FROM PONTYPRIDD TO PAVLOGRAD

Unions at forefront of solidarity from Wales to Ukraine

By Mick Antoniw Welsh Labour Member of the Senedd for Pontypridd

Mick Antoniw, a founder of the Ukraine Solidarity Campaign has just returned from delivering direct aid to the miners union PRUP in the industrial city of Pavlograd.  This much needed aid had been provided directly to workers at the front in the Armed Forces of Ukraine. The solidarity of the Welsh activists is an example to the entire labour movement of what real solidarity looks like.    

I have just returned from my seventh trip driving across Europe  to Ukraine to deliver four by four pick up vehicles and supplies to the Ukrainian miners Union and to the battalions they are supporting and where many of their members are fighting the Russian occupiers.

Military kit, medical kit, drones, power packs, ration packs and many of the items they desperately need on a daily basis, all donated by funding from Welsh political parties, businesses , trade unions and individuals .

The deliveries are made on behalf of “Senedd Cymru” , “the Welsh Parliament” where there is complete cross party solidarity in support of Ukraine, from the Liberal Democrats and Welsh Nationalists, to the Welsh Conservatives and the governing party Welsh Labour.

Mirroring the work of Ukraine Solidarity who have been delivering similar items to the KVPU in Lviv and Kyiv , trade unions have also been at the forefront of this support. In particular the National Union of Mineworkers ,who  at a UK  and a Welsh level have continued their historic political and social links with the Ukrainian Miners Union PRUP and their leaders in the mining town of Pavlograd in Western Donbas.

This time the delivery was a 2,200 miles drive direct to Pavlograd , a delegation of myself, Alun Davies MS for Blaenau Gwent, the Area Secretary of the South Wales NUM Wayne Thomas and ex miner and now Bectu official Carwyn Donovan.

Solidarity means showing your face , meeting face to face and showing Ukrainian miners and trade unionists that they are not alone in fighting Russian Fascism. Only last month Pavlograd was hit and severely damaged by a Russian missile attack . Yet only a few weeks later a strange normality had returned to this predominantly Russian speaking town. Eight coal mines are still working with the support of 15,000 miners. It was closer to 20,000 before the Russian invasion but 5,000 miners are now fighting on the front line. They have lost 260  but are adamant they will win . We handed over the Isuzu four by four to a deputy battalion commander who came straight from the Bakhmut front where Ukrainian forces are slowly and painfully advancing, to take the vehicle straight to the front line where it will be used to deliver supplies and provide support to the wounded. He too, ( I won’t mention his name) is a coal miner from Bakhmut as are most of his comrades.

Support for this solidarity has been growing amongst trade unionists despite the attempts to undermine support from the old Stalinist left and other purportedly leftist groups. But they are in an increasingly isolated and minority position.  The socialist organisation “Ukraine solidarity” has been instrumental in working with trade unions in the UK to develop closer links and to provide direct support to their brothers and sisters in Ukrainian trade unions. This support has been growing as trade unions increasingly recognise the anti-labour and fascistic nature of Putin’s regime.

The National Union of Mineworkers stepped in right at the beginning of the invasion with financial support for vehicles and technical equipment, GMB have not only vocally supported Ukrainian trade unions, but the Union and its branches have donated financial support, Civil Service Union PCS  are planning a delegation, Aslef- the train drivers union whose General Secretary Mick Whelan was in Kyiv meeting unions and human rights groups in Kyiv up to 48 hours before the invasion, now the lecturers Union UCU, the CWU communication workers and various branches across public sector union Unison and Unite the Union.

The Trades Union Congress has been disappointingly slow and  has failed up till now to co-ordinate effective solidarity across the UK and to organise solidarity delegations to Ukraine. This has perhaps reflected its own internal divisions and the influence of Putin apologists who have promoted the Putin narrative that this is somehow either the fault of Nato, or an intern,al civil war between Ukrainian and Russian speakers . Both these narratives  even amongst some of their propagators are increasingly  recognised to be little more than farcical propaganda.

It is Ukrainian workers and trade unions alongside the armed forces that will enable Ukraine to win, and they are convinced they will. It is the railway, hospital, communication, public sector workers who enable the country to continue running  and survive. It is the electricians and energy workers who kept the trains running and the power stations working and the miners who keep the power stations supplied with coal. In Zaporizhia it is the nuclear energy workers who are doing all they can to keep Europe’s largest power station safe despite Russian occupation and maltreatment.

Now is the time for UK trade unions to go to Ukraine, meet their brothers and sisters face to face, to provide direct support and international solidarity.

Mick Antoniw

Labour Senedd Member for Pontypridd

(Mick is writing in a personal capacity but is also a member of the Welsh Government, Counsel General for Wales and Minister for the Constitution.)

This article is republished from Open Democracy