The United Jewish People’s Order is 100 years old and the Winnipeg chapter celebrated this milestone at the Ukrainian Labour Temple last week. In keeping with UJPO’s social justice mission, the committee members who advised the Canadian Museum of Human Rights on its new Nakba exhibit (Palestine Uprooted: Nakba Past and Present) were honoured guests. Here’s my video of the festivities.
Archive for the ‘In Solidarity’ Category
Why should we care about Cuba?
Posted: May 27, 2026 in In Solidarity, Nibbling on The EmpireTags: Canada-Cuba, Cuba, US imperialism
Cuba has been under attack from the United States seemingly forever. Why should we care? This seminar, organized by Manitoba-Cuba Solidarity, answers this question with useful information and thoughtful insights. I recorded it at Winnipeg’s iconic Ukrainian Labour Temple on May 23, 2026. Please share widely.
Elbows up for Cuba, Canada!
Posted: February 11, 2026 in Act Locally, In Solidarity, Nibbling on The EmpireTags: Canada-Cuba, donald-trump, news, politics, Trump, us oil embargo on cuba, Venezuela
The United States has ramped up its decades-long campaign to smash its tiny Caribbean neighbour. While the country has been plagued with shortages of essential goods since the end of the Covid-19 pandemic, recent US measures to starve the country of fuel have made a bad situation much worse. The US oil blockade amounts to a state of war and the American government has threatened dire consequences for any country that comes to Cuba’s aid.
So, what’s a freedom loving human to do in the face of Yankee aggression? Here are some suggestions.
Tell Carney to “Elbows Up” for Cuba
Canada’s relationship with Cuba has been mixed. On one hand, we’ve had diplomatic relations with Cuba since 1945 and trade relations since the 18th century. Canadians account for one-third of Cuba’s tourists and we’ve held that number one spot for many years. On the other, there are documented instances of Canada spying on Cuba for the United States.
Canada has long claimed its generally friendly relations with Cuba in the context of Yankee hostility as evidence of Canada’s independent foreign policy. One way we can help Cuba is to compel our government to provide real support Cuba in the face of US aggression.
There is an online petition to the House of Commons calling for the Canadian Government to assist the people of Cuba in resisting United States aggression. Specifically, the petition calls on our government to:
- Publicly condemn U.S. aggressions as violations of international law;
- Refuse to participate in, support, or legitimize military, economic, or political aggressions against Venezuela and other countries;
- Reaffirm and actively support the Caribbean as a Zone of Peace, free from external military intervention;
- Actively reject any and all interventions and military aggressions against Cuba, Colombia and Mexico;
- Firmly oppose U.S. economic and other coercive measures against Cuba and vigorously advocate for their removal;
- Deepen economic ties, trade and assistance to Cuba; and
- Unequivocally uphold and promote the right of self-determination of the peoples and countries of Latin America and the Caribbean.
If you wish to sign this petition, do so, here, before April 20, 2026.
Additionally, the Canadian Foreign Policy Institute and Just Peace Advocates are conducting an online email campaign that calls on our federal government to sell oil, food and medicine to Cuba. You can join in here.
Finally, you can contact for MP directly (and senator(s) as well). All of their contact information is available here.
There is even a Canada-Cuba Parliamentary Friendship group . It is time to remind our Parliamentarians of its existence.
Get your own “elbows up!”
On a more individual, person-to-person basis, you can plug into local activities with your nearest Canada-Cuba friendship committee, of which there are many across Canada. The umbrella organization for most if not all of there groups is the Canadian Network on Cuba. The CNC is an excellent source of information about Cuba solidarity and the many groups across Canada that you can work with.
Many peace groups are actively supporting Cuba and other countries struggling against imperialism. The Canada-Wide Peace and Justice Network is a good place to find local groups and national news.
If you belong to a union, it may have a social justice or international solidarity committee or program. Many churches have social justice and/or international development programs.
Information is Power
You have to keep informed. There is so much contradictory information, disinformation and outright bullshit, it is often difficult to know what is going on. With regard to Latin America and the Caribbean, here are some sources that I have found to be helpful:
Winnipeggers say “HANDS OFF VENEZUELA!”
Posted: November 24, 2025 in In Solidarity, Nibbling on The EmpireTags: Venezuela
The United States has been meddling in Venezuelan affairs since the election of Hugo Chávez in 1999. Despite American backed coup attempts, assassination plots, and economic sanctions, the people of Venezuela have stood firm and continued to elect Chávez, and following his death in 2013, Nicolás Maduro. More recently, under the pretext of combatting drug smugglers, the US military has been murdering unarmed fishers (more than 80 to date) and amassing a naval force off the coast of Venezuela. An invasion could come at any moment.
