The Azov Brigade, dubbed the “Azov Battalion” at the time, was founded in 2014 as a volunteer paramilitary militia to defend Ukraine against Russia’s invasion. But it was barred roughly a decade ago from using U.S. weapons after American officials found that some of its founders expressed racist and xenophobic views, and multiple human rights organizations accused the group of humanitarian violations. In late 2014, the group was “reorganized and expanded into a special police regiment,” folding the organization into the Ukrainian National Guard. Azov has participated in military operations across Ukraine in conjunction with the Anti-Terrorist Operation and Joint Forces Operation. One of Azov’s organizers, Andriy Biletsky, has long been considered a white supremacist, writing in a 2014 commentary, “The historic mission of our nation in this critical moment is to lead the White Races of the world in a final crusade for their survival. A crusade against the Semite-led Untermenschen.”The Biden administration has lifted a ban on providing weapons and training to a Ukrainian military brigade that has been criticized over its ties to neo-Nazi groups.
According to Azov founder Andriy Biletsky, Ukraine's national mission is to "lead the white races of the world in a final crusade… against the Semite-led untermenschen.”
Biletsky now commands the 3rd detached assault brigade, which is also authorized to receive US weapons https://t.co/MKwmfK5I6S
— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) June 12, 2024
"Untermenschen," German for "sub-human," was used by the Nazi Party against non-Aryan people they considered inferior, including Jews, Roma, Slavs (primarily ethnic Poles, Serbs, and Russians), and later blacks.
Biletsky, a former history student, former member of parliament, and amateur boxer, has acknowledged being ultraconservative, but has denied association with Nazism and white supremacy. He is heading Azov’s Third Assault Brigade, which is now eligible to receive U.S. weapons.
When asked about Nazi sympathies, Biletsky once said, “After the First World World War, Germany was a total mess and Hitler rebuilt it: he built houses and roads, put in telephone lines, and created jobs. I respect that,” just before dismissing homosexuality as a mental illness and saying the scale of the Holocaust “is a big question.”
A spokesperson for the U.S. State Department told the BBC that after vetting the Azov Brigade, they “found no evidence of gross violations of human rights.”
The spokesperson added that “Russian disinformation” is responsible for “attempts to conflate Ukraine's National Guard Unit of 12th Special Forces Brigade Azov with a militia formed to defend Ukraine against Russia's invasion in 2014, called the 'Azov Battalion.’”
Weapons deliveries to the Ukrainian brigade were prohibited under several federal laws. The Leahy Law refers to two statutory provisions preventing U.S. military assistance to foreign units credibly found to be committing human rights violations. A separate ban preventing Azov from receiving U.S. weapons has been included in various appropriations bills, amid concern over the unit’s origins.
Russia responded to the Biden administration clearing weapons deliveries to Azov saying it has “serious concerns” over the policy shift.
"Such steps by Washington in relation to an openly nationalist formation can cause nothing but extreme indignation," Russian Ambassador to Washington Anatoly Antonov said in a statement quoted by Russian state media outlet TASS.
The way media and Congress spent a full decade warning the Azov Battalion was a neo-Nazi and highly dominant force in Ukraine, only to immediately abandon that and herald them as heroes in February of 2022, was one of the creepiest propagandistic turns I've seen. Still ongoing: https://t.co/eiFox46Hvo "The most serious concerns arise not only in relation to America’s strategy in Ukraine, but also in relation to US approaches in the fight against terrorism," Antonov said. He compared providing weapons to Azov to the United States’ policy of creating armed units in the Middle East, which “resulted in such dreadful phenomena as ISIS, the deaths of hundreds of thousands of civilians, millions of refugees, including in Europe, and the prolongation of bloody conflicts for decades.” Ending the ban has been a top priority for Kyiv. An unnamed Ukrainian official who spoke with the Washington Post said Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba raised the issue with Secretary of State Antony Blinken last month when Blinken visited. “The decision on lifting the restrictions under the Leahy vetting process required thorough considerations and diplomatic efforts,” Ruslan Muzychuk, spokesman for Ukraine’s National Guard, told the Post, noting that a wide variety of units carry out operations on the front line. “Understanding by our allies how important it is to help each of these units is another important step on the way of our struggle for independence.”
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) June 11, 2024
