasion of his country in 2008. Next, Estonian Consul General in San Francisco Anna Hanni spoke briefly. The three small former Soviet Union Baltic countries, Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia, are in Putin’s target in his quest to reestablish the Soviet Union.
A Ukrainian high school student spoke about how he has become stranded here in the US due to the war and that his parents are still in Ukraine. He continued to tell of his grief not knowing when, if ever, he will be able to see them again.
In a most somber reminder of the cost of the war brought upon Ukraine were many baby strollers and car seats that sat empty along with children’s toys on the expansive lawn, many with yellow and blue balloons symbolic of the 139 children and infants killed so far in the war.
The protest was organized by MaydanSF, a group of Bay Area Ukrainian Americans created to support Ukraine in its fight for Democracy, Independence, and Freedom; the Ukrainian School of San Francisco, a language and culture institution; and the Ukrainian American Coordinating Council (UACC), a nonprofit national umbrella organization involved in advocating for the over one million Ukrainian Americans.
(Phil Pasquini is a freelance journalist and photographer. His reports and photographs appear in the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs and Nuze.ink. He is the author of Domes, Arches and Minarets: A History of Islamic-Inspired Buildings in America.)