International solidarity in opposition to America’s plans for Venezuela is building. In coordination with the Canada Wide Peace and Justice Network call to action for a week of emergency protests, Winnipeg peace activists held an information picket on November 23, 2025. The action was organized by Peace Alliance Winnipeg, The Manitoba Cuba Solidarity Network, United in Action, the Communist Party of Canada-Manitoba and Araucaria.
Africa’s New Revolutions
Posted: August 30, 2025 in In Solidarity, Nibbling on The EmpireTags: Alliance des États du Sahel, anticolonialism, Burkina Faso, Ibrahim Traoré, Mali, Niger
The Alliance of Sahel States (French: Alliance des États du Sahel), or AES is a confederation formed between Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso, located in the Sahel region of Africa. The AES has been actively breaking colonial ties and its anti-imperialist stance has placed it in conflict with many of its African neighbours (as well as France, the former colonial master). Peace Alliance Winnipeg held a public forum on August 19, 2025 to explore this topic.
The forum was moderated by Canadian Dimension magazine columnist Owen Schalk and featured Professor Amina Mire of Carlton University and Prudence Iticka, an organizer with Black People United Calgary.
Canada’s ongoing betrayal of Haiti
Posted: November 13, 2021 in In Solidarity, Nibbling on The EmpireTags: Canada, colonialism, Haiti, imperialism
In this webinar, viewers discuss the film Haiti Betrayed with director, Elaine Brière, and the current Haitian situation with activist Jennie-Laure Sully. The webinar was hosted by Peace Alliance Winnipeg on Nov. 13, 2021.
Background
In 2004, Canada collaborated with the U.S. and France to overthrow Haiti’s elected president, Jean Bertrand Aristide, who enjoyed widespread support among the poorest Haitians. Since then, with Canada’s support, a series of right-wing governments have overturned Aristide’s reforms and violently repressed his supporters.
Released in 2019, Elaine Brière’s documentary, Haiti Betrayed, exposes the role Canada played in the 2004 coup. You can watch it here, in English or French.
Biographies
Elaine Brière is a Canadian filmmaker and photojournalist. Her first documentary, Bitter Paradise: The Sell-out of East Timor, won Best Political Documentary at the l997 HOT DOCS! festival and Production Excellence award at Seattle Women in Film in l998. Bitter Paradise aired on TVO, CBC Radio-Canada, CFCF-12 Montreal, BC Knowledge Network, SCN, WTN, PBS and Swedish National Television.
The Story of Canadian Merchant Seamen, released in 2006, aired on SCN and Knowledge Network and toured extensively in New Zealand, the UK and Australia.
Elaine’s photographs have been collected by the visual arts section of the National Archives of Canada. Her work has appeared in The Globe & Mail, the New York Review, Canadian Geographic, Carte-Blanche, and the Family of Women. East Timor, Testimony, was published in 2004. She is the founder of the East Timor Alert Network and received the Order of Timor-Leste in 2016 for her contribution towards the liberation of East Timor from Indonesian occupation.
Her current feature documentary, Haiti Betrayed, on the role of Canada in the 2004 coup d’état in Haiti, was released in late 2019. It was translated into French in the summer of 2020 and aired on TV5 in Québec and France.
Jennie-Laure Sully is a researcher at the Socioeconomic Research Institute (IRIS) and a community organizer at CLES, a center for sexually exploited women.
She studied anthropology and public health and has a master’s degree in biomedical sciences from the University of Montreal. She has worked as a research coordinator in hospitals and as a psycho-social caseworker in rape crisis centers.
Jennie is very active in the women’s movement and in the movement for the human rights of migrants. She was born in Haiti and moved to Quèbec with her family when she was 2 years old. Among the many causes she cares about, the fight against imperialism and for the sovereignty of Haiti is among her top priorities.
Stop the Canada-US hybrid war against Venezuela!
Posted: September 12, 2021 in In Solidarity, Nibbling on The Empire, SocialismTags: Canada, imperialism, Venezuela
The lack of any discussion of Canadian foreign policy during this election is shocking and shameful — almost as shameful as Canada’s foreign policy itself. Take the case of Venezuela. For the past two decades the United States has been waging a war of sanctions and other dirty tricks to overthrow the democratically elected socialist governments of Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro. Ever Washington’s poodle, Ottawa has joined in with disgusting enthusiasm. Liberal governments or Conservative ones — it has made no difference.
To gain a deeper understanding of Canada’s foreign policy, Peace Alliance Winnipeg (of which I am a member) has organized a series of webinars that, so far, have looked at Canada’s international mining industry, Canada’s military deployments since 1867 and Canada’s policies with regard to Palestine.
Yesterday, Peace Alliance Winnipeg turned its attention to Venezuela by hosting a webinar with Venezuelan-born, Canadian scholar and activist María Páez Victor. Dr. Victor is a sociologist, educated in Caracas, New York, Mexico City, and Canada who taught the sociology of health and medicine as well as health and environmental policies at the University of Toronto for many years. Now retired from teaching, she writes and is a frequent commentator on Latin American history and politics. As well, she has her own weekly radio program about Venezuela in the Spanish language community radio of Toronto.
Here is video of the webinar.
UPDATE, Sept. 16, 2021: In an article published on Sept. 16, 2021 by Peace Alliance Winnipeg, María Páez Victor reports on positive developments in the peace negotiations being held in Mexico between the Venezuelan government and the major opposition parties. The opposition has agreed recognize the Venezuelan State, political institutions, and the legitimacy of President Nicolás Maduro and to work with the government to have the United States rescind the devastating economic sanctions that have caused such misery throughout the country.
The Nakba Continues – Palestine and Turtle Island
Posted: July 15, 2021 in Aboriginal Peoples, Human Rights, In SolidarityTags: Canada, Human Rights, indigenous rights, Palestine
There are many parallels between the struggles of Palestinians and the indigenous peoples of the Americas. Chandni Desai and Ali Abunimah reflect on some of these in this presentation.
Chandni Desai teaches at the University of Toronto. Her research and writing focus on Palestinian resistance culture and the politics of internationalism. A community organizer who works for justice in Palestine, she hosts the Liberation Pedagogy Podcast.
Ali Abunimah is director of The Electronic Intifada, an independent nonprofit publication focusing on Palestine. He is the author of “One Country, A Bold Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse” and “The Battle for Justice in Palestine.”
This presentation is part of a longer discussion in a webinar sponsored by the International Manifesto Group entitled “Palestine, Unifier of All Struggles” that was held July 11, 2021. Video of the entire webinar will be available at the YouTube channel of the Geopolitical Economy Research Group.
Pond Inlet Testimony
Posted: February 5, 2021 in Aboriginal Peoples, Environment, In SolidarityTags: Baffin Island, Environment, mining, Pond Inlet
“Personal message from Norman Cohn, president and co-founder with Zacharias Kunuk of Kunuk Cohn Productions, co-founder of Isuma Distribution International and IDI’s website IsumaTV.”
This Saturday, one day before 120 million viewers will watch the SuperBowl live from Tampa, another live television event will unfold in Pond Inlet in the Canadian arctic that maybe a few thousand people worldwide will be lucky enough to watch.
All day, from 9 in the morning until 9 at night, with short breaks for coffee, lunch and dinner, a continuous stream of Inuit men and women, elders and youth, unilingual and bilingual, will step up to a microphone to say what they think and feel about being bulldozed – by the gigantic multinational Baffinland Iron Mines Corporation, their own Canadian government, their own Nunavut government and their own Inuit Organizations – to surrender their land, wildlife, culture and human rights in order that those bulldozers make an uncountable profit at their personal expense.
I have seen something like this before and can tell you, without hyperbole, that you should not miss it. Unforgettable testimonies at similar hearings in 2012 are among the most astounding scenes in a film we made in 2014 called Ataatama Nunanga (My Father’s Land), another show only a few thousand people worldwide ever have seen. This film is on iTunes in thirty countries subtitled in six different languages if you want to preview Saturday’s show in a ‘historical context.’
But this Saturday’s show WILL BE LIVE, happening while and if you watch, from a hamlet in the arctic wilderness to wherever you are; and on Live Television as dramatic and compelling as the Senate Watergate Hearings were live in 1973, as other-worldly and surreal as the Moon Landing live in 1969 and as hypnotically horrifying as the Twin Towers hit, burning and finally collapsing Live on Television the morning of September 11, 2001.
Instead of being hyped like Sunday’s Super Bowl by weeks of advertising before being televised by networks around the globe, this Saturday’s Pond Inlet Testimony will appear on Uvagut TV, the world’s newest, smallest and most obscure TV network, launched just two weeks ago with no outside funding by a small Inuit non-profit, Nunavut Independent Television Network (NITV), and the Inuit media arts collective ISUMA, both operating out of Igloolik, Nunavut for the past thirty years. And no advertising. The only way people will know they can watch this is if we tell them. I’m telling you now so you can pass it on.
Uvagut TV is Live on Shaw Direct satellite channel 267 nationally; Co-op cable channel 240 in Nunavut and NWT; FCNQ cable channel 308 in Nunavut, northern Quebec; and online with English or Inuktitut audio feeds.
Links
www.uvagut.tv
www.isuma.tv
www.isuma.tv/nirb-audio-feed
http://www.isuma.tv/uvagut-tv-media-info
Paul S. Graham 